Drafting Aaron Rodgers

[Drinkin Fortes]

Saw an interesting piece about the 21 teams that passed on Aaron Rodgers in his NFL draft 10 years ago. In the 10 years since he was drafted Rodgers has been to 11 playoff games, winning 6 of them including a superbowl and has 2 MVPs.

 

SF took Alex Smith 1st overall and paid him $50M ... Smith has been to 3 playoff games, winning 1 of them and obviously no longer plays for SF.

 

MIA had the 2nd pick and had been struggling to replace Marino, but passed on Rodgers for Ronnie Brown. Since that draft Miami has been through 12 QBs.

 

CLE had the 3rd pick and took Braylon Edwards. Since passing on Rodgers the Browns have been through 16 QBs.

 

TB had the 5th pick, TB was starting Brian Griese at that time ... but took Cadillac Williams.

 

Teams that were struggling with QBs all passed on Rodgers, including OAK who passed on Rodgers to take Fabian Washington. Since that day the Raiders have been through 16 QBs, including JaMarcus Russell with a $40M price tag.

 

Division rivals CHI, MIN and DET all had top 10 picks that year and all passed on Rodgers. Minnesota even passed on Rodgers TWICE. Since that day Rodger is 31-9 against his division rival teams.

 

Since that day, those 21 that teams passed on Rodgers have gone through 201 starting QBs, 78 HCs, and 53 GMs.

 

Finally with the 24th pick GB took Aaron Rodgers and signed him to a $7M deal.

 

17 of the 23 players taken before Rodgers are now out of the league.

I'm sure he knows all of this too, and it partly drives him. He is one of the best QB's in the game and he landed right where he needed to be.

[Mr Bad Example]

We (The Steelers) passed on Pittsburgh native and huge fan Marino..we passed on Marino!

 

 

There's a fantastic 30 for 30 on that (Elway to Marino)...gets in to the what/why of Marino falling like that.

 

The story is always that Marino fell because there were rumors he was a cokehead. Which, starting QB for an eastern football power in the 80s? Duh.

[Mr Bad Example]

i think also being a back up for the legend Favre was a huge reason he is as successful as he is now.

 

 

Sitting and developing helped him. Sitting behind FAVRE, maybe not so much....although I think a lot of his better atrributes are in opposition to things Favre did NOT do well. I recall hearing a story about Andy Reid coaching Matt Hasselbeck and telling him "here are the things I want you to emulate about Brett Favre - toughness, leadership, preparation. Here are the thing I do NOT want you to emulate about Brett Favre - ball security, decision making, footwork."