Aaron Rodgers will give Jets extreme possibilities, for better or worse

BOSTON -- For one of the first times in recorded history, a star quarterback wants to be a New York Jet. How strange.

Then again, most everything involving Aaron Rodgers could be described as a bit strange.

Nevertheless, Rodgers wasted everybody's time spoke in great detail about his life and his feelings while appearing as a guest on The Pat McAfee Show on Wednesday, and the 39-year-old said that he intends to play football for the New York Jets in 2023.

It will very likely go down as the biggest story of the NFL offseason, and one way or another, it will remain one of the focal points when the football actually begins in September. Rightfully so. Despite a down season and a rising age, Rodgers is a bona fide superstar, one of the best passers the league has ever seen. He's now joining a franchise that hasn't employed an All-Pro quarterback since 1969. Understandably, provided the Jets and Packers can agree on a proper compensation package to execute a trade, expectations are sure to skyrocket in the New York metropolitan area.

The reality is that Rodgers' presumed arrival in Florham Park brings with it some astounding possibilities ... on both extremes. Depending on one's outlook, it's not at all difficult to envision some long-awaited glory for the Jets. But it's just as easy to envision an abject disaster.

That's what hangs in the balance in the upcoming season, and that's the type of extreme impact Rodgers figures to have on the Jets.

While nobody can know which of those two extremes will become a reality, here's an examination of how each picture would look.

BEST-CASE SCENARIO

While Rodgers' passing numbers dipped in a big way last year, you can almost throw that out the window entirely. And that's for one reason and one reason only: Spite.

Perhaps you missed this during Rodgers' self-absorbed soliloquies on Pat McAfee's show, but Rodgers thinks rather highly of himself. By many objective measures, he's right to feel that way. The stats bear out that he's quite the football player. But man oh man, can he take things personally.

And the general vibe that he was giving off when talking to McAfee on Wednesday was that the Packers' front office has not been straightforward with him this offseason and that the decision-makers are essentially pushing him out the door in Green Bay. Rodgers believes that process started when the team drafted Jordan Love in the first round in 2020. The veteran QB's MVP seasons in 2020 and 2021 bought him some time in Green Bay, but Rodgers felt a clear message from the Packers this offseason that it's time to move on. (He felt many other things, too, and he's more than happy to tell you all about it. You don't even have to ask!)

Forget the fact that Rodgers has been leaving the Packers in the dark for multiple years with regard to his playing intentions. Forget the fact that he's won a whopping one playoff game over the past three seasons. And forget the fact that any smart team with a quarterback in his upper 30s would have a contingency plan in place for the future (which is, you know, how Rodgers ended up in Green Bay in the first place). Forget all of that because Rodgers isn't looking at this from the outside. He's looking at it from the inside. And inside ... it hurts.

That really sets the stage for the ultimate spite season for Rodgers. It may not be a long-term solution, but hell hath no wrath like an egomaniacal quarterback scorned. Rodgers will be as motivated as ever to prove a lot of people wrong, which should propel him back toward that MVP level at which he played as recently as 2021.

Beyond that, Rodgers will be joining a good team. It is perhaps not a great team, but it is certainly a team with plenty of talent. The offensive line is solid if Mekhi Becton is healthy (an admittedly big "if"), with Laken Tomlinson and Alijah Vera-Tucker on the interior. Breece Hall popped as a rookie before his injury, and Garrett Wilson won Offensive Rookie of the Year despite the dysfunctional quarterback trio of Zach Wilson, Mike White and Joe Flacco. That's an incredible accomplishment. (Really. Someone should write a book about it. Perhaps even build a statue.) Allen Lazard will add a level of comfort for Rodgers, and the Jets are sure to add another piece from his wish list before it's all said and done.

Defensively, the Jets are great, ranking fourth in both points and yards allowed last year. Sauce Gardner was the Defensive Rookie of the Year, Quinnen Williams was a monster, and C.J. Mosley is in his prime.

Much like Garrett Wilson's OPOY win, the defense ranking fourth in the NFL was an incredible accomplishment, considering the Jets ranked 29th in average time of possession on offense. The Jets moved the chains just 294 times, seventh-fewest in the NFL. They had the fifth-worst third-down offense. Correspondingly, they had the fifth-most punts in the NFL.

