Los Angeles Rams Give Tavon Austin Four-Year Extension

The Los Angeles Rams agreed to an extension for Tavon Austin and includes $30 million guaranteed.

If Tavon Austin wasn’t feeling the pressure to have a breakout season for the Los Angeles Rams before, the wide receiver is certainly going to be feeling it now.

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Austin and the Rams agreed to a four-year, $42 million extension on Saturday with $30 million guaranteed. The deal also includes incentives that could increase the amount to $52 million and will keep Austin in Los Angeles through the 2021 season.

Of course, the decision by the Rams should cause plenty of debate when it comes to whether the team is overpaying Austin when looking at his statistics from the first three seasons. Austin did manage to find the end zone 10 times during the 2015 season, but the argument can be made that he’s never lived up to the hype as a No. 1 wide receiver threat.

The fact that Austin set career highs last year as a wideout by catching 52 passes for 473 yards and five touchdowns shows how inconsistent he’s been for the Rams’ offense so far in his career. With this type of deal, let’s hope Los Angeles can build off of last year’s success and help the speedy wide receiver finally reach his true potential.

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Otherwise, the Rams will just be wasting money on Austin like they did with Nick Foles–who was released by the team a few weeks ago.