NFL offseason power rankings: No. 2 Seattle Seahawks weren't just a Super Bowl champion, they were a dominant one

Not all Super Bowl champions are the same.

>There's a difference in a team like the 1989 49ers and the 2011 Giants or 1980 Raiders. The banners fly for all of them and lesser champions aren't ordered to get smaller rings, but Super Bowl champs aren't all on the same tier.

>Analytically, last season's Seattle Seahawks rank closer to great teams like the 1989 49ers, 1985 Bears or 1991 Washington than one of the more forgettable champs. They profiled, statistically, as an all-time great champ. When Aaron Schatz, who invented DVOA, ranked the 60 Super Bowl champions he placed the Seahawks third all-time. That's even better than the Seahawks' other champion, the Legion of Boom juggernaut. It was a dominant team all season and it steamrolled the Patriots in Super Bowl LX.

>Yet, it was a bit of an unusual champion. A lot of great champions are associated with a legendary quarterback. Sam Darnold got the job done and shed the NFL Draft bust label, but he isn't exactly Joe Montana. Some defensive-led champs, like the 1985 Bears, 2000 Ravens or 2002 Buccaneers are remembered well, but they had big stars on defense with outsized personalities. The Seahawks have some really good players on defense but their star is clearly coach Mike Macdonald and his scheme. Cornerback Devon Witherspoon, safety Nick Emmanwori, defensive linemen Leonard Williams and DeMarcus Lawrence and linebacker Ernest Jones IV are fantastic players but most casual fans couldn't identify them.

Charles Cross of the Seattle Seahawks lifts the Vince Lombardi Trophy after Seattle won Super Bowl LX. (Photo by Chris Graythen/Getty Images)Chris Graythen via Getty ImagesThe lack of recognizable superstars is part of what made the 2025 Seahawks unique, and part of what makes the 2026 Seahawks contenders again. Jaxon Smith-Njigba emerged as a star and the NFL's Offensive Player of the Year, but it's a team that was great due to the sum of its parts.

>No matter how last season's Seahawks end up being remembered, they were a testament to team football. Smith-Njigba and Jones were the only Seahawks to get more than four of the 50 first-place votes for first-team All-Pro. It's not a team with an obvious Hall of Famer, though Smith-Njigba is on a very early path. And the Seahawks were as good as almost any team in the history of the NFL, analytically speaking.

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>It's hard to repeat as Super Bowl champions, no matter how good a team was the season before. The Seahawks also get the unusual challenge of having a division rival as this season's Super Bowl favorite. Yet, a Seattle team that was elite on defense and special teams and good enough on offense is going to be in the Super Bowl mix this season and probably for a few seasons after as well. That's because the organization, led by Macdonald and general manager John Schneider, is one of the NFL's best.

>There are questions, as there are for most Super Bowl champions. A team that prefers running the ball lost Kenneth Walker III, the Super Bowl MVP, in free agency and Zach Charbonnet might not be ready for the start of the season after he tore his left ACL in the playoffs. Walker was one of four free agents who got $12 million per season to leave Seattle. They're hoping first-round rookie Jadarian Price helps replace Walker. The Seahawks' offense stabilized last season with Klint Kubiak coming aboard as its coordinator, and Kubiak did such a good job the Las Vegas Raiders hired him to be their head coach. When you become the best team in football, other teams want pieces of your roster and coaching staff.

>The Seahawks showed that they are built on organizational stability, not necessarily individuals. The Rams might have stolen some of the attention from the Seahawks over the offseason with some flashy moves. But a rock-solid Seattle team isn't going to back down after the historic season it just had.

Offseason gradeThe Seahawks had what's a pretty normal offseason for a Super Bowl champ, which means they lost a lot. The four players who got $12 million per season to leave were defensive end Boye Mafe, running back Kenneth Walker III, safety Coby Bryant and cornerback Riq Woolen. Woolen had worn out his welcome but he is a talented player, as are the other three who left.

>The big moves were re-signing receiver Rashid Shaheed, a midseason trade acquisition who made a big impact on special teams and should do more in the offense in his second Seahawks season, and cornerback Josh Jobe. The only outside free agent who got more than $2 million per season to join Seattle was edge rusher Dante Fowler Jr., who signed a one-year, $2.5 million deal.

>The draft class was led by running back Jadarian Price, the last pick of the first round. The Seahawks are a good organization, but Price was pretty clearly a reach pick due to need. That said, Price did flash plenty of ability as Jeremiyah Love's backup at Notre Dame. Price can make the grade better if he's an impact starter right away, but Seattle took some hits this offseason.

>Grade: D

Quarterback reportSeattle's quarterback isn't "NFL Draft bust Sam Darnold" anymore. He's "Super Bowl champion Sam Darnold." His legacy changed in one postseason.

>Darnold's teams are 28-6 the past two regular seasons, and while that is an indicator that quarterback wins is a flawed stat, Darnold has played well. One thing that's still a problem is turnovers. He had 14 interceptions and a league high 11 fumbles, losing six. He led the NFL in turnovers, though he didn't have one in the postseason.

>Darnold has become a good, reliable quarterback and is clearly capable of playing well enough to support a team on its way to a championship. But if there's something the 29-year-old can clean up, it's protecting the ball.

