For me ... I extend Sammy before Game 1.

Lots of debate here about whether to rent Sammy for a year or extend him pre-season.

I can see the general principles behind wanting to wait. Let the guy prove he is healthy. Don't risk dead cap space. I think the underlying sense is that, after decades of losing, we can't afford another big mistake.

However, I don't buy that reasoning. I actually think we CAN afford another big mistake in the sense that we are losers who keep losing and nobody takes us seriously anyway. I don't think that, in the grand scheme of things, we have much to lose. We fans will be miserable, but how of us poor, benighted suckers are there? The NFL won't care. As 81 says in his great CPR post (link), the patient is virtually dead anyway. How much harm can a mistake do?

For me, this is a chance that we haven't had, really, since the Marshall acquisition to turn things around dramatically. Sammy is not an exciting but unproven draft pick. He is a legit star WR who has proven that he can battle NFL secondaries and make plays. And yet, he is not an aging vet who may be sliding down from his peak. This is a young guy still on his rookie deal who figures to peak in the next year or two. We have a chance to lock him up for the best years of his career. He is younger in career terms than Marshall was when we got him.

That, folks, is a 1 in 500 chance to secure superb value. And, we can do it for a ridiculously affordable price. We gave up very little to get him, and, if we extend him NOW, we will get a risk-of-injury discount. As others have pointed out in other threads, he will be considerably more expensive to extend after a productive year with us. We could lock up a stud WR in the beginning of his prime for a discount that opens cap space for other talent next year.

That's drool-inducing stuff. But, of course, one must consider the risks. 1) Will he be productive? 2) Will he be healthy?

I don't see anyone worrying much about #1. Goff doomsters may feel we don't have the QB to get value, but all the more reason to lock Sammy up and keep looking for a decent QB whom he can help to shine. The beauty of a proven stud is that you know what he can do ... exactly what no Ram WR has been able to do since Torry retired.

And that leaves the injury risk. Now, I don't know enough to evaluate his actual health. IF Sammy has some sort of condition that significantly raises his odds of injury, then obviously you don't extend until he proves health. I have seen posters argue this way, but I don't see actual information on it. What I generally feel I am seeing from posters is an abstract anxiety: "well, he's been injured. Injured guys often get hurt again. Let him prove he's healthy and then we can extend him."

But, then, that's the point. Whoever signs Sammy after a good, healthy year will pay a large premium for the neutralizing of that risk. There is a COST for waiting to see him prove his health. Indeed, there's a cost both ways, and this is always true. It's why Donald won't practice right now. He does not want to assume the risk of injury. In sports contract negotiations, one of the biggest points of contention is always about who assumes the risk of injury. Extend a guy NOW, and the team assumes that risk. It therefore receives compensation in a lower contract number. Wait and extend him later, and the PLAYER assumes the risk, and thereby gets paid for having won the bet on his health. We do not eliminate risk by waiting for Sammy to prove his health. We may be free of the risk of locking up cap space in a guy who gets hurt, but we incur the risk of the guy remaining healthy.

And imagine what we'd face next off season if Sammy has a good or better year. He would be demanding top WR money and teams would be lining up to pay him. We'd have to pay him top dollar while trying to pay other guys. And we might well lose him. What an irony that would be: we finally get a top WR and because we nickel-and-dime him, we lose him to, say, the Seahawks. Talk about Same Old Sorry Ass Rams!!

Losing a rented stud because we aren't willing to risk extending him would confirm the worst traits of a losing franchise. In the threads discussing this issue, I see a number of guys citing recent Ram history. Well, it's understandable. We are trying to heal the scars from that history. So, emotionally, I can see why guys would see extending Sammy as yet another blunder by the group that extended Foles and Austin. And there ARE parallels. All 3 would be cases of extending guys before something is proven.

But, see, those parallels are not the point. The problem is not that the Ram FO have a habit of extending guys when they shouldn't. The problem is that they make the WRONG CALL. There is nothing intrinsically right or wrong in taking risk to extend guys. It is wrong to extend the wrong guys. And it would be equally wrong to NOT extend the RIGHT guys. The question of whether to extend has no inherent bias one way or another. We Ram fans have been burned recently by bad extensions for the wrong guys. But if we then assume that every risk-taking extension is a mistake, another sign of the lousy Ram FO, then we are reacting out of conditioned reflex, out of emotional scar tissue.

I HATED the extension for Tavon. I initially thought well of the Foles extension because I figured Foles was a good acquisition. I was, I think, right in the first case and wrong in the 2nd. And, looking back, I can see why Foles constituted a genuine performance risk.

But for me, the case with Sammy is completely different. I don't see a performance risk. I don't assume that, just because the Ram FO is doing it, a risk-assuming extension is bad. And, assuming the health risk is reasonable, I personally see extending Sammy as a no-brainer. Lock him up and build a passing game around him and Woods and Kupp. Save a bit of cap space for our guys next year.

So, if'n it was me, I'd start the re-negotiation process up right away. I'd play Sammy in games 2 and 3 and watch his foot. I'd take a long look at his health, and assuming things were OK, I'd try to finish the extension the week before Game 1. I'd be happily willing to assume the risk in that move for the really good bet on incredible player value on which to build a fine offense and maximize the odds of Goff succeeding.

I know other guys see this differently. That's fine and in general I think beaten-up Ram fans need to be allowed to figure out how to deal with their scar tissue on their own. But, speaking honestly, when I see posters trashing the idea of an early extension because it would be yet another example of a lousy FO making a bad bet, I feel I am hearing the voice of scar tissue.

You can't win without placing bets. ALL BETS are risky. You can lose by tossing in your chips and you can lose by holding them.

This seems to me a really good bet. David Bromberg used to sing a song with a great refrain:

A man should never gamble
More than he can stand to lose

I'll take this gamble and I can stand to lose it.