Seattle Seahawks Awarded Four Compensatory Picks For 2015 Draft

The Seattle Seahawks are without a first round pick in the 2015 NFL Draft after trading for All-Pro Jimmy Graham. However, John Schneider and company now have the ammunition to move back into the top 32 if they see fit to do so.

The ‘Hawks were awarded four mid-round draft picks in compensation for the free agents lost in the 2014 off-season. They added a fourth round pick (no. 135 overall), a fifth round pick (no. 170 overall), and two sixth rounders (no. 209 and no. 214).

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Given the Seattle Seahawks’ recent draft history, this is big news. A large percentage of the roster, including stars such as Richard Sherman, Kam Chancellor, K.J. Wright, Malcolm Smith, J.R. Sweezy, Walter Thurmond III, Byron Maxwell and Jeremy Lane, are successful NFL players drafted by Seattle in the fourth round or later since 2010.

But how many roster spots are available?

The four additional picks gives the Seahawks 11 in total. And Seattle has one of, if not the deepest roster in the league. There’s a good chance that not even half of their 2015 draft class make the team.

This makes moving up in the earlier rounds possibly making some sense. This is just my observation, but I think it’s possible that the Seahawks made the Graham move with the knowledge in mind that compensatory picks were on the way to offset the loss.

Compensatory picks are untradeable, but the rest of Seattle’s picks are now significantly more expendable. Being that they don’t pick until no. 63, I also think it’s unlikely that they move all the way back into the first round. However, moving up to the early or middle of the second round for a player such as Carl Davis from Iowa or Marcus Peters from Washington should they start to slide definitely makes some sense.

Losing Brandon Browner, Golden Tate, Breno Giacomini, Clinton McDonald, Thurmond and Chris Maragos last season sucked at the time, but we’ll have to see who the compensation turns into.

And the same goes for next season. Losing Byron Maxwell, Malcolm Smith and James Carpenter might bring in some more draft capital, although signing Cary Williams could offset that slightly.

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