It was made clear earlier this spring that Los Angeles Rams quarterback Matthew Stafford wanted to renegotiate his contract to include more guaranteed money in the last two years of his contract. As of right now, he ensured zero dollars in 2025 and 2026, with $31 million coming his way this season.
Stafford has been in attendance at the first two days of organized team activities despite ongoing contract talks.
With today’s session of the Rams OTAs open to the media, McVay fielded several questions from reporters about the progress of those discussions. McVay remained steadfast in not revealing any news about the matter during the post-practice press conference.
Los Angeles Rams Wish To Keep Stafford Contract Matter “In-House”
Here is the exchange he had with the reporters in the scrum.
Sarah Barshop, ESPN: “During the draft weekend you mentioned that Matthew Stafford wanted more guaranteed money out of his contract. Has there been any progress towards making that happen?
McVay: “Out of respect for the situation, Sarah, we’ll just keep it in house. What I am appreciative of is that he’s here, leading the way. It’s been a good couple days for him.
Gary Klien, LA Times: “You said at the draft that you were confident that you guys were going to be able to come to some kind of an agreement and that you wanted him here”
McVay: “He’s here and we appreciate that. We’ve had good conversations with him about football and anything other than that, you know, really just going to keep it in house”
Jourdan Rodrigue, NY Times: “Is the conversation still open?”
McVay: “In-house.”
Klien: “Are you confident that it’ll be..”
McVay: “I respect the questions. I really do, but you know out of respect for just the totality of the situation, there’s just a lot of things that we want to be able to just keep in house. If there is any information on that front you guys will certainly know and maybe you’ll break it on your Twitter.”
Klien: “Are you confident that he’ll be at training camp?
McVay: “I’m confident that he’s been out here leading the way and that’s really where we’ll kind of keep it right now.”
While McVay did a masterful job of avoiding answering the question, the fact that Stafford is in attendance for the Rams’ optional OTAs points toward a lack of tension between the multiple sides of the contract negotiation.
