What Sports Illustrated’s Albert Breer announced the other day, about why the Jets didn’t excuse Aaron Rodgers’ mandatory minicamp absence, was important from a cultural standpoint.
“They communicated to him that they wouldn’t be able to excuse him for that, and again, it’s because that’s how you maintain credibility with your locker room,” Breer said on NFL Network. “You can’t do something for one person that you wouldn’t do for other stars of the team, let alone, like, guys on down the roster, right?”
And Breer inferred what Rodgers was doing during the mandatory camp was not something you could excuse if you want to maintain “credibility” with your locker room:
“The best I can answer this right now that I feel solid about is that he is somewhere that they could not excuse and maintain credibility with the rest of the locker room, but would be expected, would not be an out-of-left-field thing for him.”
Good football cultures don’t have double standards and that’s why former Patriots head coach Bill Belichick often called out Tom Brady in front of the team in New England, in film sessions, if the legendary QB made a bad mistake, Belichick called him out, just like he would call out a cornerback, who blew a coverage.
Belichick, Brady and company won six Super Bowls together in New England.
And while some ripped the Jets for head coach Robert Saleh saying Rodgers’ absence was “unexcused,” if the quarterback truly feels the team’s culture needs to be “fine-tuned’ as he said late last season, he should embrace how Saleh handled his absence. Take one for the team.
Look, Rodgers did a great job in the off-season program with excellent attendance up to the mandatory minicamp. And the head coach, GM, owner, and so forth still love him and are pumped to have him. They are pinching themselves that he is working at 1 Jets Drive.
But if you are going to fine defensive end Haason Reddick for missing the mandatory minicamp, how can you not fine Rodgers?
Good cultures don’t have double standards.
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