Are you like Mike Macdonald, anxious to see Jadarian Price make his Seahawks game debut?
Keep waiting. Until the opener.
The Seahawks play their final two preseason games in the span of five days. The first is Sunday night in Nashville against the Tennessee Titans they scrimmaged against in a joint practice here Friday.
The rookie Price was limited in that joint practice. George Holani was the first running back in Seattle’s starting offense against Tennessee’s starters.
Price, the first-round pick the Seahawks drafted this spring to replace departed (to Kansas City in free agency) Super Bowl MVP Kenneth Walker, will not play Sunday night against the Titans. He’s not going to play at the Chiefs Friday, either.
Macdonald and general manager John Schneider have seen enough of Price’s speed, decisiveness in cutting into outside-zone run gaps and his pass catching to know Price is too valuable, and the running-back room too thinned by injuries already this preseason, to risk the rookie lead back in these games that don’t count.
Price himself missed a week this month with what Macdonald vaguely described as “upper-leg soreness.” So, no preseason games in uncontrolled environments against hungry foes such as the Titans that are planning to play their starters through the first half.
Tennessee’s players went all out in the joint practice, aggressively mocking and chirping at the Seahawks. During a break midway through the scrimmaging Friday with a felt-like temperature of 100 degrees on the field, All-Pro defensive tackle Jeffery Simmons barked to his teammates: “They’re out of gas! Super Bowl champs? Blah, blah, blah!”
Price only got a few carries and a couple catches on throws from quarterback Sam Darnold in the joint practice.
“He’s ramping back,” Macdonald said Friday. “It’s not responsible to give him a thousand carries after being down for a minute.
“But I’m eager to watch the tape. I was looking forward to seeing him play (Friday).”
In fact, almost none of Seattle’s starters on offense and defense are going to play in Tennessee Sunday night. NFL offensive player of the year Jaxon Smith-Njigba, Darnold, newly minted Pro Bowl cornerback Devon Witherspoon, Pro Bowl veteran defenders Leonard Williams and DeMarcus Lawrence, middle linebacker Ernest Jones — none of them are expected to see game action until Sept. 9. That’s the opening night of the NFL season, with the league’s kickoff game between the Seahawks and New England Patriots in a Super Bowl 60 rematch at Lumen Field.
Veteran backup quarterback Drew Lock is expected to start and play the first half at Tennessee. Jalen Milroe is expected to play the second half. The Seahawks aren’t likely to rotate both QBs in and out of the game in each half as they did last week.
That was in an ugly, 17-7 preseason loss to Dallas that had Macdonald displeased.
What to watch for at TennesseePrice and the starters not playing Sunday night leaves one position battle as the most intriguing issue to watch develop during the game at Tennessee.
Macdonald, defensive coordinator Aden Durde and defensive-backs coach Karl Scott are trying to decide on the third-cornerback spot. That’s essentially been a starting position in Macdonald’s five- and six-defensive backs nickel and dime packages that have been Seattle’s base defense the last two seasons.
Veteran Noah Igbinoghene and unproven, 2024 fifth-round pick Nehemiah Pritchett will alternate in at nickel against the Titans’ starting offense in the first half. Whoever plays better Sunday will have the inside track to win that job.
But that designation coming out of this game will come with a caveat: Trevon Diggs is ramping up to compete. The former All-Pro cornerback with Dallas that Seattle signed this past week practiced with the Seahawks for the first time Friday. He was limited to position drills, then took off his shoulder pads to watch scrimmaging. It was his first practice in 7 1/2 months, since his second of two games of an ultra-short stint with Green Bay to end last season.
Diggs said “maybe” he will be in football condition enough to play Friday’s preseason finale at Kansas City. He turns 28. He hasn’t played a full season since 2022 with the Cowboys, after multiple serious injuries including to his knee.
Yet Macdonald, Durde and Scott see Diggs, when healthy, as fitting the match-coverage style the head coach has his outside cornerbacks playing. Diggs becoming an option would move Witherspoon inside to nickel again, the spot Macdonald can best use him to blitz and affect more of the field more from the middle of it.
The Seahawks are also likely to sign free-agent Terrion Arnold within the next week, perhaps before the Chiefs preseason game. They reached an agreement nine days ago to sign the cornerback and Detroit Lions first-round pick two years ago. The NFL is expect to put Arnold on the commissioner’s exempt list as soon as he signs with Seattle. That will make him exempt from the roster, unable to practice or play but allowed to be in the team facility for meetings and off-field training.
Arnold is facing eight felony charges related to an alleged kidnapping and burglary in Tampa, Florida, in February. He was arrested in June, and the Lions immediately cut him. He is facing possible life in prison. His next scheduled court hearing is in person Oct. 5 in Tampa, the day after the Seahawks’ fourth game, at home against the Los Angeles Chargers.
The Seahawks’ hope is for Arnold, 23, to somehow be able to play by mid- to late season. Plus, by signing him now as a second-year veteran, Seattle would retain rights to Arnold for the 2027 season as a restricted or potentially (if he doesn’t play at all in 2026) an exclusive-rights free agent.
Arnold has the outside-coverage skills that, like Diggs’, match how Macdonald wants his outside cornerbacks to play. Arnold’s arrival would also enable Witherspoon to move back inside to nickel more.
As it stands, with Diggs trying to get into football shape and Arnold still unsigned and in limbo, Macdonald may be inclined to keep Witherspoon outside and Igbinoghene as the nickel, as something of a stop-gap. Washington Commanders head coach and former Seahawks defensive coordinator Dan Quinn turned Igbinoghene into a starting NFL nickel back inside for the Commanders in 2023, after the former Miami Dolphins first-round pick spent his first seasons in the league exclusively as an outside cornerback.
If Pritchett wins the job by improving his tackling Sunday night, he would most likely play outside with Witherspoon inside at nickel to begin the season.