Ravens and Lamar Jackson have agreed on a five-year contract extension

After deadlocked in contract talks this offseason, star quarterback Lamar Jackson and the Baltimore Ravens reached an agreement in principle on a five-year contract extension Thursday, Jackson announced in a statement. video posted to the team’s Twitter account.

“There’s been a lot of ‘he said, she said’, a lot of nail biting, a lot of head scratching going on in the last few months,” Jackson, 26, said before declaring he would “light up” the movie. Ravens’ home stadium for the next five years.

The deal is worth $260 million, according to a person with knowledge of the terms of the agreement who requested anonymity because the team had not disclosed financial details.

Jackson won the league’s Most Valuable Player Award in 2019 and entered the 2022 NFL season with one year left on his rookie contract. Uncertainty hung over Jackson’s future in Baltimore, as he and the team could not agree on terms for an extension, and contract talks were suspended until the offseason. In March, still unable to come to an agreement with Jackson, the team gave him the non-exclusive franchise tag, worth about $32 million annually, and allowed him to negotiate with other teams.

Jackson said on Twitter last month that he asked for a trade in early March because the Ravens “weren’t interested in meeting my worth”.

Other quarterbacks in the league signed new deals or found new teams through trades, including Jalen Hurts, who agreed to a contract extension with the Philadelphia Eagles last week, and Aaron Rodgers, who moved from Green Bay to the Jets earlier this week. Jackson’s situation with the Ravens appeared to be in a stalemate — until the team’s announcement Thursday, hours before the start of the NFL draft. Jackson’s average annual earnings are now the highest in the league, surpassing Hurts, whose five-year deal is worth $255 million, according to multiple reports.

The Ravens selected Jackson with the last pick of the first round in the 2018 NFL draft. He took over as the team’s starting quarterback midway through his rookie season, following an injury to Joe Flacco. He led the Ravens to the playoffs in four of the past five seasons, though he sat out the team’s wild card game in January after suffering a season-ending knee injury.

Jackson has reimagined how the quarterback position is played at the sport’s highest level, challenging opponents with both his arm and legs with more success than ever before. He is the first quarterback to rush for more than 1,000 yards in multiple seasons, in 2019 and 2020. Last season, Jackson surpassed both 4,000 rushing yards and 100 passing touchdowns, faster than any player in league history.

Like many of the dual-threat quarterbacks that preceded him, particularly black quarterbacks, when Jackson turned pro, Jackson faced questions from NFL teams about his stamina and deflected suggestions that he might be better suited for another position . A lasting image from the 2018 draft is Jackson and his mother sitting in the green room late into the night waiting for his name to be called.

However, the Ravens embraced rather than suppressed Jackson’s unique abilities, building an offense around him unlike any other in the league. In 2019, Jackson’s MVP year, the Ravens broke a 41-year-old record for most rushing yards in a season, and from 2018-21 tied a league record by rushing for at least 100 yards in 43 consecutive games.

By staying in Baltimore, Jackson will continue to duel with the cadre of talented young quarterbacks in the AFC, including two-time Super Bowl champion Patrick Mahomes of Kansas City; Joe Burrow of Cincinnati; Josh Allen van Buffels; Justin Herbert of the Los Angeles Chargers; and Trevor Lawrence of Jacksonville. He will have at least one new offensive playmaker to pitch to, receiver Odell Beckham Jr., who signed with the Ravens earlier this month after sitting out the 2022 season while recovering from the torn anterior cruciate ligament he suffered when he the Los Angeles Rams helped. win Super Bowl LVI.

Even as negotiations between Jackson and the Ravens stalled, coach John Harbaugh said the two sides valued each other and that he expected Jackson to be his starter this season. “Numbers can be traced,” Harbaugh said last month.

The Ravens figured out how much to bid to keep Jackson, and now they have five more years with him.