EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. — Aaron Rodgers approached his head coach with a message and an assumption.
“Two-score lead,” he told Robert Saleh as the New York Jets went up 14-0 against the New England Patriots.
Then he shoved his coach.
Consider it a miscommunication.
Rodgers and Saleh aligned on their message — on the significance of a two-score lead for the team’s game plan, and the significance of this dominating moment along their road to what would become a 24-3 victory on Thursday Night Football.
But their celebratory gestures conflicted. So as Rodgers went in for the chest shove and Saleh the hug, gravity separated rather than uniting them. They downplayed a moment the internet viewed ominously.
“It wasn’t awkward at all,” Rodgers said. “He’s not a big hugger usually, so I didn’t know he was going for the hug. He likes to do the two-hand chest push as well. But he talks a lot about two-score leads.
“So I just kind of gave him a push and said, ‘two-score lead.’”
The explanation aligned with initial lip-reading attempts, but either way there was reason for confusion: Two-score leads have been few and far between for the Jets in recent years. Reasons for celebrations, quite frankly, have as well.
The Jets will need time to learn how to celebrate, just as they’ve needed time to round into form with the four-time MVP at their helm.
But as the Jets broke a 15-year streak without consecutive wins against the Patriots, a raucous prime time crowd saw more than just division records changing.
For the first time in his Jets tenure, Rodgers looked dominant. The Jets looked excellent. And a complementary brand of football returned to the Jets after an extended vacation away.
The game spoke volumes about what the Jets could become this season and how. And it also voiced a warning for the Patriots beyond just the loss on their record.
Rodgers turns back clock to lead rejuvenated Jets
Allen Lazard was marveling long before the end-zone visits.
The veteran receiver who’s spent all seven seasons of his career on the same roster with Rodgers had seen this magic before.
But was Rodgers really escaping the pocket, faking a pass and scrambling for a 5-yard first down on the second play of the game?
Was the 40-year-old quarterback who tore his Achilles 374 days earlier really going to throw off-platform this powerfully, this soon?
“I mean, that plant medicine must really be working,” Lazard told Yahoo Sports after catching three passes for 48 yards and the game’s first touchdown. “I might have to try it out here soon, so hopefully I’ll be playing when I’m 40.”
The Jets’ first touchdown against the Patriots reflected Rodgers’ intellectual mastery of football more than physical mastery. The quarterback calculated his chances of success if he isolated Lazard to the left, Rodgers unleashing the ball near-instantly after the snap as Lazard baited his defender with an extra flat route.
Lazard then stopped suddenly and restarted en route to a 10-yard score. It was the Jets’ first touchdown of the night but hardly the last.
“Our biggest emphasis was just trying to bury them in the second half and everything,” Lazard said. “That’s what good teams do. We want to be a great team.”
The Jets’ running back room accounted for score No. 2, Breece Hall’s so-close-it-was-challenged touchdown giving the Jets the highly anticipated two-score lead.
Now the Jets’ defense could frustrate Patriots quarterback Jacoby Brissett more fully, the obvious passing downs activating the pass rush up front as an opportunistic secondary salivated in back.
But Rodgers wasn’t done. He knew that for three weeks, opposing defenses had sold out to shut down receiver Garrett Wilson, protecting themselves with two-high safeties often even as Wilson faced top corners in the 49ers’ Charvarius Ward, the Tennessee Titans’ L’Jarius Sneed and now New England’s Christian Gonzalez.
But with 6:24 to play in the third quarter, the Jets were 2 yards from home after Rodgers had found Wilson for 8. Wilson told his quarterback in the huddle to hit him again and Rodgers was happy to oblige via a run-pass option.
Rodgers threw airborne and Wilson caught it airborne. “For a mere mortal, a really difficult catch,” Rodgers said, “but [Wilson] made it look easy.”
That’s how most of the Jets viewed Rodgers’ first complete Jets home game more broadly, as he completed 27-of-35 passes for 281 yards, two touchdowns and a 118.8 passer rating.
Lazard thought back to a moment they shared in the weight room before the season opener, when Lazard walked in and saw Rodgers squatting. He thinks he saw four plates and a 25-pounder, but maybe it was three plates and a 25, he reckons. Whether 325 pounds or 425 pounds, Lazard knew this was not standard for Rodgers’ age and health.
“It was a lot more than any 40-year-old should be able to do,” Lazard said. “And for him to come off his Achilles … it’s incredible.”
Will Patriots heed hard lessons from Jets QB?
The magic of Rodgers’ evening stood in sharp contrast to the Patriots quarterback situation.
After upsetting the Cincinnati Bengals in Week 1 and taking the Seattle Seahawks to overtime before losing in Week 2, New England never mustered a real fight throughout four quarters.
Brissett completed 12-of-18 passes for 98 yards and an 80.3 passer rating, after throwing for 149 yards and a touchdown in Week 1 and then 121 yards in Week 2. But Brissett’s limited production was not New England’s main problem. The quarterback and offensive line’s inability to handle the Jets’ pass rush was.
After taking three sacks against the Bengals and just one against the Seahawks, the Jets sacked the Patriots seven times and hit their quarterbacks 15 times. Brissett weathered the first 50-plus minutes of the beatdown before the Patriots gave the 2024 third overall draft pick Drake Maye the final series.
Brissett was pressured 13 times, the 56.5% pressure rate the highest he’s faced in any game with at least 10 attempts, per Next Gen Stats.
Maye completed 4-of-8 pass attempts for 22 yards and a 56.2 passer rating, also rushing twice for a total of 12 yards. His spell of play indicated what should have already been obvious to the Patriots: Quarterback may not be the only problem on their offense, but it’s certainly not yet their solution.
Maye’s eight pass attempts sent him halfway toward the total the four-time MVP on the other side of the field received his rookie year.
Rodgers started zero games in his first three years after the Packers drafted him in the first round in 2005, attempting no more than 28 passes in any of those campaigns.
The 10 Pro Bowls, regular playoff contention and a Super Bowl championship that resulted is far from a guaranteed result just because teams rest their quarterback. But on Thursday, a long-suffering Jets team showed the Patriots what can be possible when a team amasses talent to surround a quarterback before asking him to elevate the team. The Jets showed New England what quarterback play can look like when a gunslinger has proper time to develop physically and mentally.
Rodgers’ ability to control the offense, to avoid a three-and-out on the night, and avoid turnovers as he moved the Jets down the field repeatedly, represented the opposite end of the quarterback-play spectrum from what led the Carolina Panthers to bench 2023 first overall pick Bryce Young just two games into this season.
The Patriots had examples this week alone of the risk and reward they face in developing Maye.
They should heed them.
Patriots head coach Jerod Mayo declined to confirm whether he may substitute Maye for Brissett as starter, saying “I don’t know” about a quarterback change but the coaching staff would “see where it goes” as players compete weekly.
The Jets, across the stadium, breathed a sigh of relief that for the first time in a while the quarterback question is not their problem — and as they continue to learn not only how to get on the same page on the field but also with their celebrations.
“If the expectation is winning, then we’re going to celebrate it, but we should expect to win,” Rodgers said. “The next step is to expect to dominate.”