Aaron Rodgers was one of the last first-round quarterbacks to sit behind a veteran for more than one year. Apart from his own successor, Jordan Love. In fact, he did it for a whopping three years while the legendary Brett Favre continued to push for a second Super Bowl.
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However, Favre led the league in INTs (22) and fell short in the NFC Championship Game in 2007. According to Favre, at that point, the Green Bay Packers began to pressure him to retire. He obliged. But it didn’t take, and he unretired a couple of months later as a war of words ensued. It was a messy divorce after a long and successful marriage. And it was all because of one very patient man: Aaron Rodgers.
That first day that Favre announced his unretirement must have been a rollercoaster for Rodgers. Not only was his professional life possibly going up in smoke, but he also met one of the stars of the hit NBC sitcom, The Office. Talk about ups and downs.
Brian Baumgartner, a Packers superfan who plays Kevin on the show, recently told Rich Eisen that the first time he met Rodgers was on that fateful day at the annual American Century Celebrity Golf Tournament.
“My very first [ACC Tournament]. In fact, the day that we met was the day, this was 2008, the day that Favre said I’m not retiring. We were sitting next to each other at a blackjack table… and he’s sitting next to me, and I don’t know who he is. Once he introduced himself, like ‘Oh, you’re the Cal guy, you’re Favre’s backup.’ Like I knew who he was, but I didn’t recognize him,” Baumgartner recalled.
Baumgartner, who played Kevin Malone in The Office, says he has been to the tournament 18 times overall, and yet that encounter with Rodgers has always stuck out to him. And why wouldn’t it? It was a turbulent time for Baumgartner’s Packers, and no one quite knew what Rodgers would be yet.
No doubt, he has mixed feelings about Rodgers since the veteran left the Packers. His departure wasn’t quite as acrimonious as Favre’s, but it wasn’t ideal either.
But the actor went on to describe how they hit it off thanks to the QB’s love of Baumgartner’s show. The pair just so happened to be at that blackjack table when the Favre news came across the ticker on ESPN.
“He was a fan of The Office, and we just started a relationship there. And on the screens they had a TV show station that was running sports on loop. And they were saying, ‘Favre is not retiring. What’s happening to Aaron Rodgers?’ And we’re literally sitting next to each other on that day. And that is when we became friends. Yeah.”
What we would give to have been a fly on the wall at that blackjack table when that most random of pairs got that momentous news. It certainly led to a long-lasting bond, perhaps even a trauma bonding experience, that continues to this day.
The two met professionally when Rodgers made a guest appearance in The Office‘s ninth season episode “AARM”, which was the series’ penultimate episode. Rodgers played himself and served as a judge on a cappella singing show akin to American Idol.
