Despite being one of the finest young quarterbacks in the competition, Lamar Jackson had a tough time securing a deal last year. At one point, fans and experts were absolutely sure that the Ravens will not give him an extension. Many even asked him to hire a professional agent instead of asking his mother to negotiate for a deal. Amidst all the hullaballoo, Jackson recently surprised everyone by finally signing a 5-year $260 Million deal with Baltimore after which, he was recently seen working on his game during Ravens’ OTA.
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However, things were a lot different last season. After the Ravens and Lamar weren’t able to reach common ground for the extension deal, the star QB had kept himself away from the OTAs. Although he had stated that snubbing the Organized Team Activity didn’t have anything to do with his contract, fans weren’t ready to believe this narrative.
Lamar Jackson is definitely attending OTAs this time around
As reported by Baltimoreravens.com, while talking about why he missed the OTAs last year, Jackson had claimed that he “just wanted to stay away and just grind.” As OTAs are a great way of developing chemistry with other team members, Jackson had stated that he did consult the other players in the unit before missing the activities and they were cool with it.
However, Jackson’s absence had caused an absolute frenzy on Twitter, with several fans even theorizing that he won’t show up for Ravens’ games. Some even stated that he might not put up his A-game for his unit. All such baseless rumors were dozed down by Lamar who not only gave his best, put also ended up guiding the team to the playoffs last season.
However, when the Ravens decided to franchise-tag Lamar during the offseason, more speculations started arising. To make matters worse, several teams came out to make it clear that don’t want to rope in expensive Lamar into their unit. However, preventing things from going awry, Baltimore ultimately made Lamar the highest paid QB(on an annual basis) in the league. His average contract value currently stands at $52 Million per year.
A look at Lamar Jackson at Ravens OTA on Wednesday: pic.twitter.com/Eqrs3DUABW
— Jamison Hensley (@jamisonhensley) May 24, 2023
Without a doubt, Lamar would be more relaxed now as the deal is done and he got what he wanted. As a result, he recently showed up at the team OTA and worked out in full force. “New offense,” was Lamar’s response as per FOX, while listing the reason behind attending the activities. He stated that the 2023 season is approaching super quickly and he wants to develop a good camaraderie with his mates. However, one should also keep in mind that Jackson missed this year’s first OTA as well, per ProFootballTalk, but is planning to attend the rest without fail.
Lamar Jackson has truly raked in the moolah this time
One has to admit that Jackson did tick all the boxes while getting his contract done. Moreover, as he has his mother Felicia as an agent, he saved another 3% on the contract in agent fee. The figure comes out to a whopping $7.8 Million which Jackson decided to gift his mother.
As far as the deal is concerned, out of $260 Million, $185 Million is what comes as overall guaranteed money, while $135 Million being fully guaranteed out of which, $72.5 Million is Jackson’s signing bonus. Needless to say, the Ravens have gone all out in a bid to retain their favorite QB.
In fact, $72.5 Million signing bonus which Jackson is set to take home is the highest ever in the history of the competition. It will be interesting to see how Jackson performs in the coming season.
