New York Jets quarterback Aaron Rodgers has made quite a few headlines this offseason. Of course, when a person is a four-time NFL MVP and future Pro Football Hall of Famer, headlines are easy to make. That being said, a great deal of the press surrounding Rodgers has had very little to do with football and more on what personal beliefs he holds.
Now, Rodgers’ freedom of speech is protected under the First Amendment, as is every American’s. He does not have to withhold his opinions on any topic just because he is a professional athlete. After all, the shows and podcasts that he has been on sought him out rather than the other way around.
That being said, many of the things Rodgers has said recently, or rather, the fact that he was saying them on large platforms in the first place, detract from a statement he made earlier this offseason.
Aaron Rodgers Wanted the New York Jets to “Flush the BS”
As everyone is well aware, the Jets’ 2023 season did not go as planned. After acquiring Rodgers in a trade with the Green Bay Packers, New York was supposed to compete for a Super Bowl last season. However, the future Hall of Famer tore his Achilles just four snaps into his Jets tenure and was out for the season.
What followed was an absolute nightmare for New York. Zach Wilson stepped back into the starting job, lost it, and then needed to be convinced to take it back. The Jets’ free agent signings of Allen Lazard and Randall Cobb failed to pay dividends as both had the worst seasons of their careers.
Fortunately, the defense played well enough to help New York finish 7-10 and with hope that, if Rodgers could return to his 2021 form and stay healthy, they could be competitive again in 2024.
But so much had gone wrong in 2023, and it was not just on the field. The locker room was in shambles, there were (and still are) concerns about coaching (specifically about Nathaniel Hackett), and an overall culture that was not conducive to winning.
After their season mercifully ended, Rodgers was asked what the franchise needs to do in order to create a winning culture.
He responded:
“Flush the bulls—. “Anything in this building that we’re doing individually or collectively that has nothing to do with real winning needs to be assessed.
“If you want to be a winning organization and put yourself in position to win championships and be competitive, everything that you do matters. And the bulls— that has nothing to do with winning needs to get out of the building. So that’ll be the focus moving forward.”
Those were pretty strong words that are also true. Professional organizations in sports cannot have any external factors affecting their primary goal, which is winning a championship.
The problem this offseason is that Rodgers seems to have failed to follow his own advice.
New York Jets Quarterback Aaron Rodgers Made Waves This Offseason
Now, it wasn’t like Rodgers wasn’t part of the problem during the season. His weekly appearances on The Pat McAfee Show often had people talking about things that he said about topics outside of football rather than what was happening on the field.
Towards the end of the season, Rodgers made waves for comments he made about comedian Jimmy Kimmel and the infamous Epstein List. The blowback from these comments was so intense that McAfee admitted that the stress that came to him personally as a result made him reconsider a few things.
After the season, Rodgers continued to make appearances on various shows, and in the process shared some of his beliefs that are, well, not what one might call mainstream.
Some of these beliefs include:
- Architecture as we know it isn’t real
- Joe Biden is dead or incapacitated and whoever is running the country is a body double
- The United States government created the HIV/AIDS epidemic
- Russian president Vladimir Putin is both smart and interesting
- The NFL is run by big pharma
- The United States government is hiding facts about Pat Tillman’s death
And all of these do not include the fact that he was considering retirement in order to run for Vice President with Robert F. Kennedy Jr., nor does it take into account the story that he denied the Sandy Hook school shooting ever happening.
In other words, Rodgers was involved with a lot of things this offseason that did not have to do with creating a winning culture in New York.
New York Jets Quarterback Aaron Rodgers Defends His “Opportunities” During the Offseason
On Wednesday, Rodgers spoke to the Jets’ media for the first time since the start of organized team activities (OTA’s). During his media session, one reporter brought up his quote from the end of the season about “flushing the BS,” and how he reconciled his numerous controversial appearances on shows during the offseason with that statement.
Rodgers responded:
“I mean, I appreciate anybody’s opinion. That’s the beauty in First Amendment in this country and free speech, where it’s positive to me, whether it’s negative. I joke about people talking about their vax status before they mention comments about me.
“I do that because there’s definitely people that view me under that lens, and so the comments that are made about me are usually framed in that mindset. [That’s not] a ‘sensitive’ comment or a ‘victimization’ comment, that’s just the actual truth.
“I respect those opinions, but those are offseason things. And those are real opportunities. Mostly podcasts with friends of mine, and the Bobby thing was a real thing. . . . Once the season starts, it’s all about football.”
The problem with Rodgers’ defense of his offseason guest appearances is that he has never limited them to the offseason. He constantly talks about social issues and other non-football topics during his regular appearances on The Pat McAfee Show, and he only appears on that show during the football season.
Again, it is his right to express his beliefs; but the issue here is that, on the one hand, he wants the Jets to be focused on football and winning during the season. On the other hand, he has regularly been a distraction for things unrelated to football during the season.
It appears that it is a “rules for thee, but not for me” situation for him. He wants the rest of the team focused on football, but also wants to be able to address topics not related to football himself.
