Gregg Bell
The News Tribune
The Seahawks are choosing the familiar to back-fill at safety after Earl Thomas’ season-ending injury.
They announced Wednesday morning they signed veteran safety Maurice Alexander in time for the former Los Angeles Rams starter to play on Sunday against his former team at CenturyLink Field.
Seattle also signed ex-Indianapolis Colts safety T.J. Green. He has played in 31 of 32 games the last two seasons, starting 11. He played both free and strong safety for the Colts.
The Seahawks also promoted former University of Washington tight end Darrell Daniels from their practice squad. That was one day after the team put rookie tight end Will Dissly on injured reserve because of a knee injury that needs surgery.
The Seahawks signed Alexander, 27, this spring as a free agent. He was the Rams’ starting strong safety until they benched him for a game against the Seahawks last season. Los Angeles waived him in October. Injuries during the offseason and through most of August limited Alexander’s chances to win, though he was the Seahawks’ first-team strong safety for some training-camp practices the first week of August.
Interestingly for right now, Seattle’s coaches moved him to weakside linebacker in late August, when veteran Pro Bowl starter K.J. Wright went off for arthroscopic knee surgery at the end of the preseason.
“It does help us. He’s got a lot of flexibility in that he can play ‘will’ (weakside linebacker) and safety,” coach Pete Carroll said Aug. 30, minutes after Alexander played linebacker for the first time in Seattle’s final preseason game, against Oakland. “He really seemed to take it right off the bat, and he looked comfortable and made a couple hits and looked good in coverage. That’s a really good start. I’m going to need to see the film to really detect what there is to uncover there. But, he did a good job for us. We’re fired up to see that.”
Two days later, Seattle cut Alexander while announcing its first 53-man roster for the regular season. Four days after that, Thomas ended his holdout, and the need for Alexander had passed.
That need is back.
Thomas went on injured reserve Tuesday. The Seahawks learned Tuesday that the league suspended Mychal Kendricks, Wright’s replacement the last three games, for insider trading. Wright is still not back from his knee surgery, and Carroll said this week his veteran may not be available again Sunday against the Rams. So Alexander becomes an option there.
He’s also a primary option at strong safety. That would move the versatile, now-indispensable Bradley McDougald from strong to free safety to start for Thomas against Los Angeles. The Seahawks see McDougald as almost equally skilled at both safety spots.
Alexander’s arrival shows they may not be so keen on 2017 draft choice Tedric Thompson making his first career start at free safety against the high-flying Rams offense.
