Prior to prying Matthew Stafford from the Lions for a considerable haul of draft picks, the Rams are believed to have attempted to acquire a higher-profile NFC North quarterback.
The trade-happy franchise “made a run” at landing Aaron Rodgers, Sam Farmer of the Los Angeles Times said during an NFL Network appearance (video link). The Packers, however, insisted they do not plan to trade their future Hall of Fame passer. It is not clear if any offer emerged for Rodgers.
Rodgers’ comments after Green Bay’s NFC championship game loss opened the door to immediate speculation regarding his future, and the decorated quarterback said during the 2020 offseason that finishing his career elsewhere may be the realistic scenario due to the Packers trading up for Jordan Love. Many around the league believe he wants out of Green Bay.
The Rams have not been shy about pulling the trigger on blockbuster trades under GM Les Snead. This one would have ventured to a different level, given Rodgers’ accomplishments and recent level of play. Rodgers is under contract through the 2023 season, though the 37-year-old superstar may now want another new deal.
Stafford will provide Sean McVay with a considerable upgrade in QB talent and will head to Los Angeles for his age-33 season. While Rodgers will turn 38 near the end of next season, he has said he would like to play well into his 40s and showed this past season he remains in elite form. That form was on display in both playoff games, including an efficient divisional-round performance against the Rams. But the Packers, who said earlier this week they were “not idiots” and will be holding onto their franchise quarterback, would be left with only Love as a viable starter on their roster were they to trade Rodgers. It is not clear yet if Love would qualify as such in 2021; he did not take a snap this season.
The Rodgers-Green Bay saga clearly is not over, especially with Love on the roster, but the team was not ready to deal with the Rams — a team that does not hold a 2021 first-round pick.
If the Packers don’t insist on moving Rodgers any time soon they shouldn’t have drafter a QB in the first round.
So, according to your logic, the Packers should have been concerned with how Rodgers would take drafting a QB who might not be ready for 2,3, maybe 4 years….kind of sounds like the Farve/Rodgers situation doesn’t it.
And, further, if Rodgers should (and I don’t wish this on anyone) suffer an injury like Smith did on the Washington Football team, the Packers should just get ready to lose the rest of that season, and then be under the gun with a rookie QB who has never played the next year….or better yet, try and make a trade with another team that knows all the well that the Packers are desperate for an established QB and get taken to the cleaners on a trade deal? WOW!
All that being said, how do we really know that Rodgers didn’t know of the Packers intentions to use their #1 on a QB 2 seasons ago….after all, he would have to be angry about it to further his “brand”!
And lastly, all those $Millions he makes per year should give him a bit of a thicker skin to all this….after all it is all about TEAM isn’t it?
“but but Farve Rodgers”. Rodgers was supposed to be the #1 pick in the draft. It was a miracle he dropped to them. Packers are a team on the brink of the super bowl and they need all the help they can get. Using the pick on Love was so bad for where the team currently sits.
Agreed.
Tee Higgins
Michael Pittman Jr
Laviska Shenault
KJ Hamler
Chase Claypool
Aaron Rodgers with Adams and Tee Higgins would have been crazy sauce.
Rodgers also was in a position to win now. Not like they drafted a can’t miss QB they drafted Jordan Love when they should have drafted another offensive or defensive weapon. You don’t pick a QB who’s not a sure thing with Rodgers on the roster when you’re trying to win now
Rocky7 how you going to call him out like you are right and he is wrong? Favre had been talking about retiring on and off for about 3 years by that draft. Rodgers was potential #1, Love was potential mid round. Rodgers said he wants to play into his 40’s. Do the math. They are different.
Rodgers sat for 3 years behind Favre. Packers looking down the road. Not a big deal.
why not?? this is what the packers do. Turned out pretty good for Rodgers when he was drafted.
Jordan Love is not Aaron Rodgers.
No one knows at this point. He may be great or he may suck but that determination can’t be made right now given that he hasn’t even played a snap
where does jordan love rank with this years qb draft class, 5th-6th best? late second, early 3rd rounder tops?
He was ranked 3rd best in some reports but was the 4th QB drafted
People said Aaron Rodgers is not Brett Favre too. Kind of dumb to predict Love’s career without seeing him take a snap.
I’m not predicting his career. I’m saying they should have drafted anyone but a QB. They have the best QB in football with a super bowl caliber roster. You give that roster all the help it can get.
In Rodgersfourth year not his second year.
Rodgers sat for 3 or 4 years behind Favre. What’s the big deal?
Because, again, Rodgers and Love are not the same player. Rodgers was a potential first overall that fell to 22 miraculously. Love was never close. Also the Packers did not trade up for Love.
Also, Rodgers was not considering/threatening retirement. The more you look at it, the less similar it is.
AK185 –
It’s amazing to me how thick some people’s skulls are that they cannot understand the difference between the two situations. Favre continually threatening to retire…3 years in a row. Rodgers expected #1 overall pick up until a week before the draft. 100% different than this scenario. Congrats TommytheCat, on your amazingly thick skull
Yeah I just realized that I mistyped Love’s name instead of Rodgers’ into the “traded up for” part lol. Agreed with your post entirely though
Yea that tracks
Rodgers should go to SF if GB let’s him go. He’d crush it with Kyle Shanahan and be closer to home.
Green Bay is not letting him go. Geez.
Yes to a team who has no receivers, no run game and often injured tight end
Mr Porter , SF was ranked 15th in rushing. They have a run game. Debo and Aiyuk are more than serviceable.
