Leave It To The Jets To Be Held Hostage By An Aging QB’s Mercy
By the time this gets posted, it could be moot. Bombshells are the norm when it comes to superstars in pro sports, especially one as mercurial as quarterback Aaron Rodgers.
A Green Bay Packer for the past 18 seasons, Rodgers is reportedly weighing his options for the 2023 season. The Jets are said to be on the cusp of trading for the future Hall-of-Famer, though the cost is uncertain.
It’s up to Rodgers to first make a decision. There have been hints, including a tweet from an ESPN host, that he is ready to take on the challenge of leading perhaps the NFL’s most dysfunctional team, one that sports the league’s longest postseason drought and hasn’t been to a Super Bowl in 54 years.
Then again, who really knows? Rodgers has the right to change his mind. It’s not like his previous behavior has been 100% predictable.
He could also decide to hang it up for good, which would screw the Packers by creating a $40 million dead money charge on the team’s salary cap (that can be split into two seasons if designated post June 1). He’d be getting back at a Packers organization that seems more than amenable to moving on from Rodgers and handing the reins to Jordan Love no matter where Rodgers lands. I can only imagine the Cheeseheads fans’ wrath should Rodgers ultimately decide that he wants to give it another year in Green Bay and then they play Love anyway.
Or maybe the Packers pull a “Draft Day” maneuver and renege on whatever consideration, if any, had previously been agreed to in principle with Jets General Manager Joe Douglas, before New York’s “Plan B” options left the market. Derek Carr, Jimmy Garoppolo, Jameis Winston—heck, even Sam Darnold and Mike White have been signed by new teams—ae all now off the board. Yesterday’s price might not be today’s price, right?
Does that mean, “Hello, Gardner Minshew?” I think not, but that’s the level of available “veteran” QBs remaining in free agency. Oh, and Lamar Jackson is a pipe dream. The Ravens are more than willing to wait on an offer sheet for their franchise-tagged star QB to let the market set his value and then match. Besides the immense salary cap implications, any trade for Jackson would cost an acquiring team a boatload of premium picks, possibly more than the haul the Seahawks got from Denver last year from trading Russell Wilson. The Jets aren’t close enough to make that big a bet.
How comically ironic (or tragic) would it be if the Jets had to settle for Quarterback D and he couldn’t beat out 2021 Draft bust Zach Wilson in training camp? Don’t laugh (or cry), that’s still a plausible scenario.
So the Jets and their fans have to wait as if they’re held hostage and praying the ransom instructions can be met. And for what? A past prime QB who at best could elevate the team into contending for a wild card spot? A Rodgers-led Jets squad would still be inferior to Buffalo, Kansas City, Cincinnati, et al.
I’ve been through this before in previous posts—why Rodgers would be crazy to abandon the relatively cozy NFC North in the first place for the rough AFC, not to mention New Jersey taxes and the diminished state of the Jets’ franchise after years of unproductive Drafts prior to 2022. New York area bettors may be pounding the Jets’ Super Bowl odds in the last few days, but they’re fools.
This latest Rodgers dance is the type of madness that only happens to the Jets. They’re always looking for the Back Page splash, even if it keeps putting the program in a perilous position when it inevitably fails.
From ownership down, they have been clueless as the rest of the league has passed them by. Previously moribund organizations like Cincinnati, Detroit, and Jacksonville are moving up while New York stays in its dark place, banking on prayers to aging veterans to shine some light instead of building a sustainably winning team the right way.