Rams’ Aaron Donald was so close to ending career that he submitted a retirement letter to the team, per report

Aaron Donald was so serious about retiring after the Rams won the Super Bowl that he actually had his agent send a retirement letter to the team. 

According to NFL.com, the letter was sent on May 9 and it was written to let the Rams know that Donald was going to call it quits after spending his entire eight-year career with the organization. 

The retirement speculation originally started on Super Bowl Sunday when Rodney Harrison reported on NBC’s Super Bowl pregame show that there was a “a strong possibility” that Donald would retire if the Rams won. After the Rams beat the Bengals 23-20, it appears Donald spent nearly four months agonizing over his retirement decision before having his agent send the letter to the Rams. 

After the Rams got the letter, they were supposed to send it to the league office, but instead of doing that, the team did its best to try and talk him into returning. The Rams started talking with Donald’s agent (Todd France) about a new contract one day after the letter was sent and less than a month later, the two sides had hammered out a restructured deal for Donald that gave the three-time Defensive Player of the Year a $40 million raise on his three remaining contract years. 

Between when he wrote the letter (May 9) and when he got his new deal (June 6), Donald did an interview on Brandon Marshall’s “I Am Athlete” podcast where he made it pretty clear that he might be willing to put off retirement if the Rams made him the right offer. 

“It ain’t about the money, but it’s a business at the end of the day,” Donald said, via NFL.com. “That’s what you’ve got to see. For me, it’s about winning. I don’t want to play football if I can’t win anyway, so I feel like if I got a real opportunity to win another Super Bowl, then it makes sense to play. But again, it’s still a business. We’ve got to handle the business side of things, and if that wasn’t to get handled then, you know, it is what it is type of situation. I’ll be fine regardless.”

Although Donald ended up returning for another season, he might actually have retired if Sean McVay didn’t return. Early in the offseason, there was some speculation that the Rams coach was thinking about taking a media job and if that had happened, Donald probably wouldn’t be playing for the Rams right now. 

“If Sean ain’t here, I told Sean when he first got here, we came up with some things early and I first told him as long as he’s the head coach here, I want to continue to build my legacy with him,” Donald said in July, via NFL.com. “As long as he’s here and I got the ability to still play at a high level, I’m going to be here. When he’s gone and it’s all said and done, that probably will be when I’m hanging it up, too.”

The good news for the Rams is that not only did McVay return, but he signed a new extension that will keep him with the team through the 2026 season. At the minimum, this means that Donald could end up playing out his deal, which means the Rams will have their star defensive player through the 2024 season. With McVay and Donald both around, the Rams Super Bowl window should be wide open for the next few years.