Aaron Rodgers discusses handling pressure of expectations with Jets

At this time last year, New York Jets players were discussing pursuing a Super Bowl berth with Aaron Rodgers as their starting quarterback.

During an appearance on Tuesday's edition of the WFAN "Boomer and Gio" program, Rodgers was asked about being tasked with ending the longest active playoff drought in the four major North American sports leagues as he prepares for what could become a franchise-altering season for the Jets.

"That’s the fuel…as competitors, we like to put it on the line," Rodgers explained, as Ryan Chichester of Audacy shared. "I’ve been fortunate enough to play for two organizations that set a standard of excellence. That’s where you want to play. You don’t want to play in a city where they’re excited to just win a few games a year."

Rodgers became a four-time regular-season Most Valuable Player and earned a single Super Bowl ring while featuring for the Packers from 2005 until Green Bay traded him to the Jets in April 2023. The hope last offseason was that a Jets team with an elite defense needed only solid quarterback play to compete for a title. However, Rodgers gave Gang Green four meaningful snaps before he suffered a season-ending Achilles tear in the club's regular-season opener.

New York ultimately finished the campaign at 7-10.

More recently, some referred to Rodgers as "selfish" and "self-centered" after he skipped the Jets' two-day mandatory minicamp in June to enjoy a vacation trip to Egypt. He insisted the organization was fine with that decision and suggested that he largely ignored negative outside noise during Tuesday's interview.

"I will respond to that with a scale of how much I care, where 'I don’t give a s---' is zero and 'care deeply about it' is 10, and I would say it’s about a one," Rodgers said about his reactions to criticisms he's received from analysts and reporters.

That's all well and good, but it's no secret that Jets owner Woody Johnson retained general manager Joe Douglas and head coach Robert Saleh for another season in part because Rodgers backs them. Johnson could deem this latest experiment a failure and blow things up if the club misses the playoffs for a 14th consecutive year.