Top 10 Most Entertaining Aaron Rodgers Games
Whether I like it or not, this may very well be Aaron Rodgers’ last season as a Green Bay Packer.
Given that possibility, as the playoffs approach, I thought it would be appropriate to take the time to look back and remember some of the most exciting games for Packers fans since he took over the starting job in 2008.
CRITERIA:
This is not a list of Aaron Rodgers’ “greatest performances,” or “greatest moments.” This is my attempt at listing the Most Entertaining games of Aaron Rodgers’ career.
Ideally, each of the games on this list reward repeat watching on demand via the streaming app NFL GamePass, because they’re gripping minute-to-minute, quarter-to-quarter.
That means I can include entertaining losses if I wish, and I can exclude boring games with only one transcendent moment (I’m looking at you, Detroit Hail Mary Game).
I have tried to apply the following four metrics to each game, each ranked 1–5 with 5 being the best. The metrics are:
STORYLINE: How juicy were the off-the-field storylines? Was Rodgers playing through injury? Was it a contest of future HoF quarterbacks? Was there bad blood? Does it feel like there was a dramatic author writing the game?
SEASON STAKES: How much did the season ride on the outcome of the game? Was it a playoff game? Did they need to win in order to make the playoffs?
OPPONENT: How tough was the competition? Demolishing minnows can be fun, but it isn’t as entertaining as beating Tom Brady.
ENDING: Did the game end with a classic, “4th-and-1 on the goal line for all the marbles” type play? Or did the outcome swing on a massive play within the final 4–5 minutes?
HONORABLE MENTIONS (in no particular order):
Week 13, 2011: @ New York Giants
2010 Divisional Playoff: @ Atlanta Falcons
Week 13, 2015: @ Detroit Lions
2016 Wild Card Playoff: vs. New York Giants
Week 6, 2012: @ Houston Texans
Week 10, 2014: vs. Chicago Bears
Week 7, 2019: vs. Oakland Raiders
Week 16, 2016: vs. Minnesota Vikings
2009 Wild Card Playoff: @ Arizona Cardinals
2015 Divisional Playoff: @ Arizona Cardinals
Week 8, 2021: @ Arizona Cardinals
2014 NFC Championship: @ Seattle Seahawks
Week 6, 2014: @ Miami Dolphins
Week 3, 2021: @ San Francisco 49ers
Week 15, 2009: @ Pittsburgh Steelers
10. Week 1, 2011: vs. New Orleans Saints
STORYLINE: 3 SEASON STAKES: 3 OPPONENT: 5 ENDING: 4
The Packers were the reigning Super Bowl Champions, and this was the NFL Season Kickoff for 2011. The last two Super Bowl winners (Saints in 2009) would play under the lights at Lambeau Field.
Off-the-field, the NFL had just gone through the 2011 player lockout during CBA negotiations with the players’ union. The Saints’ legendary quarterback, Drew Brees, had made a big deal of holding “player-only workouts” to supplement the lack of OTAs and minicamps. The national sports media considered this a sign of Brees’ leadership, and soon began questioning the leadership of any players not advocating “player-only workouts.”
Aaron Rodgers was one of those not calling for workouts.
In the post-game press conference, Rodgers let the media have it multiple times:
“It was a good start for us,” Rodgers said, sarcastically. “I was going to ask myself, what would have happened if we had had offseason workouts? I mean, could we have started any faster and scored more points tonight?”
“I’ve been thinking about this for a month,” Rodgers told Michael Silver of Yahoo! Sports. “I’ve been thinking about winning this game, and what I was gonna say afterward. Cause I’ve got a little something. For everyone.”
On the field, this game was the big stage debut of rookie Randall Cobb, who returned a crazy kickoff for a touchdown and caught another while running the wrong route. The game was the first demonstration of Green Bay’s offensive firepower in the franchise’s only 15–1 season, and it also was the first glimpse at the porous defense that would eventually be their downfall.
