Assessing Need: Safety

by John Morgan on Apr 9, 2010 12:43 PM PDT

Safety

Starter:

Potential Starter: Jordan Babineaux

Age: Turns 28 August 31.

Health: Excellent.

Contract: Three years remaining.

Performance: Some good; a lot of bad.

Depth: Jamar Adams

Age: Turns 25 November 29.

Etc.

Position need: I hope it's obvious to everyone else that Adams will stick at strong safety and the Adams-Babineaux duo will be spoken of like the hypothetical pairing of Lott-Easley. I hope. If you're with it. Like me.

Seattle needs two starters, has one potential starter it could upgrade on and one player that may be euphemistically described as seasoned depth. Why is Babineaux a potential starter after starting last season? Well, it's not entirely that he was bad, though he was bad at times. It's more that Babineaux was the default safety after Seattle dropped Brian Russell in the eleventh hour. Everyone in Seattle town wanted an improvement over Russell, and Babineaux was an improvement, but he was a Babineaux sized improvement. Seattle shed one problem and took on another.

Seattle needs a starter and another talent to compete. It also needs depth. It needs safeties.

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Comments

That caption got a pretty good guffaw outta me, well done.

Now bring on late round pick Robert Johnson.

by DJ C-Raig on Apr 9, 2010 12:46 PM PDT reply actions

Except Russell would just bounce right off of them

Stephen Jackson would blow through them like he was his 18 year old pregnant lover…ZING!!!

At least we aren't the Raiders?

by Generzal Zod on Apr 9, 2010 1:10 PM PDT up reply actions

Robert Johnson to visit Seattle.

Per (ug) NFP. I’m stoked.

by DJ C-Raig on Apr 9, 2010 3:05 PM PDT up reply actions

He looks like an interesting prospect.

by Hawksince77 on Apr 9, 2010 4:25 PM PDT up reply actions

At this point I'd be pretty shocked if one of our first round picks isn't a safety.

Waiting around until pick #60 seems like a huge gamble — maybe they have a late second round guy in mind who could plausibly start, but there’s no guarantees he’s still around at that point.

We have no third round pick, and there’s no way you’re going to find a starter-ready safety in the 4th round. Even if picks were packaged to trade back into the 3rd and snag a safety, how comfortable are you starting a 3rd round safety? I’m sure not.

This is what baffles me about Grant’s release — they took a position of average starting quality and poor depth and made it such an enormous vacuum of suck that they absolutely must address it with an early pick or else enter the season without a credible starter.

by sev79 on Apr 9, 2010 12:53 PM PDT reply actions

I gotta say, it must be a bit of a trick.

They know there’s a bunch of safeties in the early-to-mid first round, so by releasing Grant now they’re FAKING the idea of taking a safety early.

Just guessing.

by djafrot on Apr 9, 2010 1:07 PM PDT up reply actions

That bothered me more than Tapp, Wallace, or Sims

Not to be a dead horse but agree or not if they don’t have a use for them then get something but we did have a use for Grant (even though his contract was huge) because we didn’t have anyone else on the roster.

At least we aren't the Raiders?

by Generzal Zod on Apr 9, 2010 1:12 PM PDT up reply actions

Well if it's a trick, better hope there's a safety available at #60 who can start right away.

Unless they can still pull off a trade. The FA safety market is pretty thin.

by sev79 on Apr 9, 2010 1:28 PM PDT up reply actions

Chad Jones, Reshad Jones, Morgan Burnett, Nate Allen...

Safety is deep this year. There is certain to be a capable player at 60, but I’d be skeptical about waiting until the 4th. Maybe we get our dream Safety in Berry or Earl Thomas in the first.

Early prospect watch: RB C.J. Spiller, QB Sam Bradford, OT Ciron Black*, DT Gerald McCoy, S Eric Berry, DT Ndamukong Suh, CB Ras-I Dowling**, RB Jonathan Dwyer

by Misfit74 on Apr 9, 2010 8:07 PM PDT up reply actions