By the time Aaron Rodgers retires, he will be praised as the greatest quarterback of all-time by countless fans. Some believe he is already the GOAT. However, what is Aaron Rodgers’ worst game as an NFL quarterback?
Rodgers has appeared in over 200 NFL games including playoff games. Many of those games are contenders for the most dominant individual quarterback games ever. There have been 27 games to have a quarterback throw for four touchdowns, zero interceptions, over 400 yards, and finish with a 130 passer rating. Rodgers owns three of those games, tied for the most in NFL history.
He has 10 career 400-yard games, 55 games with three passing touchdowns and zero interceptions, and over half of his regular-season appearances resulted in a passer rating over 100.
However, the two-time MVP is far from perfect. He has looked vulnerable in a handful of games throughout his career. Oddly enough, Rodgers’ duds tend to pool against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. In his four starts in Tampa Bay, Rodgers has three games with a passer rating below 58.0. Aaron Rodgers’s worst game came in 2020.
What Was the Worst Game for Aaron Rodgers?
October 18, 2020
Heading into their Week 6 clash with the Buccaneers, the Packers were undefeated. Rodgers was an early-season MVP front-runner with four consecutive multi-touchdown games without tossing an interception. Through four weeks, Rodgers had 13 touchdowns and a 128 passer rating. He had proved the doubters wrong.
Rodgers started reasonably well, connecting on a long third down to escape a three-and-out. Rodgers and the Packers ate up 52 yards across four plays to get into field goal range. The offense stalled, and Mason Crosby split the uprights.
Green Bay forced a three-and-out. Rodgers was winning the battle between GOAT candidates (Tom Brady).
Green Bay’s second drive started slowly, but Rodgers found Robert Tonyan for a first down. A Jamaal Williams 25-yard run put the Packers in Tampa Bay territory before Rodgers completed a trio of passes to put the Packers in the red zone. Rodgers converted another third down, and Aaron Jones punched the pigskin into the end zone to put the Packers up 10-0.
Tampa Bay’s second drive stalled.
With 13 minutes left in the second quarter, Green Bay was cruising. Even after two incompletions to start their drive, Green Bay was cruising.
Then Tampa Happened
Jamel Dean jumped a Davante Adams route to notch an interception. Dean ran untouched into the end zone for just the third pick-six of Rodgers’s career.
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In true Tampa Bay/Aaron Rodgers fashion, it was Rodgers’ second pick-six at Raymond James Stadium. Two of Rodgers’s 137 pass attempts in Tampa Bay became pick-sixes. In contrast, Rodgers has thrown over 3,200 passes at Lambeau Field. William Jackson returned one for a touchdown in 2017. In Rodgers’ 3,500 passes in stadiums other than Lambeau or Raymond James, none have been pick-sixes.
It Became Aaron Rodgers’ Worst Game
Three snaps later, another pass intended for Adams was tipped to Tampa Bay safety Mike Edwards. Edwards returned the interception down to the Green Bay goal line, and Ronald Jones scored immediately.
ANOTHER @Buccaneers INT!
This one returned inside the five-yard line. #GoBucs
📺: #GBvsTB on FOX
📱: NFL app // Yahoo Sports app: https://t.co/qYnOYOB3CA pic.twitter.com/wW2xvbWGkq— NFL (@NFL) October 18, 2020
Rodgers is not at fault for the second interception, but rookie Antoine Winfield Jr. dropped one of the easiest interceptions later in the game.
After 134 yards and 10 points in the first quarter, the Packers totaled five yards in the second quarter. Within two minutes, the Packers went from up 10-0 to 14-10. Green Bay’s two second-quarter punts were answered with Tom Brady touchdown passes as the Buccaneers took an 18-point lead heading into the half.
At the half, Rodgers was completing 44 percent of his passes.
Tampa Bay took a 31-10 then 38-10 lead in the third quarter as Rodgers had no answers for Tampa Bay’s exotic blitzes.
With seven minutes left in the fourth quarter, Tim Boyle came in relief for Rodgers. Brady was pulled for Blaine Gabbert, and the massacre was over.
When the dust settled, Rodgers completed 16 of 35 passes for 160 yards, zero touchdowns, and two interceptions. His wide receivers had several drops, but Tampa Bay’s relentless blitzing rattled Rodgers.
Larger Scope
Rodgers’ 35.4 passer rating was so putrid that he would have had a better passer rating from spiking each snap into the turf (39.6). Rodgers has been sensational in the other five games of the 2020 season, and his 35.4 rating would have to be tripled to be in the same area code as his other performances.
The most telling stat of Rodgers’s abysmal game is his 2.00 adjusted yards per attempt. Among games that he threw at least 12 passes, it is the worst of his career. It was simply Aaron Rodgers’s worst game of his career from the eye-test and any statistical measure.
Adjusted yards per attempt include extra value for touchdowns and diminished value for interceptions.
At the end of the day, Rodgers is one of the best quarterbacks to touch a football. No one is immune from a performance such as this, and the other GOAT contenders have had their share of stinkers.
