The Los Angeles Rams made a franchise-altering move at the start of the month when they acquired Myles Garrett from the Cleveland Browns in exchange for Jared Verse and three future draft picks.
Verse had emerged as a star for the Rams, but the Browns made it clear that they wouldn’t give up Garrett unless they received a young impact player in return, so L.A. made the difficult choice to part ways with him.
It couldn’t have been easy for the Rams to tell Verse that he was being traded, but head coach Sean McVay praised the 25-year-old for how he handled things.
Verse had one request for McVay, and that was being able to tell his Rams teammates about the trade before they heard about it elsewhere.
“I like to consider myself a leader of the team. I like to think that I help elevate not only myself but my teammates with the way that I work and show out on the field and the way that I try to produce in practices, most importantly. When he gave me that news, my mindset wasn’t, ‘Oh my god, I’ve got to leave, all this stuff. I’ve got to pack up my house. I’ve got to go across the country.’ My mindset was, ‘I’ve got to leave my teammates, I’ve got to leave my brothers behind, because I don’t want to leave my brothers,’” Verse told Browns senior broadcaster Nathan Zegura.
“So if I’m going to, I want to address them. I don’t want them to find out from ESPN or from this news site or that news site. I want them to hear from me. Went to the team room, Coach, he released it, he told everybody that, ‘We’re trading Jared,’ and I got to tell everybody. I said, ‘It sucks I’m not going to be here. I love you guys to death. You guys are going to go out there, you guys are going to dominate, you guys are going to do everything you can do and you guys are going to play the best you can. You guys got 17 games for sure. Who knows what’s going to happen after that but just go dominate.’”
Although he will now be playing in a different conference, Verse’s final message to the Rams was to make sure they beat the reigning Super Bowl champion Seattle Seahawks.
“And I told them the most important thing, ‘Make sure’ – and I’m not going to cuss, but the words I used – ‘Make sure you beat the Seahawks. That’s all I care about,’” Verse said.
The former Defensive Rookie of the Year will now look to fill Garrett’s shoes with the rebuilding Browns, who are being led by first-year head coach Todd Monken.
Braden Fiske & Byron Young visited Jared Verse to say goodbye
Verse was a popular player with the Rams, and now that he is heading to Cleveland, his former teammates Braden Fiske and Byron Young wanted to visit him at his home to say goodbye and wish him well in the next chapter of his career.
Verse and Fiske were particularly close as they played their college ball at Florida State and were selected by the Rams in the first two rounds of the 2024 NFL Draft.