Imagine that, the NFL Scouting Combine approaches and trade rumors begin to heat up again. We must be talking about the Seahawks.

Let me see if I have this straight. The Seahawks don’t have a lot of cap space. They have several highly paid stars that are getting a bit older. They don’t have a lot of draft picks, either, as they traded their second round pick to the Jets for Sheldon Richardson, and their third to the Texans for Duane Brown. Obviously those picks were worth it, assuming they can re-sign Richardson.

Assuming the Seahawks draft at their current position in every round, their picks would count about $6.5 million against their already low $14.5 total cap space. They will make moves, of course, but they’ll still have a similar amount of money against the cap in rookie salary. If you want to do some searching yourself, all Seahawks cap numbers are from spotrac.com, an excellent source for a dizzying array of sports financials.

So where do they create space above that paltry left over $8 million? Cuts and trades. It’s dead certain that Jeremy Lane will be cut. He’s about 37th on the cornerback depth chart, and his departure would save about $4.7 million in cap space. Cliff Avril is another likely cap space casualty, unfortunately due to the injury that may yet end his career. Cutting Avril would save at least $6 million, if not over $7, depending on whether he’s actually able to come back to play in 2018.

That’s close to $11 million at the least. That may be enough to keep Sheldon Richardson on the squad. Yes, I linked to his stats, but they come nowhere near showing how valuable he is. Keeping him would go a long way to getting back to the playoffs in 2018. Signing Richardson eats up the space created by cutting Lane and Avril.

So what’s next? According to the usual rumors, the Seahawks could trade Richard Sherman, Earl Thomas, or both.