Aaron Rodgers has had his fair share of controversy throughout this NFL season.
Most of it centered around comments he made before the season started, when he told the media he had been “immunized,” leading them (and the rest of the public) to believe he had been fully vaccinated for COVID-19.
He later tested positive for COVID, and admitted that he had not, in fact, been vaccinated due to the fact that he is allergic to one of the ingredients in the Pfizer and Moderna’s mRNA vaccines. He also said that the NFL and the Green Bay Packers knew from the very beginning that he was not vaccinated.
Of course, reaction from the public ranged widely, with his estranged father supporting his decision, and people like Terry Bradshaw ripping him on national TV with some misleading information of their own in regards to Aaron taking Ivermectin after consulting his doctor (and Joe Rogan).
But, that all happened back in November, and it seemed like the whole situation was largely behind us. I mean, the Green Bay Packers just clinched the #1 seed in the NFC after a 37-10 win over the Minnesota Vikings on Sunday night at Lambeau Field with one more game to go in the regular season.
Aaron has continued to have a stellar season at quarterback despite the outside noise, which has made him the easy favorite to win the league’s MVP award this year.
Well, it’s made the reigning MVP from 2020 the favorite for a lot of voter’s besides Hub Arkush.
Hub, a Chicago sportscaster, analyst and executive editor of Pro Football Weekly, recently made comments about why he won’t be voting for Aaron this year… and it has nothing to do with his on-field performance, telling Pro Football Talk recently:
“I don’t think you can be the biggest jerk in the league and punish your team, and your organization and your fan base the way he did and be the Most Valuable Player. Has he been the most valuable on the field?
Yeah, you could make that argument, but I don’t think he is clearly that much more valuable than Jonathan Taylor or Cooper Kupp or maybe even Tom Brady. So from where I sit, the rest of it is why he’s not gonna be my choice. Do I think he’s gonna win it? Probably.
A lot of voters don’t approach it the way I do, but others do, who I’ve spoken to. But one of the ways we get to keep being voters is we’re not allowed to say who we are voting for until after the award has been announced.
I’m probably pushing the envelope by saying who I’m not voting for. But we’re not really supposed to reveal our votes.”
He continued to back up his decision, saying that he didn’t feel his vote should be (or needed to be) solely based on how good a football player Aaron has been this season:
“I just think that the way he’s carried himself is inappropriate. I think he’s a bad guy, and I don’t think a bad guy can be the most valuable guy at the same time.”
He has also publicly stated that he should’ve kept those comments to himself, and he made a “huge mistake” in revealing part of his decision before the winner has been announced.
Of course, Hub’s decision to base his MVP vote for the NFL’s best player on a situation that had nothing to do with on-the-field play drew wide criticism, and rightfully so.
And now, Aaron is speaking out. During yesterday’s press conference, he called Hub an “absolute bum”:
“I think he’s a bum. I think he’s an absolute bum. He doesn’t know me. I don’t know who he is. No one knew who he was, probably, until yesterday’s comments. And I listened to the comments.
But to say he had his mind made up in the summertime, in the offseason that I had zero chance of winning MVP — in my opinion, that should exclude [him from] future votes.
His problem isn’t with me being a ‘bad guy’ or ‘the biggest jerk in the league’, because he doesn’t know me. He doesn’t know anything about me. I’ve never met him…
His problem is I’m not vaccinated. So if he wants to go on a crusade and collude and come up with an extra letter to put on the award just for this season and make it the ‘Most Valuable Vaccinated Player,’ then he should do that.”
If Aaron does end up winning the MVP award, he’d be the first player since Peyton Manning (in 2008 and 2009) to be named NFL MVP in back-to-back seasons.
The winner will be revealed on February 10th live from the NFL Honors on ABC at 9 p.m. ET.
And if you remember back to Aaron’s appearance on The Pat McAfee Show, right when the news broke, Pat asked Rodgers if he knew that he was never going to win an MVP again.
Aaron said:
“I think that’s a legitimate statement…”
Who knew it would only take two months to come to fruition.
