SEATTLE — For the second time in as many years, the Seattle Seahawks have made a splash by adding a tight end.
Seattle acquired former Pro Bowler and first-round draft pick Kellen Winslow Monday in a trade with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, adding depth the team has been searching for at tight end since free-agent John Carlson signed with Minnesota earlier in the offseason.
Last summer, one of the Seahawks’ biggest offseason moves was the signing of free-agent Pro Bowl tight end Zach Miller.
Terms of the deal were not announced by the team other than Seattle will send a conditional 2013 draft pick to Tampa Bay, but according to ESPN, the Bucs will get a seventh-rounder that could become a sixth-round pick depending on Winslow’s performance in 2012.
The Seahawks have been trying to add a tight end since Carlson left in free agency, and looked at free agents Visanthe Shiancoe and Jacob Tamme. But instead Seattle was able to work a trade for one of the more productive tight ends of the last decade.
The No. 6 pick in the 2004 draft, Winslow caught 89 passes in 2006, his first full season in the NFL thanks to broken leg early in his rookie season and a motorcycle accident that cost him the 2005 season. In 2007 he caught 82 passes for 1,106 yards and five touchdowns to earn Pro Bowl honors.
After being traded to the Buccaneers for second- and fifth-round picks in 2009, Winslow caught 218 passes during his three seasons in Tampa Bay while appearing in every game.
He was still under contract with the Bucs, but he disclosed on a SiriusXM radio interview Monday that new Tampa Bay coach Greg Schiano told him he was going to be traded. The trouble started when Winslow missed the team’s organized training activities last week.
Winslow said during the radio interview he had been working out near his home in San Diego, but that he planned to attend this week’s OTAs before Schiano told him not to show up.
“He was kind of upset that I wasn’t there working out with the team in the offseason and for the first week of OTAs,” Winslow said during the interview with SiriusXM. “But I’ve been there the last three years and I’ve had a successful career so far. You don’t just get rid of one of your best players because of that. … I don’t have nothing bad to say about coach Schiano. It was just a disagreement on why I’m not there yet.”
Winslow, the son of Hall of Fame tight end Kellen Winslow Sr., has 437 career receptions for 4,836 yards and 23 touchdowns. He will turn 29 in July, and is due $3.3 million in base salary next season. His current contract runs through 2014 with him schedule to make $4.5 million in base salary in 2013 and $5.5 million in 2014.
Herald Writer John Boyle: jboyle@heraldnet.com
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