The Ravens' awkward contract talks with Lamar Jackson show neither side has read the room

This is the online version of our daily newsletter, The Morning Win. Subscribe to get irreverent and incisive sports stories, delivered to your mailbox every morning. Here’s Robert Zeglinski.

Before we know it, the latest round of NFL free agency will be here. We’ll talk about the teams that spent way too much money and those that should have probably been more active. We’ll look at all the exciting fits for the players in new cities. It’ll be a grand old time! It almost always is.

And by the looks of it, it’s starting to feel like Lamar Jackson will unthinkably be someone on the move.

By now, the Baltimore Ravens’ extended contract talks with Jackson (who represents himself) have been one of the more perplexing stories in the football world. Dating all the way back to last summer, the Ravens didn’t give Jackson — the former 2019 unanimous MVP — the compensation he feels he deserves.

Inevitably, such a mess seemed to cast a shadow over what could’ve been in their 2022 season.

I have to admit: I’m still so confused by what’s happening in Baltimore.  There are maybe a handful of quarterbacks with a fraction of Jackson’s talent. And here, with the franchise tag negotiating window now open, the Ravens want to play hardball with the player keeping them relevant.

Why?

No one has read the room.

According to a report from ESPN’s Jamison Hensley and Jeremy Fowler, the Ravens have apparently listened to Jackson. Somewhat. They wanted to make him one of the league’s highest-paid QBs. But complications over the unprecedented fully guaranteed $230 million deal Deshaun Watson received from the Cleveland Browns last year muddled matters.

“Jackson turned down a five-year, $250 million contract in September that included $133 million guaranteed — far less than Watson’s deal, but more than the guaranteed figures awarded to Russell Wilson ($124 million) and Kyler Murray ($103.3 million) last offseason.”

Go figure. The Browns are finally a relevant thorn in the Ravens’ plans.

Jackson would, of course, counter with what he wanted: a fully guaranteed deal worth more money than Watson’s. You know, because he’s a better and more accomplished player and should be compensated as such.

Understandable! More via ESPN:

“According to a source with knowledge of Jackson’s contract negotiations, all of his counteroffers to the Ravens last year were for fully guaranteed contracts that exceeded that of Watson.”

This entire needless saga boils down to two points lost in the weeds.

The Ravens clearly believe Jackson is a superstar-level talisman. But, they don’t want to be an organization that extends a precedent for massive fully guaranteed deals. The current NFL landscape doesn’t seem ready for such a reality. Owner Steve Bisciotti has previously said as much in alluding to what Watson’s deal might do to other contract negotiations.

But at the same time, if anyone has earned such astronomical compensation, it’s Jackson. We’re talking about one of the more gifted signal-callers in league history carrying the Ravens on his back year in and year out.

If he can’t get the most guaranteed money ever, what are even we doing here?

I understand NFL teams fear opening Pandora’s Box on fully guaranteed contracts. But the cat’s out already out of the bag. Watson and his $230 million are being treated as an extreme exception, and it shouldn’t be. In a sport as dangerous as professional football, executives should be more accustomed to rewarding players with financial security, given all they sacrifice.

Superstar players in the future won’t stop advocating for more money just because squads like the Ravens don’t want to set a poor example. It’s silly to think otherwise.

Jackson’s one of the best football players alive, and the Ravens still have him under their control (for now). Both sides should read the room before these awkward talks become a painful breakup.

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