Memo to the Arizona Cardinals: Should you’re severely contemplating including quarterback Aaron Rodgers, do not. It isn’t value it.
Rodgers — who performed for the Pittsburgh Steelers final season — stays a free agent. The Steelers positioned the seldom-used unrestricted free-agent tender on Rodgers on April 28. Pittsburgh will obtain a compensatory draft choose if the four-time league MVP indicators with one other crew earlier than July 22 or the start of their coaching camp.
The Cardinals could also be one of many few groups that will be prepared to surrender that choose for Rodgers. Arizona vast receiver Kendrick Bourne provided a recruiting pitch to the 42-year-old QB on X.
Cardinals head coach Mike LaFleur, in the meantime, didn’t clarify if they are going to.
“Actually, Jim, proper now we’re targeted on the fellows we obtained coming in,” the coach advised Westwood One’s Jim Rome on Tuesday. “We obtained a room that we’re excited to work with, and that is solely the place my focus is.”
That is clearly coach-speak. A QB room that features journeyman Jacoby Brissett and rookie Carson Beck evokes little pleasure. Rodgers, nonetheless, is not the man who will lead Arizona to its first playoff look since 2021.
Why Aaron Rodgers would not be a savior for Cardinals
Rodgers went 10-6 in 16 begins for the Steelers final season, tossing 24 landing passes and 7 interceptions. Within the playoffs, although, he wilted. Throughout a 30-6 loss to the Houston Texans within the AFC wild-card spherical, he accomplished 17-of-33 passes for zero touchdowns, and 146 yards, and he threw one choose.
Since leaving the Green Bay Packers following the 2022 season, Rodgers has regarded like a shell of a participant who was as soon as thought of the very best QB within the league. Throughout this span, he has ranked nineteenth in passer ranking (92.4), twenty second in completion proportion (64.2 %) and nineteenth in passing yards per sport (212.3), per StatMuse. The decline could also be tied to a left Achilles tear suffered in Week 1 of the 2023 season.
One in all his worst seasons got here with the New York Jets in 2024, wherein he posted the bottom passer ranking (90.5) as a beginning QB of his profession. Nathaniel Hackett served because the offensive coordinator for the Jets that season. He is now the OC in Arizona. So, why would the Cardinals need to reunite the 2 after that calamitous season?
Arizona feels it wants a franchise QB after lacking out on Ty Simpson (now with the Los Angeles Rams) through the 2026 NFL Draft. It ought to look to the 2027 class as a substitute of Rodgers.
Tankathon has the Cardinals taking Oregon Ducks QB Dante Moore (6-foot-3, 206 kilos) with choose No. 2 in its newest mock draft. He tossed 30 TD passes final season, piloting his crew to the School Soccer Playoff.
QB is the Cardinals’ largest gap heading into the 2026 season. Signing Rodgers nonetheless will not plug it.
A crew that is rebuilding, like Arizona, should not signal Rodgers as a one-year rental. He might not even be the best man for the crew if it have been a Tremendous Bowl contender.
