Behind the Steel Curtain
The four-time MVP can still sling it, and he can help the Steelers end their playoff drought
Mercifully, the months-long will-he-won’t-he game is over. Aaron Rodgers is officially the quarterback of the Pittsburgh Steelers - but now what? What is the ceiling of this team? How far can they go? And what will Rodgers look like in his 21st year in the NFL? There are plenty of questions that still remain, even with Rodgers answering the biggest one. One thing seems pretty evident, though, and it’s that the Steelers are banking on the fact that Rodgers still has it and that he can prove a lot of people wrong - much like his former predecessor Brett Favre did in 2009.
Like Favre, Rodgers went to the New York Jets after a long career with the Green Bay Packers, and both stints didn’t exactly go as planned. Favre looked poised to lead New York to a playoff berth after an 8-3 start, but the Jets lost four of their final five games and missed the playoffs. Favre threw 22 touchdowns and 22 interceptions that season, and it looked as if that would be an unceremonious sunset season for the three-time MVP. However, in 2009, he joined the Minnesota Vikings and looked like a completely different player.
That season, Favre recaptured some of his former glory at age 40, throwing 33 touchdowns to just seven interceptions, which was the lowest total in a full season for his career. He also topped 4,200 yards passing for the first time since 1998 en route to leading the Vikings to an improbable appearance in the NFC Championship Game. And if not for a patented awful Favre interception late in the fourth quarter, the Vikings likely would have won and gone on to face Peyton Manning and the Colts in the Super Bowl.
I say all that to say this - Rodgers showed he still has some gas in the tank in 2024. Despite the Jets being a tire fire, Rodgers had 28 touchdown passes, which ranked sixth in the NFL. He averaged more yards per game than Justin Herbert, Jordan Love, Kyler Murray, C.J. Stroud, and Josh Allen, and his 90.5 passer rating was hovering around the league average of 92.3.
Rodgers’ arm talent was still very evident in 2024, as well. He finished seventh in the NFL in big-time throws with 26, and also didn’t put the ball in harm’s way, finishing with the third-lowest turnover-worthy play percentage of all quarterbacks with at least 150 dropbacks in 2024, per PFF.
To continue, Rodgers had one of the worst offensive lines in the NFL last season, which is practically kryptonite for an older signal-caller. Of the 44 quarterbacks with 150 dropbacks, he finished 33rd in average time to throw. Rodgers also didn’t get any help from the run game, as the Jets finished with the second-fewest rushing yards per game in the NFL. To compare, Justin Fields had the...