9. Week 5, 2017: @ Dallas Cowboys
STORYLINE: 3 SEASON STAKES: 3 OPPONENT: 5 ENDING: 5
One week before breaking his collarbone in Minnesota, Aaron Rodgers was well on his way to a third MVP in 2017 (it ended up going to Tom Brady).
This was Jordy Nelson’s last season in Green Bay, and it was the year that Davante Adams began to look like a superstar. In fact, part of the reason new GM Brian Gutekunst let Nelson go after 2017 was concern that Rodgers would stunt Adams’ growth by force-feeding Nelson.
This was also the season of Martellus Bennett, who Green Bay signed in the offseason as a replacement for departed tight end Jared Cook. In Week 5, Bennett was still playing hard, and has a terrific outstretched catch down the sideline at the start of the second half. After Rodgers’ season-ending injury a week later, Bennett notoriously gave up on the team by faking an injury, forcing his release, and then signing and playing with Tom Brady and the New England Patriots in the Super Bowl (because injuries don’t exist in the Super Bowl).
One more bit of story going into this game was cornerback Damarious Randall, who had ended the previous week in the locker room after being sent off by head coach Mike McCarthy. He would have a pick-six against the Cowboys in this game. Looking back, a lot of cracks were emerging in 2017 that would eventually fall apart the following year in 2018, when McCarthy was fired mid-season.
Week 5 was a rematch of 2016’s epic showdown in the NFC Divisional Playoff when Rodgers threw that miraculous pass to Jared Cook to set up the game-winning field goal. Dallas knew that their only chance of winning the game was to keep Rodgers off the field with ball control and chewing clock. They did a great job, and this was the best Dak Prescott ever looked playing against the Packers.
However, just like in the playoffs the season before, Rodgers was given the ball with just over a minute left in the game, down by three. The third down run on the final drive where he eludes stud tackle David Irving is the truly remarkable play of the game, for me.
8. Week 17, 2014: vs. Detroit Lions
STORYLINE: 5 SEASON STAKES: 5 OPPONENT: 4 ENDING: 5
The stakes were clear: winner of the game would win the NFC North and the #2 seed in the NFC playoffs. But Aaron Rodgers was struggling from a tear in his left calf suffered the week before in Tampa Bay.
The 2014 Detroit Lions were the best Lions squad ever in the Aaron Rodgers era. Matthew Stafford, Calvin Johnson, Reggie Bush, Eric Ebron, Ndamokung Suh, and Golden Tate were just some of the marquee names, and they had pushed the Packers to the final game of the season to decide who owned the division.
This game had everything: a blocked field goal, a safety, a punt return for a touchdown, and some of the best, bruising runs of Eddie Lacy’s career.
With 2:30 remaining in the first half, Rodgers scrambled and tossed a touchdown to Randall Cobb to put the Packers up 14–0, but came up lame on that left calf and collapsed. It looked like the magical, storybook season that was 2014 was going to be over. The division, the playoffs, everything… gone.
Until the second half.
After a brief spell by backup quarterback Matt Flynn, Green Bay’s lead had evaporated, 14–14. Aaron Rodgers returned to the game, operating almost exclusively out of the gun formation, which would allow him to pass and hand off with minimal movement.
But Rodgers didn’t stand still the whole game. He even performed a gutsy quarterback sneak for a touchdown with 8:50 to go in the game, something he rarely does even when healthy.
The biggest drama of the game was the continued dirty play by Ndamokung Suh. In the fourth quarter, knowing Rodgers was playing with an injured leg, Suh stepped on him with his cleats. This resulted in Suh being suspended by the league for the Lions’ Wild Card Playoff game against the Dallas Cowboys the following week (the Lions lost that game).
7. Week 13, 2014: vs. New England Patriots
STORYLINE: 5 SEASON STAKES: 4 OPPONENT: 5 ENDING: 4
This was the first time Mike McCarthy and Aaron Rodgers faced off against Bill Belichick and Tom Brady at Lambeau Field. And it was a doozy.
