Jordan Rodgers Publicly Defends Brother Aaron After Years-Long Family Feud

Jordan Rodgers spent years barely having a relationship with his older brother, Aaron Rodgers.

Now he's defending him on national television.

Jordan offered his first public comments about Aaron since the brothers reconciled earlier this year, and there was nothing particularly complicated about where he stood Wednesday morning. During a Sept. 23 appearance on ESPN's “First Take,” Jordan made the case that Aaron has played considerably better for the Pittsburgh Steelers than some of the early criticism suggests.

He even caught himself sounding like a protective younger brother.

“I think if you truly watched Week 1, this was a team that was a few drops and a few drops away from being absolutely explosive like we haven’t seen out of the Steelers in a really long time,” Jordan said.

“Rodgers was actually very accurate down the field. The throws that were not completed because of either a non-call or a drop down the field were on the money. Not trying to be a homer.”

Jordan Rodgers preaches patience with Aaron Rodgers and the Pittsburgh Steelers.

"Rodgers was actually very accurate down the field…not trying to be a homer." pic.twitter.com/xuWkf5pAZD
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) September 23, 2026

The final line got a laugh from the “First Take” panel.

It also landed differently given everything that has happened between the Rodgers brothers.

Jordan Rodgers' Defense of Aaron Marks a Major Change

There was a time when hearing Jordan publicly call himself an Aaron Rodgers “homer,” even jokingly, would have been difficult to imagine.

Their fractured relationship became public in 2016 when Jordan appeared on “The Bachelorette” and openly acknowledged the distance between them.

“Me and Aaron don’t really have that much of a relationship,” Jordan said at the time. “It’s just kind of the way he’s chosen to do life and I’ve chosen to stay close with my family and my parents and my brother.”

The estrangement lasted for years.

That's what made Wednesday's conversation noteworthy. Jordan wasn't being pressed about the family feud or asked to revisit what went wrong. He was sitting at an ESPN desk talking football, and Aaron was simply his brother again.

Jordan's perspective became even more interesting when the conversation moved to Aaron's reunion with Mike McCarthy in Pittsburgh.

McCarthy coached Aaron for more than a decade in Green Bay, a run that included a Super Bowl championship but eventually ended with their relationship under considerable strain. Years later, the two are now trying to make it work again with the Steelers.

Jordan compared it to getting back together with an ex.

“The other aspect that I think is still a feeling out process, Rodgers and McCarthy are like that ex you ended up getting back together with after a long time,” Jordan said. “You’re like, ‘Things are better. We’re different people. We’re still trying to figure out those quirks we had when we were in a relationship.’”

Coming from someone who recently rebuilt his own relationship with Aaron, the analogy was hard to miss.

“So I think they’re still trying to figure out who they want to be based on what they both are capable of in this second iteration of their relationship,” Jordan continued. “I think that’s going to take time.”

Aaron Rodgers Revealed the Brothers Finally Reconnected

Aaron was the first of the two to publicly reveal that the long estrangement had ended.

During a Sept. 10 appearance on Cam Heyward's “Not Just Football” podcast, Aaron said he had recently spent time with both of his brothers.

“I went out to Nashville and met with my older brother,” Aaron said, referring to Luke Rodgers. “A couple weeks after that, I met with my little brother. It was cool.”

Aaron didn't offer many details about his meeting with Jordan, but he acknowledged that they had a “tough conversation.”

He also credited his wife, Brittani, with helping him reach a place where he was ready to have it.

“I'm in a much better headspace, and I said it before, but my wife deserves a lot of the credit for that just to be even able to get to that point where I could think about having the conversation,” Aaron said. “She was a big part of that, not that she was pushing anything, she wasn’t.”

For years, the Rodgers family divide was discussed publicly far more often than either brother probably would have preferred.

Wednesday offered something entirely different.

Jordan wasn't talking about why he and Aaron stopped speaking. He wasn't explaining the feud. He wasn't being asked whether they could ever repair it.

He was breaking down Aaron's quarterback play, defending him against criticism and laughing about being a “homer.”

After nearly a decade of public distance between the brothers, normal might be the biggest development of all.

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