Since pads have yet to come out with training camp still almost six weeks away, the Seattle Seahawks have yet to have much of a real opportunity to truly evaluate their offensive line, most notably in the interior where they will have three new starters at center and both guard spots.

Keeping that in mind, it would be easy to overreact to Seattle’s current situation at right guard, where second-year blocker McClendon Curtis received all of the first-team reps during OTAs and mandatory minicamp instead of returning starter Anthony Bradford and third-round pick Christian Haynes. The fact Bradford missed most of the offseason program obviously impacted those rotations as well and if healthy, he’s probably getting all of those reps.

Even with him being the most seasoned candidate and the incumbent after starting 10 games as a rookie, however, Seahawks coach Mike Macdonald didn’t commit to Bradford in his closing press conference after the team’s final minicamp practice, making it clear a “great competition” awaits once training camp opens in late July.

“He’s right there. Just good to see him out there. Missed a little bit of time there throughout some of the OTAs. He’s right in the mix. Got a great competition, especially on the right side of the line, and he’s right there. He’s got a great opportunity to go earn himself a job. “

From a positional battle standpoint, Seattle won’t open camp with many question marks in regard to starters on either side of the football. That includes left guard and center, where veteran Laken Tomlinson and second-year blocker Olu Oluwatimi look to have a strong grip on their respective positions and barring an unexpected surprise or injury, they should be in the starting lineup against Denver in Week 1.

On defense, the most notable competitions for the Seahawks will be for reserve or rotational roles with much of the starting lineup already etched in stone.

But as Macdonald acknowledged, the same cannot be said for the right guard spot, as Bradford’s injury only created more uncertainty heading towards camp. And, maybe most importantly, his absence opened the door for a third viable option in Curtis to jump into the competition this spring.

Starring at Chattanooga, Curtis developed into an NFL prospect playing multiple positions for the Mocs, starting 30 games at right guard and seven games at left tackle in six seasons with the program. Along with being named All-SoCon First-Team three times to close out his college career, he earned FCS All American distinction in 2022 and participated in the Reese’s Senior Bowl.

Standing 6-6 and weighing 328 pounds, Curtis looks more like an NFL tackle with a tall, athletic frame. But he delivers powerful blows to the frame of opposing defenders with bricks for hands and uses excellent length to create push in the run game as well as keeping hands on pass rushers, possessing the skill set to excel in the interior despite his height.

Viewed as a bit of a tweener by NFL evaluators, Curtis went undrafted and signed with the Raiders, ultimately landing on the practice squad after failing to make the team out of training camp. Once the Seahawks lost tackles Abraham Lucas and Charles Cross to injury in the season opener, they promptly signed him and fellow undrafted rookie Raiqwon O’Neal to the 53-man roster as developmental insurance policies.

Though he only played a handful of special teams snaps in one game as a rookie, general manager John Schneider name dropped Curtis as a player to watch during the NFL annual meetings in March, clearly impressing behind the scenes. Drafting Haynes, a two-time All American at UConn, seemed to suggest he wouldn’t be in the hunt for a starting job.

Yet, with Haynes exclusively working with Seattle’s second-team offense throughout the spring program and Bradford sidelined, Curtis benefitted as much as anyone on the roster from extensive practice reps over the past month, positioning himself to be major player in an already intriguing competition come July.

“He knows multiple spots, so if you know what to do it’s easy to move you around,” Macdonald said of Curtis during OTAs in late May. “I think the whole offensive line — it’s always one big puzzle piece as you trying to find the best five and the backup plan if someone can’t go and making sure you have enough depth so you’re not looking in the middle of the season and you have really no options. He’s doing a great job. Had a great offseason.”

Looking towards the 2024 season, based on experience alone, Bradford likely remains the favorite to win Seattle’s starting job after getting his feet wet last year with Haynes being the biggest threat to usurp him from the lineup. With both players being recent mid-round draft picks for Seattle, the team has made significant investments in them and in an ideal scenario, at least one of those young blockers will develop into a foundational long-term starter under the tutelage of new line coach Scott Huff.

At the same time, while he had plenty of positive things to say after the final minicamp practice, Macdonald and his staff don’t have any allegiance to Bradford and as a rookie without any NFL experience, Haynes won’t be given a starting job by default either. Huff will be ramping up the evaluation process when the pads come on and the real bullets start flying in August, and based on how things have transpired so far, it looks to be anyone’s race coming out of the offseason program.

