Last night I did something I knew I shouldn’t have done. I knew it was a bad idea at the time, and yet I did it anyway. I tweeted about Aaron Rodgers and Jordan Love.
I fired this sucker off, went about my night and eventually returned to a firestorm. So let’s just take a second here & go through the overall thought in my brain when I thought it was a good idea to dip my toes into these very specific waters.
I think it’s fairly well-known that I’m a fan of Aaron Rodgers and what he has done for the Packers over the course of his career. Yes, he helped deliver a Super Bowl and has provided me with endless highlight throws and memorable games. But there’s a bigger thing: Rodgers has been the QB of the Packers for the entire time I’ve been writing about football. Watching him on a weekly basis and studying his decision-making has taught me a ton about football.
All that being said…
He has…what? One more year? Two, max? If we’re only talking about 2023, I still firmly believe Rodgers gives the Packers the best chance to win. No, 2022 wasn’t his best season, but a whole host of factors played into that. A new OC leading to a lot of issues with attention to detail early in the year. A (mostly) new WR corps that took a while to get rolling, and dealt with a lot of injuries along the way. An offensive line in-flux. A midseason broken thumb. This version is not 2011 Rodgers, but he’s still a good QB.
But it’s not just about 2023. It never is. Let’s play out a scenario.
Let’s say Rodgers decides to come back in 2023 and the Packers pick up Love’s 5th year option. Unless some major changes are made, this does not feel like a Super Bowl contending team. They feel like a team that could get into the playoffs and earn the “no one wants to play them” tag, but it’s tough to see anything past the Divisional Round.
It’s also tough to see them bottoming out, and that’s where my original thought came from.
Let’s say 2023 finds the Packers getting bounced in the Divisional Round and then Rodgers decides he’s done. You don’t have a high enough draft pick to get one of the guys at QB, and you’ve got Jordan Love - who you still really haven’t seen in extended game action - on a 5th year option and likely not wanting to stay on that 5th year option. Sure, you could have him play under that then franchise him, but what message does that send to the rest of the team? I know I am often guilty of forgetting about the people side of this business.
Beyond asking if Jordan Love wants to stay in Green Bay after all this (a question worth asking, seeing as how there are already whispered reports that he may ask for a trade if he’s not playing in 2023), it’s worth asking about the rest of the team. The QB is the leader; the face of the franchise. The Packers have been an organization known for treating their guys well. What if this impacts that? How does that color future contract negotiations, both in-house and in free agency? Not saying it will, but the human side of this is one that needs to at least be considered.
Back to the original point. “If the Packers feel Jordan Love is good enough to start, he needs to be the guy.” Why “good enough to start?” Quite simply, because it’s hard to find a quality starting quarterback and I don’t think the bar needs to be that high for the Packers to choose Love. If they think Love can be a legit starter and they don’t see a pick in the top 10 for as long as Rodgers is under center (or in shotgun, I guess), they’re not going to have another chance to grab their franchise QB anytime soon. Unless they want to make a big trade (like we saw for Russell Wilson) or crossing your fingers and hoping that a guy of Kirk Cousins’ ilk makes it to free agency so you can throw guaranteed cash at him. That doesn’t sound particularly fun.
It comes down to the GM and Coach at this point. If there’s a plan in place to tear it down after Rodgers leaves and build around the core you’re building in the next year or two, this is all null and void, vull and noid. Because that means those guys have assurances that their jobs are secure after Rodgers leaves, even if they’re bad for a few years after the fact. And maybe that’s the case.
But if they plan on being competitive for the foreseeable future - whether that’s trying to pry this current window open or living in a world of 7-10 wins for a couple years - it’s hard to make a case for them to do anything other than rolling with Love.
Unless they don’t think Love is that guy. And, while I liked what I saw of him in limited time against the Eagles, that’s an extremely small sample size featuring Love operating a limited playbook. He operated it extremely well and it wasn’t his fault it was limited, but playing well in 9 dropbacks doesn’t exactly guarantee that he will be a competent QB over the course of his entire career, or even an entire season.
And maybe that’s the answer. Maybe the reason why the front office is clinging so hard to Rodgers is because they already know Love ain’t it. Unless we’re in that building, we simply don’t know. We can watch Love’s limited NFL tape and do our best to read the tea leaves, but we simply don’t have the information necessary to know whether or not Love is in a good spot. He’s certainly better than he was when he entered the league, but some of those same issues that plagued him in college - occasional inaccuracy at all levels, bouts of poor decision making, locking onto WRs, etc. - still popped up in pretty much every game we’ve seen other than the Eagles game.
This is entirely too long, so I’ll end with this. There are two paths. Roll with Rodgers until the wheels come off then either be bad for a few years or luck into a QB later in the draft, or go with Love now before the relationship sours. To me, that decision should be driven by what the Packers believe they have in Love.
Here’s one thing I know for sure: no matter what happens, people will be mad about it. SPORTS!