These New England Patriots would eventually go on to win the Super Bowl that year over the Seattle Seahawks. Brady, Julian Edelman and Rob Gronkowski were at the peak of their powers.
According to ESPN’s Mike Reiss, Patriots beat reporter:
What made the 2014 game between Belichick’s Patriots and McCarthy’s Packers so unique was New England’s unconventional defensive approach. Intent on not allowing quarterback Aaron Rodgers to extend plays by breaking the pocket, Belichick had his defenders sink at the line of scrimmage and essentially mirror Rodgers.
That often gave Rodgers extended time to throw — during one play he held the ball for more than 10 seconds — and forced cornerbacks to cover longer by using a “plaster” technique of mirroring pass-catchers. Rodgers, who led the Packers to a 26–21 victory, noted that it was a different approach compared to what he usually saw.
On defense, the Patriots had seasoned veteran Derrell Revis at cornerback, and in the week prior to the game, there was a lot of talk in the national media about “Revis Island” returning at Lambeau Field (at that time, Revis was still arguably the best cover corner in the league).
Instead, Rodgers, Jordy Nelson and rookie Davante Adams made mincemeat of Revis. With only seconds to go in the first half, on 3rd-and-2, Rodgers hit Jordy Nelson on a crossing route in stride and Nelson took it to the house.
This gave the Packers a 23–14 lead which they never surrendered.
After the game Bill Belichick, a man who rarely praises other coaches, commended Mike McCarthy. “Mike’s one of the best coaches I’ve ever gone up against.”
As recently as this year, 2021, when asked about possibly facing McCarthy’s Dallas Cowboys, Belichick had this to say: “It hasn’t been very often, and I’m happy about that. I wouldn’t want to play Mike twice a year. … Mike’s teams are sound fundamentally. You gotta go out there and play well to beat them. They don’t beat themselves.”
6. Week 1, 2018: vs. Chicago Bears
STORYLINE: 5 SEASON STAKES: 4 OPPONENT: 4 ENDING: 5
The 2018 season was a terrible one for the Green Bay Packers. Things would get so bad that Mike McCarthy, the head coach who led the team to a 125–77- 2 record, 9 postseason berths and a Super Bowl victory during his tenure, would be fired midseason.
But the season opener was one for the ages.
The Chicago Bears were coming in with high expectations for the season after going all-in on a trade with the Oakland Raiders for the best defensive player in the league, Khalil Mack. Mack would absolutely wreck the first half of the game with a strip sack and pick six.
With 9:16 left in the first half, Aaron Rodgers was sacked by Mack and Roy Robertson Harris, and didn’t get up. He had suffered a tibial plateau fracture and a sprained MCL in his left knee, and was carted off with tears in his eyes.
It appeared the Packers’ season was over before it started.
Somehow, Rodgers returned at the start of the second half. With his team down 20–3 in the fourth quarter, the win probability for Green Bay was 6.2%. After scoring two touchdowns (one to Geronimo Allison, the other to Davante Adams), the Packers had widdled the deficit to 6.
On third-and-ten, with 2:39 to go in the game and no timeouts left, Rodgers passed the ball to Randall Cobb at the Packers’ 40 yard line, and he took it to the house for 75 yards. It was gorgeous.
All Chicago needed was a field goal to win the game. They had 1:46 left and two timeouts to work with. The Packers defense held them and stopped them on fourth down only to find that star linebacker Clay Matthews had given the Bears a gift — an egregious 15 yard roughing the passer penalty.
The Packers would have to stop the Bears a second time to secure the win, and with a strip sack on fourth down by OLB Nick Perry, they did.
5. Week 7, 2010: vs. Minnesota Vikings
STORYLINE: 5 SEASON STAKES: 5 OPPONENT: 4 ENDING: 5
This was Brett Favre’s last time playing football at Lambeau Field. Unfortunately it was for the Minnesota Vikings.
After taking the Vikings to the brink of the Super Bowl in 2009 (and beating his former teammates twice on the way), the old gunslinger returned to Green Bay one more time.
