NFL Free Agency 2016: Seahawks tender Patrick Lewis, six exclusive rights free agents

The Seahawks have started the process of tendering their restricted and exclusive rights free agents. Per Tom Pelissero:

#Seahawks gave RFA C Patrick Lewis the low tender ($1.671M). Six XFAs tendered, too, including DeShawn Shead ($760K), Cooper Helfet ($600K).

— Tom Pelissero (@TomPelissero) March 5, 2016

When Pelissero says "the low tender" he means, in this case, an original round tender (Patrick Lewis was undrafted), which means that if another team signs Lewis to an offer sheet higher than $1.67M and he went to another club, Seattle would not get any compensation. It seems a little unlikely that will happen -- but Seattle could match if if that were the case. If he gets no offer sheets, Seattle may also try to renegotiate another lower-level deal with Lewis or add a year or two to it. RFA tenders are not guaranteed.

Here are the tender amounts for this year:

2016 restricted free agent tender values:
1st round: $3.635M
2nd round: $2.553M
Original round: $1.671M

— Field Yates (@FieldYates) March 3, 2016

Seattle also did some work on their exclusive rights free agents. By tendering these ERFAs, the Seahawks are essentially just saying, "yes, we'd like to have you on our team."

The six ERFAs to receive tenders thus far per Pelissaro are DT A.J. Francis, TE Cooper Helfet, LB Eric Pinkins, CB Mohammed Seisay, CB DeShawn Shead, and S Steven Terrell. So far, DT Jesse Williams and CB Marcus Burley have not been tendered. Not sure why, at this point, that Burley has yet to receive one, but he still may. Williams had been battling cancer so his comeback to the NFL has been very difficult.

Seattle is likely to tender a few more of their RFAs before it's all said and done. Here's a list of all their RFAs and ERFAs:

And, just to refresh your memory, here's the difference between the two types of restricted free agents.

RESTRICTED FREE AGENT (RFA): A player whose contract has expired and has fewer than four tenured years in the league. He may sign an "Offer Sheet" with any other team, but his original team has seven days to match any offer he receives. If the original team does not match the offer, compensation will be awarded in the form of draft picks from the signing team. The round and quantity of picks are determined by the "Qualifying Offer" made by the player's original team. If a RFA is tendered a minimum qualifying offer the compensation is the equivalent of the round in which that player was originally selected. If that player was originally a rookie free agent, no compensation is awarded.

EXCLUSIVE RIGHTS FREE AGENT (ERFA): A player whose contract has expired and has three or fewer tenured years in the league. His original team must make a contract offer by the league imposed deadline or the player becomes an unrestricted free agent. No compensation is awarded for losing EFAs.