The Seattle Seahawks are world champions once again. Seattle dominated New England in Super Bowl 60, bagging their second Lombardi Trophy in franchise history. But now the Seahawks have plenty of difficult decisions to make during the offseason.
ESPN's Adam Schefter warned the Seahawks about the “Super Bowl tax” that could make their offseason more difficult.
“This is the Super Bowl tax that every Super Bowl winner pays,” Schefter said on The Adam Schefter Podcast on Tuesday. “All their players want more, all their free agents deserve more. Everybody wants their piece of the pie as they should. But it makes it that much more challenging to field a great, Super Bowl-caliber roster and make it back the next year and in the years to come.”
The 2024 Philadelphia Eagles offered a good example of what the “Super Bowl tax” can look like. Philadelphia lost several key players, including Josh Sweat and Milton Williams, during free agency last spring.
The same phenomenon could happen to Seattle with several players scheduled to test free agency. Those include Super Bowl MVP Kenneth Walker III as well as several defensive players like Riq Woolen, Coby Bryant, Boye Mafe, and Josh Jobe.
Schefter pointed to Jaxon Smith-Njigba and Devon Witherspoon as two players who are now eligible for contract extensions. That throws yet another wrench into the situation.
“We saw the type of year that Jaxon Smith-Njigba had,” Schefter added. “…he's going to want to be paid like the [NFL's] Offensive Player of the Year. We saw the type of year that Devon Witherspoon had… he also is contract eligible for the first time. So if we make Jaxon Smith-Njigba the latest $40 million a year wide receiver, and if we make Devon Witherspoon one of the top paid cornerbacks in the game, all of a sudden it gets harder to assemble the type of roster that can compete for championships on an annual basis.”
But Schefter did compliment Seahawks GM John Schneider as one of the best general managers in all professional sports. If anyone can make the most of Seattle's situation, it would be Schneider.
Seattle enters the 2026 offseason with $72.28 million in cap space, so they will have some ability to reload in free agency. But the Seahawks only have four selections in the 2026 NFL Draft, which is far from ideal.
It will be fascinating to see how the Seahawks approach the upcoming offseason.