Odds breakdownFrom Yahoo's Ben Fawkes: "The Super Bowl champions will look remarkably similar this season, led by QB Sam Darnold and the league's best defense by most metrics. They were terrific to bettors last year, going 12-5 ATS in the regular season and covering all three playoff games as well.

>"Losing Kenneth Walker III in free agency could hurt, but Seattle hopes that first-round draft pick Jadarian Price can help shoulder some of the load. The Seahawks are favored in 14 games and have a win total of 10.5, both of which would be higher if not for a certain team south of them in the same division."

Yahoo's fantasy takeFrom Yahoo's Scott Pianowski: "Most of the Seattle pass-catchers get ignored after Jaxon Smith-Njigba, and that might be a mistake. Rashid Shaheed should be vastly improved in his first full Seattle season, and tight end AJ Barner also offers sleeper value.

>"Barner scored six times on a modest 68 targets last year, and he also picked up nine first downs (and one touchdown) on a surprising 10 rushing attempts. Perhaps Barner is still a wait-and-see option in standard leagues, but I've been targeting him in deeper formats and in leagues where scoring is slanted to tight ends. You can land him around Pick 130 in Yahoo."

Stat to rememberThe Seahawks didn't blitz much last season and still got after the quarterback at a top 10 rate. That's not easy to pull off, but teams that can do it are usually going to be very good on defense. The Seahawks blitzed just 24.7% of the time, the seventh-lowest mark in the NFL, according to FTN Fantasy, but still tied for seventh in the NFL with 47 sacks. The Seahawks didn't plan on that being the signature of the defense, but Macdonald adjusted to his personnel.

"Frankly, we've detoured pretty significantly from where we thought we were going to be at the beginning of the season, and that's not really personnel driven," Macdonald said in late October, according to the team's site. "I think it's really what we're doing well and what our guys have shown that they're good at."

The result was a defense that led the NFL in points allowed, was second in net yards per pass attempt allowed and first in rushing yards per attempt allowed. The Seahawks were also No. 1 in defensive DVOA by a healthy margin over Houston. Don't expect much change to the scheme this season, though Macdonald will be ready to adjust if needed.

Burning question: Can the Seahawks offense still thrive without Klint Kubiak? After Mike Macdonald's first season as head coach he made a decisive move, firing offensive coordinator Ryan Grubb and moving onto Kubiak. There were some key hires across the NFL last offseason but the Kubiak move arguably had the most impact, considering the Seahawks won it all.

>Kubiak is off to the be the head coach of the Raiders, and often it's hard for teams to replace good coordinators who move on to head coaching gigs. Kubiak is replaced by Brian Fleury, who was the run game coordinator and tight ends coach of the 49ers. That means he'll be running his version of the Mike/Kyle Shanahan scheme, as Kubiak did.

>The worry is Fleury has never been an offensive coordinator before and has big shoes to fill. Seattle's offense was 10th in DVOA and eighth in success rate, which was more than good enough to support an elite defense. The starting personnel is the same on offense other than Kenneth Walker III, which helps.

"I do think one of the advantages of taking this job is there is going to be a lot of continuity," Fleury said, via the team's site. "I've already started to dive into everything Klint was doing last year, and the goal would be to maintain as much of that as possible."

Fleury is still a big question until he gets a chance to show he can be a capable replacement for Kubiak. It's an issue that has derailed other reigning champs.

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Best-case scenarioThe Rams are going to be the trendy Super Bowl pick, and it's justified. That should be just fine with the Seahawks, who are in the rare spot of not having the typical pressure of repeating as Super Bowl champions. That pressure has shifted to Los Angeles. However, there's no good reason the Seahawks can't again be the best team in football.

>Sam Darnold continues to evolve, and maybe this is the season he starts to limit turnovers. Jadarian Price could be a fine replacement for Kenneth Walker III. Jaxon Smith-Njigba is dominant and Rashid Shaheed should be better in his first full Seahawks season.

>Seattle's defense is going to be really good, as will the special teams (which was a huge edge over the Rams last season, and played a key role in both of Seattle's wins over Los Angeles). There's no real weakness to this Seattle team. They beat the Rams when it mattered last season and can do it again on their way to a second straight Super Bowl title. Nobody should be surprised if that's the outcome.

Nightmare scenarioIt's rare for the two best teams in the NFL to reside in the same division. The last time that happened might have been when Seattle had its first championship run and San Francisco was fantastic at the same time. Last season, the Rams were the second-best team in the NFL but second in their own division. That could be Seattle's situation this season.

>It was pretty easy to rank Seattle second this season, because only the Rams come close to the Seahawks' level … but Seattle also doesn't profile better than the Rams after the offseasons the two teams had. Nothing that happens this season should be all that bad for the Seahawks. They won a Super Bowl practically out of nowhere last season, and that should and will be celebrated for a while.

>But it would still be disappointing to not follow that up with at least a division title, perhaps due to Sam Darnold's turnovers becoming costly and the running game not being as potent.

The crystal ball saysThe Rams and Seahawks played three competitive games last season. We can pinpoint one key play in each game that if it went the other way, the result would have changed. Seattle has bragging rights from last season, but the two teams were evenly matched.

>And now Seattle has to deal with a Rams team that just added the best defensive player in football, Myles Garrett, and an elite cornerback in Trent McDuffie. Seattle will be very good. It was a remarkable team last season, and I don't want to dismiss that. But it's a different season. Seattle will be the second-best team in football. Unfortunately, the best team also plays in the NFC West.