The Ravens could adopt the Bills’ approach to Josh Allen‘s extension when pursuing a similar deal with Lamar Jackson this year.
“The sense here around the league is that Baltimore could follow the blueprint that Buffalo put together back in March when they extended Josh Allen, even though he had multiple years left on his contract,” said ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler during a recent SportsCenter appearance (via Bleacher Report’s Joseph Zucker). “The feeling is, get ahead of that huge quarterback market money in three or four years from now, just pay your guy now when he’s got multiple years left on his current deal.”
Earlier this offseason, Allen signed a six-year, $330MM contract that replaced his 2021 extension, which had four years remaining. The deal brought him back to the highest tier of the quarterback market after a dozen quarterbacks surpassed his $43MM APY in the last four years; it also provided Buffalo with financial flexibility for the rest of the decade.
Jackson and the Ravens are in a similar situation. He was the league’s highest-paid quarterback when he signed his first extension in 2023; now, he ranks 10th. The two-time MVP is only set to earn $122.75MM in base salary over the next three years ($40.9MM per year), per OverTheCap, but his cap hits will total $192.5MM in the same period, including a whopping $74.5MM in both 2026 and 2027. An early extension would offer Jackson more money in the immediate future while giving the Ravens plenty of room to manage the salary cap for the foreseeable future.
Fowler’s comments suggest that the Ravens will adopt the Bills’ approach when it comes to to Jackson’s contract, but it is unclear if that means ripping up his first extension and replacing it with a brand-new deal like Allen. An extension could create $15.8MM of cap space in 2025, which Baltimore could use for summer signing and in-season contingencies. More importantly, a new deal for Jackson will lower his cap hits in 2026 and 2027, which will help the Ravens retain key talent approaching the end of their contracts.
Jackson was asked about his contract status at mandatory minicamp on Tuesday, but maintained his past approach of staying mum on the topic. He only offered a “sounds good” when asked about John Harbaugh‘s expectation that Jackson will once again be the highest-paid player in the league whenever he signes a new deal.
Wow he’s “only” set to earn $122 million the next 3 years. Poor guy. How can he play on that kind of money?
If you could make it to the second half of that sentence you’d see that “only” is compared to the cap hit over those three years being $70 million higher.
Is this really news? Or is Baltimore’s PR team trying to put a spin on the delay since the media has been speculating all off-season on his impending new contract.
I personally think it’s delusional to think you can get ahead of the “market money” for quarterbacks or any other position. Players are always checking to see where they rank on the salary list. If a guy sees several other players have moved ahead of him on the list he’s going to get his agent to negotiate for a revised contract structure. It won’t matter how long he has been on the current deal.