An early peek at 2006

I know, I know -- its not even the 2005 season yet. But I thought it might be interesting to roll out and take a look at 2006 as far as our free agents go.

Here is a listing of players on the current roster who will be free agents (mostly UFA's, but some RFA's as well) after the 2005 season. Projected starters are in red text:

Shaun Alexander, Steve Hutchinson, Koren Robinson, Mack Strong, Maurice Morris, Joe Jurevicius, Jerry Wunsch, Ryan Hannam, Kris Richard, Terreal Bierria, Marquand Manuel, Kevin Bentley, Wayne Hunter, Seneca Wallace, Joe Tafoya, Salomon Bates, Omare Lowe, Otis Leverette, Leo Araguz, Rashad Moore, Josh Brown, Taco Wallace, Tracy White, Kerry Carter, Kevin House, Jerheme Urban, Jason Willis, Jordan Babineaux, Terrence Robinson, Christian Mohr, Ryan Dutton, Marque Davis, Kevin Miller, Michael Harden.

There are several intriguing discussion points from that list.

1. Will Alexander be on the roster by the start of the 2005 season?
2. Will Robinson be released/traded after June 1st?
3. Will Mack Strong retire after the 2005 campaign?

It's clear that Hutch will get a mega deal, and it's safe to say Josh Brown will be due for a nice raise as well.

I'll put my amateur capologist hat on for a minute and address the salary cap for next season. The Seahawks are sitting pretty as of current, with no dead cap on the books into 2006 (all of the releases to date have obviously been prior to June 1st so all the dead money gets applied to the 2005 cap). I expect that will change with the release of Bobby Taylor after June 1st (which frees up $2 million and is almost a foregone conclusion because we need the cap space to sign the rookie class).

If we guesstimate the NFL cap for 2006 will be around $90 million, the Seahawks will have somewhere (very fringe guess right now because it's so far in advance) around $20-22 million under the cap.

One big detriment is that under the CBA extension of 2001, signing bonus proration is limited each year we march towards the final uncapped year. For contracts signed in 2005 (like Hass and Jones, for example), the limit is 5 years and that will be reduced to 4 next year. That was one reason why it was so critical to get Hass and Jones locked up NOW, as the cap hit for large deals swells considerably when you can only spread the bonus so far.

Long story short, there will be far fewer players to address next off season -- and I think it's safe to say we'll never face another situation like this year's 16 UFA's!

We should be in great position to sign Hutch long term (hopefully way before the next free agent window), keep the core guys from the above list, and sign several impact free agents frm other teams.

Greg