Seahawks Make Threat to Jamal Adams Amid Contract Standoff


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The Seahawks are in a standoff with Jamal Adams.

The Seattle Seahawks are prepared to use the franchise tag on Jamal Adams if the two sides are unable to reach a new deal, per Pro Football Talk’s Mike Florio. Adams has one more year on his current contract, and the Seahawks have the power to use the franchise tag on the safety for both the 2022 and 2023 seasons.

According to Pro Football Talk, the franchise tag for a safety in 2022 projects to be $13.5 million, well below what the Seahawks’ current offer is believed to average annually. Florio reported the Seahawks are “at the end of the rope” with Adams and made their final offer to the star safety.

“The Seahawks are at the end of their rope in the Jamal Adams negotiations,” Florio detailed. “More than a week after making reportedly a final offer to the fifth-year safety and with no plans to budge, a league source tells PFT that the team is truly done negotiating with Adams. They believe they’ve made a fair and appropriate offer, and that if he doesn’t want to accept it, he can play out his option year and get franchise-tagged twice, for 2022 and 2023. The Seahawks also are learning that which the Jets concluded before trading him last year — he’s not easily manageable. Or, as the case may be, not manageable at all.”


The Seahawks Are Prepared to Let Adams’ Contract Play Out One Season at a Time

The Seahawks gave up two first-round picks in the trade with the Jets for Adams but appear poised to let the safety’s contract play out on a year-by-year basis. It will be interesting to see if this is part of a negotiation tactic by the Seahawks.

“Seattle believes it treats players properly, that it pays them the appropriate amounts,” Florio added. “They’ve reached the point where they’ve decided to let it play out one year at a time with Adams, more than confident that when push comes to shove he will show up and play.”

The Seahawks have been described as having little leverage in the negotiations with the safety, but the franchise tag gives the Seahawks control over Adams’ future for a total of the next three seasons. The Seahawks have rarely used the franchise tag, but The News Tribune’s Gregg Bell described it as a “fallback option” for Seattle.

“This has always been Seahawks’ fallback option in the negotiations with Jamal Adams,” Bell noted on Twitter. “It’s why they ultimately hold the leverage here. The franchise tag for safeties is expected to be abt $13.5M in 2022 & $16.3M in 2023. That would give SEA 3 more yrs of Adams, at fixed cost.”


The Seahawks’ Offer Would Pay Adams $17.5 Million Annually: Report

All indications are the Seahawks have a strong offer on the table for Adams that would make him the highest-paid safety by a significant margin. The Seattle Times’ Adam June and Bob Condotta reported the Seahawks are offering Adams a four-year deal averaging $17.5 million annually. The Seahawks’ preference is to keep Bobby Wagner as the team’s highest-paid defender.

“When training camp began two weeks ago, the two sides were roughly $4 million apart in annual compensation for Adams, sources told The Seattle Times,” June and Condotta detailed. “After back-and forth negotiations over the next week, they were close to a meet-in-the-middle agreement. On Friday, the Seahawks made what they labeled their final offer: $17.5 million in total annual compensation on a four-year contract, with roughly $38 million guaranteed, a deal that would make Adams the highest-paid safety in the NFL.”


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