The day after Pete Carroll steered the Seahawks to another NFC playoff bracket, he signed an extension to stay with the team long-term.
The Seahawks announced they now have their head coach under contract through 2021. This deal will be worth more than $11MM per year, Ian Rapoport of NFL.com reports (on Twitter), keeping Carroll among the NFL’s highest-paid coaches.
Carroll’s previous Seahawks contract, signed in 2016, ran through next season. Both Carroll and GM John Schneider are now locked up through 2021. Contract talks began last week, Carroll said (via the Seattle Times’ Bob Condotta, on Twitter) and obviously progressed quickly.
The most successful coach in Seahawks history, Carroll has now piloted teams to the playoffs in seven of his nine Seattle seasons. Given the expectations going into this season, this latest berth may be the veteran coach’s most impressive work. Viewed as a rebuilding team after jettisoning many Super Bowl-era cornerstones, the Seahawks are 9-6 and likely set for the NFC’s No. 5 seed. Seattle has defeated other playoff-qualifying teams, its best win coming Sunday night against likely AFC No. 1 seed Kansas City.
The oldest active NFL head coach at 67, Carroll said at the end of last season he was not considering retirement. Carroll retooled his coaching staff, replacing coordinators Darrell Bevell and Kris Richard with Brian Schottenheimer and Ken Norton Jr., and helped oversee significant roster turnover. The Seahawks have quickly moved into a Russell Wilson-centric era — playing 2018 without the likes of Richard Sherman, Michael Bennett, Kam Chancellor and, for the most part, Earl Thomas — and may be a dangerous underdog next month.
Formerly the Jets’ and Patriots’ HC, Carroll has now passed Mike Holmgren as the Seahawks’ winningest coach. He is 88-54-1 running the Seahawks after going 33-31 in four combined 1990s seasons in the AFC East. In between, Carroll revitalized the USC program, winning two national championships.
With more than $63MM in projected 2019 cap space, the swiftly reloaded Seahawks could be an interesting team this offseason. And their longtime Schneider-Carroll power structure will oversee matters for the foreseeable future.
Passing Gruden in salary
Although I am not a Seahawks fan, I think this is a good move. Guy can motivate players.
Seahawks fan here and am glad Pete is sticking around although all indications were that he was staying. While they lost a lot of talent, it appears that they got rid of a lot of locker room malcontents. Penny seems to be getting better and Carson has been such a find, it’s pretty remarkable they did a retool on the fly without a huge down season.