An Unwelcome, But Not Unexpected Outcome For Aaron Rodgers
He leaves the stage with a win in New York, but the Jets organization in worse shape than when he arrived.
With the Miami Dolphins clinging to the slim hope of qualifying for the National Football League (NFL) Playoffs heading into the final week of the league’s regular season, the decision was made to “flex” their road game against the New York Jets into a national broadcast window on Fox at 4:25 p.m. on Sunday afternoon. Wrapping up my own weekend, and with serious winter weather bearing down on the East Coast on what essentially was the last day of the holiday season, I settled into the recliner in front of my television, this despite my vow to watch the Jets nevermore.
Having been mathematically eliminated from playoff contention a few weeks ago, the Jets have now failed to reach the postseason for 14 consecutive years, the longest stretch in the entire league. I’ve watched a lot of meaningless, late-season Jets football, a situation where a loss would help improve the team’s position in the NFL Draft, only to see the Jets pull out a victory and drop one or two selections later in the first round, often with disastrous results. Earlier in the day, I experienced a feeling of déjà vu as Fox’s Jimmy Johnson confidently predicted that a Dolphins team playing without injured quarterback Tua Tagovailoa would “upset” the favored Jets in New Jersey. While I can appreciate that Johnson, who coached the Dolphins for a few seasons, might want to display some loyalty to his former employer, I knew in that moment that the metaphysical “fix” was in, and the Jets would find a way to win.
After falling behind 6-0 early, “Gang Green” pulled into the lead in the second quarter and never looked back, securing a 32-26 victory in what has to be the last game in a Jets uniform for quarterback Aaron Rodgers.1 It’s been a little less than two years since the Jets acquired Rodgers from the Green Bay Packers for a second round draft pick, hoping that adding him to a team with one of the league’s best defenses would catapult the Jets back to the postseason, and perhaps, the Super Bowl berth that has eluded them since 1969.
I hardly need to review the unhappy outcome. The Rodgers experiment was derailed just three snaps into the 2023 NFL season when he suffered a season-ending achilles tendon tear. He committed himself to an arduous rehab schedule, rejoining the team for practice before the end of the regular season, but didn’t return to the starting lineup until 2024. In the meantime, the dominating Jets defense turned ordinary even at the best of times, while Rodgers was just a shadow of his former self, lagging in the bottom quartile of the league in quarterback rating as the losses piled up. And somehow, the Jets, who finished 7-10 last season without Rodgers in the lineup, inexplicably got worse with him in it, coming into Sunday’s game with a 4-12 mark.
For many NFL observers, his abject failure has been the subject of much jocularity, and it’s hardly surprising after he played coy with the national media about whether or not he had been vaccinated for COVID-19. Reporters don’t like feeling they’ve been deceived, whether or not Rodgers had a right to keep that information private. And he didn’t do himself any favors with some of his off-the-field activities, like his decision to skip minicamp to vacation in Egypt, an ayahuasca retreat, or the frequent appearances on ESPN’s Pat McAfee Show. Still, I hardly cared, as my only concern was whether or not Rodgers performed on the field, a measure by which he has consistently come up short this season, effectively ending the careers in New York of former Head Coach Robert Saleh, General Manager Joe Douglas, as well as his own.
But on Sunday, at least for once in a Jets uniform, Rodgers flashed glimpses of a form that won him a Super Bowl ring, an NFL MVP award and a future ticket to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton. Although he threw an early interception, he completed 27 of 39 passes for 339 yards and a touchdown pass to old buddy Davante Adams, the 500th of the quarterback’s career and possibly his last.
If he left the field for the last time, he did it as a winner with a smile on his face. Unfortunately, he leaves behind an organization that finds itself in worse shape than when he arrived and still searching for answers almost 46 years after its only Super Bowl win. While acquiring Rodgers might have only cost a second round pick, the team’s efforts to surround him with offensive talent cost more, and his $112.5 million contract that has one year remaining will prove to be a headache long after he’s gone.
It is for this that he’ll be judged in New York, just another man in a long line of quarterbacks who wilted in the spotlight for the city’s also-ran football team.2
He won’t be missed.
The Dolphins had little incentive to play hard as they needed a win and for the Kansas City Chiefs to defeat the Denver Broncos on the road in Denver. Unfortunately for Miami, the Chiefs, who had already secured the top seed in the American Football Conference (AFC), rested their starters against the Broncos. The home team cruised to a 38-0 win and punched their ticket to the playoffs.
Meanwhile, no less than two former Jets quarterbacks — Sam Darnold and Geno Smith —are starting for teams that had winning records, while a third, Zach Wilson, is a backup for a Broncos team that finds itself in the postseason. It would be easy to infer that the problem wasn’t the talent at quarterback, but insufficient patience on the part of the organization when it comes to developing a winner.