Seahawks end offseason like last season: Defense ruling, celebrating Super Bowl
Editor's Note: The Seahawks’ offseason training ended just like their last season did.
With the defense dominating. And celebrating winning the Super Bowl.
The final day of Seattle’s mandatory minicamp — and thus their offseason practices —began with dynamic safety/linebacker Nick Emmanwori jawing at Charles Cross, Grey Zabel and Seattle’s starting offensive line. That was before an 11-on-11 red-zone scrimmage started.
Sam Darnold and the starting offense had Devon Witherspoon and fellow cornerback Josh Jobe turned around watching Jaxon Smith-Njigba catch Darnold’s pass into the end zone.
That was about the only time coach Mike Macdonald’s defense that led the NFL in fewest points allowed last season faltered Thursday.
The second- and third-team defense particularly shined. And strutted. And of course let the offense know about it.
Rookie cornerback Julian Neal, Seattle’s third-round pick this spring, intercepted a tipped pass from Jalen Milroe at the goal line. He sprinted to the other end zone with the ball. Witherspoon, who with the starters had been watching the 7-on-7 drill, ran off the sideline 90-plus yards with Neal to celebrate.
When they got to the other end zone, near the team’s headquarters building, Neal threw the ball straight into the air. He and Witherspoon pantomimed shooting it, like it was a clay pigeon in skeet practice.
On the next play, second-year linebacker Chris Paul Jr. leaped and almost intercepted Milroe’s pass at the goal line.
As Styx’s “Renegade” blared on the loud speaker before an 11-on-11 scrimmage, Witherspoon led the entire defense, all three strings of it, leaping up and down in a circle.
Cornerback Noah Igbinoghene, an eight-year veteran and former starter for the Dolphins and Commanders Seattle signed this offseason, intercepted Drew Lock at the goal line. Witherspoon ran with him, and with Nehemiah Pritchett, to that other end zone near the building again. They celebrated by throwing up the ball and pretending to skeet-shoot it again.
Rookie second-round pick and safety Bud Clark sped to tip away Lock’s pass to new wide receiver Irvin Charles in the back of the end zone. Neal sprinted across the field to deny Milroe a clean look at wide receiver Ricky White’s long crossing route. Milroe errantly threw the ball elsewhere.
Practice ended after linebacker Jalan Gaines raced in unblocked for what would have been a sack of Milroe on a bootleg pass. The defensive players roared at that. Macdonald, the defense’s maestro, pumped his arm toward the ground and hopped happily.
The coach had an assistant blow the horn to end minicamp practice, and the offseason.
Witherspoon then bellowed his defense’s exclamation point to the day, camp, offseason — last two years, really.
“Whole lotta ass whippin’!” the three-time Pro Bowl cornerback yelled.
Then the players showered and left the facility to prepare the grand event of the offseason.
The Seahawks players, coaches and football staffers were receiving their glittering Super Bowl rings Thursday night in a fancy ceremony.
The few departed players who signed elsewhere this offseason from the team that won Super Bowl 60 in February were flying back into Seattle for the ring ceremony. That includes safety Coby Bryant (now a Chicago Bear) and linebacker Boye Mafe (who signed with the Cincinnati Bengals).
The players had been buzzing all week about getting their rings to cap the offseason. That contributed to the giddy vibe to minicamp practices, though that doesn’t explain the exuberance of Neal and Clark.
They, fellow rookies and all other players who have joined the Seahawks since the Super Bowl weren’t invited to Thursday night’s bash. They didn’t earn Super Bowl rings last season.
Then again, with exuberance is just how this Seahawks top-ranked defense rolls.
“We’re excited. But I think it’s just our culture. I think that’s what I love about it,” veteran Pro Bowl defensive lineman Leonard Williams said. “I think regardless of the situation, regardless if we were getting our rings today or it’s the last day of practice, breaking for OTAs, I think we just play with passion, energy.
“We love each other. We love coming to work. So I think any given day, we’re having these type of practices.”
Still, it’s not every day in the NFL you get a priceless Super Bowl ring. Williams played 11 years in the league, mostly for the often woebegone Jets and Giants, before he earned this first one.
“It’s going to be cool,” Williams said.
“We all understand this is a business. Guys come and go. That’s the nature of the league. I hit up Mafe, Coby Bryant, some of those guys. Know they’re going to be in town for tonight’s ceremony. We’re all excited to see them.
“I’m sure it’s going to feel like no time has passed. They’re going to feel like a brother for us.
“I feel like that’s going to be like that forever, regardless of where guys end up. Or even after football.”
Jody Allen’s final gift
Williams and his teammates saw team chair Jody Allen seeing that the players and coaches got their rings on the final day of offseason training before a six-week break leading into the start of training camp July 25 as a perfect way to close their minds to the 2025 season and move on fully to 2026.
“It’s gonna be cool to celebrate, kind of put the final bow on this past season,” Zabel said. “And then, at the end of the day, this is June of ‘26. We’ve got to start preparing for this next year and understand we are a new team...and figure out how to win games this next year.”
This, picking out and buying the team’s Super Bowl rings, is essentially Allen’s final gift to the team. She, as the team chair, is overseeing the ongoing sale of the Seahawks from the estate of her late brother, Paul G. Allen.
The NFL pays for an initial order of 150 rings contributing about $7,000 to each ring. Team owners pay the rest — as much as they want to. The rings can be worth up to $50,000 or more each. They can weigh like small bowling balls.
“A lot of people are saying it’s a big ring,” Zabel said. So, yes, they will party over them.
“What a better way to celebrate the end of OTAs and minicamp and have this kind of party?” Zabel said. “I know there are a lot of (new) guys on the team that wish they could come to it, and they want to get going to this next year so we can do this all over again next year.”
Zabel was looking forward to his favorite Busch Lights at the ring ceremony Thursday night. You know, the beers he declared he was about to crush at his home party in Pierre, South Dakota, on draft night in the spring of 2025 when the Seahawks made him their first-round pick.
“We’ve gonna have a ton of fun,” Zabel said. “Probably have a few brewskis in there tonight, and enjoy each other.
“And then, just move on.”
This story was originally published June 11, 2026 at 5:05 PM with the headline "Seahawks end offseason like last season: Defense ruling, celebrating Super Bowl."
