The Cal 100: No. 2 -- Aaron Rodgers
We count down the top 100 individuals associated with Cal athletics, based on their impact in sports or in the world at large – a wide-open category. See if you agree.
No. 2: Aaron Rodgers
Cal Sports Connection: Rodgers was Cal’s starting quarterback in 2003 and 2004, and in 2004 he led the Golden Bears to one of their two final top-10 rankings since 1950.
Claim to Fame: Rodgers finished ninth in the 2004 Heisman Trophy voting, and was a first-round NFL draft pick. He has won the NFL MVP Award four times, more than any player except Peyton Manning, and he won a Super Bowl in the 2010 season. His radical opinions and actions off the field have made headlines and have made a significant impact on the public’s opinion of him.
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The fact that Aaron Rodgers has won the NFL MVP Award four times, more than any player in history other than Peyton Manning, merely refelects his impact on the football field. His influence off the field the past few years may be even greater.
---His refusal to get vaccinated for COVID in the fall of 2021 as well as his misleading implications that he had been vaccinated were national news. That was followed by his outspoken reasons for not being vaccinated, which reflected many people’s distrust of the vaccine, but also brought scorn on Rodgers.
---Rodgers’ admission in August 2022 that he used the psychedelic ayahuasca during one offseason and his claim that it helped him win an MVP was national news again. Rodgers said it had an impact on a lot of NFL players who later asked him about the use of psychedelics. This past offseason, Rodgers stated that the use of psychedelics should be legalized.
---Rodgers’ experience in a total-darkness retreat this past offseason again was headline news and again drew public opinions about Rodgers’ personality.
---Rodgers’ relationships with women became frequent topics of entertainment magazines and gossip media outlets.
---He dominated football news the past two offseasons with assertions that he was contemplating retirement while implying that the Packers might not want him back the following season.
---His trade to the New York Jets gave rise to talk of that the Jets were now a Super Bowl contender, and it prompted HBO to film its documentary series Hard Knocks at the Jets' preseason camp this year
Obviously if he had not won the MVP four times, these actions would not have had the impact they had, but the fact is, no current NFL players’ actions and words are more closely scrutinized than Rodgers’ – partly because he might do or say something noteworthy at any moment.
Rodgers has come a long way for a guy who received no Division I scholarship offers and was not an immediate starter in college or the pros.
It all started when Cal coach Jeff Tedford went to a Butte Community College practice to take a look a potential recruit, tight end Garrett Cross. While watching practice Tedford noticed a quarterback he had never heard of who looked awfully impressive. His name was Aaron Rodgers, who was at Butte because he had received no Division I scholarship offers coming out of Pleasant Valley High School in Chico, Calif., only an offer to walk-on at Illinois.
Photo courtesy of Cal Athletics
Tedford signed both Cross and Rodgers, who had spent just one season at Butte. Rodgers did not become a starter for Cal in 2003 until the fifth game, but his first-half performance against USC (he sat out the second half with an injury) helped Cal hand the Trojans their only loss of a season in which USC would go on to win a share of the national championship.
Rodgers was an absolute star in 2004, leading the Bears to a 10-1 regular-season record and a No. 4 national ranking heading into the postseason. Rodgers finished ninth in the Heisman Trophy voting that season, and was still upset years later regarding the politicking Texas coach Mack Brown did to help Texas, and not Cal, earn a Rose Bowl bid that season. The Bears ended up losing to Texas Tech in the Holiday Bowl and wound up ranked No. 9.
Interestingly, it was in Cal’s one regular-season loss that Rodgers had his best game. USC would go undefeated and win a national championship in 2004, but the No. 1-ranked Trojans were lucky to beat No. 7 Cal and Rodgers that year.
On Oct. 10, 2004, before a crowd of 90,000 at the Los Angeles Coliseum, Rodgers set an NCAA Division I record by completing his first 23 passes. He was 29-for-31 for 267 yards and touchdown when Cal got a first down at the USC 9-yard line with 1:47 left and Cal trailing by six points. But an incompletion, a 5-yard loss and two more incompletions ended the upset bid in a 23-17 loss.
Rodgers was a first-round selection by the Packers in the 2005 NFL draft, although he slipped all the way to the 24th pick after being considered a possible No. 1 overall selection. (The 49ers, Rodgers’ favorite team growing up, chose Alex Smith with the top pick.)
Rodgers served at Brett Favre’s backup for three seasons before finally becoming the team’s regular starter in 2008. The Packers went just 6-10 in his first season as Green Bay’s No. 1 quarterback, but improved dramatically from there.
The Packers won the Super Bowl in the 2010 season, and Rodgers was the MVP of that February 2011 game. He has been selected to the Pro Bowl 10 times, and was a first-team All-Pro pick four times.
Rodgers was named MVP four times – 2011, 2014, 2020 and 2021 – and he is one of just two players who have won at least four MVPs, the other being Peyton Manning, who has won five.
Rodgers ranks second in NFL history in career passer rating, behind only Patrick Mahomes, and Rodgers owns the two best single-season passer-rating scores in history, posting the best season in 2011 at age 38 and the second best in 2010 at age 37.
His 475 career touchdown passes rank fifth alltime and are first among active quarterbacks, more than 100 TD passes more than anyone else currently playing.
Rodgers’ 2020 season in which he threw 48 touchdown passes with just five interceptions while completing 70.7% of his passes for a team that went 13-3 in the regular season is considered one of the best seasons ever by an NFL quarterback.
Rodgers will be a first-ballot Hall of Fame selection, so his comments and actions get noticed.
Rodgers made a seven-figure donation to Cal in 2019 to renovate the Bears locker room -- now known as the Aaron Rodgers Locker Room -- and to create the Aaron Rodgers Football Scholarship.
And, by the way, he is wearing jersey No. 8 for the Jets, the number he wore while at Cal.
Yet he is only No. 2 on our Cal 100 list.
Cover photo of Aaron Rodgers courtesy of Cal Athletics
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