Amid Lofty Expectations, Byron Murphy II Eager to Elevate Game to New Level for Seahawks in Year 3
RENTON, Wash. - Mere weeks after the Seattle Seahawks shelled out record-breaking money to cornerback Devon Witherspoon, on the heels of a similar market resetting contract for Jaxon Smith-Njigba back in March, John Schneider doesn’t want Byron Murphy II thinking about his own financial prospects just yet.
After all, with his third season with the organization set to begin in a couple weeks, Schneider and the front office can’t even negotiate with the 2024 first round pick until next spring. When asked about Eagles defensive tackle Jalen Carter’s recent contract and if Murphy has been paying attention to the market at his position, the reigning Executive of the Year could be heard jeering the reporter with a loud “wow” as he walked into the building from the practice field, jokingly expressing his distaste with the question bringing up something still many months down the road.
Dishing out a response that Schneider will appreciate, coming off a breakout sophomore season where he emerged as one of the top defensive linemen in the league, Murphy pivoted away from talking at all about a future contract, shifting back to the present and gearing up for the regular season.
“It’s cool to see, but I’m not worried about that right now,” Murphy smiled after briefly sharing a laugh with Schneider from behind the podium. “I’m focusing on me, focusing on what’s happening right now as far as training camp and going into the season.”
While Murphy may not be delving into the prospects of earning $40 million per year and becoming the latest massive contract on Seattle’s books for young stars, at least publicly, the franchise already has started to brace for that possibility behind the scenes, even if Schneider doesn’t want that conversation started just yet. On the way to a Super Bowl win last season, he and teammate Leonard Williams became the only defensive tackle pair on the same team in the league to surpass seven sacks and 50 pressures apiece, wreaking constant havoc on opposing quarterbacks while also being stalwart’s for the NFL’s top run defense.
After posting such impressive numbers and earning a few All-Pro votes for the first time in his young career, if the 23-year-old Murphy meets the insanely high expectations being bestowed on him in year three by everyone from guard Grey Zabel to coach Mike Macdonald this summer, there’s no question he’s going to take the top off the defensive market next spring.
Following a padded training camp practice where Seattle’s offensive linemen couldn’t keep Murphy out of the backfield, including Zabel getting whipped by him twice in the 1-on-1 competition drill, the second-year left guard couldn’t stop raving about his teammate’s unique skill set and what makes him so difficult to block.
“How long do you got, and where do I start?” Zabel asked in regard to what makes Murphy special. “I think Byron wins the leverage battle right away. He’s got the strength to bull rush, he’s got the quickness to go side to side. He’s got the ability to bend if he needs to get to an edge or bend a corner. You allow him to really get outside of that A-gap and play as like a three-technique and give him a two-way go or a three-way go with his strength if he wants to bull rush. It’s a guy that I don’t think there’s a ceiling on what he can do. And I think last year what was so cool to see what he did was he was really just in the A-gap for most of the time.”
As Zabel noted, Murphy managed to dramatically improve his pass rushing production from his rookie season for the Seahawks despite actually seeing a slight uptick in snaps playing the A-gap as a nose tackle. After playing 14.4% of his defensive line snaps at the nose spot in 2024, that number jumped north of 15.8% in regular season and playoff games in 2025, according to Pro Football Focus.
Even with that significant workload reduced inside, Murphy’s sack numbers ballooned from 0.5 as a rookie to seven last season, tying with Williams and Uchenna Nwosu for the team lead. In addition, his quarterback hit total skyrocketed from two to 13 and his Pass Rush Win Rate (12.3%) ranked 14th among qualified defensive tackles, a few spots higher than Williams and more than a full percent better than Carter. He saved his best for last with two sacks and five pressures against the Patriots in Super Bowl LX, dominating from start to finish against a beleaguered offensive line that had no answers for slowing him down.
For as well as Murphy played hunting down quarterbacks, Macdonald believes the former Texas standout has just started scratching the surface of his game-wrecking potential in the pass rushing department, and early returns have backed up that sentiment on the practice field with him giving Seattle’s offensive line constant fits with his blend of raw power and elite quickness.
