Woody Johnson has been on a mission of late, settling all family business with the New York Jets before he probably heads off to England in a few months for political dealings again. First, he got rid of head coach Robert Saleh. Then on Tuesday it was general manager Joe Douglas.
Aaron Rodgers has to be next.
It does seem like it’s headed that way as the newly formed Hurricane Woody tears through his downtrodden franchise, meddling in ways that he’s apparently never meddled before. He reportedly had pushed Douglas aside long before he fired him and started making his own roster decisions. He even reportedly suggested benching Rodgers after a poor showing back in Week 4.
But nothing is ever guaranteed when the 77-year-old Johnson is involved. He has long been viewed as being susceptible to the whims of public opinion or open to the whispers of insiders he thinks he should trust. People who know him say it’s not inconceivable that someone with the status of Rodgers could talk him into taking one more shot.
In fact, one source familiar with the Jets’ plans told FOX Sports on Tuesday that there was “no chance” Rodgers would return, which sounded good until the source added “but it really depends on who Woody is listening to.” Johnson will have to hire a new GM and a new coach first, and it’s hard to imagine any qualified candidate would want to roll with a broken-down, 41-year-old quarterback.
Unless …
“Sometimes he hears what he wants to hear,” the source said, “and sometimes people tell him what he wants to hear.”
So hear this: Bringing Rodgers back in 2025 would be one of the dumbest things Johnson has done in his 25 years of running the franchise, which obviously says a lot. He was right to lure Rodgers out of the darkness two years ago when it sure did look like the Jets were a competent quarterback away from Super Bowl contention. It was totally worth taking that big shot for a franchise that is about to miss the playoffs for the 14th straight season and hasn’t been to a Super Bowl in 55 years.
But they got the worst of Rodgers in every conceivable way. And some of that was self-inflicted. It wasn’t just that Rodgers snapped his Achilles four plays into his first Jets season, or that he’s hobbled through this year with knee, ankle and hamstring injuries. It’s not even just that he’s 3-8 and heading toward one of the worst statistical seasons in his soon-to-be Hall of Fame career.
It’s also that the Jets, with Johnson’s blessing, gave Rodgers the ability to have near-total control of their roster decisions. Douglas really had done a good job of re-stocking the franchise with talent. They had one of the NFL’s best defenses and dazzling young skill players like Garrett Wilson and Breece Hall. But then they wasted cap space and draft capital, acquiring a slew of Rodgers’ friends like receivers Randall Cobb and Allen Lazard and backup quarterback Tim Boyle. They even recently traded a third-round pick for former Packer Davante Adams — a surprisingly high price and a deal reportedly ordered by Johnson on Rodgers’ behalf.
Worst of all, instead of letting Saleh hire his choice of offensive coordinators, they hired Nathanial Hackett, a Rodgers favorite with a dubious resume any time he wasn’t coaching Rodgers in his prime. Hackett’s offense, to no one’s surprise, has been a disaster, and he eventually had his play-calling duties stripped away just as Johnson threw Saleh out the door.
There’s no way to know if Saleh and Douglas could have done better with this team if they weren’t acquiescing to a de facto player-GM. But the new regime can’t have those kinds of restrictions, whether they’re ordered or just implied. This young Jets team really does have a lot of talent on the roster and most of it will be back next season.
They just can’t have a demanding, 41-year-old anchor at quarterback weighing them down.
Of course, this being the Jets, they’ve backed themselves deep into a quarterback corner without any obvious escape route. Parting ways with Rodgers won’t be cheap or easy. Thanks to the massive contract they revised when they traded for him in 2023, he’ll leave a whopping $49 million in “dead money” on their books, which is just a painful pill they have to find a way to swallow.
The bigger issue is that the Jets were so “all in” on him they never bothered planning for what was next if their geriatric quarterback faltered. They haven’t drafted a quarterback in the first four rounds since they whiffed on first-rounder Zach Wilson in 2021, so there’s no successor on the roster. Worse for the Jets, they’d currently pick seventh in what is generally viewed as a quarterback-weak draft. And there aren’t great options in free agency, either, unless they’re crazy enough to try to lure Sam Darnold back.
Ironically, that makes Rodgers simultaneously their best and worst option. But they can’t fool themselves into believing the best is yet to come. They have to accept the pain that comes from the poor decisions of their past. Maybe it’ll take a few years for them to find the franchise quarterback they’ve been seeking for five decades. It might even take so long that most of their current nucleus of talent will be gone.
But they have to do it. Just like they have to sit quietly when Rodgers goes on his inevitable post-Jets podcast tour and blames everyone but himself. They have to understand that they won’t make it far on their path to salvation with the latest aging star they thought could be their savior. Johnson has to stay strong, even if Rodgers turns on the charm, swears he’s found some kind of potion that will magically make him healthy, and tries to sell the Jets on one last run.
It really did look like a good deal at the time. Nobody can fault Johnson and the Jets for swinging for the fences. It just didn’t work out, and there’s no chance — absolutely none — of it working any better in the future. The Aaron Rodgers Era in New York has met its inevitable end. It has to be over.
It’s time to turn out the lights, so maybe someone else can turn them on.
Ralph Vacchiano is an NFL Reporter for FOX Sports. He spent the previous six years covering the Giants and Jets for SNY TV in New York, and before that, 16 years covering the Giants and the NFL for the New York Daily News. Follow him Twitter at @RalphVacchiano.
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