This game became the subject of a feature documentary I directed in 2012 called Last Day at Lambeau, which you can watch for free here.
The stakes were about getting ahead of the Vikings in the division race, but also, in retrospect, they had to win this game to make the playoffs. At the end of 2010, the Packers needed to win their final two regular season games to become the #6 seed en route to Super Bowl XLV. If they had lost this game against Favre’s Vikings, a division opponent at home, the Super Bowl season would surely have been derailed.
The Vikings were not the juggernaut they had been in 2009, but they still had Favre, Adrian Peterson, Percy Harvin, Randy Moss, Visanthe Shiancoe, Jared Allen, and Ryan Longwell.
Emotionally, what Packers fans wanted more than anything, was to sack Favre and to get an interception. They ended up picking him off three times, one of which was taken to the house by linebacker Desmond Bishop.
With 1:06 left in the game, the Packers were leading 28–24, but Favre was on the move. Adrian Peterson caught a pass and took it to the Green Bay 15 yard line.
After a couple penalties, the Vikings were pushed back to the 36 yard line. On 1st and 30, Favre pump-faked and fired a dart to Percy Harvin in the back of the end zone for a touchdown with only 48 seconds remaining.
But Percy didn’t get both feet down, so on review, the Packers breathed a sigh of relief.
On 4th and 15, Favre took one last shot to Randy Moss in the end zone, but overthrew him. The Packers had vanquished the ghost of their former champion, allowing a new story to be written about a new quarterback who would break nearly all of Favre’s records (except interceptions).
4. Super Bowl XLV: vs. Pittsburgh Steelers
STORYLINE: 5 SEASON STAKES: 5 OPPONENT: 5 ENDING: 4
How can the Super Bowl possibly be so low on the list, you ask?
Only because the ending wasn’t as insane as #3–1.
The storyline was obvious: a new Millennial generation of Packers players and Packers fans marking their personal histories with the team the same way Generation X did with Super Bowl XXXI in 1996.
The stakes can’t get any higher, and the opponent was formidable. Ben Roethlisberger’s Pittsburgh Steelers (coached by Mike Tomlin) had beaten the Packers by one point a season earlier in another thriller for the ages (you’ll find it in my honorable mentions), and in Super Bowl XLIII, Roethlisberger gave the NFL possibly the greatest finish in history.
The Steelers had been to the Super Bowl two years earlier. The Packers were all newbies.
But the results on the field turned differently in Super Bowl XLV. By the end of the first half, the Packers had intercepted Big Ben twice and scored three touchdowns to put them up 21–10. In the process, however, they would lose both star wideout Donald Driver and team captain cornerback Charles Woodson to injuries.
After the Steelers scored 14 unanswered points to make it 21–17, in the fourth quarter, Clay Matthews made the defensive play of the game when he forced a fumble from Rashad Mendenhaal on the Green Bay 31 yard line. The ball was recovered by Desmond Bishop and the Packers went on to score, making it 28–17.
But Big Ben and the Steelers have been here before. They roar back and score a touchdown with 7:30 left in the game and convert a two-point conversion to make it a three point game.
The offensive play of the game occurred on the next drive as Green Bay tried to kill the clock. On third and ten from their own 25 yard line, Rodgers fired one of the finest passes of his career millimeters over Ike Taylor’s outstretched fingers to receiver Greg Jennings to keep the drive alive. If they hadn’t converted that third down, we would perhaps have been talking about a Super Bowl loss, as all the momentum was with Pittsburgh.
3. 2016 Divisional Playoff: @ Dallas Cowboys
STORYLINE: 5 SEASON STAKES: 5 OPPONENT: 5 ENDING: 5
2016 was supposed to be the Dallas Cowboys’ year.
They had the hottest team in the league the entire year. They’d secured the #1 seed in the NFC behind the strength of their surprise star quarterback Dak Prescott and their Rookie of the Year running back Ezekiel Elliott. They were supposed to go all the way.
The #4 seed Packers had beaten a fairly lowly New York Giants team at Lambeau Field in the Wild Card round, and it was roundly expected they would be put in their place in Arlington.
