Report: Packers Upset With Teams That May Have ‘Tampered’ With Aaron Rodgers
First Aaron Rodgers was 'disgruntled'. Now the Packers are 'upset'. Nobody in Green Bay is happy right now.
In a piece from ESPN's Rob Demovsky, the author reports the Packers are upset teams may have reached out directly to Aaron Rodgers to get a sense of how interested he would be in playing for their team if they were to offer a trade to Green Bay.
Among the teams believed to reach out to Rodgers are the San Francisco 49ers and the Denver Broncos, but Demovsky's report implies there are other teams that may have done the same.
While there haven't been any open reports about Denver contacting Rodgers or the Packers organization, we learned last Thursday, just hours before the NFL Draft kicked off, that the 49ers reached out to Green Bay on the subject of a trade for Rodgers. While the official news (via Tom Pelissero) is that San Francisco contacted the Packers last Wednesday without a formal offer, one report suggested the 49ers would have been willing to offer a sizable haul that would have included their #3 overall pick, Jimmy Garoppolo, and a number of other picks and players for Rodgers.
All of this is eerily familiar to the situation the Packers faced in 2008, when Green Bay filed formal tampering charges against the Minnesota Vikings. The claim was that the Vikings reached out to Brett Favre, who was on the reserve/retired list for the Packers. While Favre had retired, #4 was still property of Green Bay as far as his playing rights were concerned. Favre would go on to play for the New York Jets for the 2008 season before ending his career in Minnesota, playing in the 2009 and 2010 seasons before retiring permanently.
According to Demovsky's report, the Packers have not filed charges with the NFL because it would be "nearly impossible to prove". This was the same outcome of the tampering claims Green Bay filed against the Vikings over 10 years ago.
Despite the messiness in Green Bay, the Packers continue to say Rodgers is their guy into the 2021 season. Alternatively, Rodgers has expressed that he is considering sitting out or retiring if he and the team can't come together on a resolution to his contract situation or a deal to trade the quarterback to another team.
Regardless of who is at the helm of the Packers offense this season, they will face some stiff competition. Here are the teams they will play against in the season ahead.