Kuhn Believes Rodgers Will Be Packers’ Quarterback in 2021
GREEN BAY, Wis. – John Kuhn, longtime Green Bay Packers fullback and close friend with Aaron Rodgers, believes the MVP quarterback will be the team’s signal-caller in 2021.
“If I used my gut and I used everything that I hear from the Packers organization, it makes me feel really, really good,” Kuhn told “The Zach Gelb Show on CBS Sports Radio” on Wednesday night. “If I used the football business acumen and see the tough spot that the Packers are in right now with that first-round pick that they used last year on Jordan Love, that’s what makes me pull back a little bit. I still think it’s somewhere around 70, 75 percent that Aaron Rodgers is the starting quarterback for the Packers this year.”
From the moment Packers general manager Brian Gutekunst drafted Jordan Love with the first-round pick last year, the logical timeline to move on from Rodgers has always been following the 2021 season. That’s when Green Bay could pick up valuable salary-cap space while getting Love into the lineup so Gutekunst could make an informed decision on Love’s fifth-year option, which must be trigged after Love’s third season. That’s an incredibly expensive decision. Jameis Winston and Marcus Mariota, for instance, played for $20.9 million in 2019.
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Rodgers doesn’t want to be a lame-duck quarterback in 2021. Rather, he wants certainty that he’ll be the quarterback in 2022 and beyond. Playing for the Packers through 2022, Kuhn pointed out, “would use the first three years of Jordan Love’s contract up.” A contract extension would push that timeline out further.
“They’d have to choose to use the fifth-year option on a first-round draft pick without seeing him play. That’s a tough position,” Kuhn said.
Kuhn, who’s talked to Rodgers recently, said his friend is “conflicted” about his future.
“This man loves to play the game of football, this man loves to be a Green Bay Packer and this man truly sees careers,” Kuhn said. “He’s watched friends leave, he watched Brett Favre’s career toward the end. He’s watched all these things play out in front of his eyes, he’s taken notes throughout his career. He’s seen some situations that didn’t feel were done or finished the way that they could or should have. And he’s just trying to take his earned destiny within his own hands. To that affect, I actually admire him because not many players in the NFL have that opportunity. I sure as heck didn’t. I played until everybody told me you can’t play anymore, and it’s a humbling feeling. Aaron Rodgers has an opportunity take a little bit of that power.
How will it happen? Through compromise.
“I just think it’s going to take two men that are dug in right now and try to meet in the middle somewhere they’re both happy.”
