Seahawks Sign Guard Chester Pitts to One-Year Deal

According to ESPN’s Adam Schefter, the Seattle Seahawks have signed free agent guard Chester Pitts to a one-year deal worth a maximum of $2 million. Pitts is coming off a season in which he missed 14 games due to a knee injury, and saw his suitors severely thinned out because of it.

But for only $2 million, the Seahawks are taking very little risk and have made a great move to shore up a line that, overall, is looking very shaky heading into the 2010 season.

For such a small amount, it’s a wonder why a team like the Washington Redskins, who recently lost Mike Williams for the season due to blood clots in his legs, wouldn’t go after an established veteran like Pitts. Up until Pitts’ injury, he had not missed a game in eight seasons.

It’s just another strong move in an offseason of strong moves for the Seahawks, but they still don’t figure to be contenders in 2010. Their new head coach, Pete Carrol, is going to have to deal with the distraction of cheating allegations stemming from his time at USC, and they still have question marks on the offensive and defensive lines, as well as at quarterback.

Pitts will likely start off by blocking for Matt Hasselbeck but could wind up blocking for Charlie Whitehurts, a restricted free agent pickup from the Chargers, by the end of the season.

In another interesting nugget, Schefter is reporting that Pitts shares an agent with the Seahawks second first-round pick, Earl Thomas — so Thomas could be the next first-round pick to sign and hopefully speed up this painfully slow process.