The NFL got free agency right - Ingles

This was so much fun, let's do it again next year. And the year after that and the year after that and ...

Open up a small window maybe a couple of weeks wide, in early May, after the draft, and tell the NFL teams all of the free agents have to be signed in that period.

Free Agent Frenzy.

It would light up the blogosphere. It would spin the wheels of the rumor mill like the reels on slot machines and make "NFL Live" must-see TV every day, months before the opening of training camp.

Two weeks of Free Agent Frenzy every May would steal the front page from the NBA playoffs and the start of the baseball season.

Football fans would be glued to their computers the way they were the past couple of weeks, watching their teams transformed before their very eyes.

This was too thrilling to be a one-time thing. This felt too real to be a lark, especially with the Seahawks throwing around money and gobbling up players as if this were a fantasy-league draft.

In Seattle, which lately has felt like the City of Perpetual Remodeling, the Hawks have undergone a makeover that has amped up interest and anticipation in this season in a way the city hasn't seen since 2005.

Isn't it fun to have an owner who is willing to pay for a change? The Hawks understand that the risk of doing nothing is much greater than the risk of doing something.

Just a few blithe swipes from owner Paul Allen's pen have rebooted the franchise.

This was so exciting even a hooper like the 206's Nate Robinson of the Oklahoma City Thunder was tweeting that he might want play for the Seahawks. The former Huskies cornerback came to the Hawks' camp last week. Was he looking for something to do during the NBA lockout?

The Seahawks still could use another cornerback, but they made significant moves that addressed many of their problems areas.

Free Agent Frenzy was a time for dreamers. And the Seahawks dreamed big.

General manager John Schneider was daring and Allen was doling, throwing around millions of dollars like it was so much Halloween candy.

When you make as many mistakes as the Seahawks did in the final years of general manager Tim Ruskell, it takes some guts (and a lot of cash) to change the paradigm.

And this wasn't just change for the sake of change. The Hawks needed to surround their kids with some veterans. You can't just win with kids, no matter how talented they are. Teams that want to compete immediately have to pay for quality veterans.

The Hawks did that.

They got a seasoned left guard, Robert Gallery, who will lead a youthful corps of offensive linemen. They found a quarterback, Tarvaris Jackson, who has the requisite "escapability" to survive a season with this offensive line-in-training.

They weren't timid and they played the salary-cap game about as well as it can be played.

They found a talented and familiar wide receiver for Jackson, former Minnesota teammate Sidney Rice, and a Pro Bowl tight end, Zach Miller. They signed Alan Branch, a starting defensive tackle, and as important as any import, they re-signed defensive tackle Brandon Mebane.

The Hawks still are an incomplete puzzle. They are thin at linebacker and in the defensive backfield. There are questions to be answered on special teams. The growth of the young offensive line isn't a given, and quarterback Jackson is an unsolved mystery.

But they are much better than the pre-draft Seahawks. In less than a fortnight, they remade themselves into a contender again in the fast-improving NFC West.

Free Agent Frenzy was a great diversion, the way sports are supposed to be. I'm sure it aged some general managers. Eventually, it may cost a few of the Frenzy's losers their jobs.

But for the people who buy the season tickets, who purchase the television packages, the fantasy-league players, the Sunday afternoon soft-drink-and-beer-swillers, the Frenzy was a welcome relief from the worry and boredom of the lockout.

It felt like a national holiday.

So why not find a way to make this small free-agent window a permanent part of the NFL schedule? Make it the kind of celebration of the game that it became this year.

Free Agent Frenzy was good for the league. And great for the Seahawks. This article was written by Steve Kelley and appeared in The Seattle Times.