Former Packers Exec Predicts Rodgers’ Fate

Andrew Brandt is sticking with his guns on what he thinks the Packers will do with MVP quarterback Aaron Rodgers.

REEN BAY, Wis. – From the moment the Green Bay Packers traded up in the 2020 NFL Draft to select Jordan Love, there was a timeline in place at quarterback.

Aaron Rodgers would play in 2020 and 2021 and the job would be handed to Love for the 2022 season so the team could get a gauge on Love before having to decide on the expensive fifth-year option.

That time is here and, Rodgers’ two MVP seasons haven’t changed that dynamic.

That’s the belief of Andrew Brandt, the former Packers vice president of player finance who writes Business of Football column for Sports Illustrated. Brandt worked for the Packers when they traded Brett Favre so Rodgers could play. He thinks the same outcome is on the horizon for Rodgers and Love.

The reality of the NFL is that first-round quarterbacks play. They don’t sit forever; they’re not flipped for draft picks; they play. For an NFL team to have the conviction to take a first-round quarterback, no matter where in the round, it is deciding that he is going to play. The only question is when.

For Aaron, that time frame turned out to be an extraordinary length: three years. Patrick Mahomes sat for one year, and it seems like Trey Lance will assume the Niners’ starting role after a year on the bench, too. Every other first-round quarterback drafted since 2012 has played during his first year. Except, of course, for Love, who has now sat two years.

A resolution will come by March 16, the start of the league-year and the date when teams need to be in compliance with the salary cap. The Packers are about $50 million over the cap and Rodgers’ contract – either with a cost-cutting extension or a cap-saving trade – will be a part of the solution.

A lot has changed since the Packers drafted Love. Mostly, Rodgers has delivered two excellent seasons while Love performed poorly in a midseason start at Kansas City and in relief of Rodgers at Detroit in the finale.

Two days after the season, coach Matt LaFleur made clear the franchise’s intentions.

“We would love for him to be a Packer and be a Packer to the day he decides to retire,” LaFleur said during his season-ending Zoom call on Monday.

CLICK HERE for all of Brandt’s thoughts on Rodgers and the retirement of Tom Brady.

Grading the Quarterbacks

Aaron Rodgers ($27.53 million cap charge; ranking No. 3 among quarterbacks)

The restructured contract that was part of Rodgers’ return to the team made him a huge bargain. The two quarterbacks with a higher cap charge, Seattle’s Russell Wilson and Minnesota’s Kirk Cousins, and the quarterback right below him, Atlanta’s Matt Ryan, failed to even post a winning record.

Rodgers is likely to win his fourth MVP, an unlikely accomplishment in light of how he infuriated so many media members with his stance on COVID. In the Super Bowl era, there have been only five seasons in which a quarterback ranked No. 1 in passer rating, touchdown percentage and interception percentage. Rodgers did it 2020 and again in 2021.

On the same page as coach Matt LaFleur and sharing the same brain as Davante Adams, Green Bay’s passing game was superb during the second half of the season. He finished the season with 37 touchdowns vs. four interceptions – including 37 touchdowns vs. two picks after Week 1. He finished fourth in YAC per completion, a byproduct of his accuracy putting his receivers in position to turn something into something more.

However, what happened in the playoffs can't be ignored. Since winning the Super Bowl in 2010, Rodgers is 7-9 in playoff games. He has lost four NFC Championship Games. Three times, he lost in overtime. Five times, he lost on the final play of the game. Six times, the defense allowed more than 30 points.

While the special teams stunk, the divisional-round loss to San Francisco falls on his shoulders for wasting a superb performance by the defense. Nonetheless, the Packers want him back for the long haul. Green Bay’s status as a championship contender in 2022 will depend on it.

“I think the older you get, the smarter you have to get in a number of different areas,” Rodgers said late in the season when asked to compare a potential 2021 MVP with his first MVP season of 2011. “Obviously, the experience gives you a lot of banked memories you can draw from, but physically, just from a physical standpoint, I probably weighed between 225 and 230 the majority of the season in 2011, and I’ve been between 215 and 220 in the majority of this season, so that 10 pounds has made a big difference for me. It’s allowed me to still move in the pocket, to still keep legs.”

Grade: A-minus.

Jordan Love ($2.81 million cap charge; ranking No. 40 among quarterbacks)

Getting his first real playing time, Love did nothing to provide confidence that he could possibly be the winning successor to Rodgers. The Packers lost four games during the regular season; Love had a hand in two.

Starting against Kansas City and playing the second half against Detroit, Love completed 58.1 percent of his passes with two touchdowns, three interceptions and a 68.7 passer rating. Of the 50 quarterbacks with at least Love’s 62 attempts, he ranked 46th in passer rating, 44th in completion percentage and 47th in interception percentage. He threw only one fewer interception than Rodgers despite throwing 469 fewer passes. That will never be winning football.

“The same it is for every other guy. You’ve got to come back to be the best version of yourself,” LaFleur said of his offseason message for Love. “I think Jordan’s come a long way. I still think, with any young player that hasn’t gotten maybe the experience up to this point, there’s still a lot of room for growth. It’s going to be an important offseason. When he does come back, it’s making sure that his footwork is sharp, that he’s on the details of what we’re trying to accomplish on each and every play and all the concepts, really a mastery of the offense, and just the command that he has. I know he takes that to heart and he takes it very personally and he’ll do whatever he can to be his best.”

Grade: F.

Kurt Benkert ($193,067 cap charge; ranking No. 93 among quarterbacks)

Benkert spent most of the season on the practice squad but took a knee for two snaps at the end of the Dec. 12 rout of the Chicago Bears. Obviously, with Rodgers and Love, Benkert wasn’t going to play. Nonetheless, he was a nice story this year. When Benkert ran out of the tunnel for that game, it marked his first real game in 1,445 days dating to the Military Bowl that capped Virginia’s 2017 season. He originally signed in May and outlasted veteran Blake Bortles. This summer, he’ll have to beat out Danny Etling to stay on the roster.

“There’s so many little things in your game that you can improve on,” Benkert said before the Chicago game. “Even a guy like Aaron, he’s been in the league for 17 years, he still corrects himself on things and goes out with a purpose and has a few things he wants to work on. For me, I got a long ways to go. Behind the scenes, that’s my only job really is the little things. I try to just knock a little bit out a time and that kind of keeps me going.”

Grade: Incomplete.

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