Aaron Rodgers seemingly confirmed he will not play in the New York Jets’ preseason games. Right or wrong decision, he doesn’t feel it’s necessary.
But he also dropped a funny story about the offensive drive he played for the Jets in last year’s preseason.
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In a live interview with WFAN’s Boomer & Gio Show, Rodgers claimed the preseason isn’t real football. He said no team shows their true coverages, making any reps virtually meaningless for a quarterback from that perspective.
But then he added, “Now, last year with Wink [Martindale, then the Giants’ defensive coordinator], the few plays we played, he told us pregame he was going to play Cover 3 and chill out. Then he brought [Cover] zero* on the first play, zero on the second play, and zero down in the red zone. So that was like really playing.”
* Cover zero is an aggressive defensive look showing man coverage across the board with no deep safety and all other defenders blitzing.
Rodgers then described what happened on the Jets’ first play against the Giants in last year’s preseason. The Jets had a run play called. When the Giants showed out in Cover 0, Rodgers checked into a quick backside pass to Garrett Wilson. Rodgers laughingly said, “I looked over at Wink and gave him the finger, like, ‘What are you doing, bro?'”
Rodgers contrasted that with most other preseason defenses, which run a single-high zone. He asserted that the Jets won’t be able to run the offense they’ve practiced in camp against a simplistic defense. He also commented that any quarterback evaluation comes from practice when going up against a full array of defensive looks.
Rodgers admitted, though, that the threat of a pass rush is real in the preseason. That’s why some would suggest he should play in the preseason, especially coming off such a severe injury. Although practice might have a game feel, wearing that red non-contact jersey removes the mental aspect of worrying about getting hit. A moment of hesitation due to that concern could be costly in a regular season game.
Regardless of what happens in this year’s preseason, Rodgers’ recounting of last year’s matchup was amusing. It could have been a taste of things to come in the regular season if not for his Achilles injury. The Jets hope to avoid the catastrophe of a preseason injury by keeping Rodgers off the field until the games matter.
