Former Seahawks QB Russell Wilson finalizing deal with CBS, reports say

Russell Wilson, who quarterbacked the Seahawks to their first Super Bowl title following the 2013 season and set just about every significant team passing record in 10 years in Seattle, may be done playing football.

Reports from Front Office Sports, ESPN and the NFL Network on Monday morning all stated that Wilson is finalizing a deal to become an analyst for CBS Sports and will become part of its pregame show along with James Brown, Bill Cowher and another former Seahawk and Seattle native, Nate Burleson.

Wilson, who it had been recently reported had been in talks with CBS, is filling a spot left vacant when former Atlanta quarterback Matt Ryan left the show to return to the Falcons as the team’s president of football.

The NFL Network reported that the news does not mean Wilson is retiring but that he is taking “a pause” in his football career.

Wilson, who turns 38 in November, ended last season as a backup with the New York Giants and became a free agent in March with no rumors or reports of him signing with any other teams.

Wilson played for the Seahawks from 2012-21, leading the team to back-to-back Super Bowls in his second and third seasons in 2013 and 2014.

But his career in Seattle ended acrimoniously when he let the team know he would not re-sign another long-term contract following the 2021 season.

That helped precipitate a trade to Denver in March of 2022 for three players and five draft picks, a haul that included two future first-rounders that the Seahawks used to help build the team that won the Super Bowl last February — left tackle Charles Cross (ninth overall in 2022) and cornerback Devon Witherspoon (fifth overall, 2023).

Wilson had hoped that leaving Seattle would mean even more freedom to become more of a passing quarterback and run an offense his way while resulting in a few more Super Bowl appearances and wins to add to his legacy, a word he used often his final few years with the Seahawks.

Instead, his career stalled from the moment he left the Seahawks.

The Broncos finished 5-12 in Wilson’s first season in 2022 and 4-11 in the games he started — including a 17-16 loss at Lumen Field to open the season against the Seahawks and their new QB, Geno Smith — and Wilson was benched when the team went 7-8 in his starts in 2023 and eventually released.

He played the 2024 season in Pittsburgh and helped lead the Steelers to a 10-7 record and a wild card berth. But the Steelers lost their final four regular-season games and were beaten decisively in the playoffs, 28-14, by the Baltimore Ravens.

That led to the Steelers deciding to move on from Wilson in favor of Aaron Rodgers for 2025.

Wilson landed with the New York Giants, signing a one-year deal worth $10.5 million, where he initially got the starting nod ahead of rookie Jaxson Dart.

But the Giants lost each of their first three games with Wilson starting and he was benched before Week 4 and played only in mop-up or injury relief duty in three more games the rest of the year finishing 69 of 119 passing for 831 yards with three touchdowns and three interceptions.

The Giants decided to keep Jameis Winston as their backup for the 2026 season behind Dart, leaving Wilson’s immediate football future in limbo. He recently had a visit with the New York Jets — who recently traded for his Seahawks successor, Geno Smith — and ESPN reported “he had an offer on the table” with the Jets.

Instead, he is set to join CBS Sports and head into what could be the post-playing portion of his football career.

In Wilson’s final appearance with the Giants he was 3 of 7 for 45 yards and sacked twice in place of an injured Dart against the Bears in Chicago on Nov. 9, 2025.

If that game proves to be it for Wilson’s football career it might prove fitting.

It was in Chicago in December, 2012 where Wilson led a comeback overtime win for the Seahawks against the Bears, 23-17, a game many would point to as the moment he truly won over teammates and coaches and convinced them the team might be able to quickly reach Super Bowl status.

Wilson came to Seattle in 2012 as the 75^th overall pick of the 2012 draft out of Wisconsin, which he had led to the Rose Bowl, famously taken five spots after Jacksonville selected punter Bryan Anger.

The Seahawks’ selection of Wilson was questioned by some given that the team had just signed free agent Matt Flynn to a three-year deal worth up to $26 million with $10 million guaranteed the month before. That was one reason one draft analyst for Bleacher Report gave Seattle’s draft an F grade.

That grade would linger as part of the Wilson narrative and his “Why Not Us?” credo of proving he and the Seahawks could overcome doubters as he led them to a 13-3 record and a Super Bowl win over Denver, 43-8, in his second season.

Wilson led the Seahawks back to another Super Bowl the following season in Glendale, Ariz., against New England and had them a yard away from a second straight title — and an even greater standing in NFL immortality — before an ill-fated play call led to his pass being intercepted at the goal line by Patriot Malcolm Butler.

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The Seahawks never advanced past the divisional round again in Wilson’s final seven seasons with in Seattle.

Wilson signed four-year contract extensions with the Seahawks in 2015 and 2019 and after the latter deal — which made him the highest paid player in NFL history to that point at $40 million a year — he proclaimed “I want to be a Seahawk for life” during a celebratory news conference.

That feeling began to soften the following season when the Seahawks hit a rough patch at midseason following a 5-0 start that had Wilson considered as a front-runner for NFL MVP honors.

Wilson threw seven interceptions combined in three midseason losses that helped lead to coach Pete Carroll wanting to rein in the offense a bit more.

The season was capped by a 30-20 home loss to the Rams in a wild card game in which Wilson had one of the worst statistical outings of his career — 11 of 27 passing for 174 yards and an interception for a pick six that helped turn the game L.A.’s way.

After an offseason that featured numerous trade rumors that didn’t come to pass, leaving each side saying as the 2021 season neared that all was well, Wilson suffered a fractured middle finger on his throwing hand in a Week 5 loss to the Rams.

He missed three games, in which the Seahawks went 1-2 but in which Smith played far better than many anticipated, before returning.

Defeats in his first three games back doomed the Seahawks to a 7-10 record, the only losing season of Wilson’s career in Seattle.

That season ended on a high note — a 38-30 win against Arizona in the same Glendale stadium where he and the team had lost the Super Bowl seven years prior in which he threw for three touchdowns and ran for another.

Barely two months later, his Seahawks career was over.

Now, barely four years after leaving Seattle, his NFL career may also be over.

Regardless of how it ended, the numbers show he was the best QB in the franchise’s 50 years to date.

His team records include most career yards (37,059), most yards in a single-game (452 against Houston in 2017), best career passer rating (101.8), most attempts (4,735), most completions (3,079), most touchdown passes (292), best touchdown rating (6.2), lowest interception rate (1.8) and highest average gain per pass (7.8). He is second in completion percentage at 65.0 behind Smith’s 68.5.

He finished with an average yards per carry rushing of 5.6, second-best in Seahawks history, with 4,689 yards on 845 attempts, generally viewed as one of the best running quarterbacks in NFL history, a trait that helped give Seattle one of the most dominant running attacks in the NFL in his early years.

According to OvertheCap.com, Wilson made $315.8 million in his NFL career, fifth most to date.

Now his career is taking a turn into the broadcast booth with it unclear if he’ll ever step on a football field in an NFL game again.