SEATTLE — NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell on Tuesday refuted a report that interest from potential new owners of the Seahawks has been “soft" during remarks made at the league’s spring meeting in Orlando, Fla.

“There have been some reports that I would say are not accurate with respect to the amount of interest," Goodell said. “It’s exactly the opposite. It’s actually been tremendous interest in the team."

The statement appeared to be referencing a May 8 story from ESPN that quoted one team owner as saying “it’s soft" in regards to interest in buying the team, and quoted another executive as saying “there isn’t as much action as there was with Denver and Washington." Those were the last two NFL teams to sell, in 2022 and 2023, respectively.

Goodell’s statement came during an answer to a question asking if there had been any update given to the owners who attended the meeting about the progress of the sale of the Seahawks.

Goodell said “there wasn’t much of an update" to report, while noting that the sale is being handled by the New York investment bank Allen & Company.

“The process is moving forward," Goodell said. “Obviously we’re not gonna be discussing that, either with the membership or anyone else, with respect to the process until it’s completed. Once that happens then it will be handed over to us and we will work through the process of our approval, whether that happens this summer or when that happens."

Any potential sale would have to be approved by 24 of the league’s 32 owners.

The Seahawks were officially placed on sale on Feb. 18 by the Estate of Paul G. Allen. Allen’s sister, Jody, took over as chair of the Seahawks when Paul Allen died in Oct. 2018 and executor of the estate.

ESPN’s story reporting “soft" interest in the team came the day after Sportico had two stories reporting two different groups as preparing bids to buy the team, the first two apparently verified potential new owners.

One group is led by two alternate governors of the Boston Celtics, Wyc Grousbeck and Aditya Mittal. Mittal is part of the new Celtics ownership group which bought controlling share from a group put together by Grousbeck and his family. Wyc Grousbeck retained a minority share in the Celtics.

The other group is led by billionaire Vinod Khosla, a minority share holder of the San Francisco 49ers.

There have been no updates on the bids of either group for the Seahawks or reports of any other potential buyers since the initial Sportico reports. The ESPN story noted that it had confirmed the Sportico report.

ESPN's story noted that while there had been initial speculation the Seahawks could draw an offer of more than $10 billion and possibly up to $11 billion that it is now more likely to be in the $9 billion range. That would still shatter the record for an NFL team, which is currently the $6.05 billion paid for the Commanders in July, 2023.

ESPN's story cited as potential reasons for the soft interest including the rapidly rising valuations of teams and that NFL rules require a controlling owner to be able to put down 30% in cash. The ESPN story noted that a new owner "might" perceive the Seahawks as needing a new stadium "in coming years" as another reason for soft interest.

ESPN has also reported that Canadian billionaire Steve Apostolopoulos, who had been rumored as potentially being interested in the Seahawks, is apparently not in the running, quoting him as saying, “I’m not pursuing the Seahawks."

The Allen estate and Seahawks have said only that there is no news to share.

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