According to Smith, he felt as if Seattle's offer had too many "escape hatches" to get out of the contract. We at Seahawks Wire theorized this may have been a contributing reason why Smith declined the Seahawks' deal, considering how Sam Darnold's contract gives the team similar ways to escape it.

When the details of Geno Smith’s contract with the Raiders were revealed last week it raised a question — why couldn’t he have agreed to the same deal in Seattle?