(East Los Angeles, CA) [From The Editor’s Desk]: The Los Angeles Rams recently nominated their wide receiving super star, Super Bowl 21 Champion, Super Bowl MVP, and 1st Team All-Pro, #10/Cooper Kupp, for the NFL’s annual, and prestigious Walter Payton – “Man of the Year” Award. The winner of the award each year receives a $250,000 donation to the charity of his choice. All 32 nominees receive up to a $55,000 donation to their charity of choice. All donations are courtesy of the NFL Foundation and Nationwide.

Read below in the Club’s media announcement, the details of the Award and Kupp’s long list of outstanding community activities that should place him in the running for strong consideration of this distinct achievement. The Rams’ now retired, and former offensive lineman, #77/Andrew Whitworth, was the proud and celebrated winner of the Award in 2021. Last season, the Rams’ nominee for the Award was offensive lineman, #72 Tremayne Anchrum, Jr.

The winner of this year’s Walter Payton NFL Man of the Year Award will be announced “live” at NFL Honors on Thursday, February 8th at 9:00 PM ET/6:00 PM PT on CBS.

(December 5, 2023) – The Los Angeles Rams announced receiver Cooper Kupp as its nominee for the Walter Payton NFL Man of the Year Award Presented by Nationwide. The Walter Payton – NFL Man of the Year Award presented by Nationwide is the league’s most prestigious honor and acknowledges NFL players who excel on the field and demonstrate a passion for creating a lasting positive impact beyond the game in their communities.

Kupp is the Rams’ 2023 Walter Payton Man of the Year Nominee – “It’s really special.”

Earlier this season, Kupp joined forces with renowned LA-region chefs and the Los Angeles Regional Food Bank for the 8th Annual Taste of the Rams event to combat food insecurity in Los Angeles. The evening raised almost $200,000 to provide essential assistance to families and individuals facing food insecurity in LA County and the funding helped the LA Regional Food Bank distribute hundreds of thousands of nutritious meals across LA County. It was the fourth consecutive year Kupp partnered with the LA Regional Food Bank and served as the event’s Honorary Chair. He also has made donations to purchase more than 84,000 meals for food banks in the Yakima and Richland areas of Washington, the LA Regional Food Bank, and Food Share Ventura County.

In addition to his efforts combating hunger, Kupp “adopted” a local high school football team this season and is mentoring their players and coaches to inspire and help instill a winning culture for a team that’s struggled to build a winning program over the last several years.

To kick off the initiative, Kupp visited the Royal High School Football team and met the players and coaches, toured their facilities, and led the team in an extensive film session covering one of their games. The following month, Kupp invited the entire team to the Rams practice facility and served as a coach/mentor while the team practiced on the Rams’ practice fields.

He worked with Nike to provide the entire team with t-shirts and shorts along with a post-practice meal provided by El Torito. Kupp also invited players and coaches on the team to the Rams-Cardinals matchup at SoFi Stadium. Last month ahead of Thanksgiving, Kupp volunteered alongside the Royal High football team at a local food drive and gifted all players with brand new uniforms.

During the offseason, Kupp hosted a free youth football camp for more than 125 youth and funded buses to transport Lincoln Rams youth football players from Boyle Heights. He has also supported efforts to combat chronic absenteeism in partnership with Nike by rewarding academic achievements for students at local schools.

Kupp has purchased clothes to reward Inglewood Unified School District students who maintain strong attendance, participation, and engagement in school and has provided 23 student-families identified by Inglewood Unified School District with clothes for the school year.

Kupp was nominated as the team’s Salute to Service Award honoree earlier this year for his continued support of the club’s military appreciation efforts. This year, he represented the Gary Sinese Foundation during My Cause, My Cleats and is selling custom merchandise on cooperkupp.com to benefit the Gary Sinese Foundation.

Kupp and his wife, Anna, have also sold personalized merchandise and donated proceeds to Team Rubicon to benefit vets looking for work and provide aide for disaster relief.