3 breakout candidates who can raise Seahawks’ ceiling even higher

The Seattle Seahawks will enter the 2026 season with mostly the same cast that won the Super Bowl this past February, having retained 14 of their top 15 offensive players and 14 of their top 17 defensive players in terms of combined regular-season and postseason snap counts.

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And given their collection of young talent – the Seahawks had the NFL’s fourth-youngest team last season by snap-weighted age, according to FTN Fantasy – they have the makings of a team that’s still on the ascent.

Who on Seattle’s roster could take a significant leap forward in 2026? There are plenty of intriguing candidates, but here are the three most likely to experience the type of big-time breakout that would elevate the reigning champs to even greater heights.

DL Rylie Mills

Led by the trio of Leonard Williams, Byron Murphy II and Jarran Reed, the Seahawks already had arguably the NFL’s best interior defensive line. A full season from Mills could make the group even more fearsome.

Prior to tearing his ACL in December 2024, Mills was on track to be a top-50 prospect in the 2025 draft, according to NFL Network’s Daniel Jeremiah. But the injury plummeted his stock, dropping him all the way to the fifth round, where the Seahawks swooped in to pick him at No. 142 overall.

It could end up being a massive steal. Mills, who had 7.5 sacks with Notre Dame in 2024, spent most of his rookie season recovering from the injury. But after making his NFL debut in Week 15 and easing into action down the stretch, the 6-foot-5, 296-pound defensive lineman made a major statement with his jaw-dropping sack in the Super Bowl.

In a stunning display of force, Mills overpowered New England Patriots rookie left guard Jared Wilson and pushed him backward about 6 yards into quarterback Drake Maye, who Mills then wrestled to the ground for an emphatic sack. Mills made another impressive play later on, when he bull-rushed right guard Mike Onwenu and drew a double-team that helped set up a sack for Murphy.

Rylie Mills fights through the lineman for another Seahawks sack!

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Despite playing just five defensive snaps, Mills finished the Super Bowl with a sack and two pressures. It’s a small sample size, no doubt, but it provided a glimpse of Mills’ tantalizing potential.

And what’s more? Mills’ skill set includes the type of inside-out versatility that head coach Mike Macdonald covets, which could allow him to play multiple spots along the D-line. As Macdonald said this spring, “the sky’s the limit” for Mills heading into Year 2.

WR Rashid Shaheed

Shaheed provided a massive impact on special teams last season, scoring three touchdowns as a return man after arriving in a November trade with the New Orleans Saints. But the 27-year-old speedster didn’t have nearly the same level of production at receiver, totaling just 18 catches for 266 yards in 12 combined regular-season and postseason games with Seattle.

That could change in 2026. There’s been a lot of buzz about Shaheed’s performance in OTAs and minicamp, including his growing rapport with quarterback Sam Darnold. ESPN NFL insider Jeremy Fowler reported that Shaheed “had a major spring” and is “going to be a big-time player” for Seattle this fall. Macdonald also praised Shaheed, saying he achieved a number of personal bests during the team’s offseason training program.

During his time in New Orleans, Shaheed proved capable of being a legitimate No. 2 wideout. He had 719 receiving yards in 2023, followed by 349 yards in six games during an injury-shortened 2024 and 499 yards in nine games last year prior to the trade.

The Seahawks clearly have confidence he can achieve similar production in the Pacific Northwest, as evidenced by the three-year, $51 million deal they gave him in March. And if Shaheed delivers on that, it’d put even more stress on opposing defenses, who already have their hands full trying to slow down reigning NFL Offensive Player of the Year Jaxon Smith-Njigba.

TE Elijah Arroyo

With impressive speed and athleticism for his 6-foot-5, 254-pound frame, Arroyo was billed as a big-time field-stretching threat when Seattle drafted him as a second-round pick in 2025. That was on the heels of Arroyo’s breakout final college season at Miami, where he led all FBS tight ends with 16.9 yards per catch in 2024.

Arroyo showed flashes of that potential during last year’s rookie campaign, but never fully put it together. He finished with 15 catches for 179 yards and a touchdown in 13 games before suffering a knee injury, which sidelined him for the final month of the regular season and most of Seattle’s playoff run.

However, Arroyo’s size-speed combo makes him a prime candidate for a Year 2 leap – especially when considering new offensive coordinator Brian Fleury’s background. Fleury spent the past four seasons as the tight ends coach in San Francisco, where he worked with one of the NFL’s premier tight ends in George Kittle, and learned from one of football’s brightest offensive play callers in head coach Kyle Shanahan.

While Fleury will run a similar Shanahan-style offense as previous Seattle OC Klint Kubiak, he’s expected to bring some new wrinkles with him from San Francisco. And one of those differences could be more motions and shifts from tight ends. “Those tight ends are gonna be moving all around with the motion that they’re gonna be doing,” ESPN’s Fowler reported.

Could that help unlock Arroyo? If so, he’d provide an added field-stretching dimension that would further complicate things for opposing defenses.

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