"I really expect Murph to have a spike in productivity rushing the passer," Macdonald said on July 30 after Seattle’s first padded practice. "He's earned it, but he does it every year, and it's great work for our offensive line. He is in a great spot.”
As far as the biggest reason to buy what Macdonald is selling in regard to another breakout of sorts for Murphy, beyond the simple fact that he’s still not even 24 years old, look no further than how he has been deployed during training camp by the Seahawks’ coaching staff.
While Murphy played plenty of snaps at the 3-tech defensive tackle role last year and blossomed on his way to career numbers across the board, the player mentioned on Tuesday that he has been getting plenty of opportunities to rush from wider alignments during the summer, which plays to his strengths as a penetrator and cuts down on the number of double teams he faces compared to when he lines up shading the center or A-gap at the nose role. Seeing more one-on-one blocks like the ones he has shredded at the VMAC since camp opened would be incredibly advantageous and make life that much tougher on opposing quarterbacks with constantly collapsing pockets.
Still anticipating that he will play around the same percentage of nose tackle reps due to his stoutness handling double teams at the point of attack and the problems he creates for offensive lines as a run defender reduced inside, Murphy welcomes both opportunities as a pass rushing threat along with the occasional snap playing out wide as a 5-tech defensive end, now having a more polished skill set and understanding for how to attack blockers from every alignment.
“At the 3-tech, you have a lot of space, so you have a lot more opportunities. You can win in the B gap, you can win B to A. You can mix it up from the 3,” Murphy explained. “But from the nose standpoint, it’s pretty hard because you have the center and the guard right there, so you’re pretty much rushing [against] two. You can hardly get any one-on-ones when you’re rushing at the nose. It’s a bit difficult. You have to be tight with your rushes and have your hands ready when you’re at the nose position. Also, everything happens quicker at the nose position. It’s pretty challenging, but I’m going to find a way and manage to get the job done.”
Historically speaking, dating back to 2006 when quarterback hits officially started being tracked, Murphy became the 13th defensive tackle to produce at least seven sacks and 13 quarterback hits in his second NFL season. Past precedent suggest trying to match those numbers in year three will be quite difficult, as according to Pro Football Reference charting, of the previous 12 players to achieve the feat, only one player - former Bengals star Geno Atkins - equaled or increased his sack total and only four equaled or surpassed their quarterback hit totals from the year prior.
On average, with Buccaneers defensive tackle Calijah Kancey coming with an asterisk after only playing in three games last year due to injury, those 12 defensive tackles saw their sack numbers dip by 2.875 and quarterback hits drop by 3.5 from year two to year three. Even without accounting for Kancey’s injury-influenced plunge, both totals decline by close to 2.5 compared to the prior season.
With that said, as long as Murphy can avoid injury and stay healthy, it can be argued that he has as strong of a supporting cast around him as any of the previous 12 players who hit those numbers in their sophomore seasons. That talent could ultimately cost him in the sack department with so many mouths to feed, but at the same time, playing next to Williams, Jarran Reed, and ascending second-year player Rylie Mills along with the array of rushers Seattle can throw at teams each week off the edge should make it far trickier for opponents to double team him regardless of alignment, setting up ideal single block opportunities to feast on.
If the summer has been any indication with Murphy regularly stealing the lunch money from a talented young guard like Zabel, the weight of expectations aren’t having any impact on the rising star, who continues to lean on the veterans around him chasing edges to further refine and bolster his toolbox while also expanding his own leadership presence. Playing for a unit with most of the starters returning from the Seahawks’ Super Bowl squad, the sky truly could be the limit for him, a scary proposition for the rest of the NFC as they try to figure out how to neutralize him and a front line with a “lot of dogs” ready to hunt in the trenches.
“They’ve helped me take my game to a whole other level. Having them guys, it gives me a lot of confidence in my play and the ability to go play free and not have to worry about anything because I know they have my back and I have theirs.”
