With one sentence, Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers ignited the great leverage argument of this NFL offseason.
“I intended to play, and I intend to play for the New York Jets.”
With that claim on Wednesday, league analysts, talent evaluators and seemingly everyone else circling the NFL’s news cycle are in a frenzied debate: Who is now painted into a corner and how do they break out of it? Will you leave?
For the Packers, the advantage is clear. want jet and need Rogers tough. Almost every other quarterback option outside of Lamar Jackson is off the table. When it comes to a potential Super Bowl-caliber roster, starting Zack Wilson in 2023 would be a malpractice, so the need for Rodgers is essentially a top one. When this kind of need and hunger for a quarterback is at this level, the team controlling him is in a violent state.
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In contrast, jets have a mind of their own when it comes to leverage. First and foremost, Rodgers has a titanic contract and limited window that virtually no other team in the league is interested in importing. They Know On Thursdays, they are the only game in town when it comes to Packers business. In that case, why would they bid for a business package when there is no competition?
Rodgers has gone public with who he wants to play for in 2023, resulting in a patient game of poker. The paramount question: Who needs to move first? With Rodgers yet to publicly announce his next team, the Jets feel very strongly about the answer to that question.
This kind of debate is being looked at in a big way: The Packers vs. Jets, with the subplot of who can wait longer.
Overriding is at fault here too.
The leverage is not in the hands of the Jets Or Packers. It’s in Rodgers’ hands, like it has been for weeks. When it comes down to it, the only person who can paint Green Bay into a corner is its current quarterback. He wears number 12 and he is ready to set sail. He is also ready to sit tight and stare at his current franchise.
That’s the person we should be focusing on in this trade talk right now: Aaron Rodgers.
Why? There are three wrinkles in all of this that Rodgers understands. And they all play into the hands of his next team rather than his current one. from them:
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Rodgers knows the Packers don’t want him back. He knows the front office wants to move forward with backup quarterback Jordan Love, who is on track to have his fifth-year option picked up by the franchise in May. He hasn’t had to talk about Packers CEO Mark Murphy in recent days, but it certainly helped when it came to an element of clarity into Green Bay’s future. It’s a future that will be incredibly uncomfortable when it comes to the idea of Rodgers returning in 2023 — a scenario that will only happen if Green Bay general manager Brian Gutekunst turns against Rodgers over the development of the first-choice quarterback. Vengeance preferred. round of the 2020 NFL Draft. If Gutekunst wants to play that game of chicken, Rodgers will join in. count on it.
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Rodgers knows that his declaration of intent to play for the Jets in 2023 and the reality of his salary structure beyond next season make him an unattractive option for any other trade suitors. No one is coming out of the ether to suddenly upset the apple cart and become the third team to try to engage in trade talks. Jet is the only destination. Rogers knows it. The Jets know this. The Packers know this. It’s not like Matthew Stafford in 2021 or Russell Wilson in 2022. Not a wealth of options. The Packers look to cut Rodgers and absorb more than $94 million in future salary cap fees, or hold him hostage into 2023 and the NFL world as a whole on shaky paths as judges versus a trading partner Staring at
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Rodgers and all parties involved — including the Jets, Packers and the rest of the NFL — know that some wild trade to withhold for compensation is absurd. Rodgers is 39 years old and staring at a window of one season (or at most, two) remaining at the tail end of his prime. If the Packers really wanted a mega deal for him, they should have put their foot down in 2021 and traded him to the Denver Broncos. It was time to angle for the big deal. Now? After walking Rodgers through a subpar season and then questioning his desire to continue playing? His value is nowhere near what it would have been 12 months ago. Everyone knows it, and it dramatically affects one’s willingness to import the risk of someone else rolling the dice on it. Peak compensation time departed last January. Now Green Bay has to deal with it.
It matters to all the parties involved. It’s so certain to the litany of Twitter jockeys or pundits that Green Bay has a mountain of leverage over the next few months. Packers don’t. They surrendered that high ground when they made it publicly clear that they wanted Rodgers off the roster. Once that happened, it became a game of patience, public perception and a willingness to be spiteful that the other institution would not.
Rodgers is going to win on all of those fronts. And he’s going to help the Jets win with exactly that. He wants to go to New York, but if the Packers want to test him and bluff a possible return to the fold in Green Bay, they should know he’ll call that bluff. He would go back to this stage only to embarrass Gutekunst, Murphy and anyone else who would publicly suggest he is no longer wanted. This is the correct leverage in this situation. This is the real power.
When It’s All Over, Green Bay Is Ultimately Going To Settle For Much Less Than This Ridiculous Floating Theory Rodgers is worth two first round draft picks, He is not. The Packers and their quarterback have put up quite a fight to be sure. The sooner Green Bay becomes aware of this fact, the faster a deal can be completed and everyone can move on with their lives.
By then, the clock is ticking and everyone is staring at each other. Which party blinks first is a matter of time and patience. And both would eventually end up for the Packers.
