Seattle Seahawks

Report: Seahawks won't give Russell Wilson $20 million a year

Published May. 15, 2015 6:07 p.m. ET

foxsports

By Ryan Phillips

The Seattle Seahawks and quarterback Russell Wilson are in the middle of contract negotiations and what was expected to be a smooth process has gotten decidedly rocky. Wilson has one year left on his rookie contract and is in line for an extension, the problem is, the Seahawks and he are far apart in negotiations.

On Friday, Bleacher Report’s Jason Cole reported that Wilson is looking for $20 million annually on a five-year extension. Cole claims the Seahawks “have no desire to get anywhere close to that.” The report goes further to state that Seattle is willing to let Wilson play out the final year of his deal without getting an extension done.

If that happens, the Seahawks could wind up franchise tagging Wilson in back-to-back years through 2017. That move would earn Wilson somewhere around $45 million over that time. That’s not a bad chunk of change, but the 26-year-old undoubtedly would prefer the security of a long-term deal.

These whispers have been out there for weeks and Cole has now confirmed what many have suspected. The Seahawks love Wilson, but given the balance of their roster they don’t want to commit too much money to one position. That said, Wilson nearly led the team to back-to-back Super Bowl titles, as Seattle was a few yards away from beating the New England Patriots this year before an untimely interception.

In his three NFL seasons, Wilson has started 48 games, and has completed 63.4 percent of his passes for 9,950 yards, with 72 touchdowns and 26 interceptions. His career quarterback rating of 98.6 is excellent. The diminutive signal-caller has established himself as an excellent starting quarterback, but I don’t he can lay claim to being a top five guy. That makes it hard to justify giving him top quarterback money.

These talks haven’t gotten truly ugly yet, but they are certainly trending in that direction.

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