A healthy Red Bryant should help Seahawks’ D-line

By Brady Henderson

Defensive line will be an offseason priority for the Seahawks after a season in which they struggled to generate a consistent pass rush, were periodically gashed by opposing rushing attacks and lost starting weakside end Chris Clemons to a torn ACL.

Red Bryant

Clemons is an everydown player, and his recovery will likely force him to miss at least part of next season. That makes addressing those deficiencies even more crucial.

That’s not necessarily to say Seattle will have to spend an early pick or sign a big-name free agent to bolster its run shaky defense, which ranked 10th in the regular season and allowed 167 yards during the playoff loss to Atlanta. Perhaps the Seahawks could merely bank on improvement from defensive end Red Bryant, who played much of last season with a plantar fascia foot injury.

That injury and the effect it had on Seattle’s run defense were among the topics discussed when Mike Sando of ESPN.com joined “Bob and Groz” on Monday.

“I just remember sometimes during the season going into that locker room and he’d have a boot on that thing,” Sando said. “It wasn’t just sore, I think he was playing with something that was severely limiting him.”

Last offseason, the Seahawks saw enough value in Bryant’s run-stuffing prowess to sign him to a five-year contract that included $14.5 million in guaranteed money. How much better should they expect their defensive line to be next season assuming Bryant returns to health?

Bob Stelton and Dave Grosby share their thoughts on that question in the video below.

You can listen to Monday’s show here.