2026 could decide Love’s future with Packers
Chris Simms and Mike Florio discuss the future of Jordan Love and question if the Green Bay Packers will keep or move on from the 2020 first-round pick after 2026.
Video Transcript
I'm looking at the summary of Jordan Love's contract because remember, it was in 2024 that Athletes First, which represents both Jordan Love and Tua Tagovailoa, they did the okey-doke on the Packers and the Dolphins, and they played one off of the other.
Yeah.
And they got great deals for both guys.
And the deal for Tua was too great.
The deal for Tua is what got Chris Greer fired, and frankly, it would justify firing him multiple times for what a bad deal that was and what it's done to set back the Dolphins organization and put it behind the salary cap eight ball.
The Jordan Love deal, which averages 55 million a year, four year, $220 million extension, we're getting to the end of the fully guaranteed money.
Yeah.
And this could be the up or out year for Jordan Love.
They c- I'm not saying they should, I'm not saying they will, but they'll have flexibility after this season to move on if they would choose to.
They have to choose to, they have to have a better option out there.
I'm not saying they should, I'm just saying as we get into the, these contracts, there's a certain number of years where you're just stuck with it, unless you wanna have a ridiculous $99.2 million dead money charge over two seasons like the Dolphins will have.
Yeah, yeah.
Or what the Cardinals are dealing with with Kyler Murray, and what the Broncos emerged from with Russell Wilson.
So after this year, it becomes easier from a cap flexibility and a cash flexibility standpoint to make a change if they decide that a change is necessary.
I'm not saying a change is necessary, I'm just We're getting toward a pivot point where they're either gonna renew vows and extend this deal, or they gotta start thinking about the future.
Yeah.
Because it's possible Jordan Love, they will decide after this year, isn't going to get us to what it is that we want to be.
Yeah.
I, you know, I, I, I feel like they believe he's the guy.
I think the politics of the sport are gonna make them believe he's the guy.
He's shown me he can be that guy.
It's about, again, our word with him is just the, the consistency.
The, the word I always use, the surgicality, right?
And maybe a little bit of that is that they're offense.
It's one of the reasons I do like them when they're, when they're playing well and fun to watch and got it going, because LaFleur, he really likes to throw the ball down the football field.
I mean, he wants the bombs away.
He wants 40 yard throws, he wants 20 yard crossers.
That's what he wants.
but within that, and playing that way, you gotta be able to trust the quarterback to not always go, "Ooh, wait, I like it, I'm gonna try to throw it up and give it a chance," and still keep your offense in some good positions there.
And that's where maybe Jordan Love hasn't been, you know, at his best.
You know, but there's only a few of these guys out there when you go and just go, "Hey, he's a starter and he's a pretty big time starter in the NFL," and Jordan Love is that.
And I do feel like they're tied to him a little bit here.
They got rid of Aaron Rodgers for him.
They gave him too much money too quickly.
I don't disagree with what you said there.
He had a eight or nine game stretch in 2023 and they were like, "We're sold.
Here's 55 million."
But at the same time, that's where the politics of the sports, they wanna be sold.
"Yeah, see?
This is why we got rid of Aaron Rodgers.
Look, he's here.
He's good, he's good.
Here's the contract, here's the money.
See?
It's, it's, it's, it's verified.
He's good.
We made the right decision."
And within that, that probably led it to be too m- too expensive in, in how you laid it out that way.
So let's see what Jordan Love can do.
But I, I do think that we're more on the extend side than the let's find somebody else.
Because no, I do think Jordan Love, like you said, top 10.
If he's not in the top 10, he's dancing right around it and d- and that kind of quarterback and, you know, like we know, there's not too many of those falling off trees in the NFL.
I don't disagree with you about that assessment.
And look, between the two guys, Jordan Love deserved the 55 million, market is the market level deal- Yeah more, far more than Tua did.
Yeah.
And, and he's a keeper, but you know, the definition of keeper has changed in the NFL.
It used to be if you had a guy who just checked the basic boxes, who was a passable passer, you kept him for as long as you could.
Yeah.
Now we see teams moving on from objectively good quarterbacks all the time in the hopes of finding someone better, because good enough for some teams isn't good enough.
They want great.
And, and I, I agree with you that Jordan Love is closer to great than good enough.
Yeah.
But this is all being proven out one iteration at a time, one season at a time.
And it's becoming glaring.
9-8, 9-8-1, 11-6.
That doesn't look nearly as good as those first three years with Aaron Rodgers and Matt LaFleur tied together.
And at some point there's going to be, I think, not an outcry, but just frustration, discomfort, and they're gonna start looking at their options.
They're gonna scout the quarterbacks in the draft a little more carefully than maybe they have, and they're gonna think about the possibility of a future.
And hey, it's gotta be difficult when you've been blessed with Favre to Rodgers to Love.
This is where the politics comes into play.
