Well, well, well.
The news that the Vikings wouldn’t be signing quarterback Aaron Rodgers “at this time” sparked a report that Minnesota’s lack of current interest won’t impact Rodgers’s timetable. As reported by Adam Schefter of ESPN.com on Wednesday, Rodgers remains “in no rush at all.”
And while he might not be in any rush to sign a contract, he has paid a visit to Pittsburgh. Via Gerry Dulac of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Rodgers is currently at the Steelers’ facility.
Dulac calls the development “an indication that a deal could be forthcoming.” Adam Schefter of ESPN.com reports that “no deal at this time is close.”
Regardless of what happens, this is the first official free-agent visit of Rodgers’s entire career. At this point, who knows what happens next?
Minnesota’s reported lack of interest was promptly clarified to explain that plans could change later in the offseason. And, initially, Rodgers seemed to be content to wait for the Vikings to conclude that Rodgers will be a better option for 2025 than J.J. McCarthy.
Now, Rodgers is at least doing some due diligence. The next step remains to be seen.
Ryan Kelly’s departure from Indianapolis as a free agent this offseason was notable enough to elicit a statement of gratitude from Colts owner Jim Irsay and the Vikings center discussed his decision to switch teams on Thursday.
Kelly made four Pro Bowls while spending the first nine years of his NFL career with the Colts and he told reporters that he had long envisioned spending his career in one place. He said there was “no major event” that led him to change his mind, but that he began to feel “it was just time to move on” as he got closer to the end of his contract with the team.
“It was time for me to maybe check out what else is out there and move on and have a new perspective in this career,” Kelly said, via Stephen Holder of ESPN.com. “So, yeah, I can’t say there’s a specific event. I’ll miss the guys in the O-line room and I’ll miss a bunch of people there. But, in my heart, I just knew it was time to move on and I kind of felt that way over the last year and a half.”
Kelly noted that he snapped the ball to 13 quarterbacks during his time with the Colts and the current hope in Minnesota is that he will only be snapping to J.J. McCarthy during his time in a Vikings uniform.
The calliope has stopped for the NFL’s game of musical chairs. Multiple teams had been waiting for Aaron Rodgers to pick a seat, any seat.
If he’s not going to do it any time soon, at what point does the chase for chairs continue without him?
The Steelers and Giants are seemingly waiting for Rodgers to make a decision before making moves with other veteran quarterbacks. Caught in the wash of Rodgers’s delay are players like Russell Wilson, Joe Flacco, Jameis Winston, and (if a trade is possible from the Falcons) Kirk Cousins. With the Vikings reportedly not signing Rodgers “at this time” and with Rodgers potentially waiting to see whether J.J. McCarthy performs well enough during the offseason program to keep the Vikings from breaking glass in event of emergency, will the Steelers and Giants keep waiting, too? Or will they move on?
It’s more imperative for the Giants, who currently have one quarterback on the roster — journeyman who has yet to do much journeying Tommy DeVito. They desperately need someone, anyone on whom they can pin even a portion of their hopes for 2025. (They’ve brought in Wilson, Flacco, and Winston for visits in the past week.)
The Steelers have two quarterbacks on the roster: Mason Rudolph and Skylar Thompson. Rudolph performed well down the stretch for the Steelers in 2023, after the soft benching of Kenny Pickett (and before Rudolph wanted more than the Steelers were inclined to pay). Thompson, like Rudolph, has once started a playoff game in Buffalo. The Steelers seem to be in better position to let it ride through the draft than the Giants.
It’s also possible the Steelers and/or Giants could add a veteran with the understanding that, if Rodgers comes calling at some point down the road, the veteran will be sent packing. That will make the terms of any contract even more important; the fully guaranteed money at signing, or lack thereof, will shine plenty of light on whether the veteran is at risk of being thrown overboard if/when Rodgers shows up.
There’s also a chance that, if/when Rodgers decides to take a job with one of the team to which he has been linked, no jobs will be open. He surely understands this fact, and he seems to be willing to accept the risk that the chairs will be filled — and won’t be tipped over and emptied — if/when he finally decides to make his move.
On Wednesday’s PFT Live, I complained about Rodgers seemingly waiting to make his choice. It now seems that he’s strategically waiting for whether he’ll have a chance to choose the Vikings. Which, if true, raises a key question for the Steelers and Giants.
How long are you going to sit around and wait for Rodgers?
The Vikings have agreed to terms with free agent wide receiver Rondale Moore, the team announced Wednesday.
Moore, 24, visited the Vikings five days ago and also took trips to the Jets, Titans and Bears.
Moore was traded from the Cardinals to the Falcons ahead of the 2024 season, but he injured his right knee in training camp and missed the entire season.
Moore, 24, was a second-round pick of Arizona in 2021, and he spent three seasons in Arizona.
He had 135 catches for 1,201 yards and three touchdowns with the Cardinals, while also running 52 times for 249 yards and a score. Moore also saw time as a returner in his rookie season.
Multiple teams remain interested in quarterback Aaron Rodgers. But if he should decide to retire, there reportedly is not much of an appetite for Rodgers among the major TV networks.
Michael McCarthy of FrontOfficeSports.com found “surprisingly little interest” in Rodgers, based on conversations with “sources at multiple NFL media partners.”
There would be interest in Rodgers, if he hadn’t made a heel turn in 2021.
“He could be a great analyst,” one unnamed source told McCarthy, “but he’s insufferable.” Another unnamed source said Rodgers “needs an image rehab.”
