The Seattle Seahawks had been open to entertaining trade offers for Russell Wilson in recent days, but that is apparently no longer the case.
The Chicago Bears signed Andy Dalton on Tuesday after they were unsuccessful in trying to trade for Wilson. Numerous reports indicated they made an aggressive offer for Wilson but were ultimately turned down. According to Ian Rapoport of NFL Media, the Seahawks took some time to think about Chicago’s offer — which included multiple first-round picks — before committing to Wilson for 2021.
“The Seahawks slept on it and discussed it,” Rapoport said. “Pete Carroll, who is 70 years old, does not want to rebuild and decided we are not trading Russell Wilson to the Bears.”
When you connect the dots, it sounds like Chicago offered enough to at least make the Seahawks consider trading Wilson. However, as Rapoport notes, the talks led Seattle to “firmly decide” that they are keeping Wilson — at least in the short term.
Most people expected this outcome. The Seahawks would have had to absorb a nearly $40 million dead salary cap hit if they traded Wilson. More importantly, they would have needed to find a viable replacement in order to remain in contention. They supposedly had one quarterback in mind for that role, but he would have been a huge step down from Wilson.
The real losers in all of this are Bears fans. They went from thinking they had a chance to land Wilson to having to accept Dalton as their quarterback. Their reactions on Twitter (see the best ones here) said it all.
