Seahawks make Jaxon Smith-Njigba NFL’s highest-paid receiver

The Seahawks made quick work Monday of one of their biggest offseason objectives — securing the services of receiver Jaxon Smith-Njigba for the long haul.

The Seahawks and Smith-Njigba agreed to a four-year extension that keeps him under contract through the 2031 season, The Seattle Times confirmed. That makes him the highest-paid receiver in NFL history, the highest-paid Seahawk in franchise history and the highest-paid non-quarterback in NFL history.

The four-year extension is worth up to $168.6 million overall, or $42.15 million per season. Russell Wilson had been the highest-paid player in team history at $35 million per year on the last deal he signed with the Seahawks in 2019.

That’s a new-money average almost $2 million more than the previous record for a non-quarterback — receiver Ja’Marr Chase of the Bengals, who signed a four-year deal last March that averaged $40.4 million per year.

Smith-Njigba’s new contract includes $69.13 million fully guaranteed at signing.

The news of the agreement broke just three days after the team announced on Friday it was picking up an option for the 2027 season on Smith-Njigba’s initial rookie contract that paid him an average of $3.6 million per year. He was set to make just over $23 million in 2027 with the fifth-year option.

The new contract enveloped those years and added four more and in essence means Smith-Njigba can now make $195.1 million over the next six years, or an average of $32.5 million.

It’s a deal that one NFL salary cap expert, Jason Fitzgerald of OvertheCap.com, called “truly stunning’’ in how it allowed Smith-Njigba to leapfrog the receiver market.

“While many will paint this as a modest jump from Ja’Marr Chase’s $40.4 million to $42.15 million per year, the reality is far bigger,’’ Fitzgerald wrote. “The cash commitment from the Seahawks is truly stunning in this contract. What I consider his “year 0” salary (his raise over his existing rookie contract salary) is a gigantic $42.65 million. The other high end players on the market are all around $18 to $11 million.’’

Fitzgerald noted further that Smith-Njigba will make $62.5 million in the first year of the contract, meaning salary and bonuses paid for this season and next. That’s roughly $9 million more than Chase.

“This again sets new high water marks compared to the rest of the market both in terms of overall salary and salary paid as a percentage of the total contract value,’’ Fitzgerald wrote, concluding that “this is a really strong player contract that really moves the needle for the receiver market as the next group of players gets ready for an extension.’’

Teams around the league who also have young receivers they need to extend may have winced once the final numbers were in, notably the Los Angeles Rams, who are tasked with re-signing their standout wideout Puka Nacua.

While Smith-Njigba led the NFL in yards receiving this year at 1,973, Nacua — who missed one game due to injury — led the league in yards per game at 107.2 to JSN’s 105.5 and may want a slightly richer contract, as well.

That Seattle got its deal done with Smith-Njigba before the Rams could extend Nacua — each entered the league in 2023 and each is now 24 years old — was called “a smart move’’ by Fitzgerald in not letting L.A.’s deal set any precedents the Seahawks would have to match.

Besides making life potentially more difficult for their NFC West rivals, getting the deal done early shows Seattle’s commitment both to Smith-Njigba and to the goal of keeping its Super Bowl core intact.

It had been clear for a while now that re-signing Smith-Njigba and cornerback Devon Witherspoon — who is now next up to get a megadeal — was a priority.

That became evident in how the Seahawks had treated their offseason so far, spending significantly only on other re-signings — such as left tackle Charles Cross in July and receiver Rashid Shaheed earlier this month — to save both cash and cap space for JSN and Witherspoon.

Via OvertheCap.com, the structure of JSN’s deal means his cap hit for 2026 will only go up about $5.8 million, to $10.3 million, dropping the Seahawks to about $28 million in effective cap space. But it drops the 2027 cap hit that would have existed on the fifth-year option by more than $8 million, which will help make room for Witherspoon, before increasing from there, peaking at $50.3 million in 2031.

The signing also somewhat bucked Seattle’s usual routine of waiting until deeper into the summer to complete significant extensions, many of which were usually finished shortly before or during the opening week of training camp.

But that seemed to only further reinforce the importance of getting the deal done, while also seeming to validate the claims of general manager John Schneider and coach Mike Macdonald that everything is “business as usual’’ while the team is up for sale.

Consider the Seahawks solidifying a big part of their future — with maybe more to come — as a nice parting gift from Jody Allen.

Needing to re-sign Smith-Njigba to a rich extension this offseason, of course, was the goal when he was selected 20^th overall in the 2023 draft as the first receiver overall.

Smith-Njigba, coming off a final season at Ohio State in which he played just three games due to a hamstring injury, eased into things as a rookie while playing as the third receiver behind Tyler Lockett and DK Metcalf.

But he began to prove himself as a true No. 1 receiver in 2024 when he essentially surpassed Lockett on the depth chart and caught 100 passes — tying Lockett’s team record.

That breakthrough allowed the Seahawks to feel that much more comfortable making what was a long-anticipated move to cut Lockett last March and get out of a big cap hit in what would have been the final year of his contract in 2025, and then to trade Metcalf when it became apparent that he was serious about wanting out and being unlikely to sign an extension.

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If possible, Smith-Njigba delivered even more than the Seahawks could have hoped for in 2025 both in on-field production and in how he represented the team off the field and his locker room presence.

He spent much of the season on pace to set the all-time NFL record for receiving yards in a season before tailing off late in the year, during a time when the offensive focus also shifted a bit to the Kenneth Walker III-led rushing attack.

Smith-Njigba, though, hardly seemed bothered.

“He’s one of the most unselfish guys on this team,’’ fellow receiver Jake Bobo said late in the season.

And if anyone was left wondering how Smith-Njigba might perform in big games — which there seemed little reason to considering his Ohio State résumé — he answered in full when he caught 10 passes for 153 yards and a TD in the NFC title game win over the Rams.

A few days later he was named as the NFL’s Offensive Player of the Year, only the second Seahawk ever (the other being Shaun Alexander in 2005) to win the award.

Last month, Smith-Njigba said in an interview with Dallas TV station WFAA he felt he deserved to be the highest-paid player at his position.

But there was no drama in getting an extension done.