“This Is Gonna Break the NFL”: Inside the Seismic Myles Garrett Trade That Just Changed Football Forever

 

Superstar pass rusher Myles Garrett walked through the cavernous concrete tunnels of SoFi Stadium long after Cleveland’s 2023 loss to the Los Angeles Rams. A black SUV pulled up beside him. The window rolled down. Inside sat Sean McVay.

“I didn’t f---ing sleep all week because of you,” the Rams’ head coach told Garrett, laughing.

Before that game, McVay and his offensive staff had agonized over how to slow down Garrett—a player so dominant over nine NFL seasons that he has won Defensive Player of the Year twice and broke the league’s single-season sack record last year.

Now, Garrett will play for McVay. On Monday, the Rams and Browns agreed to a landscape-altering trade. In exchange for Garrett, Cleveland will receive third-year pass rusher Jared Verse (a first-round pick in 2024), a 2027 first-round pick, a 2028 second-rounder, and a 2029 third-rounder.

Garrett has shared many complimentary moments with coaches throughout his illustrious career. But McVay’s words always stood out, Garrett once told The Athletic, because of the coach’s league-wide stature, his directness—and because the two might never have crossed paths if Garrett hadn’t left the locker room at that exact moment.

“The timing was impeccable,” Garrett said.

Years later, it would be again.

How the Deal Came Together

With a potential trade window opening on June 1, the Rams and Browns had been discussing a Garrett deal for months, starting in late March. By Saturday, the framework was agreed upon, pending final details, according to multiple league sources.

But without the precise timing of several variables—Garrett’s frustration in Cleveland, his no-trade clause and recent contract adjustment, the Browns’ shifting team-building strategy, L.A.’s willingness to part with a beloved young player, and even the Rams’ controversial first-round draft pick in April—this seismic move might never have happened.

Even days before it became official, the magnitude felt unbelievable to those involved. As one high-ranking team source put it: “This is gonna break the NFL.”

Why the Rams Went All In

The Rams have coveted Garrett for years. McVay considers him one of his favorite players—ever. The coach believes Garrett could eventually be regarded as the best outside pass rusher of all time.

Featuring him within the defense, Rams decision-makers believe, will provide an advantage similar to the one they enjoyed with future Hall of Fame defensive lineman Aaron Donald. Donald’s dominance required multiple blockers on every snap—much like Garrett, whose double-team rate on pass-rush snaps reached nearly 60 percent last season (per Pro Football Focus), the second-highest among all defensive linemen.

When an offense dedicates its blocking plan to stopping or shifting away from one player, it becomes vastly more predictable. Moreover, Garrett’s ability to win quickly, close on the quarterback, and convert pressure into hits and sacks reminds the Rams of the benefits Donald once provided to their secondary and second-level defenders.

McVay and his staff used to joke: “Who is the best cornerback on our roster? … It’s Aaron Donald.”

A History of Pursuit

L.A. first called Cleveland about Garrett’s availability in 2022, as the Rams attempted to repeat as Super Bowl champions, according to a league source. That season ended disastrously due to injuries and McVay’s own burnout. Cleveland wasn’t open to trading Garrett then.

Rams leadership revisited the idea the following offseason before pivoting to a roster teardown and rebuild through strong draft classes in 2023 and 2024.

Meanwhile, the Browns remained mired in the fallout from their 2022 trade for quarterback Deshaun Watson, which cost three future first-round picks and a fully guaranteed $230 million contract. Watson, who faced multiple sexual assault allegations, was suspended 11 games and later missed additional time due to injury. From 2022 through 2025, Cleveland went 26-42. Watson played in just 19 of those 68 games, as his salary and the draft-pick void anchored the roster.

In February 2025, after a 3-14 season, Garrett requested a trade. Though he received a four-year, $123 million extension from the Browns in early March—complete with a no-trade clause—the perception of a philosophical rift lingered.

By the end of the 2025 season, Garrett had claimed the single-season sack record but had played in only three playoff games over nine years. Cleveland had drafted well, building a young core, yet the team wasn’t winning.

