Seahawks notes: Cornerback Quinton Dunbar’s season over, leaving his future in Seattle uncertain

SEATTLE – Quinton Dunbar’s rocky first year with the Seahawks is over, as head coach Pete Carroll said Wednesday that the cornerback will undergo knee surgery and won’t return this season.

Dunbar can become an unrestricted free agent, so it’s possible his first year with the Seahawks could also be his last, especially because they have found an able replacement at right cornerback in D.J. Reed.

Dunbar was acquired from Washington in March for a fifth-round draft pick. He was coming off a 2019 season in which many thought he had played at a Pro Bowl level before missing five games because of a hamstring injury.

Dunbar played just six games this season, and it was a year that went off track from the start.

Dunbar was charged in May in connection with an armed robbery in Florida. All charges were dropped, but he was placed on the NFL commissioner’s exempt list and missed the first 2½ weeks of training camp.

After arriving, he battled knee issues, playing every snap in only one game (a loss at Arizona). He was inactive for two early games and after struggling to make it through a game at Buffalo was placed on injured reserve Nov. 19.

Dunbar returned to practice two weeks ago, with the Seahawks hoping he could play again.

“He’s going to get his knee fixed,” Carroll said. “He just couldn’t make the turn. He tried really hard the last couple weeks, and he just can’t get over the hump on it.”

Dunbar allowed a passer rating of 111.0 in his six games, almost double the 61.2 he gave up in 2019 with Washington, according to Pro Football Reference. He allowed 35 completions on 54 targets for 491 yards and four touchdowns.

Reed has started the past three games at right cornerback and figures to remain there. The Seahawks also reported that Tre Flowers returned to practice Wednesday after being on IR because of a hamstring injury. Flowers has started seven games this season and was the starter at right cornerback the previous two years.

Carroll said this week that Reed “deserves” to keep playing, and he seems likely to remain in the starting role. Reed has allowed a passer rating of just 78.7 this season and recorded his second interception of the season in Sunday’s 20-15 win at Washington.

Washington turned the draft pick it received for Dunbar into linebacker Khaleke Hudson of Michigan. Hudson had played only one defensive snap all season before starting Sunday’s game against the Seahawks because of injuries to other players. He had eight tackles.

Dunbar wanted out of Washington after making it clear he was unhappy with his contract. He had a $3.25 million base salary for this year.

The assumption when the Seahawks traded for him was that they were likely to want to re-sign the 28-year-old Dunbar and make him a long-term fixture in the secondary, some thinking a secondary that featured Dunbar and Shaquill Griffin at cornerback and Jamal Adams and Quandre Diggs at safety could be among the best in the NFL.

That quartet started just two games together this season – the first two.

Dunbar’s injury-riddled season and the emergence of Reed could change the Seahawks’ thoughts on what it wants to do with the secondary in the future. Reed remains under contract through the 2021 season on his rookie contract signed when he was drafted in the fifth round by the 49ers in 2018, and he is due to make a $920,000 base salary next year.

With Griffin a free agent and Seattle expected to offer an extension to Adams, the Seahawks could use a bargain starter in the secondary. They may have found it in Reed, especially with Flowers also under contract through the 2021 season on his rookie deal. Diggs is also under contract through 2021.

“It felt like from the day he got here he wasn’t 100%,” Seattle defensive coordinator Ken Norton Jr. said. “ … You can tell he’s got some really special stuff about him. He was just unable to continue it over a long period of time.”