Love Grew Into Starring Role

Jordan Love discussed his path from 5-foot-6 high school freshman to elite NFL quarterback on The Pivot Podcast.

Author:
Bill Huber
Mar 25, 2024

In this story:

Aaron Rodgers

Green Bay Packers

Jordan Love

GREEN BAY, Wis. – Jordan Love’s growth into the next star quarterback of the Green Bay Packers didn’t start in 2020, when he toiled behind Aaron Rodgers and Tim Boyle. Or in 2023, when he hit his stride during the second half of the season.

It started with literal growth when he was a freshman at Liberty High School in Bakersfield, Calif.

Because his parents started him in school early, he was a year younger than some of his classmates. At 5-foot-6 and 145 pounds, nobody could have envisioned what he’d become.

Certainly not Love.

“I got a football picture my freshman year, I was one of the smallest dudes. In my friend group, I was the smallest dude,” he said on The Pivot Podcast with former NFL players Ryan Clark, Channing Crowder and Fred Taylor.

“And then I got another picture of my senior year. I’m taller than everybody. So, it’s crazy how it is.”

Love is 10 inches taller now. He’s no longer a backup receiver, like he was during his freshman year. He emerged as one of the best quarterbacks in the NFL during a superb second half of the season that led the Packers to the cusp of the NFC Championship Game. An enormous contract extension is coming his way.

“That was a journey for me because in high school, obviously, undersized, was a backup,” Love recalled. “I got strength coaches telling me, ‘You’re going to be 6-4. You’re going to be huge.’ Look at my hands, look at my feet, things like that. ‘Just wait, you’ll grow into your body.’ I’m not believing it. Then I started hitting a growth spurt but still was trying to figure it out on the field, things like that.”

Love was named all-area co-MVP as a senior, when he completed barely 50 percent of his passes.

“I wasn’t this great player,” he continued. “I was a two-star (recruit) coming out. My confidence wasn’t super-high. More than anything, I was a basketball player. I thought I was going to be a hooper.”

Attending some seven-on-seven camps got him on the recruiting radar.

“That’s when the offers started rolling in,” Love said. “I was like, ‘OK, I’m going to go to college and get a free education and, hopefully, become the starting quarterback.’ But my mindset still wasn’t, ‘I’m going to make it to the NFL.’ That was a dream, but it wasn’t a reality thinking that could actually happen.”

Love landed at Utah State, where he redshirted as a freshman in 2016 before taking over as the starter midway through the 2017 season. His redshirt sophomore season of 2018 is when everything changed. He threw for 3,567 yards with 32 touchdowns vs. six interceptions. He finished eighth in the nation in touchdown passes and 10th in passing efficiency as the five-time Mountain West Conference Offensive Player of the Week.

“Once I started starting in college and started seeing myself getting better and better and better and being able to compete with these dudes” is when his NFL outlook changed, he said. “I was looking around like, ‘Man, these dudes are really good. I wish I could get there.’ And then just kept working and, obviously, I got there, I took over in college, became a starter and those dreams, I was like, ‘OK, the next step’s the NFL now’ and it’s all becoming a little bit more real, so I think my confidence through that just kept growing.”

Love’s final season, 2019, wasn’t nearly as good. Having lost his coaches and skill-position threats, Love threw 20 touchdowns vs. 17 interceptions. Those struggles were on the field. As a first-round pick in Green Bay in 2020, his struggles were everywhere else.

COVID eliminated the 2020 offseason program and preseason. And, of course, there was the ever-present specter of Rodgers and whether he’d ever get a chance.

“It was more motivation just wanting to prove people wrong,” Love said. “I see everything they’re saying. ‘This guy can’t play. This guy’s trash.’ Just knowing that once I get my opportunity, I’m going to show them who I am.”

It wasn’t the pressure from the outside that was a challenge for Love. Rather, it was the pressure from within.

“Being the guy that was drafted to a team that had Aaron Rodgers, I’m trying to prove myself and prove how good of a player I am to these guys, who don’t know me, have never played with me. So, that was where I felt that pressure, just trying to prove to my teammates who I am, which was tough.”

Love got opportunities in the 2021 and 2022 preseason. He got a brief opportunity in relief of an injured Rodgers at Philadelphia in 2022. His growth on the field and behind the scenes that season was part of the impetus of trading Rodgers to the Jets last offseason and handing the keys to the offense to Love.

The Packers started the season 3-6. It included a four-game losing streak and last-minute miscues in losses at Atlanta, Las Vegas, Denver and Pittsburgh. But Love caught fire down the stretch. From the Week 11 victory against the Chargers through the wild-card rout at Dallas, Love threw 21 touchdown passes vs. one interception. In those nine games, he had a 100-plus passer rating in eight to prove to everyone that he belonged.

Love and Co. couldn’t get it done the following week at San Francisco. The defense gave up a late touchdown and Love, just like he did in a few early-season losses, threw an interception with the game on the line.

While the season as a whole was a success, the disappointment from that game is driving the team into 2024.

“We’re all very hungry for this upcoming year,” Love said. “The confidence from top to bottom is there. The organization believes that it’s the perfect time to have a chance to win a Super Bowl this year.

“Those conversations we had after that 49ers game were, ‘Man, work harder try and find ways to get better because next year we’re going to do it.’ There’s no more, ‘We’re a young team.’ There’s no more of those what-ifs. People know what we’re about now and, obviously, we’ll have that target on our back. So, we’re hungry. We’re all very excited [because] we got a great squad.”