Lol if i remember correctly they ran for like 500 yards in playoffs against you last year
Porter –
Watch much football? The 49ers offense is just fine. Not sure where you’re getting your info from, but one or two injuries does not mean the whole unit is crap.
Best tight end in the NFL. Period. Very effective WR’s and RB’s that go 3-4 deep at each position. Maybe they aren’t stars, but they are very productive.
Imagine rodgers with Rams! Holy cow that offense and defense would surely win a title
There are so many small children who have never been alive for a Rams’ first round pick
Lol for what? Their next 7 first round picks? Gtfo here Rams
I don’t think they can trade more than 5 years out, but even without their firsts I bet they still draft better than GB.
Just about everyone drafted better than Green Bay, especially last year. And this is coming from a life-long Packer fan!
Jets only team with the capital to trade for Rodgers.
Hasn’t part of the tension between Rodgers & lafleur been bc he doesn’t allow AR a ton of wiggle room to change plays at line of scrimmage etc.
Lafleur comes from McVay so it would seem like an odd fit to me bc id assume they’re pretty similar coaches/styles/systems. They’re also very close, obv AR woulda been an upgrade but idk just seems odd to me.
Rodgers has all the wiggle room. Even Rodgers says that. That was a false narrative. Heck before the Tampa game LaFleur said you know what to do. You see what’s going on. Make the calls.
There was no tension between them up until the title game loss. Then Rodgers said some stupid things in the heat of the moment and all of a sudden the media starts to blow everything WAY out of proportion. It’s been an absolute joke. Rodgers was just being a bit of a prima donna in a difficult moment, but everything will be perfectly fine. All season long he’d been perfectly happy, if not ecstatic, with the offense and Matt LaFleur. Don’t buy into this crap that the media continues to spew out. He will be back. He will be happy. Mark it down
Why not ask? The worst outcome is not a “no” it is regret for not having asked at all.
Rams were just asking. Nbd
Does Les Snead even know that the draft is supposed to have seven rounds?
I think the point several posters have made is that he drafts well in later rounds, so yes…he is likely aware of how many rounds there are, and he does well with them. That could also be a reason he feels comfortable trading 1st round picks to improve the team short term, for better or worse overall.
People have said that, but I don’t quite see it. Most of the Rams’ playmakers over Snead’s tenure have been free agent or trade acquisitions. They get a few starts out of some guys, only to lose them or for them to fall off. The team was eternally bad in St. Louis under Snead’s leadership, move to L.A., and suddenly started buying players. Let us consider the current team’s starting players not drafted by the organization:
Andrew Whitworth
Robert Woods
Leonard Floyd
Jalen Ramsey
A’Shawn Robinson
Matthew Stafford – TBD technically
Let us consider, in addition, a few from their last two years as well, including the Super Bowl season:
Aqib Talib
Marcus Peters
N’Damukong Suh
Dante Fowler
Nickel Robey-Coleman
Clay Matthews
Eric Weddle
Brandin Cooks
All of these players (and I’m sure I’m missing a few) have started games for the Rams the last few years, most of them significantly. None were drafted by the organization. There was also the earlier trade of Sammy Watkins for a second rounder.
Snead also has quite a few busts on his list (Greg Robinson being the most prominent, unless you count the mostly media-driven Michael Sam debacle, which admittedly was just a seventh round pick). His 2017 draft was really, really great, but other than that, the list of names on his record is unrecognizable for the most part. Seriously, look it up, there are plenty of names. A team that has to find this many starters outside of the organization is not just adding talent to fill holes. They’re not drafting well. And as good as the 2017 draft was for Snead, that’s only a single year of nine that he’s hit it out of the park. He does not draft well, and turns to free agency/trades to compensate. If Snead’s 2017 draft represented his entire history, I could agree, but it does not.
Besides, if he did draft well, he’d probably do better with some extra picks, wouldn’t he?
Rodgers often pouts when the Packers lose and even shows irritation when his passes are dropped. The point is that he can come across as a bit of a spoiled child at times, but he’ll get over it and the Packers will not trade him.
100% dead on, Chief!
The CEO of the Packers, Mark Murphy, has stated clearly, Aaron Rodgers, is going “nowhere”. I’ll take him at his word.
Funny, but I often here Aaron Rodgers is “overrated”. Then I hear the Packers should only get 1 number 1 pick for him. He’s old. He’s not that good. Of course, then you get if he went there “they would go to the Super Bowl with Rodgers!
By the time Jordan Love is ready he’ll be a free agent. You can’t sit these guys 3-4 yrs anymore. It was a wasted pick
For real. I don’t understand that pick no matter how you look at it, and it was the wrong thing to do for so many reasons. Love is a total project QB. You don’t have any idea how he’s going to work out, but the early returns are NOT GOOD, to say the least. Thank god he’s got another couple years to try to figure it out, but the Packers would be absolutely sunk if he had to play in year 2. Even if Love eventually develops, he’ll be near free agency by the time Rodgers’ contract is up. What good does that do the team?
With so many other glaring holes that could have been filled with that pick, it was an incredibly stupid move to make. Who knows…one more talented playmaker on either side might have gotten them to the Super Bowl this year. Instead we get to look at Project Love sitting on the sideline.
The Packer’s should listen to offers for Rodgers and if they were offered something like what Detroit got ask for a little more. Because his worth will never be better than now. He could get hurt or retire in the next couple of years and you get nothing. And I love my Packer’s since the early 60’s but I’m a realist street when the iron is .