Does Macdonald keep Geno?

[oldhawkfan]

I hope not. I'm so ready to move on. Almost any qb can replace Geno's level of play, and hopefully we will draft one that will far exceed it.

 

[SoulfishHawk]

Look, I'm not a huge Geno fan. But.........almost any QB can replace Geno? Come on man

 

[Sgt. Largent]

Hard question to answer with knowing who the O-coordinator is.

Does MacDonald and his coordinators want to style his offense in the same vein as Baltimore's, a more athletic running style QB? Or is he OK with more of a traditional pocket passing offense with Geno?

Obviously there's only one Jackson, so he may have to go with Geno for a year for stability until they find their QB of the future, either through the draft or trade.

 

[CouchLogic]

Geno isn't the guy. You can talk o-line, defense, etc. But I'm looking at GENO and he's a good story, but that story doesn't end with a parade.

Can't be beat for the price though, so there's that...

I say draft someone and see what happens.

 

[warden]

It really comes down to be John Schneider choice. He has final say

 

[GemCity]

We’ll know on midnight, Feb 17th.

 

[Rat]

Talking about potential Geno replacements... I'm extremely hesitant to bring this one up because I know a lot of people on here would be very much against it, but there is a starting quarterback in Denver, a former mid-round draft pick of an NFL coaching legend, who is likely to be looking for a new job this upcoming season. You all know who I'm talking about... Yep, Jarrett Stidham has a considerable roster bonus due in March, and it's not a guarantee that it gets picked up. He has shown some real ability at times and his experience would be a plus.

 

[Parallax]

Lock is not under contract after March. Geno is.

Geno can be released with very little damage or traded if anyone wants him. Lock could be signed for less. Geno fell well short of his incentives and I don't see him offering great value. He did last year and in 2022 but not now. Baker Mayfield was a bargain last year but he will require a lot to sign going forward. I think it makes sense to go with Lock and a rookie.

 

[Parallax]

I've said pretty much the same over at Rob's Draft Blog and given the OL/DL talent is pretty deep this year it would be the smart thing to do. I'm happy we have a coach that comes from an organization that believes the trenches are a priority not safeties and linebackers like most every other NFL team.

You and I are very much on the same page. Maybe in part because we both hang out with Rob, though he's way more of a Geno fan than me (or you). Sees him as significantly better than Lock, whereas I do not. Where we all agree is that one can't afford to overpay for a mediocre QB. A guy like Mahomes may be worth $50M or even $60M a year (if signed now), but that doesn't make a guy half as good worth $30M. That, unless you've got someone special, better to go with a guy on a rookie contract or an NFL journeyman.

 

[Parallax]

You weren't asking me, but I'll give my reply since @BirdsCommaAngry hasn't replied yet.

In the bad stretches over the last two seasons, Smith was a middle-of-the-pack NFL QB with a below-average-for-a-QB cap hit. In the good stretches, Smith was a top-ten QB with a below-average-for-a-QB cap hit. That contract is an immensely valuable property for teams anywhere in the success cycle, whether it's to keep the team competitive through a rebuild, to help the team through the final steps to the Promised Land of grasping the Lombardi Trophy, or anything in between.

I know the talking-head mediots (and their many parrots) constantly screech that you just can't win a title without a top-top-tier QB, but history doesn't support that. It seems pretty clear to me that a team with a good-but-not-great QB with a cap hit 40% (or more) lower than the top-top-tier guys has an opportunity to build a stronger team overall and win titles.

Geno Smith's age makes it clear he's not the "quarterback of the future" for the Seahawks, but with the 16th pick and no second-round pick in the 2024 draft, the Seahawks are extremely unlikely to be able to get a quarterback of the future who might end up becoming a top-top-tier guy. If I were in charge, I'd be looking for a younger guy with a chance of being "the next Geno Smith": a QB who can end up ranked, say, between the lower half of the top ten and the upper half of the next ten (sixth to 15th or so) in productivity, but without the giant cap hits a big-name QB brings. That could be a not-regarded-as-top-tier rookie who might be available to the Seahawks (tho' I hope they go DT in the first round), or it could be another guy like Smith who was once a starter, has had his stock fall, and is now kicking around the league as a backup, but that the Seahawks' talent-evaluation personnel believe can play at an above-league-average level as a starter in the NFL. It'll be interesting to see if Schneider and his staff genuinely believe Lock is that kind of guy. I haven't seen enough from him to want to replace Smith with him now, but Seahawks management knows a lot more about both of those guys than I do.

Despite their 4-13 record, the Cardinals showed a surprising amount of promise under their new head coach in 2023, but I'm not in the least bit worried about the Cardinals as division rivals in the near future because this next season is the one when Kyler Murray's contract extension kicks in. Murray's cap number for 2024 is over $51M, good for over 20% of the Cardinals' cap. The Cardinals are very unlikely to be able to construct a solid roster around Murray for 2024, so the chance of him living up to that gigantic portion of the cap in 2024 is very, very low. It's more likely that early next offseason, people will be talking about whether the Cardinals should take the mere $13M in dead 2025 cap by designating Murray as a post-June-1 (2025) cut (with another $20.2 in dead 2026 cap) to get the $32.6M in 2025 cap savings and start again.

