Packers Have Made “Significant Long-term” Offer to Aaron Rodgers

Another day, another bit of news on the Aaron Rodgers’ situation. It was reported by Ian Rapoport of NFL Network that the Green Bay Packers have offered Rodgers a “significant long-term contract extension” and that there “certainly has been some engagement” from Rodgers.

I wouldn’t categorize this as ground-breaking news on the matter, but there are two main takeaways from this. I’ll start with the obvious, and that is that the two sides are at least communicating and potentially trying to find a solution. We knew that the Packers wanted to find some common ground, but given the reports over the last week and a half, we didn’t exactly know where Rodgers stood. So this is a positive.

The second takeaway is that the offer is “significant.” We knew from previous reports that the Green Bay Packers had offered Rodgers an extension this offseason, but we didn’t know what the details of the deal were.

As I wrote last week, just because an extension offer was made previously, doesn’t mean that Green Bay still didn’t have a way out of the contract sooner than what Rodgers wanted. Money is not the issue here, but money can be a part of the solution as it means more control for Rodgers over his own timeline—which is what I believe he is looking for.

With the selection of Love, it was clear that Rodgers’ timeline and the Packers’ timeline for him didn’t align. Although he still had four years left on his deal at that time, signs pointed to Green Bay wanting to move on sooner.

However, with an MVP performance this past season, Rodgers regained some leverage and is perhaps using his displeasure with the team to create even more—although, that’s all just speculation on my part.

By receiving a massive extension, the influx of new money will create dead cap hits in the coming years that will take away the Packers’ ability to move on from Rodgers whenever they please. Thus giving Rodgers control of his own timeline once again.

In this scenario, Rodgers now decides when he’s ready to move on, whether that be to a new team when the extension is up or perhaps retirement at that point in his career.

Now, of course, there is no guarantee that this report turns into anything. So like we’ve been doing, we will just have to wait and see where all of this takes us. But after a week’s worth of bad news being reported, this is another positive sign for Packers fans—even if it is just a small step.