On Monday, the New Orleans Saints officially placed legendary offensive tackle Ryan Ramczyk on the team's reserve/retired list.
We've been waiting on this move for a while now. Ramczyk missed the entire 2024 season and was seen significantly lighter earlier this year. The weight loss dashed any doubt that the offensive tackle was calling it quits for good.
Back in April, Ramczyk officially announced his retirement. It was designated a post-June 1 move to help the Saints' salary cap. Even spending an extra year on the Saints roster helped the team financially.
New Orleans will be getting back $11.083 million in next year's salary cap. After protecting the Saints' right edge for seven years, Ramczyk protected the team one more time on the way out the door.
Ryan Ramczyk made an immediate impact on the New Orleans Saints
Ramczyk was able to immediately create an impact coming in, and over the years, has made the right side of the offensive line as fortified as Fort Knox. In his career, he only allowed the quarterback behind him to get sacked 19 times in 6,504 snaps, according to data from PFF.
Unfortunately, lingering issues from a 2021 knee injury ultimately forced his career to come to a premature end. The cartilage in Ramczyk's knee was literally deteriorating.
“Cartilage is something that’s really hard to regenerate, it’s something that just doesn’t recover as well.” Dr. Stephen Etheredge, a sports medicine specialist based in Baton Rouge, said on the After Further Review podcast in 2024. “So the more he does on it, the more it wears down.”
The former All-Pro was drafted back in 2017 as a part of the draft class that reopened the Saints' Super Bowl window. Ramczyk did his part by being one half of one of the best, if not the best, offensive tackle duos in the league along with Terron Armstead.
Ramczyk's class also included fellow first-round pick Marshon Lattimore, along with Marcus Williams, Trey Hendrickson, and Alvin Kamara. All five of these players made a huge impact on the Saints, either in the short term or long term.
With Ramczyk's retirement, that leaves Kamara as the last player from the iconic 2017 draft class.