New details have emerged about the elongated divorce between Aaron Rodgers and the Green Bay Packers. In an interview with The Athletic, Rodgers said that he never “ghosted” Packers general manager Brian Gutenkunst before his trade to the New York Jets, something that the latter eluded to leading up to the trade.
“Did Brian text me more than I texted him? Yeah, but did I ghost him? No,” Rodgers said. “I texted him back. There was back-and-forths that we had and so this is the story you wanna go with? You’re gonna stand on this hill of austerity and say that arguably in the conversation of the best player in your franchise history, you’re gonna say I couldn’t get a hold of him and that’s why we had to move on?”
Rodgers understandably grew frustrated with the way the Gutenkunst conducted himself to the media regarding the quarterback's future with the Packers.
“Like, c’mon man. Just tell the truth, you wanted to move on. You didn’t like the fact that we didn’t communicate all the time. Like, listen, I talk to the people that I like,” Rodgers said.
Rodgers' time in Green Bay seemed to be coming to an inevitable end once the Packers drafted Jordan Love in 2020. An ugly split and a trade probably wasn’t the way either side wanted the relationship to conclude but that's what happens in business sometimes.
Aaron Rodgers didn’t get to retire as a Packer, and it wouldn’t be shocking to see him avoid reconnecting with his old team upon retirement if Brian Gutenkunst is still in the building.