Ravens’ Lamar Jackson ‘didn’t really care for other teams,’ mum about trade request
BALTIMORE — Lamar Jackson, despite a public trade request and the opportunity to negotiate with other teams, made clear one thing clear Thursday in his first conversation with the media in five months: He always wanted to be Raven.
“I didn’t really care for other teams,” he said at a news conference at the team’s facility in Owings Mills, his first comments since agreeing to a record-breaking five-year, $260 million deal that makes him the highest-paid quarterback in the NFL in terms of annual salary. “I wanted to get something done here.”
“In the end, it was really two people,” Ravens general manager Eric DeCosta added. “I was dealing with Lamar Jackson the agent. … It wasn’t always easy [and] I’d rather deal with Lamar Jackson the player. But in the end, it was just Lamar and I talking, texting, emailing each other trying to get a deal done. There were really no other factors involved.”
Jackson demurred when asked what changed in the 56 days between his trade request on March 2 and his signing a contract with the Ravens that will keep him in Baltimore through 2027, saying only, “I’m not really worried about what happened in the past. We’re going to keep it about these next five years and keep it about what’s going on today. It’s a great day. ... That’s all I’m focused on right now.”
Yet, over the past two years, there were signs that day might not come.
There was the two-years-long slog with Baltimore to reach a long-term deal, one that now includes a reported $185 million guaranteed and a no-franchise tag clause as well as a no-trade clause.
There was the process of Jackson, who doesn’t have an agent, representing himself in the negotiations, leaning only on his mother, Felicia Jones, who acts as his manager.
There was the period of time when the two sides didn’t speak with one another, with fatigue having set in on both sides.
There were also the teams that contacted Jackson after the Ravens placed the $32.4 million nonexclusive franchise tag on him in March, though the 2019 NFL Most Valuable Player maintained he never had an interest in joining any of them.
There were, what DeCosta called Thursday “dark days,” and uncertainty as to whether a deal would actually be consummated.
There was, most significantly, Jackson’s request to be traded, which he revealed in a tweet one minute before Ravens coach John Harbaugh met with the media during the NFL owners meetings last month.
“It was a tough stretch,” DeCosta added. “But we know Lamar. We had a lot of conviction that this was the right thing to do.”
DeCosta also alluded to tough news conferences the team has had in the past, but termed this one as great and with good reason.
“Just to have your head coach and your GM wanting you to be here and believing in you, believing you can help your team achieve the ultimate goal with football, and NFL football at that — it’s like, I wouldn’t want to go no other place,” Jackson said.
“It has been a long wait, but I think we’re all in the same place all along,” Harbaugh said. “We’re all in the same place going forward.”
