Let me begin with a disclaimer: I have a great deal of respect for the Green Bay Packers, their organization, and their historical record. And I am not a fan of the Chicago Bears. The following has absolutely nothing to do with how the subject of this post has performed against the team I do root for. Having said that:
Aaron Rodgers has built a Hall of Fame career as the quarterback of the Green Bay Packers.
He has led his team into only 1 Super Bowl, but he not only won it, but was rightly named its Most Valuable Player. He has been the MVP of the National Football League 3 times, and will likely win a 4th for this season. He has been to 10 Pro Bowls, the NFL's version of the All-Star Game. His 1st such season was at age 26. His most recent, this season, came at age 38.
He holds these NFL career records: Highest passer rating in a season, lowest interception percentage in a season (and not the same season), most consecutive passes without an interception, lowest career interception percentage, and best career touchdown-to-interception ratio. Basically, he wins games, and doesn't beat himself.
Here's where he ranks in various career passing categories: passer rating, 3rd, and 1st among those age 27 and up; touchdown passes, 5th; completions and yards, 10th; completion percentage and passing yards per game, 11th.
And, most relevantly for this discussion, here's what he's done this season, at age 38, mind you: Led his team to a 13-2 record, completed 68.6 percent of his passes, for 35 touchdowns and just 4 interceptions. Think about that: At 38, this man is averaging more than 2 touchdown passes per game, and averaging 4 games per interception. That is a sicko stat.
Paul Brown on an LSD trip couldn't imagine a quarterback doing that in the NFL. Sammy Baugh would have played naked, including helmetless, for no pay at all, if he thought it would get him those kinds of stats. And defensive players are bigger, faster, and in better shape than ever before. The season that Aaron Rodgers is putting up this season doesn't seem possible in real life. Maybe in a cartoon, or a combination football and sword-and-sorcery fantasy film. But it's happened.
The NFL MVP award is given out at the end of the regular season. Whether that's fair is a separate debate. But, given that fact, it seems pretty simple that Aaron Rodgers is, capitalized or not, the most valuable player in the National Football League for the 2021 season.
Herbert "Hub" Arkush disagrees. He is a native of the Chicago suburbs. He is the editor of the magazine Chicago Football, and the publisher and editor of Pro Football Weekly. He is also in charge of the websites of both. Prior to that, he covered the NFL for the Chicago Sun-Times and the Chicago Daily Herald (the latter a suburbs-oriented paper).
He has broadcast NFL games on radio for Westwood One, and is a contributor to the CBS affiliates in his hometown, WBBM, both radio (780 AM) and television (Channel 2). He is a certifiable expert on the subject of the sport of football, especially the NFL. And, at the age of 68, he's not some kid who's new on the scene.
He is an admitted fan of the Chicago Bears, who have the NFL's oldest rivalry with the Packers, and have been on the short end of the rivalry more often than not over the course of Rodgers' career. At the end of a game at the new Soldier Field in Chicago this season, Rodgers walked off the field, got booed by Bears fans, and a microphone picked up his response: "I still own you!"
Arkush has announced that his vote for this season's NFL MVP is in, and it's not Aaron Rodgers. Why? Because Rodgers has publicly chosen to not get a vaccine against COVID-19. He called Rodgers "the biggest jerk in the league," and said, "He's a bad guy, I don’t think a bad guy can be the most valuable guy at the same time." He also said, "I can guarantee you: I will not be the only one not voting for him."
Rodgers has responded: "I think he’s a bum. I think he's an absolute bum. He doesn't know me. I don't know who he is. No one knew who he was, probably, until yesterday’s comments. I listened to the comments, but to say he had his mind made up in the summertime, in the offseason, that I had zero chance of winning MVP, in my opinion, should exclude future votes."
Arkush has since apologized for his comments.
He should not have apologized. Hub Arkush was absolutely right. Maybe not about other writers not voting for him, or why. But definitely about Rodgers being, if not the biggest, then one of the biggest jerks in the NFL.
