Tight end Noah Fant finally healthy as he enters key season with Seahawks

RENTON, Wash. – It’s been a quiet start to a critical year for Seahawks tight end Noah Fant.

As the season is approaching, Fant says he has finally shaken off the effects of a knee injury that required offseason surgery and had him starting training camp on the physically unable to perform list. He was limited before finally getting back to full action over the last week.

“I wouldn’t be out here practicing if I wasn’t right,’’ Fant said Wednesday. “The training staff has taken care of me. (Coach) Pete (Carroll) has done a great job of helping me out and taking care of me. I’m feeling good and just trying to get all of the technique back, running the routes, and things like that.”

Now that Fant is back, the Seahawks are also seeing in action the trio of Fant, Will Dissly and Colby Parkinson they feel can make their tight-end position as productive as any in the NFL. The three ranked third as a group in the NFL last year with a combined 110 receptions and 1,164 yards and fourth in touchdowns with 10.

Sharing the load meant that Fant saw a drop in his stats from his previous two seasons in Denver, with whom he played before being dealt to the Seahawks as part of the Russell Wilson trade.

After averaging 65 receptions and 671.5 yards the previous two years with the Broncos, Fant had 50 catches for 486 yards in his first season with the Seahawks, while tying a career high in touchdowns with four.

He’s entering the final year of his contract – a fifth-year option for first-round picks that the Seahawks picked up before he ever played a game with them in spring 2022 – that will pay him a guaranteed $6.85 million (Fant was eligible for the option as the 20th overall pick in 2019).

That the Seahawks enacted the option before he played a game indicated confidence in what he can do. But it also means he now is facing free agency at the end of the season.

“It’s something that’s real; it’s there,’’ Fant said of pending free agency. But he said he’ll try not to make that cause him to worry about his numbers.

“My biggest focus is to make as many blocks as possible, catch as many passes as possible and break as many tackles,’’ he said. “That’ll put me in a good position if I’m able to do those things. All of the rest, some things are out of my control and some things are in my control. I just have to take advantage of my opportunities on the field and go from there.”

And Fant, who is just 25 years old, is hardly alone in the tight-end room in facing a season critical for his future. Parkinson is also entering the final year of his rookie contract, while Dissly is in the second year of a three-year, $24 million contract he signed in March 2022, but one that contains no guaranteed money beyond this season.

Fant said the focus of the players in the room is firmly on the present.

“I think the cohesion in our room is good,’’ Fant said. “I think we all like playing and having fun with each other. I think it’s one of those things where we all are just looking forward to having another year together and going from there.”