As the Seattle Seahawks progress further into their offseason program, the many roles of the team’s plug-and-play defensive linemen are beginning to become more clear.

Mandatory minicamp is now underway, and that means veterans like Dre’Mont Jones and Leonard Williams are back on Seattle’s practice field at the VMAC full-time. Jones was not present for any voluntary OTA practices, while Williams made his first appearance in the 7th of 10 practices on June 3.

Seattle signed Jones away from the Broncos on a three-year, $51 million deal last offseason — the largest free agent contract of the Pete Carroll and John Schneider era — and he, like all the other interior defensive linemen, was criticized for the Seahawks’ poor run defense in 2023, which allowed the second-most rushing yards in the league to its opponents.

Now that Jones has reported, Seahawks head coach Mike Macdonald and defensive coordinator Aden Durde can begin to tinker with all the pieces Seattle has at its disposal in the trenches. However, nothing will be cemented until the pads come on. Macdonald, in a press conference with local media after the team’s first minicamp practice on Tuesday, said they are in the early stages of experimentation.

“He’s very much in the mix of that. I think you saw today, you know, and we don’t know the answers yet. We don’t know how it’s going to look come the beginning of the season, how it’s going to progress throughout the whole year.”

– Mike Macdonald on Jones’ versatility

Like Williams, Jones has a history of playing various techniques on the defensive line. In his first three seasons in Denver, Jones played the vast majority of his snaps inside or over the tackles and even played about 23 percent of his defensive snaps at nose tackle as a rookie in 2019, per Pro Football Focus.

But as his career has progressed, there is clearly intrigue with Jones’ potential on the outside. While he still played about 55 percent of his total snaps inside the tackles last season, the rest of Jones’ snaps came as either a 6-technique or stand-up outside linebacker in Pete Carroll’s 3-4 defense.

It wouldn’t be a shock to see Macdonald use him there more, as Jones’ physical build (6-3, 281 pounds) and athleticism have benefitted him as a pass rusher off the edge. With other 300-pound interior defensive linemen on the roster like Williams, Jarran Reed, Johnathan Hankins and rookie first-round pick Byron Murphy II, that may also be where he gets the most opportunity to be on the field. In Seattle’s first minicamp practice, most of Jones’ reps came as a stand-up outside linebacker.

“I think his skillset lends to trying to play a little matchup ball with him or setting another guy up. He can do a lot of things. We’ve talked about it, but we are really excited about Dre’Mont. He was in great shape today. He knew a lot of the stuff we were doing even though he hadn’t been in the building. Credit to him for staying up to speed.”

– Mike Macdonald

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Even in a season where Jones’ interior presence felt marginal, he amassed a career-high 49 combined tackles, according to Pro Football Reference. His 4.5 sacks and five tackles for loss were the second lowest of his five-year career, however.

Regardless of where things stand by the end of minicamp, Macdonald was just glad to have Jones and Williams back on the field so they could begin to gauge how they fit into the team’s developing defensive scheme.

“It’s a function of reps, conversations,” Macdonald said of developing a relationship with the two players despite limited chances to work with them in OTAs. “There are only so many texts and phone calls. That is only going to take you so long. Now that they’re here, we’ll be rolling. We got a couple more days here and then we’ll go take a breather and go back and attack it and camp.”

– Mike Macdonald

Mascots are a huge part of the fan experience in the NFL (or any sport really) for kids and adults alike, so having a memorable one can go a very long way.

According to a recent study, the Seattle Seahawks and their mascot Blitz need some help in that department.

Online Betting Guide (OLBG) recently conducted a study using the popular quiz site Sporcle, creating a series of quizzes that gave participants 90 seconds to guess mascots’ names from picture in each league (NFL, NBA, MLB, NHL and Premier League). The results showed that Blitz was the most-forgettable mascot in the NFL with just 44.9 percent of participants correctly guessing his name, which also made him the sixth-most-forgettable mascot across all the leagues studied.

On the other side of the coin, Raider Rusher of the Las Vegas Raiders was found to be the NFL’s most-memorable mascot, with 88 percent of fans correctly guessing his name. The most-memorable mascot in the study overall was Cyril the Swan of Swansea City AFC, an English Premier League team based in Wales.

Blitz has been a staple of Seahawks games since 1998, back when the team played at the Kingdome and wore royal blue full-time. He received a slight redesign in 2004 to appear more appealing to younger fans, followed by a major facelift in 2014 to better fit the Seahawks’ updated identity.

Alongside that 2014 redesign, the Seahawks also introduced Boom, a “official sidekick” to Blitz specifically designed with younger fans in mind.

Even considering all that, it apparently wasn’t enough to vault Blitz into the public consciousness.

As a consolation prize, the mascots of the other Seattle teams fared much better. Mariner Moose of the Seattle Mariners was found to be the second-most-memorable mascot in the MLB (90.6 percent recognized him), while Buoy of the Seattle Kraken was found to be the eighth-most-memorable mascot in the NHL (76.2 percent).

A few morning clouds and sprinkles turned to sunny skies in the afternoon and highs in the upper to mid 60s.

We saw only a few sprinkles early today, mainly along the coast and in the north interior. 

Rain Since Midnight Western Washington

Winds did get gusty today, especially in Central Washington. Winds peaked at around 35 mph for Seattle and almost 50 mph for Wenatchee. 

Peak Wind Gusts Since Midnight WWA

Tonight a few clouds will be around, but temperatures will be a little cooler along with calmer winds. 

Morning clouds start the day Wednesday and with weak high pressure building in quickly, skies will clear by midday. 

High temperatures will be slightly warmer, by a degree or two on Wednesday. Overall, we will still be below average. 

Skies will be nice and sunny into Wednesday afternoon. Winds will also be a lot calmer. 

The nicest day of the week is looking to be Thursday, highs in the upper 60s to low 70s. Our next round of rain moves in Friday afternoon and into the weekend. Skies will be cloudier Saturday with a chance of showers and possible thunderstorms in the afternoon around western Washington. Skies are looking a little drier for Father’s Day Sunday, but temps will still be cooler.