Aaron Rodgers Media Availability (Sept. 17) | Pittsburgh Steelers

Aaron Rodgers Media Availability (Sept. 17) | Pittsburgh Steelers

Mike talked yesterday about your your when he was asked about, you know, was he worried about the hits you’ve been taking? He said Aaron’s been pretty durable during his career. I I looked it up getting the most sacked quarterback in NFL history, but you’ve been, you know, been able to play a lot despite that. Have you learned anything about sort of how to absorb that uh getting tackled by 300lb dudes? I mean, nothing special. I mean, I’ve broken a couple collar bones getting tackled before. Uh, I got tackled and cracked my knee one time, but yeah, I mean, you just just playing football. What stands out to you about New England’s defense so far this season? Well, they got some new players and those guys are playing well. Uh, both their big acquisitions uh in the offseason. 97 and two have been off to a good start this season. Uh, it looks like a verbal defense. You know, the way they fly around, different looks. They got aggressive blitzing nature that they do. So, they’re they’re playing good on defense. I know you guys didn’t start off with a touchdown in this game, but you at least got points and you’ve gotten points on both of the opening drives in both games so far. What What are you guys doing well, whether it be game planning or anything like that specifically allowing that to for you guys? I think it’s good good play calls from Art and then we’re just executing at a at a high level. Uh we still had a chance to get more on the first uh first possession. You know, we had a chance down the sideline to pat um and then stalled on a a makeable third down, but uh Bos bailed us out with another good uh good kick. But uh when when we go down seven nothing, we get the ball back. You know, we got to respond with seven, even up that game, keep the crowd in it, and we had a chance to and didn’t. From your perspective, what’s kind of the next step that you’d like to see in the run game going into this week? 10 plus yard runs. clinic. That’s what uh Pat wants to see. That’s what Mike T wants to see. That’s what Art wants to see. Um you know, our backs are slippery enough. We got to get them up to the second level clean. So, we just, you know, I think, uh just keep hitting our aiming points. You know, it’s not always on the line. It’s sometimes, you know, the combination block, sometimes the track. So, we just got to be perfect in our execution. If the track is supposed to be a certain way, let’s run that track. We’re supposed to get capture an ammy point. It’s captured an ammy point and then you know we’ve seen our backs on second secondary players has been a good match up for us. What have you learned about Jaylen Warren just in the time that you’ve gotten to know him during practice and now in a couple games? He’s a quiet guy. He hasn’t seen Point Break before which was surprising considering it’s a surfing uh movie. Uh he’s probably seen Northshore. Uh, I actually haven’t asked him about that yet, but uh, he’s kind of what I what I thought from afar. You know, I think the biggest compliment I can give him is, you know, when you’re behind a four straight thousand yard rusher, you’re seen as a change up back. And, uh, you know, he’s a guy who can be a number one back on any team in the league. So, really, uh, thankful for him. I think the play that he had the other day was one of the greatest catch and runs I’ve seen. You know, Donald Driver had a crazy one back in 2009 where a guy fell over his back and he was drilled on the five yard line and somehow got in, but uh that catch and run and those jukes that he made was uh was pretty incredible. Mike said Mike said Mike said yesterday that he feels great about this offensive line. Do you share that sentiment? Do you want to see any, you know, improvement there? I feel great about the offensive line. Going to Foxboro has been a quarter century nightmare for this organization. How have you done in Foxboro? What are your thoughts on this? Well, I don’t know that we’ve won. We lost there a few times. So, you’re you’re already you’re already 0 and2. You’re 0 and2. Well, we that’s all. Yeah. I mean, we had a chance. We’re up five last year uh with like two minutes left and they hit a big uh big pass. We were tied with them going into the fourth uh 18 I believe and then uh got beat by a couple scores. I didn’t play in 2010. Matt Flynn played played well but we gave up one of the greatest plays I’ve been a part of in my NFL history and that’s when Dan Connelly had a kickoff return that almost went for a touchdown. hated that it was against us, but as a lover of the big guys, when they get opportunity to show the athleticism, uh there may have been a few of us on the sideline who had a very tiny, quiet go uh on that play, but uh yeah, it’ be nice to get a win there. After the game, we talked about how uh the Seahawks dropped in a lot of two high zone coverages. It seemed like they weren’t fighting as much on play action last week. How do you counter that as a passing attack beyond just running the ball? How do you counter guys counter that when you see that, okay, they’re they’re doing this a little bit more often? Well, you got to run the ball. If they play too high, you got to run the ball. And that’s the uh the last five or six years coming out of the uh Seahawks three that went around the league. Um you got to run the football against these combo coverages and two high coverages. So, you run the football, you have a chance to have some good play action stuff. Aaron, you’re talking about how the loss could be good for you guys. You know, in what ways would you like to see you guys respond to to turn that into a good thing or to to reverse course kind of thing? I don’t like getting too binary, but uh winning, that’s a good response. Um, but we can’t get attached to the uh the binary system that uh that our league is judged on necessarily because it is a 17 game season and the process has to be great. So, just dig into the details and the process, enjoy it, practice well, and then let game day take care of itself. because you guys have a pretty young offense in you have to maybe repeat that message not to us the message to maybe in the room too to not get caught up in the I’m telling to you guys so you guys get it out there so they see it. Uh no we got a lot of we got we have a young team but we have guys who played a lot of football. John has played a lot of football DK Isaac uh you know Kenny G myself. So there’s a lot of guys that can echo the right message every week. I know you guys have only had one full day of practice, but how have you seen the response? Kind of what have you seen from you guys this week so far in response in practice? Um, I haven’t seen anybody hang in their heads. The most important thing, like I said, after the game is it’s a it’s a marathon, not a sprint. Can’t ride the ups and downs. Um, you have to embrace the results that happen and take a look at your process every single week, whether it’s a win on the scoreboard or a loss. And great competitors know that. uh sometimes their best is not going to be good enough on some days, but your best is not just a game day performance. Your best is a is a weekly uh accumulation of how you prepared on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, how you practiced Monday or Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and then the communication that you exhibited during the week as well. So, as long as we stay on those things, game days take care of themselves. Two more. Wex mentioned the the you know playing in New England. Do you keep track of the stadiums and how you road stadiums and how you’ve done in them? Is that something that you’ve got stowed away somewhere on the wall? Yeah. At home. Will has a ball. This might be breaking the fourth wall a little bit, but do you have plans to do any outside media availabilities once a week? Whether it’s on Mac or anything the seasons, I know she hadn’t done any the first couple weeks. No comment. Any other final football question? Aaron, you guys have been efficient in the red zone. What do you feel like there are elements of your team that could make you continue to have that trend? And what would you like to see continue along those lines? We got a different uh different group, you know, with a lot of unique skill sets. Um, we have small, fast, quick guys and we got a couple, you know, real big guys and then a couple, you know, Johnny’s and and Connors and and Pats, you know, in between guys. So, um, we’ve only got down there five times, I believe. That’s not enough. We need to be down there, uh, you know, four times a game, I think, on minimum. And then you’re cashing in at least three of those with touchdowns. you’re going to be uh you know I think 25 points a game is uh was top 10 last year in points. Our best year in Green Bay we were 80% in the red zone you know but anything above 70 is really good. So we got to get down there more often. Five times in two games is not

Aaron Rodgers spoke to the media on Wednesday, September 17 ahead of the Steelers Week 3 game against the Patriots

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