And McCarthy wrote this in his article, regarding media executives to whom he spoke: “Their main concern, under condition of anonymity, is that Rodgers comes off as a pompous know-it-all who would turn off viewers. His dalliance with COVID-19 conspiracy theories and public feuds with critics like Jimmy Kimmel on The Pat McAfee Show also concern some.”
Of course, there’s no indication Rodgers would even want a media job. He has said in the past that he’s not interested in broadcasting games. During one of his appearances with McAfee during the 2024 season, Rodgers vowed to disappear from public view once his playing career ends.
Frankly, I don’t buy the notion that no one would want him. The networks desire ratings, and Rodgers is interesting, even if he’s insufferable. Frankly, I’d rather hear him speak candidly about what he sees than listen to the vast majority who tiptoe around telling the truth about the players, the coaches, the teams, and/or the league because they don’t want to piss anyone off.
If one of the traditional broadcast partners won’t hire Rodgers, someone will — if he decides that he wants to talk about football after he’s done playing it. That’s really the first question. Unless and until that’s what he wants to do after he’s done playing, nothing else matters.
The Texans have found a new left tackle.
According to multiple reports, they have agreed to terms with Cam Robinson. Robinson will step into the spot on the Houston offensive line that opened up when they traded Laremy Tunsil to the Commanders earlier this month.
Robinson joined the Vikings in a midseason trade with the Jaguars and started 10 regular season games. He also started Minnesota’s postseason loss to the Rams, but had no spot with the team in 2025 with Christian Darrisaw due back from a knee injury.
Robinson was a Jacksonville second-round pick in 2017, so the Texans saw plenty of him before he made the move to the Vikings. Now they’ll be asking him to protect quarterback C.J. Stroud against his former team and the rest of Houston’s 2025 opponents.
The clue was hiding in plain sight, at the tail end of the report the Vikings leaked on Wednesday morning to NFL Network.
The Vikings are not pursuing veteran quarterback Aaron Rodgers “at this time.”
Given that many reacted to the news as a closing of the door on Rodgers, the Vikings have leaked clarification. They could revisit Rodgers later in the offseason.
This means that second-year first-rounder J.J. McCarthy will lead the offense in the offseason program. If he checks the boxes and looks to be the best option, he’ll continue to be the QB1. If things go sideways, Rodgers could become the emergency option.
If, of course, he hasn’t signed with another team.
In the interim, the Vikings will need at least one more quarterback, if not two. Two arms (McCarthy and Brett Rypien) aren’t enough to distribute the reps in OTAs.
Would it be better for Rodgers if he has a chance to fully prepare to play quarterback for the Vikings? Sure. But remember this — in 2009, Brett Favre didn’t sign with the Vikings until August 18. This gives the Vikings a chance to be sure that McCarthy is good to go. It also gives Rodgers an incentive to bide his time.
Will it be clunky if the Vikings suddenly pivot to Rodgers in August? Sure. But the Vikings were able to overcome the “schism” that had the team supposedly split between Tarvaris Jackson and Favre. Once Favre showed up and started flinging the pig, any and all doubts about the upgrade to the aging veteran were instantly squelched.
Wide receiver Rondale Moore’s search for his next NFL team has him in Nashville on Wednesday.
Mike Garafolo of NFL Media reports that Moore is visiting the Titans. Moore has also met with the Bears, Vikings, and Jets in recent days.
Moore was traded from the Cardinals to the Falcons for quarterback Desmond Ridder last year, but a knee injury kept him out for the entire season. The 2021 second-round pick had 135 catches for 1,201 yards and three touchdowns while running 52 times for 249 yards and a touchdown while in Arizona.
Calvin Ridley, Van Jefferson, and Treylon Burks are the most experienced receivers on the Titans roster at the moment.
The NFL released the list of team-proposed changes to playing rules and bylaws on Wednesday and they include a proposal made by several clubs to change procedures used for footballs used in the kicking game.
Current rules call for those balls — known as K-Balls — to be prepared by teams during a 60-minute window on the day of games with three such balls being delivered to officials for use that day.
In the proposal, the Ravens, Browns, Texans, Eagles, Raiders, Vikings, and Commanders argue that the process “continues to put stress on NFL equipment staffs during the critical pregame period on game days” and calls for a change that would allow the balls to be prepared ahead of time.
NFL rules currently allow for balls used outside of the kicking game to be prepared in advance. The proposal adds that the same pregame inspection process would be applied to both sets of footballs in order to assure that no team is manipulating the balls to their advantage.
Any changes would need to be approved in a vote of all 32 teams with 24 votes needed to pass.
The current structure of the NFL often results in teams with lesser records hosting playoff games, because every division champion is guaranteed one of the top four spots on the conference’s playoff tree. That sparks periodic complaints, when wild-card teams with better records than division champions must play on the road in the postseason.
The Lions, who would have faced that outcome if they’d lose a Week 18 game against the Vikings, have proposed a change to that approach.
The suggestion is a simple one. The seedings for each conference would be determined by record, without regard to whether any team won its division.
Division champions would still get in. They would no longer be guaranteed a home game, and their spot on the playoff tree would be determined relative to the records of the other playoff teams in the conference.
Despite the legitimate gripes regarding the fairness of the current approach, there’s never been any real sense that teams will support a change to the rule. As it stands, each team has a one-in-four chance every year to host a playoff game.
Of course, given that the conference has sixteen teams and four teams land with the top four seeds, there’s still a 25-percent chance each year of being one of the teams that will host a playoff game.
Still, it will take plenty of work for the Lions to get at least 23 other teams to agree. The league generally believes there should be extra meaning to winning a division. Guaranteeing a home game provides it.
