Aaron Rodgers is “pretty sure” that his upcoming season with the Pittsburgh Steelers will be the final one of his professional football career, and many believe that it’s the right call to make. Rodgers’ time with the New York Jets proved to be anything but productive, as his first season with the franchise was wiped out by a torn Achilles and his second run in 2024 only yielded five regular-season wins.
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In fact, Rodgers’ 2024 campaign proved to be one of the worst of his entire 20-year career, causing many to believe that he’s no longer the surefire top-10 option that he once was. Ironically enough, however, the numbers tell a different story.
The former Green Bay Packer produced 3,897 passing yards last year, the third-lowest total that Rodgers has ever recorded while playing 16+ games in a season. Nevertheless, it was still good enough to outdo the likes of both the regular season MVP in Josh Allen and the defending Super Bowl MVP in Jalen Hurts.
The pride and joy of the Buffalo Bills managed to generate 3,731 passing yards throughout his award-winning season. Likewise, the current world champion, Hurts, put together a measly total of 2,903 passing yards.
A similar claim can be made for passing touchdowns as well. The future first-ballot Hall of Famer in Rodgers threw for 28 passing touchdowns in 2024, tied with Allen for the seventh most in the league. Given the run-heavy approach of Hurts’ Eagles, he only managed to produce 18 passing touchdowns.
In their defense, however, both Allen (77.3) and Hurts (65.6) managed to outclass Rodgers when it comes to QBR. The 41-year-old signal caller tallied a 48.0 QBR. It’s the second-worst rating of Rodgers’ career, second only to the 41.3 rating that he managed during his final season in Green Bay, and ranks 25th overall for 2024 quarterbacks.
Of course, Rodgers would rather have their postseason success than petty bragging rights over certain passing metrics. Allen managed to once again lead his team to a pair of playoff victories, something that Rodgers hasn’t seen since the 2016 postseason.
Even though Hurts is nowhere near either one of them in terms of pure arm talent, the dual-threat phenom still managed to find his way to the Super Bowl podium with the help of Saquon Barkley and co. To put it mildly, Rodgers and the Steelers will be hoping to find even a fraction of that success in 2025.
Pittsburgh is still in search of its first playoff win since January 15th of 2017, while Rodgers is hoping to claim his first one since January 16th of 2021. Both parties have been enduring their own respective droughts, but they’ve now joined forces in order to put together one last-ditch effort to salvage their records.
Whether or not their union will prove to be productive remains to be seen, but there’s plenty of room for optimism. Rodgers is still producing top-10 numbers, and for now, the Steelers believe that will be more than enough to help both of them reach that coveted divisional round spot.
