Aaron Rodgers & The San Francisco Thorn
The beginning of a legend
In early 2010, Aaron Rodgers made one of the greatest playoff debuts the sport has ever seen. The opposition Quarterback was the legendary Kurt Warner, arguably the only other player to have a better playoff debut in NFL history.
The Green Bay Packers had a nightmare start to the game. They found themselves 17-0 down by the end of the first quarter. However, Aaron Rodgers and company rallied back to tie the game 45-45. In the second half it looked like the young man could not be stopped, picking on Cardinals cornerbacks in a way that we have become accustomed to, in the years following. Ultimately the Cardinals overcame the Packers in overtime, with a fumble recovery TD. However, it was just the start of the legend that is Aaron Rodgers.
The 423 yards from Aaron Rodgers is still the most passing yards by any QB in their first playoff start. The matchup is still the highest scoring playoff game in NFL history in addition to being ranked second on NFL Network’s Top 10 Quarterback Duels. Not bad for your first playoff game as a starting quarterback.
Packers fans everywhere only had to wait one season to watch Aaron Rodgers use the experience gained against the Cardinals, to help them win it all. Additionally, the experience gave Aaron Rodgers the confidence needed to duel with the best Quarterbacks in the game, for the rest of his Packers career.
Playoff success
Playoff football has not been as joyful for Aaron Rodgers since the 2011 season. The last few seasons have been especially painful. After winning 13 games in the 2019, 2020 and 2021 regular season, the post seasons that followed, almost promised a repeat of that early career Super Bowl run. However, two bitter losses in the NFC championship game and one in the divisional playoffs is all that Aaron Rodgers was left with when all was said and done.
This creates one outstanding question that needs answering:
Was Aaron Rodgers the best QB on the field during his playoff career?
The following article will provide a detailed analysis to help answer this question. Five metrics will be used to compare Aaron Rodgers and the opposing QB across all his career playoff games:
Total yards (Passing & Rushing)
Yards per attempt
Total touchdowns (Passing & Rushing)
Turnovers per game
Passer rating
Any of these metrics taken on their own, can be argued as being a poor indicator, when comparing two Quarterback performances against each other. However, when taken as a collective, it should provide a strong indicator into whether Aaron Rodgers was as an astonishing Quarterback throughout his playoff career, as that night in early January 2010, indicated he might be.
Please note: These 5 metrics will be a strong starting point for comparing quarterbacks in any given game. At a later date, the plan is to add some additional variables, such as the strength of the opposition defense, to adjust some metrics for a more accurate comparison of opposing Quarterback play.
Career Performance
Aaron Rodgers has been involved in 22 playoff games as a Green Bay Packer. We have to discount the first game, as Brett Favre was the starting QB at the time, which leaves us with 21 games to analyze.
Aaron Rodgers is 11-10 in his career playoff games. He started his career 4-1 in the playoffs, including a glorious Super Bowl run that had fans dreaming that the next great NFL dynasty, would call Lambeau field home. Ultimately, the team has not returned to the Superbowl since 2011 and the team who Aaron supported as a boy has become the ultimate thorn in his side. Green Bay are 0-4 against the 49ers in the playoffs, during Aaron Rodgers tenure and without the 49ers we have no doubts that Aaron Rodgers would have won more than 1 Super Bowl ring. Let’s call this the “San Francisco Thorn”. However, did Aaron Rodgers do enough to win all four of those games. More on that later in this article.
Table 1.0. Aaron Rodgers overall career playoff performance versus opposing QBs
| Metric | Aaron Rodgers | Opposition QB |
|---|---|---|
| Total yards (P/G) | 294.2 | 283.1 |
| Yards per attempt (P/G) | 7.4 | 8.2 |
| Touchdowns (P/G) | 2.3 | 2.0 |
| Turnovers (P/G) | 0.9 | 1.3 |
| Passer Rating | 99.9 | 92.8 |
Per game, Aaron Rodgers has more total yards, total touchdowns, lower turnovers and an average higher passer rating than his opponent QBs. The only metric which he falls short is Yards per attempt, potentially showing inefficiency in his offences from time to time. We delved into this a little closer and found that the average completion percentage for AR and his opposing QB was virtually equal suggesting the depth of completions are lower.
