I’d like to start this post by saying that I don’t personally know Jordan Love, and that I have no real idea of what I’m talking about here. There – our lawyers should be happy with that. It’s all just reckless speculation based on shit that has happened. Nonetheless, the football world was rocked with a barrage of news on Tuesday. The first domino to fall was Aaron Rodgers, who decided to stay put and sign a new four year, $200M deal with the Green Bay Packers that makes him the highest paid player in NFL history. That’s all well and good, but lest we forget, the Packers moved up into the first round of the 2020 NFL Draft to draft Love. Now that they’re locked in with Rodgers, that means at least two more years of Love sniffing Rodgers’ backside until his rookie contract expires.
Unless Green Bay’s goal in trading up for quarterback Jordan Love two years ago was to light a fire under the ass of Aaron Rodgers, the Packers wasted their picks (a first-rounder and a fourth-rounder) on Love.
With Rodgers reportedly signing a four-year, $200 million contract to stay in Green Bay, Love — who has spent two years on the bench behind Rodgers — likely will spend the next two there, too. Unless the Packers trade him.
Yeah, I don’t know what to make of Love. I liked him coming out of that draft class because of his physical talent and skillset. At the time, everyone was looking for the next great dynamic dual-threat “quarterback of the future,” and Love had the physical tools that most closely resembled that at the time. I thought he could be a nice little project out of the third round for a team that wasn’t in immediate need of a game-changing quarterback. But, as a first round pick for a team that traded up to get him even though they already had a Hall of Fame signal-caller? Well, yeah…I’m definitely going to raise my eyebrows and twirl my mustache at that.
Love has just the right amount of suck to keep him off the field, but also the right amount of luck to have landed in Green Bay where Rodgers obviously isn’t going to ride off quietly into the sunset. I think he just might have ended up in the greatest quarterback situation of all time. Stop and think about it – it’s one where he can just sit and not worry about having to actually do anything and yet still get a first round paycheck (Love signed a four-year, $12.3M deal as a rookie). All he has to do is play well enough during training camp and the preseason to hold on to the back-up job, and he’s set for the next couple of years.
So, let’s put on our tin foil hats for a minute and say that the drafting of Love was indeed a motivational tactic to get Rodgers in gear. Was the move worth it for the Packers?! You essentially burn a first round draft pick, but then you get back-to-back MVP seasons from Rodgers. One of those seasons ended at the NFC Championship. The other yielded the Packers the #1 seed in the NFC (even though they shit the bed with it). And, as long as Rodgers is playing at this level, the Packers are going to be Super Bowl contenders regardless of what the team looks like around him apparently. So, was Love just a pawn? Inquiring minds want to know. We’ll be right back with more Ancient Aliens after this commercial break.
Could the Packers actually trade Love? Well, a popular point of speculation was Nathaniel Hackett getting the Denver Broncos job. But, we see that they wisely made the decision to go with Russell Wilson instead of trading for Love. There are plenty of quarterback-needy teams out there who could be in the market. The Seattle Seahawks are now looking for their guy, as are the Carolina Panthers and Washington Commanders to name a few who have been reportedly shopping around (namely linked to Deshaun Watson). But, what the hell is Love’s stock at right now? What little we’ve seen of him hasn’t exactly been commanding, so who is going to pay the premium to get him?
For Love to end up on another team in 2022, someone would have to like him a lot more than any of the quarterbacks hitting free agency and this quarterback draft class. They’d have to like him enough to give up legit capital unless the Packers would be willing to part ways with Love in exchange for upgraded appliances at the team’s facility or something like that. If you’re betting on Jordan Love at this junction, it’s all about the potential, and nothing else….because we damn sure haven’t seen any bona fide production out of the guy. I just don’t see who would reasonably bet on him right now.
Again, I don’t know that Love is this type of guy, but he absolutely can just sit back, prop his feet up, and continue to collect them dollars without having to really worry about any of it.
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Stoney Keeley is the Editor in Chief of The SoBros Network, and a Dogs Playing Poker on velvet connoisseur. He is a strong supporter of Team GSD, #BeBetter, and ‘Minds right, asses tight.’ “Big Natural” covers the Tennessee Titans, Nashville, Yankee Candle, and a whole wealth of nonsense. Follow on Twitter @StoneyKeeley
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