They want to complete- Totally that three-man chain of Hall of Famers- Exactly and Super Bowl winners.
Right.
They wanna will that into existence, so they're not gonna give up on Jordan Love easily, 'cause they wanna take this through to the conclusion, and he may reward them with a Super Bowl one of these days.
But it's just not-I, I think the reality is it hasn't delivered.
The whole experience hasn't delivered what we thought, especially after that second half of his first year as a starter- Yeah, totally it all clicked.
Right.
And it almost carried them to the NFC championship game, and arguably should have taken them there.
Yeah.
No, you're, you're right that You're right there.
And, and of course for LaFleur, like you said, that last game or that last NFC championship they went to with Rogers against Brady and the Bucs, that was there to be had that day.
That was, and they, they let that slip by, at least an opportunity for them to get to the promised land.
But yeah, they, they need, they need more consistent play.
I w- you know, you know, again, his, he's, his stats will show you it's top ten-ish, it's top five-ish in football, but it's a little bit of, like, feasting on the poor at times or, you know, a lot of Let's say the Denver game last year.
First half, first qu- two quarters and a half are great, but now the game's getting tight, it's late in the game, and the offense kind of disappeared and they couldn't move the ball, right?
That, that's what you're talking about.
And again, that's where, that's where, like, the timing and the stats matter, and that's where it's kind of like off with our feel a little bit.
Right?
There's that meme out there right now that through the first 10 years, Dak Prescott's stats are better than Tom Brady's.
Have you seen that out there on Instagram?
People are putting that- No up there.
And it's like, you know what?
Bullshit and bullshit and bullshit.
I don't give a damn.
The, the, to make that comparison and just look at numbers is stupid, right?
I mean, first off, Dallas and Dak Prescott have been the kings of we're l- we're losing by a lot and we get fake stats at the end of the game or, you know, they're, or they're blowing a team out or doing something like that.
We know modern day football, the stats and throwing the ball are just gonna be better even compared to 2004 and '05 when Brady was playing then.
And then, hey, through a lot of Dak Prescott's career, the red zone's been a issue.
Tom Brady, none of those things were an issue.
It was like, "Oh, wait, is it clutch time?
Oh, Tom Brady's about to go down and score."
That's not what you say about Dallas and Dak Prescott throughout his career.
I mean, that's not what they've been.
So that's where, like, you know, numbers can lie to us a little bit.
And Jordan Love's, I think, numbers are better than what he actually is right now.
That, that would be my assessment.
You know, his numbers, his quarterback rating would tell you he's a top five quarterback.
I would go, eh, I think that's, you know, a little finagled in some ways, and we don't have enough time to go through it all here.
So that's where it's gotta be better, and then they gotta be a little lucky too.
Let's, let's, you know They gotta Christian Watson does need to stay healthy, right?
Matthew Golden, the first round receiver, he's gotta show up this year.
Last year was very underwhelming.
They arguably have the next and the guy who I think was gonna break the market as far as at tight end in, in Tucker Kraft.
He tears his ACL last year.
You had the Micah injury, right?
So they did get a little unlucky that way.
Hopefully this Josh Jacobs thing won't be the start of bad luck again here in, in 2026, and they can right the ship here and be a real player in the NFC.
And that was the pathway to have this unexpected deeper dive into the Packers, but I think it was necessary.
We haven't focused on them in a while.
Jacobs creates an issue, creates a problem.
He's got two years left, non-guaranteed on his original four-year deal.
Due to make 25 million over the next two years.
They may need to start looking for options.
They could be looking for trade possibilities before or during the season.
Who knows?
It depends upon paid leave, it depends upon whether or not this is thrown out.
He's entitled to all defenses and constitutional protections, but for now, there is a problem that he and the team will be dealing with.
And by the way, Gary points out, Josh Jacobs' last 100-yard rushing game came week 12 of 2024.
Yeah.
So he has not been the same machine that he was, but that threat, that threat is there.
And, and he's effective in the passing game as well.
They, they'll be a different team without him because they don't have that clear replacement who could come in and, and be Josh Jacobs.
No, totally.
So we'll see how it plays out for them.
They lose Emmanuel Wilson in free agency to the Seahawks, right?
He was a great backup running back.
And the other thing I worry about real quick, 'cause I know we gotta go to break, is just, hey, Josh Jacobs and his weight and being in shape, that has been a thing in his career.
And now if he has to step away and not be there, those are the things that, you know, as a guy that evaluates bodies in football, that, I worry about that stuff.
It's in the back of my head there a little bit.
And, you know, I haven't looked.
I don't know who's available in free agency, but if, if he ends up stepping aside from the balance of the off-season program, they're gonna have to go out and see if they can, they can add someone.
Yeah.
now there's plenty of guys out there that are floating around who have never played in the NFL, undrafted guys, but established guys.
We'll see if, if it comes
