INDIANAPOLIS — Any uncertainty whether free agent center Austin Blythe would return to the Seahawks in 2023 ended Tuesday when he announced his retirement.
The 30-year-old Blythe took to social media to make the news public with a statement ending “retirement here we come!”
“The last 7 years have been nothing short of amazing,” Blythe wrote in an Instagram post. “For a short, unathletic, undersized kid from Iowa, I’ve played a lot of football, met countless coaches and teammates that I can call friends, and made enough memories for myself and my family to last a lifetime. I am so grateful, and extremely blessed, to have played the game for any amount of time, let alone 7 years.”
Blythe began his career with the Colts in 2016 and then started 48 games for the Rams from 2017-2020, including the Super Bowl following the 2018 season, before spending a year with the Chiefs in which injuries held him to playing in four games in a reserve role.
Blythe was unclear if he would continue with football before the Seahawks signed him to a one-year, $4 million deal last March, reuniting him with offensive-line coach Andy Dickerson and offensive coordinator Shane Waldron, who had been coaches with the Rams during his time there.
Seahawks coach Pete Carroll noted Tuesday when he talked to reporters at the NFL combine that Blythe “was ready to get out of football,” before signing with Seattle a year ago.
“Our guys who knew him kind of convinced him that he would have fun,” Carroll said.
Indeed, Blythe had a bounce-back year with the Seahawks, starting all 17 regular-season games and the playoff loss to the 49ers.
“Austin had a really nice year for us last year and did a good job for us,” Carroll said.
But Blythe was set to become a free agent on March 15, and his future with the team was unclear.
Carroll, in fact, said he had a message from Blythe that he needed to return discussing his future.
“Matter of fact, I’ve got to call on my phone that I’ve got to see what’s the update just from last night,” Carroll said. “I haven’t talked to him yet.”
Carroll said that Blythe had told them earlier that “he is interested in coming back.”
But Blythe instead is now moving on.
“He had a great time,” Carroll said. “He loved being here and all that. To the point when we left, he said, ‘If I’ve got to end my football career, I’m really grateful that it ended on this kind of a note with this kind of a team.’ So it was really positive.”
Not only is Blythe now retired, but his backup a year ago, Kyle Fuller, can also be a free agent, leaving Seattle with a significant hole to fill in the middle of its offensive line.
“We’ve got to get the center thing figured out,” Carroll said.
Seattle does have Joey Hunt, who ended last season on the practice squad and signed a futures deal in January. Hunt started 11 games for the Seahawks from 2016-19 after being taken in the sixth round out of Texas Christian in 2016, and then spending the 2020 and 2021 seasons with the Colts before returning to Seattle.
The good news is that Seattle appears pretty set at its other four offensive-line spots with left tackle Charles Cross and right tackle Abraham Lucas returning for their second seasons after impressive rookie years in 2022. The team recently re-signed right guard Phil Haynes, who shared that spot last year with veteran Gabe Jackson, and left guard Damien Lewis is under contract for one more season.
“How rare it’s been that we’ve had this many guys that have started that we know can play all coming back and they’re healthy and ready to go,” Carroll said. “So we’re going to try to bank on that.”
Haynes re-signed earlier this month to a one-year, $4 million deal that has led to speculation that Jackson could be cut, which would save the team $6.5 million against the salary cap.
Carroll didn’t seem to dissuade the idea the signing of Haynes could lead to a release of Jackson, saying, “It was important. All of those decisions take into account a lot of stuff, you know, might not just be that guy, that spot, but the potential and other aspects of building your offense and what you got to do and creating to see in the draft and all that. That was a really important deal for us.”