Once viewed as little more than a curiosity, Curtis very much has emerged as a horse worth potentially betting on to go the distance. Considering both he and Haynes are the same age (24) and each have Senior Bowl pedigree with quality physical traits for playing inside, even if he’s still an underdog at this stage, it would be unwise to rule out the former as a legitimate contender to hold onto the starting job and fend off his counterparts in camp and the preseason.

Inside the friendly confines of T-Mobile Park, Seattle pitchers routinely shift into a new gear.

For starters and relievers alike, the numbers are undeniable. The Mariners have the best home ERA (2.60) and WHIP (0.940) in baseball, walk the fewest hitters (78), and own the most home wins in the American League (27).

It’s why Logan Gilbert’s brilliant, eight shutout innings on a sold-out Father’s Day was all the more foreseeable.

Gilbert was superb on a Sunday afternoon, allowing Seattle to celebrate a three-game sweep of the reigning World Series-champion Texas Rangers, the divisional foe that could have regained precious ground in the standings. Instead, the Mariners stomped them further down the ladder and extended a season-high lead in the AL West to 8 1/2 games.

Seattle’s towering, 6-foot-6 right-hander mixed five pitches to perfection, working ahead with painted fastballs paired with a standout slider that induced silly swings in the dust. Gilbert fanned nine without a walk for his Seattle-best 12th quality start, surrendering just two hits in eight frames with a depleted bullpen behind him.

Aided by Luke Raley’s fourth-inning RBI double, Tyler Locklear’s seventh-inning solo homer, and ample insurance in the final frames, Gilbert provided an early off-day for much of the bullpen and cruised to Sunday’s 5-0 win, improving the Mariners to a season-high 12 games over .500 (43-31).

“That was fantastic,” manager Scott Servais said. “(Logan was) in total control of the ballgame and had great stuff, of course, but the execution of the slider and split-finger was electric today.

“I hope everybody appreciates it as much as I do and our pitching coaches do, because that’s really hard to do.”

Seattle’s third series sweep this season was, undoubtedly, its biggest.

Since May 26, the Mariners are 16-5, the best record in baseball during that span. And they are 23-6 at T-Mobile Park since April 15, the best home mark in the American League.

It’s the largest division lead — and the first time the Mariners have won nine consecutive home series in a campaign — since their record-breaking 116-win season in 2001.

“To have a sweep, especially at home? It’s a good feeling,” Gilbert said. “When everybody’s doing their job, we’re definitely at our best, and that’s what it looked like today.”

And what a difference Julio Rodriguez could make if this extended hitting stretch continues. The J-Rod Show sparked Seattle’s 7-5 win in Saturday’s middle game with a third-inning, two-run smash to left center off Texas righty Nathan Eovaldi and, entering Sunday’s finale he had slashed .278/.350/.463 in the month of June.

Rodriguez’s bat continues to warm up with the weather, like it did in his rookie and sophomore seasons from 2022-23. The career .238 hitter between the months of March and April ignited those numbers to .316 in July and August across his first two campaigns — a promising sign Seattle’s franchise center fielder is again turning a pivotal corner.

“Julio is at his best when he’s playing free,” Servais said. “Not thinking too much. Just letting his abilities take over, and being super competitive, and that’s what we’re seeing right now.

“He is competing his tail off. That’s what it takes.”

The Mariners own a 78.8% chance to win the AL West, per FanGraphs, the highest chance to win a division among American League clubs. Seattle has an 86.2% chance to make the playoffs and a 6.1% chance to win the World Series.

Raleigh, fans shave heads at ‘Buhner Buzz’

The Mariners teased the question in the days leading up to the first Buhner Buzz Night since 2001 — which current player would make their surprise entrance and receive a shaved head from Jay Buhner himself?

Three decades after Seattle launched the “iconic promotion” featuring its famously bald right fielder, Buhner returned to Victory Hall next door to T-Mobile Park for the revival of Buhner Buzz Night. And it was only fitting that catcher Cal Raleigh was Thursday’s featured volunteer, just three days removed from demolishing a heroic, walk-off grand slam over the White Sox.

“They did a little (promotion) tonight — buzz cuts by Jay Buhner here at the yard,” Raleigh told MLB Network. “I volunteered to get the cut. It’s a little shorter than I thought it’d be, but (Jay) told me there were some hits in it… I said, I’ll do anything for a few knocks.”

Freshly-shaved fans (and those who arrived bald) received a free ticket and Buhner-themed shirt for Thursday night’s series finale with the White Sox, a 3-2 loss in extras. But it wasn’t before 620 fans snagged a free seat and 437 buzzed their heads.

