Baltimore Ravens general manager Eric DeCosta told reporters on Wednesday that he remains “optimistic” about quarterback Lamar Jackson’s contract. It immediately sounded familiar to those keeping up with their history.

In 2022, Baltimore refused to budge on offering anything more than $133 million fully guaranteed at signing, leading ‘Action Jackson’ to establish a strict cutoff on September 9, 2022, and risk his future playing on a $23.016 million fifth-year option. That gamble took a brutal turn when Jackson suffered a grade 2 PCL knee sprain that December versus the Denver Broncos without any long-term security in place. Now, he has to go through that contract dance again, something Hall of Famer running back Shannon Sharpe believes might be frustrating the QB.

“The last time he was a one-time MVP, now he’s a two-time MVP. He’ll be 30 years old… He’s 29. He’s going to get a whole ‘nother bag…I think he’s more concerned with annual value and guaranteed money, as opposed to, ‘Oh, I got a contract worth 600 million, but I only got a 100 million guaranteed.’ What good is that? Nah, guarantee me about 200 million; guarantee me 230, 240. Now we can talk,” Shannon Sharpe expressed on The Nightcap podcast.

“He has to have some level of frustration because he’s the only quarterback that has to go through this twice. Remember, he played one year on the franchise tag. No other quarterback—Dak did it one year, and then they came back, and they took care of Dak, and they’ve been taking care of Dak ever since. He like, ‘I got to go through this again?'”

He labeled Lamar as the only elite QB to be subjected to repeated standoff cycles. He likened Jackson’s situation to that of Dak Prescott, the Dallas Cowboys QB.

But in Prescott’s case, Dallas took care of him after his tagged season with a mega-offer that made him the highest-paid QB in the league at that time. Sharpe noted that Jackson must be feeling undervalued despite carrying Baltimore’s entire offense. 

This sort of tension is nothing new for Baltimore. Negotiations dragged on through 2021 and 2023, with the Ravens applying a non-exclusive franchise tag to Lamar Jackson. That led to Jackson announcing his trade request publicly in March 2023, eventually signing a five-year, $260 million contract that April.

DeCosta also added that he and Jackson have an ironclad pact to keep negotiations confidential between the two parties.

“I would say I’m optimistic,” DeCosta said Wednesday. “I feel good about it. I really don’t like to get into details. I’m not going to talk about it specifically. Lamar and I have a pact, as you all know, I’ve said it probably 50 times – we’re not going to talk about business publicly.”

Chad ‘Ochocinco’ Johnson believes that once the 2026 regular season starts, Lamar would be laser-focused on his footballing duties.

Business has to be about assurances and guarantees, said Sharpe, citing the examples of Kirk Cousins and Deshaun Watson as QBs who have stood to benefit from bigging themselves up and demanding strong financial guarantees. Similarly, Jackson will avoid blown-up contract figures without major financial guarantees, and will want guaranteed figures in hand.

Jackson’s current contract carries a cap hit of $34.3 million. But it jumps to $84.3 million in 2027. The contract restructure in March 2026 provided temporary relief, but it merely kicked heavy financial obligations into future seasons.

Ravens owner Steve Bisciotti has previously voiced urgency to secure Jackson long-term into his 30s. Without a new deal before next offseason, the Ravens will simply not be able to absorb Jackson’s huge cap hit.

Also, this time around, Lamar Jackson has all the contract leverage in the world thanks to the nitty-gritties of his 2023 deal. He has an included no-trade clause and cannot be franchise-tagged post-2027.

This means that in a scenario where contract talks turn sour, Lamar Jackson can just walk off into unrestricted free agency!

Now that’s a scenario nobody in the Ravens organization would want. So how much does the Nightcap Trio think Lamar Jackson might settle for?

“I tell you what, this is what [Lamar Jackson] is going to do: whatever Josh Allen got guaranteed, give me a dollar more than that,” Sharpe said about Lamar’s financial demands. 

The QB market has exploded since the last time Lamar Jackson signed a contract. Dak Prescott reached $60 million annually, and Josh Allen signed for $250 million in total guarantees. Chad Johnson noted Jackson should demand even more guaranteed money than Allen.

As a two-time MVP (and many believe he should’ve had a 3rd), Jackson could demand between $60 million and $65 million per season. While Shannon Sharpe believes that Patrick Mahomes’ 8-year, $504 million total value contract extension might be out of reach, Lamar Jackson’s contract could be on par in terms of annual value (Mahomes earns $63.09 AAV).

Shannon Sharpe concluded that whatever money Jackson receives, he will have earned it as the “heart and soul” of the Baltimore Ravens. He further added that the team goes nowhere without him playing at an elite level.