The Los Angeles Rams have informed Cooper Kupp that they are seeking a trade for the star receiver, he said in a post on X on Monday, after he ended the season uncertain about his future with the team he helped lead to a Super Bowl victory.
“I don’t agree with the decision and always believed it was going to begin and end in LA,” Kupp wrote.
“Still, if there’s one thing that I have learned over the years: there are so many things that are out of your control, but it is how you respond to these things that you will look back on and remember.”
I was informed that the team will be seeking a trade immediately and will be working with me and my family to find the right place to continue competing for championships. I don’t agree with the decision and always believed it was going to begin and end in LA.
Still, if there’s… pic.twitter.com/XWmbGVscGy
— Cooper Kupp (@CooperKupp) February 4, 2025
Kupp said one day after the Rams’ divisional-round loss in Philadelphia in January that he planned to play football in 2025, though allowed that the location was uncertain. The Rams had trade conversations about Kupp with other teams ahead of this year’s deadline, of which he was aware.
“Do I want to play next year? Oh yeah,” he said, laughing. “There’s no doubt in my mind I want to play football. I feel like I’ve got a lot of good football left in me. I definitely will be playing — I will be playing football next year. That much I know.”
A multiyear team captain, Kupp was the NFL’s triple crown winner and Super Bowl MVP in 2021, and had spent his entire career in L.A. after he was drafted in the third round in 2017. The 2021 Associated Press Offensive Player of the Year said he is expecting to have a full and healthy offseason.
Kupp, 31, finished the regular season with 67 catches for 710 yards and six touchdowns in 12 games. His targets dwindled during the back stretch of the regular season and into the playoffs. He had four catches on nine targets over the last three regular-season games, was targeted once for one catch against Minnesota in the wild-card round and caught five passes on seven targets against the Eagles in the divisional-round loss. In his 14 games (including the postseason) this season, Kupp had 10 or more targets just four times and eight or more targets six times.
Injuries have been partially to blame as Kupp has dealt with ailments in each of the last three seasons. He played in just nine regular-season games in 2022, and 12 games apiece in 2023 and 2024 — with a high ankle sprain costing him time this season.
That dip in production did not meet his current salary in the Rams’ eyes. In 2022, Kupp signed a three-year, $80 million contract extension with the Rams. His salary-cap numbers in 2025 and 2026 are $29.7 million and $27.3 million, respectively, with $5 million in guarantees in 2025 and none in 2026, according to Over the Cap. He also is owed roster bonuses of $12.5 million combined over the next two seasons per OTC. The $7.5 million roster bonus owed to Kupp in 2025 triggers on March 19.
A league source said that the Rams did not directly ask Kupp to restructure his existing contract, although in order to make a trade more appealing to prospective teams, a reworked contract is likely not out of the question, whether by his own design or that of an organization.
In separate news conferences in late January, neither coach Sean McVay (who has spent his entire tenure with Kupp) nor general manager Les Snead would commit to Kupp’s future with the Rams.
Instead, Snead seemed to speak carefully about Kupp, almost as if his tenure were in the past tense, though without using language that direct.
“I can say that if you’re speaking about Cooper or Matthew (Stafford), I don’t even know if I could put into words what they’ve meant to this organization. I think I probably have a picture behind me somewhere where it’s Cooper Kupp catching a ball at SoFi on the last weekend of the NFL season,” Snead said. “A ball thrown by Matthew Stafford (changed) the course of this franchise. There is a banner hanging in that stadium that only one team gets a year. What can I say about that? Those moments, a lot of memories, and a lot of pictures, that’s what they mean to us.”
The future of Stafford, who does expect to continue playing (as he said in the locker room in Philadelphia), is also a topic in question for the Rams. Stafford adjusted his contract to move most of its remaining guarantees to the 2024 season, effectively rendering it a one-year deal.
The Rams must decide whether to adjust the contract again, or part ways with Stafford. Neither Snead nor McVay expressly committed to the veteran quarterback in their end-of-season news conferences, though allowed that figuring out his situation is a top priority.
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(Photo: Jonathan Bachman / Getty Images)