The Final Moves

This offseason, the Browns hired Todd Monken as head coach—Garrett’s fourth. Monken was chosen over defensive coordinator Jim Schwartz, to whom Garrett was deeply loyal. Schwartz resigned angrily after the decision.

In late March, the Browns and Garrett agreed to a contract modification deferring $29 million in bonus payments over three years. The move created no immediate cap space but pushed roughly $10 million in guaranteed money from March to September—a clear signal to other teams that Garrett’s trade window was open, even if Cleveland GM Andrew Berry publicly denied it.

The Rams saw a sliver of possibility. They had already decided to move future picks for the right player, having engaged with the Eagles earlier that month on a potential A.J. Brown trade before backing out.

They called the Browns. So did other teams. Berry fended off multiple inquiries, a league source said.

Then, at the NFL’s annual meetings in Scottsdale, Arizona, McVay spotted Berry and beelined toward him. Laughing, McVay ribbed him about a recent Browns proposal to allow teams to trade draft picks five years in advance instead of three—a rule change McVay, a competition committee member, had publicly shut down.

The proposal, paired with Garrett’s adjusted contract, fueled speculation: were the Browns making Garrett more tradable to increase compensation flexibility?

“Myles is a career Brown,” Berry told Cleveland reporters. “He is one of the faces of our organization… I don’t really want to waste a ton more breath on the topic.”

The Draft Tell

That friendly interaction previewed weeks of continued conversations. The Rams stayed persistent, with Berry and L.A. GM Les Snead bouncing terms off each other frequently.

Nothing was finalized until a few days ago. But by the NFL Draft, the teams’ joint confidence that the deal would get done largely informed the Rams’ surprising pick at No. 13: Alabama quarterback Ty Simpson.

The selection was controversial—few analysts projected Simpson as a first-rounder, let alone in the top half. McVay appeared surly in his post-draft press conference, stirring speculation that Simpson wasn’t his choice. Privately, though, McVay had raved about Simpson for weeks, believing the team could develop him into a legitimate starter behind reigning MVP Matthew Stafford.

McVay later explained he didn’t want to tout the pick out of respect for Stafford, who hadn’t yet finalized his new contract. League sources also said McVay was reacting to a personal situation just before the press conference.

Stafford’s age (38) and backup Jimmy Garoppolo’s possible retirement had already created urgency to find a long-term solution. But securing that future meant the Rams could use other first-round picks on a major trade—with their sights fixed on Garrett.

“If you’re going to trade future first-round picks for a player, you had better know who your quarterback is going to be,” said a high-ranking team source.

For the Browns: A New Era

League sources believe the Browns are gathering ammunition for next year’s touted quarterback class, should their current options falter. Moving on from Garrett signals a full shift toward their young roster after back-to-back strong drafts.

Getting one of the Rams’ young pass rushers back was crucial for Cleveland. Verse, the 2024 Defensive Rookie of the Year with two years left on his rookie deal plus a fifth-year option, fit perfectly.

“As we embark on a new era of Browns football with a young core and a replenished asset base, we felt this move was important to our transition,” Berry said in a statement. “Chief among the considerations was the inclusion of Jared Verse—a player our fan base will love.”

For McVay, parting with a member of the Rams’ young core gave him pause. He also didn’t want details to leak before he could speak with Verse. The teams agreed to keep negotiations quiet until that conversation happened. A source said Verse handled it “with pure class.”

A Perfect Afternoon, Then Chaos

Monday afternoon in Northeast Ohio, the Browns hosted their annual charity golf outing at Akron’s Firestone Country Club. New head coach Todd Monken spoke to local reporters about the possibility of a Garrett trade, mostly sidestepping questions about the superstar he had yet to meet in person.

About 50 yards from Monken’s scrum, and minutes before the news broke, Andrew Berry paced a parking lot, talking on his phone.

It was sunny and mild—a perfect Ohio afternoon.

It would soon become very different than any other day in the NFL.

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