You’ll find a good one! And it might not be your last… my first kayak was a 25” wide Tsunami and my current two are both under 20”. 
I had a Storm 17 GT. It’s the high volume version of the Storm series. Lots of foot room but a heavy, bulky. I’m 5’10" at 190 and it always seemed too big. The rudder on it looks like they stole it from the QE2. There must have been a reason for that. Maybe because it doesn’t track well got a 17 foot boat without it!
The high volume Storm GT is similar to the 175 Tsunami and more suited for 210 lb to 260 lb paddler.
3/4" difference in deck height is huge never mind 3".
I do typically set with my feet at an angle, even with the 14” deck. Sorry photo is blurry going the case
There’s no thigh braces in a rec kayak like you have.
I have to correct some of what I wrote a bit ago. It was my Sealution XL that has the giant rudder and lousy tracking.
PaddlerNH, some archived forum reviews describe that model as having tracking issues. I bought a used 145 Tsunami with rudder as a spare boat for my family. My legs wouldn’t fit under the thigh pads due to placement of the rudder pedals.
Since my non-rudder 145 Tsunami handles well without a rudder, options were to use it for shorter paddlers, replacing the rudder controls with stock footpegs, or moving the seat - I decided cheaoes and easiest option was to moved the seat rearward by about 43mm (move the front seat-frame bolt hole to the rear bolt hole in the hull and drill a new hole for in the hull; to my surprise, the bolt pattern on the left side of the boat was different, and the seat was also skewed, which required a completely new set of mounting holes). Moving the seat caused the boat to carve right and end up 180° when following waves pushed the boat over 6.4 mph. The rudderless 145 could reach 8.3 mph peaks and still retain control.
It was clear that whoever installed the seat didn’t use a fixture to index the seat frame, because the bolt spacing was different on each side and the seat was skewed. That makes me wonder if an improper seat location could be causing an imbalance in your boat that affects handling.
Your comments made me rethink the trim of my 175 Tsunami. Although handling is not a problem on flat water, control becomes an issue as wind and waved increase which requires rudder assistance. It’s surprising to me l that a 3 foot longer hull doesn’t track as straight as the 145 non-rudder Tsunami. Physics and theory aside, my attention will turn to moving the seat forward slightly to see if it improves handling. Will let you know how it turns out.