With Aaron Rodgers confirming on Wednesday that he wants to play for the New York Jets in 2023, you might be wondering why a trade hasn’t happened yet, and apparently, you can blame the Green Bay Packers for that.
For most of the past week, the assumption was that Rodgers was holding up the trade process, but as it turns out, it’s actually Green Bay, at least that’s what Rodgers had to say during his Wednesday interview on “The Pat McAfee Show.”
“I haven’t been holding anything up at this point,” Rodgers said. “It’s been the compensation that the Packers are trying to get for me and kind of digging their heels in.”
At this point, it’s not completely clear what the Packers want in return for Rodgers, but based on multiple reports, it seems that they’re looking for at least two draft picks with one of those being a first-rounder. Basically, the big holdup here is that the two sides can’t agree on what the compensation should be for Rodgers.
If you’re the Jets, the problem with giving up a potential first-round pick is that they have no idea how much longer Rodgers will be playing. If he goes to New York and retires after one season, then the Jets will feel fleeced if they give up a first-rounder.
On the other hand, the Jets have almost no leverage here. The Packers know that the Jets are all in on Rodgers, so they can basically tell New York, “Pay our asking price or we’re not going to trade him any time soon.”
Yes, the Packers will eventually trade Rodgers no matter what, but they could conceivably milk this thing out until August if they wanted. The Packers are in no hurry to trade Rodgers and from a salary cap standpoint, it would actually be beneficial to Green Bay to trade Rodgers AFTER June 1. When the Packers trade Rodgers, they’re going to take a $40.3 million dead cap hit, but if the trade comes after June 1, then that hit will be split over two seasons with $15.8 million coming in 2023 and $24.5 million in 2024 (Numbers via OvertheCap).
So what should the two sides do? I went ahead and saved them both a lot of time by coming up with the perfect trade package.
Let’s take a look:
- Jets get: Aaron Rodgers.
- Packers get: 2024 conditional second-round pick, 2025 conditional fourth-round pick.
On the surface, Packers fans might hate this deal, but the conditions will definitely make it better for Green Bay.
So what are the conditions here?
- 2024…
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