As for the Cowboys, they were only two seasons removed from being eliminated by Green Bay in the 2014 playoffs in the “Dez Bryant Catch” Game (see #2 on this list, hehe). Dallas fans were looking forward to revenge.
Except everyone forgot Aaron Rodgers owns AT&T Stadium.
On his first drive, Rodgers hit tight end Richard Rodgers (and gave linebacker Sean Lee a shave in the process) for an early touchdown to make it 7–3. Late in the first half it was 21–3. By halftime, the Cowboys had regained some momentum to make it 21–13.
Green Bay got the ball to start the second half, and on the first play, Rodgers hit Randall Cobb with one of the best throws of his career (but only the second best throw of the game). At the end of the drive, Rodgers performed one of the best play action fakes of his career and tossed an easy six to Jared Cook to make it 28–13.
On the ensuing Dallas drive, cornerback Micah Hyde read the play and intercepted a pass from Prescott to halt a promising drive into Green Bay territory. However, Rodgers would throw his first interception to Cowboys safety Jeff Heath a few plays later.
Eventually, Dallas would tie the game 28–28 in the fourth. With 1:35 left in the game, kicker Mason Crosby made it 31–28 Green Bay. With 0:40 left, the Cowboys tied it again, 31–31. This all set the stage for one of the all-time greatest Aaron Rodgers drives.
With 0:12 remaining in the game, Rodgers took the snap at the Packers’ 42 yard line and threw the most insane pass he ever threw 35 yards down the left sideline to tight end Jared Cook, who somehow kept both feet in bounds.
Mason Crosby kicked a 51 yard field goal to win the game, 34–31, knocking out the #1 seed, hottest-team-in-the-league Dallas Cowboys in their own house.
2. 2014 Divisional Playoffs: vs. Dallas Cowboys
STORYLINE: 5 SEASON STAKES: 5 OPPONENT: 5 ENDING: 5
Was it a catch, or wasn’t it?
Mike McCarthy, the Packers’ coach in 2014, was asked by the Dallas press when he was hired as the Cowboys’ coach in 2019 whether or not Dez caught the ball…
The “Dez Bryant Catch” was the climax to a great, great playoff game with lots of interesting storylines.
The Green Bay Packers were the #2 seed, and were 8–0 at home the entire season. The Dallas Cowboys were the #3 seed, and were 8–0 on the road all season. Something had to give.
Aaron Rodgers was playing through a torn left calf, so almost the entire offensive game plan went through the gun formation to limit Rodgers’ movement. Tony Romo was a Burlington, Wisconsin native who grew up watching the Packers, and now he was playing his first ever playoff game at Lambeau Field.
The national media hoped for Ice Bowl-like temperatures, but it was a balmy 24 degrees at kickoff. It was and still is one of the prettiest looking Packers games to watch on television, with that bright golden winter light, gleaming piles of plowed snow on the sidelines, and thick clouds of breath coming from all the players on the field.
Unlike the rematch in the 2016 playoffs, this game was led by the Cowboys for most of the clock. They took the lead in the second quarter, 14–7, which was the first time the Packers trailed at home since Week 2. Dallas might have made the lead 10 or 14 points by halftime if not for a hilarious comedy of errors:
Tight end Jason Witten got a phantom first down from the officials, after which the Cowboys called a time out to conserve clock. During the time out, the officials reviewed the tape and took back the first down, making it third and 1. The Cowboys didn’t convert, so they brought out Dan Bailey and he shanked the 50-yard field goal attempt. The 7-point lead was maintained.
But Rodgers wasn’t satisfied with that. He threw a ridiculous pass to Randall Cobb (how many times will that phrase be said in this list?) to put the Packers in position for a field goal, making it 14–10 going into half.
With 11:08 remaining in the third quarter, Romo handed the ball off to Offensive Player of the Year running back Demarco Murray, who led the league in rushing yards and rushing touchdowns that year. There was nothing but green ahead of him. He was going to score and make it 21–10 Cowboys, if not for Packers free agent acquisition OLB Julius Peppers stripping the ball.
