{"id":410707,"date":"2026-07-24T12:13:18","date_gmt":"2026-07-24T12:13:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/410707\/"},"modified":"2026-07-24T12:13:18","modified_gmt":"2026-07-24T12:13:18","slug":"rams-fine-with-aaron-donald-taking-time-to-make-comeback-decision","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/410707\/","title":{"rendered":"Rams fine with Aaron Donald taking time to make comeback decision"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Aaron Donald<\/a> did not attend a Rams<\/a> fan event Thursday night, but the crowd at the YouTube Theater in Inglewood featured many people wearing No. 99 jerseys. One waved a large printed cutout of the three-time NFL defensive player of the year\u2019s face.<\/p>\n

The Rams are waiting for Donald to decide whether he will come out of a two-year retirement and join a star-studded Rams team that is favored to win the Super Bowl, which will be played in February at SoFi Stadium.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s real clear where we can start the GoFundMe to bring Aaron back,\u201d team president Kevin Demoff<\/a> joked to a raucous crowd that was cheering \u2018AD, AD, AD.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Rams open training camp Saturday at Loyola Marymount. Donald, 35, helped the Rams win Super Bowl LVI at SoFi Stadium<\/a> to cap the 2021 season. He has indicated that he is considering a return<\/a> to a defense that features end Myles Garrett<\/a>, the reigning defensive player of the year, and All-Pro cornerback Trent McDuffie<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t have a ring, or a Lombardi Trophy or a banner if it\u2019s not for Aaron Donald,\u201d Demoff told the crowd, adding that if Donald wants to return, \u201cWe will wait with open arms.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tony Pastoors, the Rams chief operating officer, said the Rams want Donald to go \u201cthrough his process\u201d before making a decision.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhenever he\u2019s ready, we\u2019ll be ready,\u201d Pastoors told the crowd. \u201cAnd, ultimately, I would rather have Aaron Donald when we\u2019re playing actual football games than in July.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo, we\u2019ll all be patient, and if it happens, we\u2019ll be ready.\u201d<\/p>\n

Demoff echoed Pastoors.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe last 10 years don\u2019t happen without Aaron Donald, and if he wants to come help kick off the next 10 years, by all means we\u2019re ready.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Aaron Donald did not attend a Rams fan event Thursday night, but the crowd at the YouTube Theater…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":410708,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[77645,4760,164512,11273,66239,3900,48,52,51,47,50,49,23339,11706,10947,5712,11730,164513,315,164514,72],"class_list":["post-410707","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-aaron-donald","tag-ad","tag-comeback-decision","tag-crowd","tag-demoff","tag-inglewood","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news","tag-many-people","tag-ram","tag-rams","tag-sofi-stadium","tag-super-bowl","tag-three-time-nfl-defensive-player","tag-time","tag-tony-pastoors","tag-year"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/410707","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=410707"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/410707\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/410708"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=410707"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=410707"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=410707"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}