Ravens' Lamar Jackson biggest winner from the NFL draft. There's $260 million reasons why.
After Day 1 of the draft, you're going to see 7.2 billion metric tons of draft grades. Everything will be graded. Teams will. Players will. My mom will do her grades. It will be a grade fest and none of them will mention the most important grade of all:
Lamar Jackson, quarterback: A.
Actually, A+. What's higher than A-plus? Because that's the grade Jackson should get. A-stratosphere? A-galactic? A-Milky Way Galaxy?
Normally it's only teams that get grades. And certainly veteran players don't but this situation is so special, and in some ways so shocking, it practically overshadowed the draft. Which Jackson won. And it's not that the Ravens won the draft. They did to some degree. I'm talking specifically about Jackson.
Jackson signed a massive five-year contract just hours before the start of the draft on Thursday. In some parts of the media after the Eagles signed Jalen Hurts to his own seismic extension, there was a mocking of Jackson for not having his deal done. The criticism focused on how Jackson didn't have an agent. I was one of the critics.
More: Odell Beckham Jr. calls out to Lamar Jackson as he's introduced by Ravens
Now, the deal is done. It's a five-year, $260 million contract. It includes $185 million in total guarantees, the NFL Network says. The $52 million-per-year deal makes Jackson the NFL's newest highest-paid player in terms of average annual value, just a short time after Hurts signed his deal.
Somewhere Bill Polian is saying you shouldn't pay a wide receiver that much money.
"You know, for the last few months, there's been a lot of he's said, she's said," Jackson said in a video. "A lot of nail-biting, a lot of head scratching going on, but for the next five years, it's a lot of flock going on. Let's go, baby. Let's go. Let's go, man. Can't wait to get there. Can't wait to be there. Can't wait to light up M&T (Bank Stadium) for the next five years, man. Let's get it."
The NFL Network said Jackson did the deal himself. So he won the draft as a player and an agent.
And you know it's big when the governor of Maryland hails it.
Whenever I've spoken to anyone on the Ravens about Jackson there was always a consensus: he's a relentless worker. Jackson has never relied solely on his athletic ability. He's a studier and also a good teammate. In many ways, he's the AFC version of Hurts. Or maybe Hurts is the NFC version of him.
Bottom line: Jackson is one of the league's good dudes and deserved this extension. He deserved this win.
I'm reminded of when Jackson was at the NFL's scouting combine and he was asked about playing wide receiver. It harkened back to a time when Black quarterbacks were forced to switch positions because racists believed Black players lacked the mental acuity to play quarterback.
He got a series of questions from reporters at a press conference about switching positions and handled the situation with class.
"I'm not going to be a wide receiver at all," he said.
If a team asked you to play wide receiver, he was asked by a journalist, would you do it?
"No, sir," he said. "I'm a quarterback."
Jackson is and he just won the draft.