Turf Show Times
Will he or won’t he? Either way, Matthew Stafford’s trade rumors are the topic of the week
Matthew Stafford wants to play a 16th season in the NFL, the only question left is whether that will be for the Rams, Raiders, Giants, or some other team, but his contract and trade rumors have dominated the week of rumors at the NFL Scouting Combine. The latest rumors on Wednesday have Stafford meeting at Tom Brady’s house, a report that Brady’s reps denied through Ian Rapoport, to the Giants meeting with his representatives and being “hellbent” on acquiring him.
Where will Stafford be this time next week? Nobody knows, but this situation appears headed for a resolution soon.
Less than an hour after Jordan Schultz spread a rumor that Tom Brady hosted Matthew Stafford at his house to talk about becoming a Raider, Ian Rapoport put out a report that the meeting was an “overblown” occurrence of running into each other at a ski resort.
More concrete was Stafford’s agents meeting with the Giants on Tuesday to discuss the terms of a deal to come to New York.
Rumors have the Giants as “hellbent” on acquiring Stafford and that their interest is “very, very real” according to The Athletic.
The topic of trading Stafford, or the Rams replacing him with Aaron Rodgers and Davante Adams, is certainly wearing many fans thin and it’s not even the start of the new league year yet. In fact, the Rams technically couldn’t trade Stafford until March, but same as when they acquired him in 2021, two teams could agree on terms and make it all but impossible to back out of a deal.
The team that is willing to pay Stafford a new contract is most likely going to be the team that has Stafford next season and it seems less likely to me that the Rams want to do that.
If the Rams were interested in meeting Stafford’s terms, this situation would not be happening right now. They would have met his terms last summer, if not after the season, but letting him “gauge his value” around the league is surely going to drive up his price. Not lower it.
The Rams might be letting Stafford talk to other teams so that other teams become more interested and L.A. does everything it can to get a first round pick for him.
Maybe that’s not the case. The team should want to keep Stafford. But if he’s unhappy with his contract, there’s only so much the Rams are going to do to appease him. He won’t have trade value later, so they’re assessing trade value now.
If Brady and Stafford met at a ski resort, it’s like they always say:
Where there’s snow, there’s fire.
