Every breadcrumb Odell Beckham Jr. dropped about Lamar Jackson in Ravens press conference

Lamar Jackson made his first appearance as a Baltimore Ravens player on Thursday. Here’s what he said about Lamar Jackson.

When Lamar Jackson was introduced as the newest member of the Baltimore Ravens on Thursday, those around the league were waiting with bated breath to hear if he’d leak anything on Lamar Jackson.

Mainly, did he know something that the rest of the world doesn’t yet on Lamar Jackson returning to the Ravens? We know the quarterback hasn’t signed the franchise tag the Ravens offered him, and we also know he requested a trade, something he himself leaked.

Yet, OBJ and Jackson appeared buddy-buddy on social media when the signing went down, which had folks thinking Jackson might actually end up returning to Baltimore. Jackson also reportedly recruited Beckham, which could indicate he expects to play with the star receiver.

Here’s what Beckham said about Jackson possibly returning to the team.

What Odell Beckham Jr. said about Lamar Jackson returning to Baltimore

Asked if he knew anything about Jackson, Beckham said:

"“I’ve talked to Lamar while we was [in Miami] and I know that’s a better discussion for [Harbaugh and DeCosta] as far as how they handle it, but the goal was, you know, to come here and have that possibility to play with him and I’m excited about that opportunity.”"

When a reporter followed up to see if he had gotten any specific assurances, Beckham gave an incredibly vague answer:

"“[I] didn’t get any assurances for anything, you know, life’s uncertain. I think that we don’t we don’t know what’s gonna happen tomorrow, the next day, you know, we only know what’s happened in the past. So to me, it just was excited about the possibility of that you know my thoughts would be that he would be here, I know that, you know, these two one of them to be here.”"

Asked how much playing with Lamar even as a possibility factored into his decision, Beckham said, “Oh, definitely, you know, obviously, the obvious, you know, elephant in the room.”

In the press conference, general manager Eric DeCosta also commented on Jackson:

"“He’s the right player for this team to lead us to where we want to be. I think the locker room knows that the organization knows that they the fan base knows that so it’s ongoing.”"

Beckham did give a direct shoutout just for Jackson on the press conference:

"“Lamar, I know, if you’re watching… I would love to get to work with you. I’ll talk to these guys and hopefully, that gets done. I think when you think about the Ravens you definitely think about Lamar. And I was excited about that possibility.”"

So, what do these breadcrumbs indicate? Beckham clearly doesn’t want to say too much. He knows as well as anyone that the business side of the NFL is ugly and doesn’t want to be the one to mess up the Ravens or Jackson’s money. But you can clearly see that Jackson was a sizable factor in convincing Beckham to sign a fairly large deal with the Ravens.

It seems like Beckham would be somewhat surprised at this point if Jackson didn’t suit up as the starting QB in Baltimore in 2023.