When the Los Angeles Rams finally broke through and won a Super Bowl this past season, a ton of legacies were cemented, but perhaps none more than star defensive tackle Aaron Donald.
Donald has a resume of one of the greatest defensive players the sport has ever seen, but the one thing that was missing was a championship.
Not only did Donald achieve that, but he made the two game-winning plays to clinch the Super Bowl against Joe Burrow and the Cincinnati Bengals.
Now that Donald has accomplished everything there is to accomplish in the NFL though, there were some rumors that he was considering retirement at age 30.
He quieted those rumors a bit during the Rams’ Super Bowl parade when he said he would be willing to run it back if the Rams bring back their other key free agents like Von Miller and Odell Beckham Jr., although that wasn’t an official declaration or anything.
While Donald still hasn’t announced an official decision on if he’ll be returning in 2022, it seems that Les Snead and the Rams are not concerned about him retiring as they work on a contract extension, via Jourdan Rodrigue of The Athletic:
Les Snead sounds confident that Rams and Aaron Donald will be in a good place – including contractually – as they move through the offseason. Team, Donald’s team have had discussions about contract. “I never say anything w certainty (but) that’s not a concern right now.”
— Jourdan Rodrigue (@JourdanRodrigue) March 2, 2022
This is obviously great news for the Rams and their fans if Donald not only returns in 2022, but signs a contract extension to stay with the organization long-term.
Donald still has three years remaining on his current contract but is only scheduled to make around $14 million per year, so it makes sense that he would want a new contract to be paid what he is worth.
Once the Rams get extensions done for both Donald and Matthew Stafford, they will then shift their focus to retaining their other key pieces and should have plenty of cap space available to do so if they also restructure some other contracts, which is expected to be the case.
