Watching the remarkable turbulence surrounding quarterbacks in the NFL this off-season, a curiosity emerges:
What if Tom Brady hadn’t won the Super Bowl in his first year with Tampa Bay?
That single development has triggered an acceleration that may become one of the greatest pivot points in NFL history.
The acquisition of a top-shelf quarterback, veteran or rookie, by almost any means possible, has taken on an urgency even more intense than it already was for American team sports’ most vital job.
Of course, we all understand Brady is a one-off figure in NFL history. We also understand that football teams are made up of many layers and parts. And we also understand that any team sports championship secured during a pandemic is subject to all manner of skepticism, denigrations, asterisks, ahems and tut-tuts.
It is also true that executives of every team that lacks a top-shelf QB who is Super Bowl-ready look to their fans like nincompoops, stooges, clowns and dilettante ditherers.
Even when a general manager has the best QB, he’s still the village idiot.
Case in point: The Green Bay Packers’ Brian Gutekunst.
In the NFL’s smallest market, he has put together back-to-back 13-3 seasons to reach consecutive conference championships, and now is seen as a Dumb and Dumber solo act.
That’s because he pissed off the game’s Most Valuable Player, Aaron Rodgers.
Not only does Rodgers claim to no longer want to play for the Packers, he or his agent leaked the news to ESPN’s Adam Schefter on the afternoon of the NFL’s biggest annual off-season moment, the start of the draft Thursday — the very definition of flatulence in church.
On Sunday, Rodgers, 37, leaked another gaseous payload, Charles Robinson of Yahoo Sports reporting that until Packers fire Gutekunst, Rodgers won’t show up for off-season work, will hold out of training camp and is even considering retiring, though it would cost him millions in bonus money he would be contractually obligated to refund to the team.
Figuratively blasted from his garments, Gutekunst stood naked and resolute when asked whether the relationship with Rodgers was beyond repair.
“No, I don’t think so at all. That’s my opinion and that’s the organization’s opinion,” Gutekunst said. “We want Aaron to be our quarterback. We’re pretty resolute with that . . . We want to leave every avenue open for that to happen.”
Good luck. He dared think down the road. There’s no more time for that.
Whether Gutekunst was justified in drafting Jordan Love in 2019 as the eventual replacement for Rodgers without telling him, or whether Rodgers is justified in forcing his way out of Green Bay, are subjects for another time. The point here is that the shift of power in the NFL away from management and toward players, already underway, was given a big boost by Brady’s results.
Even though Brady was a free agent and walked away cleanly from New England, his choice to end an incredible 20-year run of success under coach Bill Belichick, followed by maximum success with a previously moribund franchise, opened vistas for a handful of powerful figures and sped up life for every GM.
Had Brady failed, would Rodgers have sought to split so publicly and acidly from the Packers? Would Russell Wilson have gone public with his grievances about the Seahawks’ shortfall after a 12-4 season?
Would the Rams have quit on Jared Goff and sold out a big part of their future to acquire Matthew Stafford, 33, from Detroit? Would the 49ers have sold out a big part of their future to Miami to acquire the No. 3 pick and select the lightly experienced Trey Lance? Would the Bears have spent a draft fortune to move up nine spots in the first round to select Justin Fields?
Would the Jets have quit on the third overall pick in the 2018 draft, Sam Darnold, to bet on BYU QB Zach Wilson? (According to ESPN Stats & Information, the Jets are the first team in common draft era since 1967 to select two quarterbacks within the top three overall picks in a four-year span.)
Independent of Brady’s success, Deshaun Watson and the Houston Texans are their own special kind of crazy. The franchise is dysfunctional, and the quarterback is apparently addicted to masseuses. But you can bet large coin that whenever Watson is ready to return to football, probably as a free agent, no one in the line of suitors will recall anything bad about him.
A case can be made to justify each QB episode on its merits. But there’s no denying what Brady did for himself as a player and what he did for his new team is a template that is front of mind for all NFL principals.
