The trade “rumors” about Rams corner Trumaine Johnson leave me a little baffled. Someone walk me through the logic here.

Johnson will make $16.7 million this season by virtue of the Rams, oddly, franchising him two years in a row rather than executing a long-term deal for him, or, for that matter, rather than signing corner Janoris Jenkins, who left for big money with the Giants as a free agent a year ago.

He will have made $30 million in two years from the perpetually struggling franchise, has the ability to re-enter the market next year as a free agent at the ripe old age of 28 (still pretty ideal), and he, wisely, already signed his franchise tender guaranteeing him next year’s salary.

He is a good, productive player. He is not an All-Pro player. He is not a Pro Bowler. He is not a difference-maker week in and week out. He is not a shut-down guy. And yet he is the highest paid corner in the NFL for 2017.

And I am supposed to believe, at a time when the corner market is full of options in free agency (none of whom require any compensation to sign and several of whom have better resumes than Johnson), teams are calling the Rams dying to take this contract off their hands? Really? Smells like fake news to me.

Would the Rams love to get out of this conundrum? Sure. They’d love to get some value for a good-but-not elite player who, wisely, signed that tag ASAP, binding him to that salary. But what are they going to get for him, especially at that price point? A half-dozen teams will have signed new starting corners by Thursday afternoon, there is a crop coming up in the draft and if you represent Johnson, why the hell would you do a long-term deal with anyone for less than $15 million a year? You wouldn’t. You’d negotiate off the tag.

So, again, where is the logic here? Where is the market and where is the ability to get much of anything in return? Any team that like Johnson enough to trade for him would want him long-term and what’s his motivation to do anything less than a blockbuster deal given he’ll pocket just under $17 million this season no matter what?

The Rams could’ve let him walk rather than pay him the 20 percent raise off last season’s already high salary, and waited for that 2018 compensatory pick to roll in (probably a third if he signs a high-end deal) if they were concerned about compensation. There is no way they’d get more than a third-day draft pick for Johnson now, with his 2017 salary guaranteed at a record level. I don’t see it, but then again I suppose crazy things happen in the league every year.

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