If Packers are serious about keeping Aaron Rodgers they should trade Jordan Love at deadline | You Pod to Win the Game
Yahoo Sports’ Charles Robinson explains to Yahoo Sports’ Eric Edholm why if Green Bay wants to extend Aaron Rodgers’ career with the Packers beyond this season, they need to find a trade partner for Jordan Love’s services prior to the upcoming trade deadline. Hear the full conversation on the You Pod to Win the Game podcast. Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher or wherever you listen.
Video Transcript
CHARLES ROBINSON: I look at Aaron Rodgers and the Green Bay Packers, and we see what Rodgers is doing. He's still playing at that MVP level of last season. He's still raising this team. He still looks, to me, like somebody who's got a lot of gas left in the tank.
The criticisms of him you know, whatever, not being in it, or what-- I mean all out the window.
ERIC EDHOLM: Out the window, yeah.
CHARLES ROBINSON: He is, he is, yeah, he is, he's just fine. And if I'm the Packers, and I'm serious about really keeping this guy, if I'm really serious about making sure he doesn't want to exit at the end of the season, I'm trading Jordan Love.
Like, I'm just going to-- if I'm Brian Gutekunst, I'm sitting there and I'm saying I want this guy back. I'm, I'm going to go ahead and do this. Not knowing, by the way, if it's going to affect Aaron's decision or not.
Like if Aaron, it may not be something that motivates Aaron to say at the end of the season, I want to be here. This is where I want to, I'm good. Let me finish out my career as a Packer.
But I'm going to go ahead and do it anyway. And I'm going to show him, I'm going to step up and show him I am invested in you. It is time for me to make this decision. I think this is the right decision to make to remain invested in you.
So I'm going to go ahead and shop Jordan Love around the league. And find out what I can get from him and, and move on from Jordan Love.
I think if the Packers are really serious, if Brian Gutekunst is really serious about courting Rodgers and keeping him, and figuring this all out with him, which looks worthwhile to me right now--
ERIC EDHOLM: Yeah.
CHARLES ROBINSON: --you just deal Love now.
ERIC EDHOLM: And we got to see enough of him in the preseason, right? That was the issue last year from the Packers, from a preparation standpoint, why he was the quarterback, the third quarterback for the entire year.
He didn't get any preseason games. Preseason was canceled. This year, got a ton, right? I mean, he got the vast majority of the reps. And that was important, you know?
And that was a good thing for the Packers' comfort level, to be all right, well if Aaron doesn't show, I mean, if Aaron, you know, goes down or anything like that, we have any issues with that, we know we have a guy who's gotten some reps now.
Now, it becomes this showcase thing where the teams can go back and look. Or maybe they face them in the preseason. I'd be curious to see what the list of teams might be like.
It would have to be a team that's-- and this is where my thinking comes in, this draft class, Charles, and I'm sure we'll be talking about for the next six months or whatever, the 2022 draft class right now is very incomplete. OK, Kenny Pickett excites you. What about the eight inch hands? You know, the fact that he hadn't really broken out till this year.
CHARLES ROBINSON: Right.
ERIC EDHOLM: You like Matt Corral? OK, well then watch his 10 worst plays and see if you can't get a little bit freaky, you know, and whoever. Just go down the list.
I mean, Malik Willis, six interceptions the last two games. He's been great up till then. That was a bad, you know.
So if you start looking big picture at the draft, you know, I don't know who's quarterback one. I don't know who's quarterback five. I don't know how many going in round one.
Jordan Love, ask yourself, if he was in this quarterback class, what would he be worth? And that's where, maybe, those conversations start happening.
It was so fascinating-- I'll have to go back and look and see which teams I talked to who liked him coming out. Or were more curious, more interested than not, not named the Packers, and maybe we can put our list together. Kind of merge them, and see if there's a nexus somewhere there.
CHARLES ROBINSON: Well, I know, I know Ballard, Chris Ballard really liked him. And I think it's interesting that A, Wentz gets hurt a lot, OK? He does. He gets he gets banged up.
He puts himself in positions, and that's probably still my knock on him, is that when I watch him, I think he is overly aggressive, to the point of really exposing himself, at least a few plays a game. And so I think you're always going to be worried about a Wentz injury management process, OK?
ERIC EDHOLM: Yeah.
CHARLES ROBINSON: I think that you also don't know, long term, if Wentz is going to suffer the kind of catastrophic injury that will change the calculus moving forward with him. Or if he just will not continue to, sort of, develop back into the player he once was with Frank Reich in Philadelphia.
ERIC EDHOLM: Yeah.
CHARLES ROBINSON: It's good to have a young guy in there that, maybe, you liked coming into the draft. You can get him, I don't want-- well let's be honest, probably pennies on the dollar right now. And so, I'm not saying it would be the Colts, but I know, you know, Ballard did like Jordan Love.
And again, this isn't to say, by the way, that the Packers are going to do it. I'm saying, I think they should. If they're serious about investing in Aaron going forward and saying, hey, we're going to get another three or four years out of you.
ERIC EDHOLM: Yeah.
CHARLES ROBINSON: This is the move you can do, without, you know-- don't consult with him. Go to him afterward and say, look, this is-- I hope you understand what this was for us. And maybe you won't want to be here at the end of the year.
But this is me, Brian Gutekunst, saying to you, I really am committed in you. And I believe in you. And let's, let's figure this out.