It should be noted that while Brady’s history is great, his 2020 season was merely good. On ESPN’s QBR, as well as conventional passer rating, he was ranked ninth in the regular season. That makes the point that a premium QB doesn’t have to be the best QB at the moment for ultimate success, as Rodgers will attest.
These days, teams often have to do hard things well to acquire a premium QB, and almost always have to do hard things well to keep them satisfied.
As we learned anew again with the pandemic, the world changes fast.
An analogy from technology: There are 18-year-olds who have no practical personal experience in a world without smartphones, a hand-held device that has more computing power than what helped put astronauts on the moon.
As with most NFL teams filling the quarterback position, it’s hard to navigate life without a good one, or at least the latest one. Success now requires embracing acceleration. no matter what.
36 Comments
Now the NFL just needs to switch to a fake salary cap like the NBA, and it will be major drama every year. I doubt that’s what NFL executives want, but it would be fun
The number of NFL players with leverage to bully one’s way out of town are few. What I’m intrigued about is whether NFL owners will privately pressure the Packers to call Rodgers’ bluff, in order to avoid creating precedent. They can argue that after all, you did draft Love to replace Rodgers. Just do it.
There’s no roster disruption for the team, there’s no earthquake in the NFL.
I’m still scratching my head at exactly what it is Rodgers is torqued-off about. Didn’t they dump their previous HC to appease him? Hasn’t the squad gone 26-6 in the following 2 regular seasons? Why is no one named Rodgers talking about how bad things supposedly are in Green Bay when he’s killing it and being mentioned as an MVP candidate during the regular season? But, suddenly the entire organisation is in need of a shake-up because they lose in the playoffs?
I’m with Bradshaw on this one: Rodgers looks “weak” and the Packers should call his retirement bluff. They’d be foolish to trade him simply because he’s a crybaby.
Rodgers wants to be traded to a team in Culver City.
I see what you did there.
He can afford the commute from Denver or Las Vegas.
Rodgers wants to win SBs and anything, like drafting high his replacement who didn’t play, that denies him, is an irritant. And yes, he wants a Cali life with his pending wife. He’ll never have this power position again.
Brady did to the NFL what Lebron did to the NBA in 2010 (ignoring the whole ‘Decision’ debacle). NBA stars use their leverage to create good situations for themselves. However, what all these NFL guys miss when they look to Brady as inspiration, is that he pretty much annually makes financial concessions to keep his teams good. That’s the part of the formula that Wilson and Rogers both conveniently ignore.
That said, that Jordan Love draft pick, at the time, when you still had top receivers on the board, looked stupid, and is looking dumber by the day. This is not like when they drafted Rogers who was a top 5 prospect, who fell to the back of the draft and was a steal, they traded up for a position they didn’t need, that most had as a second rounder, when they’re in win now mode. If I’m killing it for my company and just need another head on my team to put us all over the top, but my bosses hire my replacement instead, I’d also be leveraging my success to join a competitor.
UFA Brady wasn’t without a championship and on the verge of exploding into true best-player-on-the-planet status in his sport in 2020 like UFA James was in his in 2010. I’m trying to recall an ascending football player with UFA situation similar to James that also kicked off (no pun) a comparable bidding war for his talents, and I’m coming up with Warren Moon after his contract with Edmonton expired. I think Brady-to-Tampa Bay was a far bigger happening for the Buccaneers franchise than it was for Brady personally.
And, I’m genuinely curious what you think makes “The Decision” a debacle. I’ve always felt that if Shaquille O’Neal had done something similar after his Orlando contract expired 15 years before, James would’ve done something different rather than what he ended up doing, which hadn’t ever been done before. I think that’s why it worked. No one had ever seen anything like it before in any North American sport. Particularly from a UFA of that caliber and interest. I’m trying to remember the level of media frenzy and public interest in Pele coming to the NASL without having to look it up, but, I was only 5 at the time.
