BRADY HENDERSON

John Schneider: Seahawks open to trading Richard Sherman, but ‘I don’t think the odds are very good’

Apr 20, 2017, 7:37 PM | Updated: 7:47 pm

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Richard Sherman played with the Seahawks for seven seasons. (AP)

(AP)

LISTEN: John Schneider says odds are against Seahawks trading Richard Sherman

Seahawks general manager John Schneider told 710 ESPN Seattle’s “Danny, Dave and Moore” on Thursday that while the team is still open to trading cornerback Richard Sherman, it doesn’t seem likely to happen.

“We have a lot of respect for Richard, Richard has a lot of respect for us and we’re constantly communicating,” Schneider said. “Right now, I don’t think the odds are very good, but if somebody comes cruising along and something happens and we do something, it happens.”

Schneider was speaking from the annual Prime Time celebrity waiter event for Ben’s Fund, a charity that supports families with children on the autism spectrum. His comments about Sherman begin at the 12:04 mark of the audio embedded atop this post. It can also be found here.

Schneider stressed that there’s no animus between Sherman and the organization, contrary to what some might assume based on the cornerback’s tumultuous 2016 season and the unusual public candor which which Schneider and coach Pete Carroll have discussed a possible trade.

That began at the owners’ meetings in March, when Schneider and Carroll acknowledged that they’ve listened to teams interested in trading for Sherman while characterizing it as not necessarily likely. It continued with comments from Schneider to 710 ESPN Seattle’s “Brock and Salk” earlier this month in which he confirmed that the talk of a possible trade is real “on both sides” and said the team and Sherman have open lines of communication on the matter.

“We have a great relationship,” Schneider said Thursday. “We have constant communication with him. I talked to him this evening. So it’s cool. Everything’s fine, and I just think that the only reason we would do it to basically create some cap room and try to become a younger football team. But that’s just one option.”

Sherman turned 29 in March and is due a total of $22.431 million in salary over the final two years of his contract.

Asked about the report from ESPN’s Adam Schefter that Sherman initiated the situation by asking for a trade, Schneider didn’t deny it but said it wasn’t as though Sherman barged through his door demanding it.

“It’s not that. It just doesn’t work that way,” Schneider said. “The way I would answer it is that we just have just this dialogue with guys all the time. And I think he’d admit that he had a rough year. So he’s looking for maybe a new spark and he’s either going to find that here in Seattle or he would find it somewhere else, but odds are he’s going to find it here.”

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