Examining How John Benton’s Hiring May Impact Seahawks’ Offensive Line Personnel
Reuniting with offensive coordinator Klint Kubiak, long-time NFL offensive line coach John Benton agreed to join the Seattle Seahawks coaching staff for the 2025 season.
In the process of a substantial staff overhaul that started with the dismissal of former offensive coordinator Ryan Grubb after just one season in early January, coach Mike Macdonald and the Seattle Seahawks have quickly starting filling numerous holes with quality assistants to pair with new play caller Klint Kubiak, prioritizing continuity with coaches he previously has worked with.
Among those expected to join forces with Kubiak in the Pacific Northwest, the Seahawks reportedly hired long-time NFL offensive line coach John Benton, who coached with Kubiak on the Saints last season and previously worked for Kubiak’s father Gary with the Texans from 2006 to 2013. Offering 21 years of experience as an offensive line coach in the league, his units have consistently paved the way for top-10 rushing attacks, including three consecutive seasons in Houston from 2010 to 2012 and 2019 in San Francisco.
Given that track record both in terms of familiarity with Kubiak’s offensive scheme as well as his success building stellar run blocking offensive lines, it shouldn’t be viewed as a surprise that Benton emerged as an early front runner to replace Scott Huff in Seattle. And with his arrival coinciding with an offensive system that differs quite a bit from the one Grubb employed, especially considering how much the Seahawks struggled in the trenches in the run blocking as well as pass protection departments last season, significant changes likely loom as free agency and the 2025 NFL Draft approach.
Looking back at Benton’s history, particularly when he has coached in a Kubiak system in Houston and New Orleans, what does his addition to the coaching staff potentially mean for Seattle’s upcoming decisions along the offensive line? And which players currently on the roster could be on the way out due to poor fit?
If there’s been one aspect to count on with Benton over the years, his offensive lines have thrived in zone-centric schemes, which comes with the territory working under Kubiak and current 49ers coach Kyle Shanahan. Dating back to 2014 when Pro Football Focus first started charting zone and gap runs, over the course of 10 seasons, his units have blocked zone concepts north of 60 percent of the time eight times, including at an 83.5 percent clip with the Dolphins in 2014 and a 78.3 percent clip with the 49ers in 2017.
Over the years, the Shanahan and Kubiak systems have been built around wide zone runs as the bread and butter concept in their rushing attack, as Seattle knows all too well getting frequently gashed by San Francisco on the ground for much of the past decade. For this scheme to be successful, athleticism stands out as an obvious prerequisite along the offensive line, particularly at the guard positions where blockers are often asked to make difficult reach blocks on 3-tech defensive tackles on the play side and 1-tech nose tackles from the backside, requiring elite lateral quickness to be able to execute these assignments predicated on beating an opponent to a spot rather than bullying them in a gap.
At the tackle positions, at least athletically, Seattle looks to have the right personnel to excel in Kubiak’s offense and be natural fits for Benton to coach up. Coming out of Mississippi State in 2022, Charles Cross scored an average 7.56 Relative Athletic Score, but that number is quite misleading. His lack of size lowered the overall score, but his movement skills stood out as elite for his position group, as he ran the 40-yard dash in 4.95 seconds and posted an excellent 4.61-second short shuttle time, demonstrating explosiveness and lateral quickness desired for a zone-heavy offense. Third-round pick Abraham Lucas scored even better overall, running a blazing 1.69 10-yard split with a 4.4 second short shuttle and 7.25 second 3-cone drill.
Even the Seahawks’ backups at the tackles spot seem to be adequate fits, as second-year blocker Mike Jerrell equaled Lucas with a 1.69 10-yard split and posted a fantastic 32 1/2-inch vertical jump coming out of Division II Findlay. A former basketball player, veteran George Fant also dominated in vertical and broad jump drills at his pro day workout years ago, and while he may have lost a step at this stage of his career, he’s still an above average athlete and previously played for Benton with the Jets, so he should know the system inside and out from that experience.
However, while the tackle spots actually look to be in decent shape, Seattle will inevitably have difficult decisions to make at the guard positions where personnel may not be as well-equipped to succeed in Kubiak’s offense. Neither veteran Laken Tomlinson nor third-year blocker Anthony Bradford - who each started at least 10 games for the Seahawks last season - possess the ideal athletic traits for a wide zone-heavy scheme. The former posted a subpar 4.51 Relative Athletic Score back in 2013 and now has 10 years of tread on his tires, while the latter didn’t test well two years ago in agility drills with pedestrian short shuttle and 3-cone times.
On the field, per Pro Football Focus grades, Tomlinson has not scored well as a zone blocker, including ranking 40th and 47th among qualified guards in 2023 and 2022 with the Jets. As for Bradford, the 330-pound mauler didn’t fare much better, ranking 61st and a slightly better 35th in zone blocking grade in his two seasons while also struggling with holding penalties due to his struggles staying in front of defenders.
Interestingly, Benton served as New York’s offensive line coach during the two years Tomlinson played there, so like Fant, there is some familiarity there between the incoming coach and the veteran if Seattle opts to re-sign him. But it’s debatable whether either he or Bradford could get the job done in Kubiak’s offense with their lack of ideal athletic traits, which creates the question of whether 2024 draft picks Christian Haynes and Sataoa Laumea could be better in-house solutions.
Drafted in the third round out of Connecticut, Haynes arrived with lofty expectations as a potential day one starter after garnering All-American honors in his final two college seasons. But he apparently didn’t do enough on the practice field to earn more opportunities from Grubb and Huff, as he failed to seize the right guard job from Bradford during an ongoing competition in the first two months of the season and Laumea wound up replacing an injured Bradford for the final six games instead, resulting in him playing a grand total of 167 snaps as a rookie with no starts.
If there’s reason for optimism with Haynes, he tested quite well at the NFL combine last spring, including a 1.75 second 10-yard split and a 33-inch vertical jump. On film, he has demonstrated the light feet and lateral movement skills to be a quality zone blocker in limited opportunities, and it may be a better fit for him to be in a system that leans more heavily on those concepts rather than gap schemes relying on power. Laumea isn’t as twitchy as his second-year peer, but he has shown enough quicks to get to the second level on screens and off combo blocks, which suggests he could translate well to a zone-heavy system with development.
Thinking big picture, despite Seattle’s obvious struggles up front in 2024, Benton has some intriguing pieces to work with and mold, starting with the return of Cross and a healthy Lucas, who should benefit from a healthy offseason for the first time since entering the league. Haynes, Laumea, and centers Olu Oluwatimi and Jalen Sundell also check off plenty of boxes traits-wise that will appeal to the new coaching staff.
With that said, the Seahawks cannot afford to sleep walk through this offseason without pursuing clear upgrade options through free agency and the draft. While continuity should be valued as always with the offensive line and Benton won’t want to inherit a line with a bunch of new pieces that aren’t used to playing together, finding a superior veteran fit for the scheme to thrust into one of the starting guard spots and potentially adding another high-ceiling tackle to the mix must be starting points on the agenda to maximize chances of building a quality line both short and long-term.
