Seattle Seahawks defensive end Jadeveon Clowney becomes an unrestricted free agent this offseason, and he let it be known he is looking for one thing in a new team: a solid shot at a Super Bowl ring.
The Seahawks fell short of that goal this year, losing 28-23 to the Green Bay Packers in the NFC divisional round on Sunday night.
“I just want to win,” he said after the game, per ESPN. “I’m trying to get to the Super Bowl by any means. That’s what I’m looking for: Who’s going to get me there? I ain’t looking to get on no sorry team. … That ain’t going to fly. I ain’t gonna put my body through all of that just to lose no 16 games, go home with my check. I’d hate that, so that ain’t what I’m doing. So if I can’t win no Super Bowl, I ain’t going to no team that can’t win.”
The former No. 1 overall draft pick spent his first five NFL seasons with the Houston Texans, who traded him to Seattle in August. The Seahawks agreed not to put the franchise or transition tag on him, allowing him to explore free agency.
He played much of the season through a core-muscle injury sustained in Week 10. He could have surgery for the injury, which he decided to put off in the season.
“They tell me every week: ‘Thank you for not quitting on us and not giving up.’ I said, ‘Y’all ain’t never got to worry about that with me,'” he said of his teammates. “If I can go, I’m going to go. That’s what it is. If I was able to go the rest of the season, fight for them, I was going to fight for them.”
Clowney played on a one-year, $15 million deal this season. He appeared in 13 games and made 31 tackles and had three sacks, regular-season lows since his rookie season in 2014, when he played in just four games.
The Seahawks likely will make a run at keeping Clowney, who turns 27 next month, but he was far from committal on Sunday night.
“It’s been great,” he said of his Seattle season. “It’s been great. Great experience. I met a great group of guys. I just told them, ‘I appreciate everyone in this locker room because I didn’t know how it was going to go when I got to Seattle’ … so I walked in laughing and giggling. They’ve been accepting me ever since. I think it was a good experience.”
