Rapoport told the show.<\/a> \u201cI mean, they have really done a nice job of getting deals where guys can be really happy about it, but helping themselves by doing them really early. Penei Sewell was obviously a big one. Amon-Ra St. Brown, there\u2019s been several of them.<\/p>\n\u201cNow that [Hutchinson is] fully cleared and let\u2019s say he goes out in OTAs and looks normal, which is what I expect \u2019cause he\u2019s awesome. I believe that he\u2019s another one who will get paid a huge deal.\u201d<\/p>\n
To Rapoport\u2019s point, Sewell and St. Brown received extensions on the same day, April 24, of last year. It\u2019s a smart tactic to get ahead of future deals that would only raise the price. Detroit has waited longer on Hutchinson but his health was a complicating factor. Now cleared to practice, the Lions could work out a deal after getting a look at him at OTAs and minicamp.<\/p>\n
Rapoport wasn\u2019t sold on the idea of Hutchinson getting paid more than Garrett. But he\u2019ll be in the same ballpark.<\/p>\n
\u201cI believe being cleared will pave the way to a new deal,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Hutchinson getting a deal done would drive up Watt\u2019s price tag, a number that\u2019s only risen since the start of the offseason. Had Pittsburgh been first to the table, a contract worth $35 million average yearly value likely would\u2019ve gotten it done. With Watt\u2019s rival Garrett topping the charts, it\u2019s hard to see Watt wanting to take less. And if Hutchinson is able to beat Garrett\u2019s mark, even by a tiny margin, Watt may want to top that number to be announced as the NFL\u2019s highest-paid pass rusher whenever his deal is done. The same could hold true after a Parsons extension.<\/p>\n
What once appeared to be a relatively easy deal to make could now turn into another drawn-out negotiation, a possibility Steelers.com editor Bob Labriola recently acknowledged.<\/a> Like 2021, it\u2019s possible Watt holds in or at the least, has a light summer once the Steelers report to training camp. His previous extension wasn\u2019t reached until days before the season and it\u2019s possible 2025 ends the same way. Every pass rusher who gets paid before him only increases those odds.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The 2025 offseason has been a banner year for pass rushers. Las Vegas Raiders DE Maxx Crosby became…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":74396,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3],"tags":[1817,7,5328,6,57,5226],"class_list":{"0":"post-74395","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nfl","8":"tag-aidan-hutchinson","9":"tag-football","10":"tag-ian-rapoport","11":"tag-nfl","12":"tag-pittsburgh-steelers","13":"tag-t-j-watt"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/114560485753795652","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74395","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=74395"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74395\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/74396"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=74395"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=74395"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=74395"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}