I’m just perplexed by the number of people who watched The Decision and apparently felt robbed of the time in their lives that it took to reach the climax. It was good TV. It’s not as if LeBron James personally held anyone at gunpoint and forced them to watch it. I just have never understood why so many people were/have been unable to resume their own regularly-scheduled lives because of The Decision.
Warren Moon is a good pull. The Seahawks were deep into the bidding for Moon and were stunned to lose out. But that was way before social media swelled things beyond recognition.
Regarding James’ decision on TV, I didn’t like it, but I know no one who wasn’t over it in a day. But I’ve never lived in Cleveland.
My objection was mainly the kids as props to humanize James. That deserved a Christopher Guest mockumentary treatment.
Thanks for spelling out the Rodgers/Love background for those who have forgotten. Even if you aren’t Rodgers, or a Packers fan, the move was stunning, then and now. A classic case of overthinking the future.
Brady is given credit for taking hometown discounts, and they were — by terms of the salary cap. But I’m almost certain the Pats are the kind of team to discover a workaround for non-salary compensation. They’ve cheated numerous other facets of the game.
It’s cold in Green Bay. It could be worse for the Packer’s GM. His team could be hitting .207. Excuse the non-sequitur but I’ll assume readers understand the local reference. An entire team average confronting the Mendoza line. Now… that’s not cold, it’s frigid.
Glacial.
Yes! Bats gone catatonic. Need ecstasy.
Remember when this column was about football?
That’s not frigid, that’s Mariner baseball. Current ownerships new motto, bad baseball is better than no baseball. Ah hell that’s been the Mariner ownerships motto for 43 years. At least they’re consistent.
Have you seen the poor offenses throughout baseball? It’s a pandemic of coronastrikeout.
In 1969 baseball lowered the mound 5 inches. Offense perked up. Baseball needs to move the pitchers rubber 12 inches to 61 feet, 6 inches.
Granted, offensive production is down throughout MLB. But the M’s are truly redefining the Mendoza line. Or perhaps they could rename it the Marmolejos line. Why he’s in the lineup is truly one of life’s mysteries. Now back to your previously scheduled programming. Football.
There is a group pathos here that is expansion-team worthy.
But wait, there’s more. No hit by the O’s today, a dropped 3rd strike away from being perfected gamed. You can’t make this stuff up.
Right on cue. Hitless.
That’s quite the twisty analogy. But I probably have done worse.
Your twistness is clever and has rightfully succeeded. Many thanks for your choosing the world of sport to write about.
There’s the Mendoza line and the Area Code line (206). The M’s are a point above the latter.
It is all Brady’s fault, is one way to read this, Art, and somehow that seems wrong. However, you made a good case, and I am coming around to your way of thinking as I write this.
Thanks for bothering to read and comment on the topic.
Brady’s decision is not so much a fault as a breakthrough in game evolution.
I wonder if the Packers consulted with Brett Favre before drafting Aaron Rodgers?
Rodgers didn’t play for his first three seasons. It was also before the passing rules were changed.
It’s been well documented that Favre would have nothing to do with Rodgers when they played together. You have to wonder how that impacted Rodgers and f it comes into play on how he treats Jordan Love today.
What if Eleanor Roosevelt could fly?
Brady’s 9th qbr proves the adage “stats are for losers”.
It’s what’s between the ears that counts in game management and that intangible of “leadership” where Brady excels.
RW is a leader and he has the smarts, yet he has a way to go with the game management part. Hopefully this will improve with the new OC.
Not to diminish Brady, but regulsrly he’s been part of otherwise excellent teams.
All players have shortcomings. Wilson has a weakness for splash plays.
It isn’t a coincidence that Wilson, Watson and Rodgers are making noise about their teams shortcomings and moving on after Brady wins the SB. Question is at what point does the NFL believe it’s a problem when star players pull power moves on their teams and what will the League do about it.