Aaron Rodgers, Jets face a reality check after humbling loss to Cardinals
Jets quarterback Aaron Rodgers leaves the field after an NFL game against the Arizona Cardinals on Sunday in Glendale, Ariz. Credit: AP/Brynn Anderson
GLENDALE, Ariz.
When Aaron Rodgers came to the Jets last year, the team was ecstatic. It kept saying it had a quarterback who had seen everything there was to see in this league over the course of his long Hall of Fame-bound career.
This is new for him, though.
Rodgers has never struggled like this. He’s never played as inconsistently as this. He’s never had so much riding on him and failed to deliver in such a spectacular way.
And he’s never been 3-7 before.
All of which — especially that last part — clearly is taking as much of a chunk out of his colossal arrogance and manifesting mentality as any of the hits he has been absorbing on his soon-to-be 41-year-old body.
The quarterback who is supposed to have all the answers, who can decipher any on-the-field scenario, suddenly is unable to process the reality of what is happening around him.
“It’s been a lot of emotions this year, for sure,” he said after Sunday’s latest deflating loss, 31-6, to the Cardinals.
Asked to elaborate on those emotions, Rodgers declined.
“I’m not going to,” he said. “There are a lot of different emotions. That’s a loaded answer, but it’s not the time or place to get into that.”
He’s right about that. No one wants him to spend his time after such an awful performance sitting on a shrink’s couch exploring his many woes. While a journey into Rodgers’ deep inner feelings probably would be a trek that would make Freud recoil in horror, there are other avenues in which to explore those sentiments besides a postgame news conference.
But keeping tabs on Rodgers’ suddenly fragile psyche is something the Jets now need to be mindful about. Those closest to him are doing just that.
“I try to work with him and make sure to keep his mind right as much as possible,” said receiver Davante Adams, who has some experience in this realm of despair from his time in Las Vegas. “It’s tough. If Michael Jordan was on this team, he wouldn’t be happy. You are not supposed to be happy when things aren’t going great. But you do have to find a way to dig deep and fix it, and that’s what we’re trying to do.”
Running back Breece Hall chuckled at the idea that after all of the lessons Rodgers has imparted to him and the rest of the young Jets’ infrastructure, this is a time when he and the others who have been through the doldrums of playing out a lost season with almost two months left in it might be able to share some of their hard-earned wisdom with him.
“I don’t think Aaron Rodgers can be taught anything at this point in his career,” Hall said. “He’s the same person every day. Great person, great leader. Great brother, great friend. We just have to do a better job of servicing him and making the game as easy for him as possible.”
Right now, it’s anything but. The Jets continue to show up small in the biggest spots. Sunday was the latest example. The energy was low. Their spirit was nonexistent. The urgency they needed to display was left back in the Florham Park meeting rooms.
They couldn’t tackle. They couldn’t score. They can’t win.
Even on the field, they are incapable of fixing things. Adams said they couldn’t keep up with the “Rolodex” of coverages the Cardinals were throwing at them. After just a month here, Adams already has run out of answers to what he is experiencing. “I don’t really know what to say,” he said.
Garrett Wilson, who called the team’s showing “trash,” was similarly befuddled when asked why it has been so hard for this seemingly talented core of playmakers to make plays.
“I dunno,” he said. “I wish I knew. I don’t know if I would tell you, but I would feel better about it if I knew. It’s frustrating.”
That is the word most players went to: frustrating. “Unacceptable” was another favorite. Others called it “embarrassing” and said they were “angry,” although Hall noted: “We put ourselves here, so we can’t be mad at anybody but ourselves.”
These Jets aren’t bad enough to completely tarnish all that Rodgers has accomplished in his Canton-bound career. But they certainly are creating an untidy ending for his story as a quarterback.
“We just have to focus on what is in front of us,” Rodgers said glumly. “Beat the Colts [on Sunday], get to the bye and sort some things out . . . There’s a lot still in front of us.”
He’s still talking as if the season can be saved, as if he can alter the course of this team. That’s because it’s all he’s ever known. Eventually, though, he’ll have to allow himself to fully grasp what the rest of us have come to accept about these Jets:
With seven games left, their season is over. All that is left is to see how they handle that reality and who comes back for next year’s attempt to change that fate.
Tom Rock began covering sports for Newsday in 1996 and became its NFL columnist in 2022. He previously was Newsday's Giants beat writer beginning in 2008.