Seahawks make Paul Richardson return official, contract details leak

Several days ago reports emerged that the Seattle Seahawks had hosted both of their 2014 second round picks, Paul Richardson and Justin Britt, on free agent visits. With the team reportedly unhappy with the play of free agent addition B.J. Finney at center and injuries limiting the wide receiver group so much so that defensive back Jayson Stanley had started taking reps with the offense, the visits made sense.

Saturday Mike Garafolo of the NFL Network reported that the Seahawks had agreed to terms to bring back Richardson, and on Sunday the team made the move official.

In addition, it also did not take long for the terms of Richarson’s deal with Seattle to leak with NFL Insider Adam Caplan reporting the details.

Richardson has five credited seasons, which means that his base salary for the year would be $910,000. In addition, the $62,500 signing bonus will be paid regardless, while the roster bonus for Week 1 also appears to be $62,500 per Caplan.

For those who would like to know what this means in terms of the cap, the “MSB” in Caplan’s tweet, and the terms of the contract, indicate that it is a contract which qualifies for the veteran minimum salary benefit. The veteran minimum salary benefit is for veterans with four or more accrued seasons who sign a one-year contract for league minimum salary, with bonuses of no more than $137,500, and it means the player carries a cap hit equal to that of a player with two credited seasons plus applicable bonuses. Thus, for Richardson, his cap hit would be $875,000, assuming the Week 1 roster bonus is indeed $62,500.

With the maximum allowable bonus amount under the minimum salary benefit rule being $137,500, in addition to the $62,500 signing bonus there would be room for the roster bonus to be up to $75,000, and the Seahawks have traditionally maxed out the usage of the bonus amount on past contracts which qualified for the veteran minimum benefit. Whether the Week 1 bonus is $75,000 or $62,500 is something I’ll continue to work to clarify in the coming days, however, in any case $12,500 is not an amount that is going to make or break the 2020 season for the team.