The Jets are now connected to every player on Aaron Rodgers‘ wish list. The highest-profile name on said list, Odell Beckham Jr., is on the team’s radar, Dianna Russini of ESPN.com reports (on Twitter).
Beckham surfaced as a possible Jets target earlier this week, when Russini listed him as part of Rodgers’ list of free agents he wanted the Jets to acquire. Rodgers said later this week he would love to play with OBJ, and Russini adds the Jets have stayed in touch with the veteran wide receiver’s camp.
Allen Lazard has officially signed with the Jets, checking off one of the names from the list, and the team has been connected to both Randall Cobb and Marcedes Lewis. Neither have joined Lazard in signing, and Beckham has been linked to a few other teams. One of those, the Giants, looks likely to move on. After hosting Beckham on the first visit of his December free agency tour and being expected to resume that free agency courtship this year, the Giants re-signed Darius Slayton and added Parris Campbell on Thursday. OBJ is believed to be out of Big Blue’s price range, Jordan Raanan of ESPN.com tweets.
The latest Rodgers trade saga finally looks to have the future Hall of Famer set to relocate, but the Packers and Jets do not agree on compensation. It does not sound like the teams are close, with Jets brass viewing the Packers’ reported ask — a first-round pick and then a conditional 2025 draft asset for a scenario in which Rodgers plays in 2024 — as unreasonable for a player they are not planning to use next season. But the Jets are proceeding with the expectation they will employ Rodgers in 2023. And they are considering an overhaul of their receiver room — much of it, at least.
Lazard joins Garrett Wilson as the team’s top two receivers. While Corey Davis would qualify for such status over Lazard, his place with the organization is tenuous due to his salary and the Lazard signing. A Beckham addition would almost certainly lead to Davis’ departure. Elijah Moore remains in the picture, with the Jets not honoring his in-season trade request last year. But the former second-round pick did not match his rookie-year production in 2022. Beckham being a legitimate candidate to join the Jets would call Moore’s role into question as well.
As of Friday morning, the Jets hold barely $15MM in cap space. Were Rodgers’ contract to land on New York’s cap this year, he would be tied to a cap number just north of $15MM. We are a long way away from that part of Gang Green’s offseason, it appears, and the team will make more moves to free up funds as well. Davis could be one of them. Cutting the former Titans top-five pick would save the Jets more than $10MM.
Beckham, 30, is also tied to an unreasonable price point and has been for months. Still connected to a $20MM-per-year ask, Beckham will need to move off that number — likely by a considerable margin — to land with a team and resume his career. The former Giants standout did make significant contributions to the Rams’ Super Bowl-winning effort in 2021, but his second ACL tear and full-season absence altered his career path. A $20MM-per-year deal would have been realistic had OBJ finished Super Bowl LVI unscathed, but that obviously did not happen.
The Giants’ receiver room resembles its 2022 composition, with both Slayton and Sterling Shepard re-signing despite initially arriving under previous GMs (Jerry Reese, Dave Gettleman). Campbell and ex-Brian Daboll Bills charge Isaiah Hodgins join them, as does 2022 second-rounder Wan’Dale Robinson. Darren Waller is the biggest name in the Giants’ pass-catching mix, but the Pro Bowl tight end has also struggled to stay healthy. The Giants are likely still on the hunt for a starter-caliber receiver — probably in the draft — but they look to be closing the door on a Beckham reunion.
“After hosing Beckham”
lol
Making your team worse by signing a bunch of over the hill guys in order to make an over the hill QB happy..that you haven’t even traded for yet. This has epic disaster written all over it
As long as the Jets don’t sign OBJ before Rodgers is traded, these signings are mostly small potatoes and the players can even be cut if the Packers mess up the trade.
The Packers have to trade Rodgers, otherwise they will face another $186,750,000 in cap costs through 2026 whether Rodgers plays or not. If the Packers cut Rodgers, they can reduce that bill to $100 million.
The Packers are completely screwed here, without a suitor in sight for that huge guaranteed contract with automatic extensions. The Packers may be sending picks to the Jets to have them pick up Rodgers contract before this deal is done. Packers should have been smart and taken what they were given before getting Jets management’s back up.
What are you talking about boy? You Jets fans are extremely dense. Rodgers is only guaranteed his option for this year at $59,515,000. Packers can just sit him on the roster for the entire year. By trading him, their cap hit on Rodgers is actually higher, they don’t need to trade him for cap purposes. Jets have zero leverage unless it is their intention to completely tank this season for a QB next year. Though I don’t think Joe or Rob’s jobs would last after that, and Woody will have to deal with multiple eggs on his face from the national media. Jets should be lucky Packers aren’t asking for two firsts.
Rodgers isn’t retiring. See answer to @mattg below. No one expects anything from the Jets. Not much pressure on them.
link to spotrac.com
^^^That is the link to Rodgers contract on Spotrac. You can clearly see he isn’t guaranteed any money beyond this year. Packers can just cut him after the 2023 season and not pay a penny more. You think Rodgers will want to keep playing after sitting out an entire year? Jets will have the worst record in the league so they will be picking 1st at that point. If that is the plan, sure go ahead. But Woody has a woody for Rodgers. Ain’t no way Jets don’t give in. His ego couldn’t even take having to walk a block down the street so Rodgers spot wouldn’t get blown up by the paparazzi.