“It’s a big deal around here,” Raleigh said. (Jay’s) a legend. Great player, great person. We should bring it back. It’s a really cool thing for the fans, the community around here.”

Rojas picking it at third

Third baseman Josh Rojas is quietly enjoying one of the sport’s better defensive campaigns at the position. He leads all qualified third baseman with nine outs above average, per Baseball Savant, the continuation of stellar Seattle defense at the ‘Hot Corner’ despite the offseason departure of Eugenio Suarez.

“I always want to be a utility guy,” Rojas said Saturday. “I want the manager to be able to feel like he can use me anywhere on defense.

“But right now, I’m a third baseman, and I feel pretty good over there.”

Consistent, pregame work from third base and guidance from infield coach Perry Hill rewards Rojas with some of the best defensive metrics in baseball — including seven prevented runs.

“I think he’s one of the best defensive third basemen in the league,” Servais said. “We’ve been spoiled here with outstanding defensive play at third base, but Josh is right up there with (Kyle) Seager and what we saw from Geno (Suarez) for a couple of years here. He has been fantastic.”

The $58 million sale of Seattle Reign FC to a new ownership group that includes MLS’ Seattle Sounders FC is finally complete.

The Reign, along with former French owners OL Groupe, announced the news on Monday.

The Sounders are joined by private equity firm the Carlyle Group in the new ownership group. Carlyle Group is investing more than 50% of the joint venture, but the Sounders were “instrumental” in getting the deal done, said Alex Popov, Carlyle’s head of private credit.

The $58 million price tag is a dramatic increase in valuation of the team. OL Groupe bought the Reign for about $3.5 million in late 2019.

“It’s all about the potential going forward,” Popov told ESPN. “And frankly, our starting point was off. You know, that’s what attracted a lot of us to, including ourselves here at Carlyle, to think about investing in women’s sport. We have seen the potential.”

Team valuations have grown exponentially across the NWSL recently. San Diego Wave FC, which first joined the NWSL as an expansion team in 2022, is in the process of a two-part transaction that values the team between $113 million and $120 million.

NWSL commissioner Jessica Berman said last year that she hoped the sale of the Reign would close around the new year. OL Groupe previously announced the deal in March, but exact details of the new ownership group were not shared.

The Reign’s sale to a group that includes the Sounders finally gives Seattle’s NWSL side a sense of true stability in the Emerald City. The Reign have won three NWSL Shields since the club’s inception in 2013, but the team has historically struggled to find its footing off the field.

Seattle previously played at Memorial Stadium downtown, but uncertainty around the venue’s future at the end of 2018 put the Reign’s future in the market in doubt.

The team moved to Tacoma in 2019 and removed “Seattle” from its name.

Less than a year later, OL Groupe, which owned the successful Lyon women’s side at the time, bought a majority stake in the Reign and the team was rebranded as OL Reign. The team made Lumen Field its permanent home in 2022 and averaged crowds of 13,610 fans per game in the 68,000-plus seat stadium last year.

Maya Mendoza-Exstrom, who spent 10 years with the Sounders and will now serve as the Reign’s chief business officer, said Lumen Field is unequivocally the Reign’s home.

“It feels a little bit like we have the gritty startup mentality of an expansion franchise in this exciting moment, but we have this benefit of having a dedicated fan base that has been dedicated to this club, even though it has moved a ton and changed a ton over the last few years,” she told ESPN. “So, I think the opportunity just to root this club in place — Lumen is our home. The club’s not moving anywhere.”

Filling the lower bowl of Lumen Field consistently is a realistic target for the Reign, but Mendoza-Exstrom and Popov both understand that what works for the Sounders might not be the right approach for the Reign. The Sounders averaged over 32,000 fans per game last year.

“We’ll figure out where our gaps are, and we’ll figure out where our synergies are, and then we will invest in the resources,” Mendoza-Exstrom said. “And that includes human resources to make sure that the Reign are resourced in a way that’s commensurate with what we need to do to grow. And that could be any number of human beings, that could be technology, that could be facilities. It’s all on the table.”

The Reign’s new ownership structure formally unifies Seattle’s MLS and NWSL teams after over a decade of operating independently. Sounders owner Adrian Hanauer became a minority owner in the Reign upon the team’s move to Tacoma, but exited when OL Groupe bought the team. Hanauer will now be part of the Reign’s ownership group again and serve as governor on the NWSL board, with Popov as the alternate.

“Today is a milestone day for soccer in our city and I am humbled to be a part of it,” Hanauer said in a statement. “This announcement is about keeping one of the top women’s teams in the world locally rooted in our community for generations of fans to enjoy.”