GREEN BAY, Wis. — In his rookie season, in 2005, Aaron Rodgers almost never played on Sundays. Instead, he played on Wednesdays, Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays, in practice, against increasingly agitated teammates
For Green Bay defenders, Saturday mornings were the worst. The plays for the scout team, run by Rodgers, were supposed to be scripted, the tempo purposely slow. Instead, Rodgers tossed deep passes and no-look passes and tight spirals, the kinds of throws that have come to define his M.V.P.-caliber 2011 season, which will continue Sunday on the road against the Giants
By Week 11 of his rookie year, Rodgers said an assistant coach notified him that “the head man doesn’t appreciate all the Saturday no-look passes because you’re making the defense look bad.” He added, “He wants you to knock it off a little bit.”
So Rodgers and his merry band of scout team all-stars instead choreographed touchdown dances, which Al Harris, then a starting cornerback for the Packers, remembers well. “You’d want to rest, but A-Rod is out there zipping it,” Harris said. “He would do the championship belt dance. He would spike the ball. He was a trip.”