Yes, the Packers can pay 1. 2023 $31 million 2. $25 million in dead cap. And the Packers are out. With no trade compensation at all.
Rodgers could live with that. $56 million and he rarely has to leave home. Would ruin a couple of seasons for the Packers. And Rodgers can play anywhere he wants in the league in 2024 with no compensation at all to the Packers (not even a compensatory pick, as he’d be a cut).
>>Woody has a woody>> which means the Jets will cave and give away this year’s first rounder for a year of Rodgers, who like his predecessor in Green Bay, will then sign with the club he wants to play for, the Vikings.
Is one year of 39 yr old Aaron Rodgers worth the 13th overall pick?
This storyline is grab your popcorn and watch Green Bay implode. Sadly, Matt LaFleur is not a dunce, he’ll probably tell the GM to hurry up and get rid of Rodgers at any price before it turns nasty.
Cap hit is no different whether he retires or is traded. If they don’t like the compensation, then he retires and they take the same loss and continue with the same plan they would have otherwise.
Rodgers won’t retire. He’ll collect his $180 million between now and 2026. Rodgers’s current girlfriend Mallory is the daughter of billionaire Wes Edens. Aaron has to set himself up to keep Mallory in the style to which she is accustomed.
If the Green Bay Packers don’t trade Aaron Rodgers, it’s the end of the Green Bay Packers as we know them. Minnesota Vikings fans rejoice!
We’re talking Rodgers contract and team leverage and you bring up his girlfriend. Not sure if you’re just trolling or just a clown.
Personally I think it’s very funny that people think that Aaron Rodgers won’t force Green Bay to pay out the remaining $180 million he’s owed in contract if Green Bay doesn’t trade him. Rodgers doesn’t care about the trade compensation. Green Bay has one chance to (mostly) get out of this very rich contract, and that’s to give Aaron Rodgers to the New York Jets.
Rodgers knows it. The Jets know it. Everyone knows it. Except for stubborn, myopic Green Bay management playing a game of chicken they can only lose. Call it Rodgers Vengeance for the 2020 draft, which cost the Packers a Super Bowl (lost a first round pick – Love who is still on the bench, and a fourth trading up). Those picks would have got the Packers a great wide receiver and a good offensive lineman or the inverse.
For the “4th round pick” your fans are throwing around, I’d rather he just retire a Packer. They can sit on his contract this year, and we’ll see how badly he wants to still play at age 41 after sitting out an entire year.
You do know that $180 million dollar number you keep tossing around isn’t real, right?
Check the articles and Spotrac and OTC. It’s grim reading for Green Bay Packers fans.
Listening to you ramble about things you clearly don’t understand is hilarious but also mind numbing. You even linked to his contract which clearly shows the out the packers have, yet your blue bus level of reading comprehension prevents you from understanding this and thinking the packers have to pay him thru 2026! For the sake of everyone here, retreat to your cave in Jersey.
Excellent move by the Giants
Lol
I’m going to be contrarian: this could be a really smart move for the Jets. COULD be… if OBJ behaves, if he’s truly healthy, if they do get Rodgers, if they don’t break the bank. But I like the idea for them.
It’s a perfectly reasonable gamble at the right price. If it’s a one year deal and a disaster, they can cut bait. If he even plays about as well as he did for the Rams, that’s a great pickup. Some people on this site seem to enjoy hating OBJ more than they enjoy liking football.
At the right price, OBJ would go elsewhere. He’s not taking a discount for the NY Jets, with or without a 39-year-old QB.
I didn’t mean some kind of special discount for the Jets. I meant if his market ends up being not a whole lot of guarantees.
Gotta love that this so called list is being taken as gospel.
Well he made it easy to be a hater when he got into that inappropriate/Ill advised fight….
No to OBJr
Why bring this cancer to a team of guys that are jelling together so nicely ??
Remember his Florida boat party with Giants.
Don’t touch this guy Joe Douglas !!!
Woah, we got a “Boat Party” sighting!
No one on earth cares about the boat party.
Victor Cruz himself said that photo “will haunt him for the rest of his life.” I would say he cares about the boat party. Don’t try to change a narrative just because it doesn’t fit your agenda. The Giants got rolled that next game. To assume the controversy around that trip had nothing to do with it is silly. Ask their teammates if matters to them.
The boat trip is so overblown. Victor Cruz has given the story before. They were off on a Monday, granted by the coach, so they went to Miami. They had fun that night, the way most people do on their days off. They partied until the sun came up, got on a boat, took a picture, and that’s literally it. This boat trip you’re apparently so concerned about happened many, many days before the Giants playoff game. It in no way impacted it, and it wouldn’t have even been a thing if not for social media.
Apparently the Jets are so eager to be played that they would attempt to sign a 3 legged hippo with asthma if it was on Rodgers wish list.
Jets owner is as lost and desperate as the Browns owner.
The Jets have obviously decided that just because they missed on their franchise quarterback there is no reason to completely start their crash/rebuild all over again. Which is logical from Saleh’s job security standpoint.
Knowing that they are totally inept at drafting QB prospects the Jets opted to pursue a veteran. There may be some logic to that but why go after someone nearly 40? That only delays going back to draft for more pain for a year or two.
Perhaps they think that Wilson will learn something from Rodgers? After all, that is what Green Bay seems to think happened with Love.