Published August 9, 2026 06:33 PM
Aaron Donald continues to ponder whether he’ll return to football after two years of retirement. And his play-or-don’t-play decision is indeed coming soon.
But apparently not quite as soon as recently expected.
Donald’s target, we’re told, has shifted from early this week to the end of this week. (Given the ramifications of a decision to return, Donald could take a little more time before making the decision to take the pigskin plunge.)
The Rams have plenty of time to get Donald ready to go. They’d deploy the same plan utilized in 2017 and 2018 to ramp him up after protracted contract holdouts. The Rams would want Donald to have a few weeks of football activities before playing, with the goal of 30-40 snaps in the Week 1 game against the 49ers in Australia.
Unless Donald’s workouts include the equivalent of football sparring sessions, he won’t know how he moves in relation to other players until he’s back on the practice field.
Hall of Famer Lawrence Taylor retired after realizing that the younger players seemed to be getting faster. His coach, Bill Parcells, told Taylor that he was getting slower. Unless and until Donald is practicing against other players, he won’t be able to make that assessment. And that’s an important factor, because Aaron Donald wants to be sure that he’ll still be the Aaron Donald of old.
Still, Donald currently seems to be planning to make the decision on whether to play before officially rejoining the Rams and participating in practice. And he’ll be taking a bit more time to make that call.
It remains hard to envision Donald putting in so much work only to not play. Until he decides to do it, however, there’s a chance he’ll decide not to do it.
