Seahawks add WR David Moore of D-II East Central in seventh round
Apr 29, 2017, 3:05 PM | Updated: 5:44 pm
RENTON – You’ll need directions to find the first of Seattle’s two seventh-round selections.
That’s because receiver David Moore attended East Central University, a Division II school in Oklahoma.
It was scout Aaron Hineline who followed the map there and found a receiver with a combination of strength and size that had coach Pete Carroll glowing after Seattle selected Moore in the seventh round.
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“We think that David is a stud of a receiver,” Carroll said. “He’s really fast and he’s really physical.”
Really fast as in he was timed running the 40-yard dash in 4.43 seconds at his pro day.
“Maybe 4.38,” general manager John Schneider said. “Depends on the watch.”
As Carroll said, Moore is also very physical having performed 26 bench-press repetitions of 225 pounds.
The Seahawks chose Moore with pick No. 226, which they acquired in a trade with Carolina last August in which the Panthers acquired receiver Kevin Norwood.
Carroll and Schneider on WRs Amara Darboh (third) and David Moore (seventh): pic.twitter.com/oZTAp1khap
— Brady Henderson (@BradyHenderson) April 30, 2017
The upside: The Seahawks got a player whose physical measurements compare favorably to fourth-round choice Amara Darboh, only they got Moore in the seventh round instead of the third. Moore is perfectly suited to play on special teams, something Seattle asks of its wide receivers. Also, the Seahawks aren’t afraid to step to a lower level of college competition to find a contributor. Jeremy Lane played at Northwestern State in Louisiana, an FCS school. The Seahawks also drafted Michael Bowie out of a Division II school in Oklahoma though Bowie had previously been at Oklahoma State.
The risk: Seattle picked a player from a lower division, who admitted after his selection he didn’t expect to be drafted. Moore said that his Division I opportunities were limited because he didn’t perform well on standardized tests. Moore said that Division I schools that were interested in him like TCU and Texas-San Antonio were interested in him playing cornerback.
Personal file: Major listed as kinesielogy.
Bigger picture: The seventh round is where general manager John Schneider tends to take his long shots, adding guys with an exceptional physical talent. In 2010, it was Jameson Konz, who had played a number of positions during an oft-injured career at Kent State. Seattle started working with Konz at wide receiver before he ultimately saw him get on the field as a special-teams player. More recently, the Seahawks have used late-round picks on defensive linemen they tried to convert to offensive line. It worked incredibly well with J.R. Sweezy, who was drafted out of North Carolina State in 2012, and not so much with Kristjan Sokoli, who spent an entire year on the active roster after he was drafted out of Buffalo but was released last year without ever having appeared in a game.