Long story short, the inept offensive put an immense stress on Robert Saleh's defense. And that unit still excelled.

That is where the highest hopes can be found with a Rodgers arrival. The Jets won't need Rodgers to throw 50 touchdowns with eight interceptions. They'll need him to be better than the putrid 14 touchdowns and 14 interceptions that the three Jets quarterbacks combined to throw last season.

Even if Rodgers has another "down" season like he did last year with 26 touchdowns and 12 interceptions, it will have the Jets functioning on a separate stratosphere than what they dealt with last year (and what they've dealt with for the past decade, pretty much).

Remember, the Jets did beat the Bills last year, and they did beat the Dolphins. They didn't beat the Patriots, thanks largely to three Zach Wilson interceptions and a foolish roughing the passer penalty on John Franklin-Myers in the first meeting and thanks to just 77 Wilson passing yards and a game-winning Marcus Jones punt return in the second meeting. Insert Rodgers into those games (which were determined by a combined total of 12 points), and the Jets are likely looking at a 4-2 record against divisional opponents at worst.

A casual estimation of the rest of their schedule (home dates vs. the Chiefs, Chargers, Eagles, Commanders, Texans and Falcons; road dates with the Cowboys, Broncos, Raiders, Giants and Browns) shows that the Jets should realistically be looking at double-digit wins, with their record possibly climbing as high as 12-5. That could be enough to flirt with the top of the conference, and it would be enough to actually put the Jets in a real conversation about a run toward the Super Bowl.

Envisioning the specifics of that road is far too difficult to do in March. There's still a whole draft that needs to happen. Then a season. With injuries. And unexpected climbs and falls up and down the standings. Even in an effort to predict the future, doing all of that is a bridge too far.

But overall, there's a lot to like about the prospect of Rodgers joining a team that is poised and ready to be lifted to new heights with a real quarterback. Any long-suffering Jets fan can and should let their wildest dreams run wild, because the potential for greatness is very, very real.

WORST-CASE SCENARIO

While the best-case scenario is exciting for Jets fans, the worst-case scenario is objectively humorous to the rest of us. And make no mistake: The worst-case scenario is very possible.

The fact that Rodgers isn't even on the Jets yet has caused a week's worth of migraines for all involved is indicative of the headaches that can accompany him wherever he goes.

While Garrett Wilson and the rest of the receiving room will be thrilled to see a capable quarterback joining the team, it's unclear how they'll feel or respond if/when Rodgers publicly criticizes them for being inconsistent, running sloppy routes, or dropping too many passes.

While the front office may be jumping through hoops to bring Rodgers to New Jersey, the task of acquiring some of the "wish list" candidates beyond Allen Lazard may prove to be a never-ending quest to satisfy the QB.

And while Rodgers may enjoy the benefit of speaking for hours on end with no interruption or pushback on Pat McAfee's show, the New York media might prove to be a lot to deal with for a player who's been living and playing in the relative safety of Wisconsin for his entire career. The tabloids, the press conference questions, the talk radio shows, the fans in the stands ... it can be a lot if things go sour for even one minute, creating the potential for a psychological tailspin. We've seen it grip the Jets too many times to even track.

There's also the necessary concern that Rodgers' dip last year was evidence that a late-career performance decline has begun. Tom Brady obviously rewrote what's possible for quarterbacks in their 40s, but he was and is a unicorn. The reality is that in the entire history of the sport, only a handful of quarterbacks even tried to be full-time starting quarterbacks at 40. Even fewer succeeded. That list essentially begins and ends with Brady, Drew Brees and Brett Favre. 

Peyton Manning was done at 39. So was Ben Roethlisberger. And Philip Rivers. Joe Montana, Dan Marino and John Elway were done at 38.

Rodgers is currently 39, and he'll turn 40 in December. Perhaps the aforementioned spite with a dash of piss and vinegar will be enough for him to overcome the odds of being the rare quarterback to thrive at such an age. Or, perhaps, he'll face the fate that almost all of the greats before him have had to grapple with at the end of their careers ... all while collecting a massive salary in a rabid market where an unprecedented number of fingers will be pointing at him if things go south.

Really, for as much as there's reason for optimism, that nightmare scenario feels ... equally possible. The only guaranteed winner in all of this will be the TV networks, because it will be impossible to not tune in to every chapter of the journey.