of the nine draft picks of the Seattle Seahawks from the 2018 NFL Draft in order to attempt to grade the most recent draft class with the benefit of a season of hindsight. So far we’ve gone through the selections of First round running back Rashaad Penny Delano Hill Color Rush Jersey ,Third round defensive end Rasheem Green, Seventh round quarterback Alex McGough, Sixth round defensive end Jacob Martin, Fifth round tackle Jamarco Jones, Fifth round punter Michael Dickson,Fifth round linebacker Shaquem Griffin and Fourth round tight end Will Dissly.That leaves just one member of the 2018 Seahawks draft class left to be evaluated, and that is obviously Cornerback Tre Flowers, a sixth round selection out of Oklahoma State University. Flowers was yet another in a not short line of college safety to professional cornerback conversion projects for Pete Carroll, following in the path of players like Eric Pinkins and Mike Tyson. However, the path for Flowers has been far different than that of Pinkins and Tyson, who never successfully made the transition to cornerback in the NFL for the Seahawks. And for those who know what they are looking at and analyzing, the selection of Flowers by the Hawks did not come as a surprise, as Field Gulls own Matty F. Brown predicted back in the spring on the morning of day three of the draft. (Author’s note: Matty may well have been correct on Wyatt Teller and Ian Thomas, but we’ll never know. Thomas, a tight end, was drafted by the Carolina Panthers in the fourth round, and with their next pick the Hawks selected Will Dissly. Teller, an offensive lineman was selected by the Buffalo Bills in the fifth round, and two picks later the Seahawks drafted Jamarco Jones. So, has anybody ever seen Tony Romo and Matty F. Brown in the same room?)Flowers, as would be expected, struggled at times during his rookie season, but he also showed enough to warrant hope for the future. Add in the fact that he played much of the season as a member of an extremely young secondary, and it is no surprise that the team struggled at times to stop opposing offenses. However, Flowers remains extremely young, as he and Shaquill Griffin team up to make a starting cornerback pair that combined is about the same age as Tom Brady. Okay Earl Thomas Color Rush Jersey , that is a bit of an exaggeration, as Brady is 41 years old, and both Griffin and Flowers are set to turn 24 later this offseason, it’s not as much of an exaggeration as one might first imagine. However, looking past just his age and his status as a conversion project, Flowers played a significant amount as a rookie in 2018. Specifically, his 903 defensive snaps were the most that any Seahawks draft pick has played on either offense or defense since Justin Britt logged 1,058 snaps as a rookie in 2014. Just to put how many snaps Flowers logged in perspective, here’s a sampling of some other recent Seahawks draft picks and how many snaps they have played since being drafted:2016 3rd Round Pick TE Nick Vannett: 890 offensive snaps2016 3rd Round Pick RB C.J. Prosise: 251 offensive snaps2016 5th Round Pick DT Quinton Jefferson: 707 defensive snaps2016 6th Round Pick C Joey Hunt: 181 offensive snaps2015 6th Round Pick LB Eric Pinkins: 5 defensive snaps2015 5th Round Pick TE Luke Willson: 2,564 offensive snaps2015 5th Round Pick CB Tye Smith: 125 defensive snaps (with the Tennessee Titans in 2017)So, that’s just a sampling of some other draft picks and how much they have contributed since being drafted. Obviously, Flowers will need to continue to show growth and development to maintain his starting role, but if he can do that and get good injury luck, there’s no reason to doubt his ability to be a long term contributor for the Seahawks.In any case, it will certainly be interesting to watch the defensive back group continue to develop in the coming seasons. The Hawks are loaded with young potential in the secondary. and after consecutive seasons of a middle of the road scoring defense it will certainly be fun to watch what Carroll can do as the league continues to move more and more towards a passing league. Regular readers are well aware that we are slowly working our way through grading each of the nine draft picks the Seattle Seahawks made in 2018 using the benefit of a season of hindsight. We have already made it two thirds of the way through the grading process, having already finished looking at the selections of First round running back Rashaad Penny,Third round defensive end Rasheem Green,Seventh round quarterback Alex McGough, Sixth round defensive end Jacob Martin,Fifth round tackle Jamarco Jones andFifth round Pro Bowl punter Michael Dickson.Now we move to the third of four fifth round selections the Seahawks held in 2018, and take a look at linebacker Shaquem Griffin. Hopefully I don’t have to go into great detail about the fact that teammate Shaquill Griffin is his twin brother, and the two are back playing together once again after the 2017 season represented the first season they did not play on the same team. Having been teammates first at Lakewood High School in St. Petersburg, FL and then together at the University of Central Florida for four years, where Shaquem redshirted for the 2013 season while Shaquill did not. (Author’s note: Just in case you were wondering how competitive high school football in Florida is, as Juniors in 2011 at Lakewood the Griffin twins were teammates with Dante Fowler of the Los Angeles Rams on a team that went 7-4 according to MaxPreps.)Getting back to Shaquem’s 2018 performance for the Seahawks, however J.R. Sweezy Color Rush Jersey , he did not get nearly the playing time on defense as some might have expected, but did play a significant role on special teams. The Hawks used Shaquem extensively on special teams, and by the end of the season only six other Hawks had accumulated more special teams snaps. On those special teams snaps he recorded five tackles, while adding another four tackles on defense, three of which were solo tackles with the last one a small assist coming from Rasheem Green. And that brings us to the discussion of Griffin’s play on defense. Shaquem was a tackling machine for the Hawks defense during the preseason, wracking up 26 tackles, including a total of 17 in the two games against the Oakland Raiders and Indianapolis Colts, however, it wasn’t all good. That tweet from Field Gulls’ own Matty F. Brown came on the day the Seahawks played against the Denver Broncos in a disappointing season opening loss, which was the only game of the season in which Shaquem started. In fact, it wasn’t just the only game he started, it ended up as the game in which he saw the majority of the defensive snaps he played all season. Here’s a table showing his defensive snap count by game over the course of the 2018 season. Shaquem Griffin 2018 defensive snap count log by gameWeekOpponentDefensive SnapsWeekOpponentDefensive SnapsNow, it doesn’t take a rocket surgeon to be able to analyze that data. Most anyone should be able to figure out that a player who was healthy and active for all 16 games and recorded 41 defensive snaps while starting Week 1 and subsequently went on to finish the season with a total of 50 defensive snaps likely didn’t play very well in that Week 1 start. Obviously the data does not shed any light on the why, and that’s what the tape is for, which is why it’s fantastic to have someone like Matty around so that he can watch the tape and I can simply piggyback off his phenomenal work. In any case, as a fifth round pick Shaquem’s ability to come in and be a special teams contributor is significant. Maybe through experience and development he can address the pursuit angle issues that showed up, and perhaps he can one day develop into a starting linebacker at the NFL level. Even if he does not however, he has already proven that he can certainly fill a role as a core member of special teams units, while serving as depth at the linebacker position. Thus, even if he never develops into a starting caliber linebacker, there’s nothing wrong with a fifth round pick developing into the next Mike Morgan, D.J. Alexander, Heath Farwell or any other depth linebacker across the NFL who is also a special teams standout. Griffin has shown he can be a contributor in the NFL, and going forward he should have plenty of opportunity to develop more of his game. Where does that leave the Seahawks grade for the pick?