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Despite playing with the pitiful quarterbacking trio of Mike White, Joe Flacco, and Zach Wilson during his rookie season, New York Jets wide receiver Garrett Wilson still put up 83 catches and over 1,100 yards en route to winning Offensive Rookie of the Year.
So, while the arrival of Aaron Rodgers is a massive boost to the entire franchise (and fanbase, for that matter), Wilson, in particular, is set to benefit from the presence of the future Hall of Fame signal-caller, who many believe is the best pure thrower of the football in the history of the NFL.
“Aaron is a great guy. He’s a great dude. I just want to learn as much as possible. He knows that. He knows all of us grew up watching him play. The way he carries himself is like you’d expect,” Wilson said while appearing on SiriusXM NFL Radio.
“He’s a champion, he’s a former champion, he’s a great player, all-time great and he carries himself as such. So, it’s been great to be around him, for sure.”
Wilson also detailed his experience training with Rodgers during the offseason, saying that he hopes the work they’re putting in now pays off when it counts most later in the season.
“When you have a new signal-caller coming in and new quarterback, you just want to be able to get those reps and bookmark certain routes together. And we got a chance to do that,” Wilson said.
“It was awesome to be able to throw with him and go against a defense with him leading the charge and see how he sees the defense and spend time with him in the film room — all those things. The culmination of all those things hopefully leads to our success down the road. We’re going to try to keep building upon that. We have a small sample size together, but we feel like we took full advantage of the time we did have together. That’s all we could do.”
.@NYJets WR Garrett Wilson discussed what it has been like to work with QB Aaron Rodgers and how he carries himself like a champion…#Jets | #TakeFlight | @GarrettWilson_V pic.twitter.com/bLsyPZZyjL
— SiriusXM NFL Radio (@SiriusXMNFL) July 12, 2023
Wilson certainly has reasons other than his individual stats to be excited about Rodgers becoming a member of Gang Green, as the Jets are now expected to contend for a Super Bowl title.
According to current betting odds, just six teams in the National Football League have better odds of winning next season’s Super Bowl than the Jets: the Chiefs, Eagles, 49ers, Bills, Bengals, and Cowboys. Given that there are still two months until the season starts, though, those odds could change between now and Week 1.
Wilson, Rodgers, and the rest of the New York Jets — who haven’t made the playoffs since the Rex Ryan era in 2010, the longest drought in the NFL — will kick off their 2023 season at home with a Monday Night Football matchup against Josh Allen and the Buffalo Bills.