There’s no shortage of ways we can approach what happened with Aaron Rodgers and the New York Jets.
We could take the micro perspective and tell you the litany of failures that led to Sunday’s 31-6 loss to the Arizona Cardinals, perhaps the ugliest loss of the Rodgers era to the Jets. Or we can go the macro route and list this 3-7 team’s dismal and still declining playoff percentages. We could go back even further and turn to the history books and note how much this all sounds a bit like Brett Favre’s disappointing one-season outing as the Jets’ starting quarterback in 2008… except this season is exponentially worse and comes to an end. a cliff much faster.
This is a failed season, with an objectively bad team all pitted against a soon-to-be 41-year-old quarterback who has regressed to mediocrity at his position. Once we recognize that, it opens the door to the legacy question that will hang over Rodgers’ head for the rest of this lost season.
What’s left?
It is an important question, as this failure threatens to create an impression that will last. Maybe not in the troubling neighborhood of Joe Namath coming out with the Los Angeles Rams or Johnny Unitas dropping the curtain with the San Diego Chargers. But also nowhere near the respectably remembered 29 games (including four playoff games) that Joe Montana spent in closing his career in a Kansas City Chiefs uniform. If anything, Rodgers’ ending looks like Donovan McNabb is wheezing out with Washington and Minnesota.
It’s mind-blowing to have to grapple with that kind of framework for Rodgers. But that’s where we are. You could see it during his postgame news conference Sunday, another of the editions in which he emerged as a silent and defeated passenger, trapped on a journey that no longer has a map. Looking for vague explanations like “energy” rather than talent or tactics when describing what went wrong.
“It’s definitely been a lot of emotions this year,” Rodgers said Sunday. “I thought after a big victory [against the Houston Texans on] Thursday night, nice long week, we would come out with a lot of energy and fun in the game. We didn’t come out with a lot of energy on either side of the ball. And offensively, you’re not going to beat anyone who scores six points.”
It’s the second time this season that Rodgers has pointed to energy in the face of a disability. He last described the Jets as “flat” after taking a 37-15 loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers nearly three weeks ago. The following week, the talentless New England Patriots would host a get right game for the Jets. The Jets lost that one, 25-22, in what was, at the time, the most embarrassing loss of Rodgers’ starts. Until this week, when a Cardinals team in the process of finding its own footing held the Jets to a pair of field goals and rolled up 406 yards of total offense against a defense we once thought could be a top-five pick. unity in the competition.
Fired head coach Robert Saleh played no role in this. Neither did demoted offensive coordinator Nathaniel Hackett. Widespread Mike Williams? He’s in Pittsburgh and gets his first touchdown of the season from Russell Wilson on Sunday for the game-winning score. Meanwhile, recently acquired receiver Davante Adams caught six balls for 31 yards and Rodgers completed just one pass that traveled more than 10 air yards. He also continued his streak of games without a 300-yard passing performance, which now stands at 33 and counting. All numbers, but none more troubling than Rodgers’ $49 million in dead salary cap space in 2025.
All of this brings us back to the original question of what is left for him. Well, there seems to be two paths in play at the moment.
The first is that Rodgers will play out the 2024 season, salvage what he can, and then return in 2025 for one last attempt to give his career a respectable boost. A league source familiar with the Adams trade told Yahoo Sports last week that the wideout agreed to be traded to the Jets on the condition that Rodgers stay through 2025. That, of course, was before the last few weeks of futility, which has left a The question is whether the Jets want either player on the roster next season, especially with a new head coach in play and general manager Joe Douglas re-signing his contract ends at the end of the season. If Rodgers and Adams want to be back, there would need to be some serious clarification on who will be in the driver’s seat in 2025. And that could be clouded by the presidential election, with multiple sources within the Jets expecting team owner Woody Johnson to do so again. a kind of position in Donald Trump’s future plans. There are many uncertainties at stake.
The second way: this is it. That we are in the midst of Rodgers’ final year with the Jets – either because he has opted to retire or because he has left mediocrity behind for the rest of the season and then decided to make major changes at head coach, general manager and quarterback and beyond. In that scenario, several veterans are expected to walk out, including Rodgers, Adams, Allen Lazard and others. It’s a revision that would see the Rodgers experiment as a colossal failure, requiring a years-long autopsy to truly understand what exactly went wrong.
For now, neither possibility is absolutely certain. After all, next week is another one of those get right games, against an Indianapolis Colts team dealing with its own roster issues.
“We just have to focus on what’s in front of us and beat the Colts, and then go to the bye and take care of some things,” Rodgers said Sunday. “We have a few West Coast opponents coming out for one o’clock games. And we have one, two, three division games. There is still a lot ahead of us.”
There is still a lot ahead, and so much remains behind. And in between, only questions and disappointments.
