Okay after seeing the Pat McAfee show interview I’m kinda glad I waited because this ended up way better than any idea I had workshopped on Tuesday.

So, as expected, Rodgers will be following in the footsteps of his sempai and playing for the Jets after jerking around the Packers. I assume he will send pictures of his dick to a reporter next year, and then get traded to the Vikings in 2024. He will lose the NFCCG to a dirty team after throwing a terrible pick, and then retire and go on to defraud the state of California’s welfare system to build a hippie commune in the woods east of Crescent City. The precedent is set. I can’t wait.

The interview was more or less exactly what I think most of us expected. Hilarious. After McAfee asked him what the deal was to set him up, Rodgers proceeded to go all the way back to 2020 to lay the groundwork for how mad he was. They drafted Jordan Love to replace him (you could hear the spite in his voice) and then he spent more time whining about how he proved himself one of the best players in Packers history (true, and while he stopped short of calling himself the best despite obviously wanting to, I think he has a fair argument for it). The thing that kept jumping out to me in all of this backstory handwringing was how often he’d say “I’m not mad, I’m not begrudging the Packers or the fans, I love them, I understand this is part of football, etc”. Things people who are definitely not mad like to say.

He claimed that when he went into the darkness retreat a couple weeks ago he was 90% gonna retire, but came out and felt like the Packers changed their tune, and dr spite decided he wanted to keep playing after all. It was very funny to hear him complain about how the Packers weren’t transparent enough with him and how that made things difficult, as if his indecision and constant waffling about during the past several offseasons didn’t have any impact on the Packers finally getting tired of his bullshit and planning to move on without his explicit permission.

He took a big ol’ shit on Adam Schefter and Dianna Russini for being annoying reporters and while I am 100% on board for slandering stooge Adam Schefter, Russini and Schefter are…reporters. They were doing their job. Russini’s reporting was accurate, and Rodgers seemed to be trying to twist the story to make him look better. The Jets have spent the previous days signing players that Rodgers definitely at the very minimum suggested they sign to make him happy. I don’t even really have any problem with that. Brady did it, Peyton did it, when you are in the twilight of your career and have the kind of pull Rodgers has, that’s fine! I’d want to play with my guys too! But he seemed to be mad that Russini and co…reported on that. Like they are paid to.

Schefter debased himself on twitter afterward confirming that Rodgers told him to lose his number because Adam Schefter has no dignity left, making Adam Schefter the ultimate loser in this entire story, which is very funny.

I didn’t make it through the whole interview because I got the answer I was hoping for and can’t stand McAfee very much. McAfee was a fun addition to the sports talk scene when he arrived but frankly, he’s got far too much bro energy for me. Rodgers used to be an interesting addition to the show and probably made it what it is, but in recent years it has gone from what felt like a cool candid interview setup to the Rodgers PR power hour. What used to be the show’s draw has become its biggest annoyance. I think the anti-vax saga is what broke it, because McAfee obviously wasn’t going to shun his show’s golden goose or give his buddy much pushback, and since that moment the Rodgers interviews have always felt like PR rather than cool dudes hanging out, which is what made it good to begin with. Also, as an unrelated aside, I cannot stand Pat McAfee’s raspy voice (which is obviously not his fault in any way), he sounds perpetually like he spent all last night screaming in a loud bar and now can’t quite talk. I want to shove lozenges into his mouth whenever he opens it.

So Rodgers claims he intends to play for the Jets, and right now the holdup is the Packers working on the compensation. That part I generally believe. I also believe Rodgers has made the negotiations more complicated but he won’t admit that. Is this a good move for the Jets? Well, depends on a lot. How much will they give up for him? How many years does Rodgers realistically have left? The Jets were a team on the rise in desperate need of a good quarterback. Soon they will have one, but instead of a young star they can build around, they’ve effectively gone into win-now mode, and I’m not sure they are ready for it. This could very easily explode the team and get everyone fired in the end, but I guess that’s how the Jets like things. But this is also, unquestionably, an upgrade. So I’m actually excited to see what happens.

I will say, Rodgers, despite his weirdness, is still a better person than Brett Favre. For now.