Aaron Rodgers learns the hard way why you can't rely on the Jets
Jets quarterback Aaron Rodgers looks up during the second half of an NFL game against the Dolphins on Sunday in Miami Gardens, Fla. Credit: Lynne Sladky
MIAMI GARDENS, Fla.
A season that began with the Jets putting all of their faith in Aaron Rodgers came down to a game in which Aaron Rodgers had no choice but to put all of his faith in the Jets.
If he had any chance at all to play another meaningful snap this season, he needed his team to win in Miami on Sunday. He needed his young protégé, Zach Wilson, to play the kind of game he did last week. He needed the championship-caliber defense the Jets like to tell us they possess to at least be a speed bump for the Indy cars the Dolphins feature when they have the ball.
Had they been able to do so, then maybe . . . possibly . . . probably . . . Rodgers would have been medically cleared to play at some point this week and maybe . . . possibly . . . probably . . . been able to take the field for them on Christmas Eve against Washington with the postseason still within reach.
But on Sunday, Rodgers learned the folly of relying on the Jets, a misguided pursuit that the rest of us have understood for decades.
The Jets lost, 30-0, falling to 5-9. Shortly after they left the field, the Browns and Texans won their games to mathematically eliminate them.
Mathematically eliminate Rodgers, too.
That a 40-year-old man could return from an Achilles tear in about 3 1⁄2 months was supposed to be the long shot, not the Jets remaining relevant long enough for such a medical miracle to matter. Way back in November, when they were 4-3, it seemed as if they might actually pull off the caveat that was always connected to the potential return, but they lost six of their next seven.
“If that’s how it had unfolded and ended up, that would have been awesome,” wide receiver Garrett Wilson said of creating a good enough reason for Rodgers’ comeback, “but the reality of it is we were trying to win because we’re prideful people. We put in a lot, our whole life, to get to this moment. To go out there and play the way we played a few weeks this season, it’s been tough.”
Cornerback Sauce Gardner echoed that. “The objective was to win the game today,’’ he said, “and we didn’t win.”
Asked if he felt the team had let Rodgers down by not staying alive long enough for him to swoop in and salvage the season, the carrot that had been dangling for them for weeks — if not months — Gardner conceded that it was a peripheral concern.
“Our job was to keep winning, and if us winning would have brought him back, then yes,” he said. “But that’s not something that is on everybody’s mind.”
Well, it probably was on one of them.
The quarterback sat in the sullen locker room with his teammates wearing what must have been a very different coat of disappointment (he declined requests to speak and the Jets said that because he did not play in this game, he was not obligated to address the media).
The other players lost the lopsided game and had their postseason hopes dashed, but at least they had the chance to compete. Rodgers was never given that opportunity. Now he won’t have it again until September.
After tearing his Achilles on the fourth snap of the season, Rodgers already was scheming and plotting his return even before he left the training room at MetLife Stadium on Sept. 11. As soon as that possibility was broached publicly, there already were dozens of reasons why it would not work. His speedy recovery from an injury that usually takes nearly a full year to heal was the biggest doubt, but there were other matters that needed ironing out too.
Ultimately, none of it mattered. Zach Wilson, coach Robert Saleh and general manager Joe Douglas (who never added a suitable substitute for Wilson) steered this season the way Clark Griswold drove his station wagon across the country, all with Rodgers stuck in the back seat watching the adventures through the side window. On Sunday in Miami, they finally arrived at their destination amid the flurry of breathless national reports that Rodgers could be cleared to return to the active roster by Wednesday’s deadline . . . only to find Wally World was closed by their own shortcomings.
“Starting from the first series of the year to now, it’s been a constant battle,” Saleh said.
One they were never able to compete against.
There are three games left this season and Rodgers, who invested untold resources of money and time into this potential comeback, still may want to see his journey through. He could insist that he step back on the field just for the sake of saying he did it. That would put the Jets in the tough spot of potentially having to say “no” to someone they have been gushing yeses over since they flew out to Malibu to meet him in March.
“There is no discussion to be had until he is actually cleared,” coach Robert Saleh said.
The Jets would have to be mad to allow that to happen, not when they figure to be regrouping for 2024 with Rodgers as their quarterback. Sanity may be in short supply, though, as it often is with this organization.
Rodgers has been calling the shots since he arrived in the spring, and that could continue now. This may not be a fight the Jets are willing to wage against him at this point. If they’re lucky, somebody will talk him out of it, but if he truly wants to play and the doctors OK it, figure on Rodgers playing.
Putting Rodgers behind this offensive line — which gave up six sacks and 14 quarterback hits, including a few that drove Zach Wilson from the game with a concussion — would be the equivalent of tying the future Hall of Famer to railroad tracks and waiting for the next express train to come barreling through.
Sure, there is a chance he could Houdini his way free and escape unscathed with a bow and a triumphant ta-da flourish. But why risk it? Even if he plays just one series to say he did so, look what happened on just one series in September.
Rodgers may think he can rise above the nonsense and bad luck that the Jets have been mired in for many of our lifetimes. Sunday should have taught him otherwise. His optimistic manifesting proved no match for the Jets’ proclivity for misadventure.
With Sunday’s loss, the Jets already have fumbled away the one semi-logical reason for him to return to the field this season. Going double-or-nothing now with next year’s potential is not a gamble he or the Jets should even entertain.
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.
