After establishing himself as one of the most premier wide receivers in the NFL by capturing a Pro Bowl, All-Pro, and Super Bowl title all in the same season, the Seattle Seahawks have decided to reward Jaxon Smith-Njigba by granting him a four-year, $168.6-million contract extension.
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The deal will officially make the 24-year-old the highest-paid wide receiver in the history of the league after leading the NFL in receiving yards for the 2025 regular season. According to the host of the Baltimore Ravens’ Final Drive, Garrett Downing, the “record-setting deal” will have major implications not just for Seattle and Smith-Njigba, but also the rest of the wide receiver market. And more specifically, for Zay Flowers.
In referencing the fact that “this offseason is the first time that players from that 2023 class can sign contract extensions,” Downing suggested that JSN’s deal now sets the bar for the rest of his contemporaries.
“Puka Nacua from the Rams is also part of that same draft class, so he could potentially top or match that number when he gets his deal… Flower is one of the best receivers in football. He has shown that in his career and the Ravens would certainly love to have him here in Baltimore for the long term.”
The only issue for Flowers, however, is the fact that the Ravens are more likely to utilize either the franchise tag or his fifth-year contract option before granting him a massive contract extension. So even though he was eager to highlight the fact that Flowers “comes in at ninth” for total receiving yards throughout the past two seasons, even Downing himself was forced to admit that the idea of a massive extension for Flowers is more of a matter of if than when.
“Zay Flowers is going to get a big contract at some point,” he asserted. “It’s just a question of when, and that is one of the big decisions left for the Ravens this offseason.”
The real challenge for Baltimore will likely reside in timing Flowers’ extension with that of their star quarterback, Lamar Jackson. They already reworked his deal once this year in order to free up some cap space for 2026, but in doing so, they also managed to balloon his cap hit total for 2027 up to nearly $85 million.
Pair this with the fact that Jackson has also nearly fallen outside of the top-10 altogether in terms of salary, and it seems as if he’ll likely be asking for a pay increase as well. Simply put, there are a ton of contract-related issues that Baltimore needs to figure out over the course of the next year, and it shouldn’t come as a surprise to see Flowers become a casualty of the process.