And it's worse than that: Rodgers lied about his vaccination status, making his teammates believe that they danger of contracting COVID from him had been, if not completely eliminated, then minimized.
This must be said about Aaron Rodgers: Aaron Rodgers lied to his teammates about a matter of life and death. COVID can kill you. And even if it doesn't, it can leave deleterious effects that last for the rest of your life. The kind of effects that can end your multi-million-dollar football career.
So, Hub Arkush was right. Aaron Rodgers is a bad teammate. He is not the most valuable.
He is anti-valuable. He is a threat.
Say it. Aaron Rodgers is a threat to his teammates.
Say it. Aaron Rodgers cannot be trusted by his teammates.
Stan Mauldin won an NFL Championship with the Chicago Cardinals in 1947, and died of a heart attack in the middle of a game the next season.
Willie Galimore and Bo Farrington won an NFL Championship with the Chicago Bears in 1963, and died in a car crash while driving home from the next season's training camp.
These were tragedies. I don't know if, or how, they could have been avoided.
Suppose the Green Bay Packers win Super Bowl LVI next month. And then, shortly thereafter, one of the players dies from COVID. We'll have a pretty good idea of who infected him. I'm not saying it would be Aaron Rodgers, but his refusal to get vaccinated makes it more likely.
But if this happens, then it's something that can be avoided. And it wouldn't just be a tragedy. It would be willful negligence.
It would be difficult to prosecute Aaron Rodgers for a crime. But he could well end up killing his teammate.
If I were the Commissioner of the National Football League, I would not give a damn how much money Rodgers, or the Packers, or the TV networks, or the League would lose in this process: I would have suspended Rodgers until he showed proof of vaccination. And I would do this to every other player who similarly refused.
And if I were the general manager of the Green Bay Packers, I would have cut Aaron Rodgers as soon as it was revealed that he lied to the organization. I would eat the rest of his contract, and take the public-relations hit. Because I give a damn about my players' lives.
And if I were running the advertising for State Farm Insurance, or any other product that Rodgers endorses, I would drop him immediately. This isn't like an accusation of sexual harassment that comes out of the blue, as recently happened with actor Chris Noth: With Rodgers, have enough of the facts needed to make a definitive choice.
Say it: Aaron Rodgers does not give a damn whether his teammates live or die.
Filing a vote denying him an award that he will probably win anyway is the least of what he deserves.
Aaron Rodgers deserves to be banned from the NFL for life.
I don't know if he will see this. I'm just one person, whose blog is not read by very many people. If he does see it, he'll probably call me a "bum" or a "loser" or "unemployable."
But I'm fully vaccinated. And I can prove it. Because the lives of the people I come into contact with are more important than... whatever the hell Rodgers thinks he's defending by not getting vaccinated.
Freedom? I live in New Jersey, near New York City. With the restrictions in place in these locations, getting vaccinated has increased my freedom.
Aaron Rodgers is fabulously wealthy -- presuming he hasn't pissed his fortune away on something stupid. If he got banned from the NFL tomorrow, he'd still have more freedom than most of his fans will ever know.
And it's not like the Packers are a team with a terribly long drought. This is not the Detroit Lions, who haven't been World Champions since the Brooklyn Dodgers were still packing up to move to Los Angeles and Elvis Presley got his draft notice. Nor are they the Minnesota Vikings, who have been in the NFL for over 60 years and never won a World Championship. They are not desperate for a title. Quite the opposite: With 13, the Packers have more NFL Championships than any other team.
Sure, their fans, who have one of the better fan reputations in the NFL, want to win another. But they don't need to win it this season. If losing Rodgers, for whatever reason, costs them this season's title, it will hurt. But they will get over it.
Aaron Rodgers cannot be trusted by his teammates, or his team's organization. And that fact is no one's fault but his own. You know this. And since you know this, how can you call him the most valuable player?
You can. But, like Rodgers when he said he was vaccinated, it would be a lie.