The New York Jets own the 10th overall pick in the NFL Draft next month, and given that Aaron Rodgers is currently under center for the club, you would think that taking a quarterback would be out of the question.
Well, not according to Albert Breer of Sports Illustrated.
Breer can see a world in which the Jets select a signal-caller like Michigan’s J.J. McCarthy in the first round and actually thinks the team can sell the idea to Rodgers, who has been in this situation before.
Remember: back in 2020, the Green Bay Packers took Jordan Love with the 26th overall pick, which frustrated Rodgers. However, Breer says that it was more the lack of communication that bothered Rodgers than the selection of Love itself.
“I think Aaron’s problem wasn’t selecting Jordan Love, it was more the communication piece of it,” Breer said on The Rich Eisen Show. “Like Aaron didn’t hear about it until they were on the clock which I think really bugged him. If you communicate to Aaron in this spot and say hey look we’re going to kick the tires on J.J. McCarthy or we may trade up for Drake Maye or whatever it is. I actually think he’d be okay with it and that’s based on the way he treated Jordan Love. Like he has a really strong relationship with Jordan Love. So I think that [drafting a QB in round one] could be in play.”
But would it be the wisest thing for New York to do?
The Jets clearly want to win now. This is why they have invested so much into a 40-year-old quarterback. Rodgers says he may want to play for two to four more years, but anything can happen. Maybe Rodgers decides after next season that he wants to retire? Or maybe he isn’t the same after coming back from the torn Achilles?
Taking that into consideration, New York may only really have a one-year window with Rodgers, so the Jets may want to just go all in on 2024 and kick the can of the future further down the road for now.
On the other side of the coin, one can make the argument that because Rodgers may be just be a one-year thing at this point, it would be smart for Gang Green to draft Rodgers’ successor here and now.
We’ll see what the Jets decide to do next month, but barring a trade down where they can pick up an extra first-round pick, the chances of them actually pulling the trigger and drafting a signal-caller in the opening round of the draft seem relatively slim at this point.
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