Odell Beckham Jr. Signing Sends Message Ravens are Confident in Keeping Lamar Jackson

The NFL offseason is never "off." There are always stories swirling about. The single biggest one of 2023 has been Lamar Jackson's future with the Baltimore Ravens after the team gave him the non-exclusive franchise tag and the 2019 NFL MVP requested a trade out of town.

Veteran wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr. wasn't as big of a story, but where the 30-year-old will play next season still generated its share of headlines and speculation. And the fact that Beckham's new home just so happens to be in Baltimore sends a clear message.

We may not be sure whether Jackson will be a Raven in 2023, but Baltimore appears to be.

Sunday evening, the news broke that Beckham—who missed the entire 2022 season while recovering from an ACL tear suffered in Super Bowl LVI with the Los Angeles Rams—had signed a one-year deal with the Ravens that could be worth up to $18 million.

That's good news for the franchise. Baltimore was as bereft of difference-makers at wide receiver as any team in the league, and it showed in 2022. Even if you believe that Beckham's best days are behind him (his last 1,000-yard season came in 2019), he will still easily be the best wideout on the roster when he puts pen to paper.

He had nine catches for 113 yards in the Rams' NFC Championship Game win over the San Francisco 49ers, and he had two grabs for 52 yards and a score before tearing up his knee in the Super Bowl.

There's a reason why the New York Jets were prepared to host Beckham on a visit and the Dallas Cowboys expressed interest. And a reason that numerous other teams were linked to him. This wasn't a good year to look for impact players at wide receiver in free agency or the draft. Beckham was the top available option.

But the best part of the Beckham signing with the Ravens might not even be his arrival in Baltimore.

It's Jackson's apparent enthusiasm about it.

Not long after the Beckham contract was announced, Jackson shared an Instagram post of a video call between himself and Beckham. Per Jordan Schultz of the Score, that wasn't the first time the pair have discussed playing together.

That's quite the narrative shift from just a couple of weeks ago, when Jackson tweeted that he had requested a trade:

"In regards to my future plans. As of March 2nd I requested a trade from the Ravens organization for which the Ravens has not been interested in meeting my value, any and everyone that's has met me or been around me know I love the game of football and my dream is to help a team win the super bowl. You all are great, but I had to make a business decision that was best for my family and I."

That post came just as the NFL owners meetings were getting underway in Phoenix, but while speaking to reporters, Ravens head coach John Harbaugh expressed confidence that Jackson would be Baltimore's quarterback in 2023.

"It's an ongoing process," Harbaugh said. "I'm following it very closely, just like everybody else is here and looking forward to a resolution. I'm excited. Thinking about Lamar all the time. Thinking about him as our quarterback. We're building our offense around that idea. I'm just looking forward to getting back to football, and I'm confident that's going to happen."

It was similar to a message from general manager Eric DeCosta earlier in March.

"It's an ongoing discussion. We both understand the urgency of the situation. It's been a good dialogue, a good discussion," DeCosta said. "I'm optimistic, and I continue to be optimistic, and we'll see where it goes."

AP Photo/John Raoux

The Beckham signing is a doubling down on that optimism.

Mind you, this doesn't magically fix all that ails the Ravens. We're still talking about a quarterback who not only has missed 10 games over the past two seasons and has just 33 touchdown passes over that span but also feels so underappreciated by his team that he requested to be dealt. And Beckham is a 30-year-old wideout who has all of 856 receiving yards over the last three years combined.

But with each passing week since free agency opened, whatever leverage Jackson had has evaporated.

Teams could be concerned about paying a scrambling quarterback north of $45 million per season—and giving up a mountain of draft capital to the Ravens—after Jackson has struggled to stay on the field. Or maybe the league's owners quasi-colluded in an effort to rebuff another quarterback from getting a fully guaranteed deal.

But whatever the reason, there has been little interest in Jackson on the open market. At this point, it appears he has three choices: play under the tag in 2023, sign an extension on Baltimore's terms or sit out the season and leave $32 million and change on the table.

AP Photo/Nick Wass

It could be that signing Beckham indicates the ice is thawing between player and team—or at least that the Ravens are making an effort to thaw it. Perhaps it will help get Jackson back to the negotiating table. Or at least warm him to the idea of playing under the tag this year.

But bringing in OBJ makes it apparent that the Ravens expect Jackson to be their quarterback in 2023. You don't sign Beckham to a one-year deal worth more than $15 million if he's going to be catching wormburners from Tyler Huntley or a rookie. And Beckham probably wants no part of that rebuild.

The Ravens are all-in on being a contender in 2023. A contender with Lamar Jackson at quarterback.

And if that's the case, it will be hard to argue with the notion that DeCosta played the Jackson saga correctly from the jump.