If there were no salary cap, I'd be right there with the talking-head mediots and their many parrots, agreeing that a team should do whatever is necessary to get a top-tier QB. But because there is a salary cap and the QB market has gotten to the point where top QB contracts are taking up a fifth or more of their respective teams' cap space, I believe there are other routes to success, and potentially to more-sustainable success.

I appreciate your analysis. That's the problem with Murray. He's better than Geno but not worth what a team could reasonably pay a guy like Mahomes, Burrow, Allen, Jackson. In my view, if you take a swing in the draft at QB and have a near miss like Murray, the best thing to do is trade him for whatever you can get rather than re-sign the guy.

In my view, Geno is not worth the cap hit he'll require if not cut, even though it's significantly less than Murray's. He's just not significantly better than guys who can be found for far less.

 

[NoGain]

It's no secret that JS is not a big Geno fan. It was PC's call all the way with Geno. Just listen to JS's ringing endorsement of Geno when he last spoke of him.

But I'm sure JS will defer to MacDonald if he wants to keep him around for awhile. If I had to bet, however, I say they go with Locke and release or trade Geno, and draft a potential QBOTF in the draft next spring.

 

[therealjohncarlson]

I hope not. I really hope Mike starts rinsing the team of our mediocre players, starting with the most important position. And in today's NFL Geno is about the definition of mediocre.

 

[ccla]

The problem with Geno is he is at a level that is not easily replicable. He's ranges from bottom of the top 10 to top 15ish, I'd probably place him at around 12ish. Well over half the NFL teams are fielding QB's worse than Geno.

The reason why this is an issue is if you're trying to rebuild, this is the type of QB that'll keep you at the .500 level or slightly above. It also puts you in an awkward position where you can't justify replacing him, but you also have a QB that isn't going to be leading you to the promised land unless you have a psycho mode defense.

Kinda like our last coach, fancy that!!!

 

[Jac]

It really comes down to be John Schneider choice. He has final say

It's this because it totally depends on Schneider's plan with Macdonald. If they really lean into the rebuild this year, they can save money at QB and draft one. If they try to do a rebuild-in-flight (hopefully more strategic/artful than the desperate Band-Aid approach from the past few years), then Geno is decent value at the price point. Without knowing Schneider's rebuild roadmap/timeframe, it's just hypothetical. Either way though, I'd have to think (or hope) that we're going to start drafting QB's again.

 

[Titus Pullo]

Post June 1st cut saves more cap money for some reason.

Geno Smith Contract Details, Salary Cap Charges, Bonus Money, and Contract History | Over The Cap

Geno Smith contract and salary cap details, including signing bonus, guaranteed salary, dead money, roster bonuses, and contract history

overthecap.com

 

[hieroglyphics]

Why not sign Jake Browning? Won’t be too expensive. Has the UW homecoming thing (which hasn’t been a storyline here forever).

He went 4-5 but had a 70% completion rating, so kind of exactly what we were paying Geno to do, but at 1/3 the price

 

[Parallax]

Post June 1st cut saves more cap money for some reason.

Geno Smith Contract Details, Salary Cap Charges, Bonus Money, and Contract History | Over The Cap

Geno Smith contract and salary cap details, including signing bonus, guaranteed salary, dead money, roster bonuses, and contract history

overthecap.com

View attachment 64261

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It allows you to break up the cap hit between two years but it doesn't save money and in this case it makes things worse because Geno's 2024 salary becomes guaranteed if he's still on the roster five days after the Superbowl. So if he's getting cut, it's happening soon. If kept on beyond that, he could be traded. Schneider may be confident he has real trade value. I'm not but he knows way more than me.

 

[Parallax]

Why not sign Jake Browning? Won’t be too expensive. Has the UW homecoming thing (which hasn’t been a storyline here forever).

He went 4-5 but had a 70% completion rating, so kind of exactly what we were paying Geno to do, but at 1/3 the price

If we could get him cheap, I'd be on board. He played well enough last season that it might require a similar contract to Geno's.

 

[WarHawks]

Look, I'm not a huge Geno fan. But.........almost any QB can replace Geno? Come on man

How many qb's wouldn't be able to put up 1 td and a couple hundred yards per game? Is that really such a high bar? Come on man.

 

[Jegpeg]

Please no. I am not saying he is bad but he and his contract are not a piece of a Super Bowl contending team. And before you say his contract is reasonable it might be but NOT for a rebuilding team. Use his money on players to develop. No expectations next year except building the team. Oh and the “Geno could be that guy if we had a top 5 defense and ran the ball a lot and built a great o-line” argument fails because so could dozens of other (cheaper) QBs and probably a couple posters on this board.

Problem is with a QB out of his depth the rest of the team don't develop just look at teams like the Jets and the Browns in recent years throwing rookie and back-up QB into the starting roll failing for years to get a team capable of a winning record. And a lot of the rookies there were getting were top

Keep Geno, draft a rookie as back-up, give them a year to learn the system and practise with the team and hopefully in 2025 we will have someone able to cope with leading the team. The team will only develop behind a decent QB.