The issue with only talking about overall playoff career statistics, is that these numbers are skewed by great games and poor games a QB may have. To get into the detail, it is extremely important to conduct the same research on 2 further areas:
Performance against opposing QB’s in Green Bay wins versus Green Bay losses
The San Francisco Thorn
Performance in wins versus losses
Aaron Rodgers is 11-10 in his playoff career. This provides a relatively even sample size to compare. The contrast in performance against his opposing QB in wins versus losses proves interesting.
The 5 charts below display the 5 key metrics detailed earlier, for Aaron Rodgers and the opposition QB in Green Bay wins versus losses. There is plenty of detail within these charts and we have provided some commentary below, but please look at them in more detail for further information.
When Green Bay lose Aaron Rodgers’ turnovers increase dramatically from 0.5 turnovers to 1.3 turnovers per game. However, the 1.3 turnovers is actually equal to the opponents number of turnovers, suggesting AR isn’t necessarily performing worse than the opposition QB at protecting the football. However, the level of protecting the football is not up to AR usual standards when Green Bay lose.
When Green Bay wins AR passer rating is a phenomenal 108.5 against the opposing quarterbacks 91.0. However, in Green Bay losses, AR passer rating falls below that of the opposing QB to 90.5 (Opponents = 94.7). This is again a similar level to the opposing QB, but again lower than the standards that AR usually sets.
The variance in the opposition quarterbacks touchdowns per game, in Green Bay wins versus losses, has a much greater impact on the outcome of the game. When Green Bay wins, AR averages only 0.4 more touchdowns a game (2.5 versus 2.1). When Green Bay lose, the opposition quarterbacks touchdowns per game actually increases by a much greater amount, from 1.5 to 2.6 touchdowns per game (exceeding AR on average).
The San Francisco Thorn
40% of all Green Bay's losses in the playoffs, during Aaron Rodgers’ tenure, were against the San Francisco 49ers. We believe this is a hugely significant hurdle that AR wants to overcome before retirement, and potentially with a new team.
In 2013 and 2014 Aaron Rodgers came up against the Colin Kaepernick led 49ers. In 2021 and 2022 it was the Jimmy Garoppolo led 49ers. These Quarterback matchups could not differentiate more from each other, in terms of style and offensive output. Despite this, the outcome remained the same, a Green Bay loss.
The below charts displays the massive contrasts in the duels:
Jimmy G averaged a total of only 104 yards per game, whereas, Colin Kaepernick averaged a massive 385 yards total yards per game. That’s right, a massive 100 yards more than Aaron Rodgers. Additionally, Aaron Rodgers YPA was at the lower end of his career at only 6.8 versus Kaepernick's 9.1. Arguably showing a less efficient day than his usual standards.
A massive chunk of Kaepernick's yards came from rushing across the 2 games (almost 300 in total). General consensus suggests that the two match ups with Kaepernick, were unbelievably close fought duels, where both quarterbacks performed at the highest level. However, going off numbers alone, it can be reasoned that Aaron Rodgers was not necessarily the best Quarterback on the field, in those first two 49ers match ups.
More recently, it can be definitively said that, the metrics show that Aaron Rodgers out performed Jimmy G, when the two went up against each other. It is also well reported that a higher performance from Aaron Rodgers would have seen the Packers progress. We have no doubt the fans know that if Aaron Rodgers repeated his early 2010 numbers, in 2021 and 2022, Green Bay almost certainly have another Super Bowl championship, because Jimmy G was no Kurt Warner and anything can happen when you get to a final...
