During the Jets’ Week Three win over the Patriots, an awkward moment occurred when head coach Robert Saleh appeared to try to hug quarterback Aaron Rodgers and Rodgers pushed Saleh in the chest.
Rodgers downplayed any notion that it was a sign of any issue with their relationship, but the topic of how well the two men get along came up again this week. After the Jets committed a number of pre-snap penalties in last Sunday’s loss to the Broncos, Saleh said he wondered “whether or not we’re good enough or ready to handle all the cadence” that Rodgers uses to try to draw other teams offside. Rodgers said he didn’t think the Jets needed to “make mass changes based on kind of an outlier game.”
Saleh backtracked on Monday, saying that “we’re always going to push the envelope with cadence” and the whole episode led to Rodgers being asked about their relationship on The Pat McAfee Show Tuesday. Rodgers said he isn’t interested in “messaging and narratives” from outside the team because he feels the relationship is a strong one.
“Rob and I have a great relationship,” Rodgers said. “We have since day one when I got here. We have text message conversations, threads that we’re in, conversations about a number of different topics outside of football. We have a good friendship.”
Rodgers reiterated that it is on the players to execute correctly in terms of the cadence use and it will be incumbent on them to win games if they’re going to avoid weekly updates about how everyone is getting along.
