Aaron Rodgers is said to have ignored Green Bay Packers general manager Brian Gutekunst before being traded to the New York Jets.
After several months of speculation, Rodgers was traded to the Jets just days before the start of the 2023 NFL Draft in April. In doing so it ended his 18-year association with the Packers, who drafted him back in 2005.
Negotiations took several weeks to iron out before an agreement over a trade for Rodgers was agreed with the Packers eventually receiving several draft picks, including a conditional second round pick in 2024, which would be turned into a first-round pick should Rodgers take part in at least 65 percent of the Jets’ offensive snaps in the 2023 NFL season.
In the months after the Packers’ season concluded at the start of January following a Week 16 defeat to NFC North rivals Detroit Lions, rumours swirled over whether Rodgers would remain at Lambeau Field for 2023. A fresh report from ESPN has claimed to reveal what happened in the days and weeks after the end of the Packers season.
The report says that Packers GM Gutekunst tried to make contact with Rodgers to discuss his future at the end of January. It was claimed that Gutekunst was willing to meet with Rodgers in California on a scouting trip for the NFLPA Collegiate Bowl, but apparently never heard back from the quarterback.
In the report, this was apparently before the so-called “darkness retreat” that Rodgers took at the end of February to mull over his future. A source in the article then goes on to say how Rodgers’ agent; Dave Dunn, was the go-between for the Packers and the QB.
"It was: If this is the way it's going to be [ghosting the Packers] and he wants to be back, we need to have those conversations," the source told ESPN. "[Dunn] talked to Aaron at some point and then said, 'He wants to keep playing, he wants to be a Jet.'"
With Rodgers now leaving the Packers, it leaves the NFC North team placing their faith in Jordan Love, a 2019 first-round draft pick, will be the starting QB for the 2023 season, with Sean Clifford recently drafted from Penn State.
