The Seattle Seahawks have signed running back Joe Mixon, 30, after bringing him in for a workout, according to multiple reports Monday. The move comes as the team’s running back depth has thinned out despite a 3-1 start to the season, highlighted by a 30-23 win over the Chargers in Week 4.
Kenneth Walker III, the Super Bowl MVP, left Seattle in free agency, and first-round rookie Jadarian Price was recently placed on injured reserve, leaving the Seahawks short on proven options in the backfield.
Mixon will begin his Seattle tenure on the practice squad as he works back into playing shape. He did not play at all in 2025 while recovering from a severe foot injury suffered shortly after a 1,000-yard, Pro Bowl 2024 season with the Houston Texans.
The signing brings a player with a significant track record of production, along with a history of off-field controversy, into the Seahawks locker room.
A Productive Career With Baggage
Mixon spent seven seasons with the Cincinnati Bengals, winning the 2018 AFC rushing title with 1,168 yards and earning his first Pro Bowl nod in 2021, a season that ended with Cincinnati reaching Super Bowl LVI. In that game, Mixon threw a six-yard touchdown pass to Tee Higgins.
He moved to Houston and had one of his best seasons in 2024, rushing for 1,016 yards and 11 touchdowns in 14 games, earning his second Pro Bowl selection before the foot injury sidelined him for all of 2025.
But Mixon’s history off the field has drawn scrutiny throughout his career. In 2014, while at Oklahoma, video surfaced showing Mixon punching student Amelia Molitor and breaking four bones in her face. The university suspended him for the season, and he later entered an Alford plea and was ordered to complete 100 hours of community service. Several NFL teams reportedly removed him from their draft boards before the Bengals selected him in the second round in 2017.
More recently, Mixon faced a misdemeanor aggravated-menacing charge in 2023 tied to a road-rage incident in Cincinnati; a judge found him not guilty at trial. Separately, in March 2023, a teenager playing with a Nerf gun near Mixon’s home was shot by his sister’s boyfriend. Mixon was not charged, but the victim’s family sued him and the alleged shooter, a lawsuit that was settled in 2025.
Seattle is now betting that Mixon, after a full year away from the field, can provide experienced depth for a running back room that has been hit hard by injuries and departures this season.
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