How Jets Quarterback Aaron Rodgers Is Changing His Style To Get The Most Out Of The New Team News

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henry mackenna

AFC East Reporter

Aaron Rodgers shoved wide receiver Garrett Wilson under the goal post Thursday during the New York Jets’ first training camp practice in New Jersey.

It was one of many moments over the course of the day when Rodgers acted as a coach.

“I think I blew a play,” Wilson said after practice. “He just said, ‘Get it right. Know your details.'”

Rodgers wasn’t always so forgiving when he wore yellow and green. As a longtime quarterback for the Green Bay Packers, Rodgers had a reputation for urgency. He had been tough on all the players, whether they were rookies or veterans.

But so far it’s been different in New York. Receiver Allen Lazard, who joined the Jets this offseason in free agency after spending five years in Green Bay, has seen a new side of Rodgers.

“Not to say it was hard to play him early on in Green Bay, but it was a little bit more like, ‘You guys have to learn it.’ It’s a little slower here to realize that there are a lot of young players,” Lazard said. “He plays in a state of flow… he’s taking time with him.

“I’m seeing how much he cares about these guys. He really wants to put the icing on their cake as far as his career goes.”

New York is loaded with young talent who can help Rodgers bake that cake.

Wilson won Offensive Rookie of the Year in 2022. Running back Breece Hall might have won the OPOY award if not for a torn ACL. The list of young developing talent continues: receiver Mecole Hardman, running back Zonovan Knight, and tight ends Tyler Conklin and CJ Uzomah. Perhaps even the 27-year-old Lazard has more potential.

Rodgers may have some familiar friends, like Lazard and Randall Cobb, but he’ll also be joining a cast of up-and-coming stars. The veteran QB will be key in ensuring they become bona fide studs.

Expectations too high for Aaron Rodgers, Jets this season?

“I think it’s always important to be patient with shorts and helmets, be patient in the first few days of camp,” Rodgers said Thursday. “Sometimes patience can wear thin if mistakes are repeated. I’m building this right now. I want to build it the right way. And, yes, I would say early in my career, I got angry a little more easily.”

“And I feel like I’m a little less triggered as I get older.”

Rodgers’ patience won’t last forever. Eventually, these youngsters have to get it right.

“Mistakes are going to happen, and you really want them to happen right now,” Rodgers said. “But it’s the repeated mistakes that give you a little pause.”

Lazard said he’s also helping to teach younger players how to run offense, something new with the arrival of Rodgers and offensive coordinator Nathaniel Hackett, another transplant from Green Bay (via Denver).

If Lazard knows this offense inside and out, that begs the question: Is it the Packers’ offense?

“It’s Aaron Rodgers’ offense,” Lazard told reporters.

However, Rodgers rejected that statement.

“I’m not going to say it’s my offense. It’s what I’ve been successful at, for sure. But in 2020, it was a conglomeration of what Matt [LaFleur] I wanted to run, what Hackett had run in the past and what I had run in the past. We fit it in,” Rodgers said. “This is kind of an offshoot of that, maybe with a little more West Coast flavor.”

Aaron Rodgers’ Jets have to work under a microscope

As the Jets put together this playbook, whether it’s Rodgers’ offense or Hackett’s offense, the 39-year-old quarterback is trying out a new tact with guys like Wilson, whom the quarterback has compared to his favorite target of his career: Davante Adams. Rodgers said it’s been something of a “rejuvenation” to join the Jets. He also said he sought advice from retired quarterbacks Peyton Manning and Carson Palmer and NHL star Joe Pavelski about switching teams after a long season in one place.

Maybe some of his on-field adjustments will come from those off-field conversations.

That’s not to say Rodgers isn’t doing his thing. He may not be terrifying offensive ability players, but he’s still a nightmare for those who line up in front of him.

“He messes with the defense, looking at the safety, telling him to come down. [He’ll say,] ‘I know you’re coming’ when we’re trying on the costume, and it makes me laugh,” coach Robert Saleh said Thursday after the team’s first practice. “He’s a coach who can still play football.”

But back to that cake we were talking about, the one that Lazard said Rodgers and the Jets are trying to put the icing on. What would that look like?

“I’m not going to beat around the bush. We want to win a Super Bowl,” Wilson said. “You don’t make moves in the offseason like we did unless you’re trying to get there.”

It’s not the only thing the Jets talk about, but it’s one of the key talking points. They desperately want a Super Bowl. Urgently. Ironically, Rodgers, at least for now, has abandoned that urgency to make sure this team doesn’t get ahead of itself.

Before joining FOX Sports as a reporter for the AFC East, Henry McKenna spent seven years covering the Patriots for the USA TODAY Sports Media Group and Boston Globe Media. Follow him on Twitter at @henrycmckenna.

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