The Seattle Seahawks recently lavished star Jaxon Smith-Njigba with a four-year, $168.6 million contract extension, making him the highest-paid wide receiver in football. The Seahawks selected JSN with the 20th overall pick in the 2023 NFL Draft, he blossomed into one of the best players in the league at his position and so the Seahawks rewarded him with a major deal.

Their next priority is coming to a similar agreement with the No. 5 overall pick in the same draft -- cornerback Devon Witherspoon. Like Smith-Njigba, Witherspoon has become one of the best players in the league at his position, and he deserves to be rewarded. The Seahawks and Witherspoon, however, are not yet close to coming to an agreement, according to ESPN.

Still, it makes sense that the Seahawks would make this their top priority. Witherspoon is a star at a premium position: He has made the Pro Bowl in each of his three NFL seasons, and in 2025, earned a Second Team All-Pro label.

He is also coming off one of the most impactful performances of his career in Seattle's Super Bowl LX romp over the New England Patriots. Witherspoon collected four tackles, including one for loss, as well as a sack, three quarterback hits and a pass defensed on a play that could have resulted in a Patriots touchdown had he not gotten his hands on the ball. He also had a strip-sack overturned and changed to an interception on a play where Uchenna Nwosu took the ball to the house for a game-sealing score. 

He's extension-eligible heading into his fourth year, and the market value for top cornerbacks is likely to only increase as the years go by. It's already gone up this offseason, with new Los Angeles Rams cornerback Trent McDuffie surpassing the deals signed by Derek Stingley Jr. and Sauce Gardner, who previously reset the market above the top deals for players at the position by several million dollars per year. 

Perhaps complicating the issue of Witherspoon's extension is the fact that another star cornerback -- the Patriots' Christian Gonzalez -- is also eligible for a new deal, and the two players share the same agency. There is speculation that the two negotiations may be connected, according to ESPN. This is similar to the dynamic when CeeDee Lamb and Justin Jefferson were negotiating contract extensions a couple of offseasons ago, though those two players didn't share an agency.

Seattle, of course, has more than enough time to work out a new contract with Witherspoon. He's only in the fourth year of his rookie contract, and Seattle picked up his fifth-year option for the 2027 season. Whenever he signs, Witherspoon is likely to receive the richest contract in cornerback history. Getting that done sooner rather than later is certainly preferable for the Seahawks, and it would be advisable to work out a deal ahead of this coming campaign -- even if it takes until later this summer to get it done.