It was perhaps the most important defensive play by the Packers since Clay Matthews’ fumble in Super Bowl XLV four years earlier, because the Packers took the ball and scored another field goal, making it a one-point game, 14–13.
The Cowboys would score on the ensuing drive, making it 21–13. But this game was also the coming-out party for rookie wide receiver Davante Adams (7 rec, 117 yards, 1 TD), who caught a touchdown pass for 46 yards, juking a defender out of his boots in the process.
Dallas led by one point heading into the fourth quarter. With 9:13 remaining in the game, Rodgers fired another one of his all-time passes to tight end Richard Rodgers in the end zone, just barely past criss-crossing Cowboys defenders in the end zone… all while hopping on one leg.
Now it’s the Cowboys’ turn to try to erase the deficit. On the ensuing drive, with 4:30 left on the clock, on 4th and 2, Romo goes for it all. He chucks a deep pass down the left sideline to Dez Bryant, who catches the ball at the 3 yard line. However, he doesn’t maintain control of the ball through the process of the catch (the NFL rule in 2014), so Mike McCarthy challenges.
It is by far the greatest challenge in Green Bay Packers history. The officials overturn the call, the Packers get the ball back and run out the clock with a combination of Eddie Lacy bruising rushes and converting passes to Randall Cobb.
This game is barely more entertaining than the 2016 rematch because of two factors: frigid Lambeau Field is prettier to watch, and the game was much more in doubt throughout in 2014.
1. Week 17, 2013: @ Chicago Bears
STORYLINE: 5 SEASON STAKES: 5 OPPONENT: 5 ENDING: 5
Finally, the #1 most entertaining game of Aaron Rodgers’ Packers career so far.
Aaron Rodgers had missed the majority of the season with a broken collarbone he suffered on Week 8 against the Chicago Bears at Lambeau Field. Prior to that, receiver Randall Cobb suffered a broken fibula against the Ravens.
The Packers struggled to hold on to their season with backup Matt Flynn and receiver Jordy Nelson the ensuing 7 games and entered Week 17 with a 7–7–1 record.
They had a shot to make the playoffs after all. If the Packers beat Bears at Soldier Field, they would win the division and host a playoff game in the Wild Card round. To make it even more dramatic: both Aaron Rodgers and Randall Cobb could play in the game.
This game was only possible because the Bears lost to the Eagles the week prior. This kept the division in range for the Packers, who had lost to the visiting Steelers and thought their season was over. But the football gods wanted to see a grudge match for all the marbles at Soldier Field.
On his first drive, Rodgers threw a pick in the red zone, which has only happened seven times in his entire career. The Bears scored on the next drive to go up 7–0. Next Packers drive, Rodgers threw another interception off the hands of Jordy Nelson. It did not start well.
With 3:28 remaining in the first half, Rodgers seemed to throw an incompletion, but no referees blew the whistle — it was ruled a fumble! After some urging by Rodgers, wide receiver Jarrett Boykin picked up the ball and ran into the end zone for a touchdown while everyone else on the field stood still. It’s still one of the most surreal plays in recent Packers history.
After a hard-fought game with multiple exciting lead changes throughout, the score was 28–27 Chicago. It finally came down to the greatest fourth quarter drive of Aaron Rodgers’ career, which happened to include three fourth down conversions.
The first conversion came on 4th and 1 with 4:43 remaining in the game. It was a one-yard handoff to fullback John Kuhn.
The second conversion was 4th and 1 at the 2:00 warning. Rodgers hit Jordy Nelson on a five yard curl route.
The next play, everything could’ve ended when the ball was snapped before Rodgers was ready for it. Luckily, his reflexes caught it, and the play resulted in just an incompletion.
Finally, it came down to the play: 4th and 8 from the Bears’ 48 yard line. 46 seconds to go in the game. One timeout left, so if they didn’t convert, the game (and their season) would be over.
The ball was snapped and Rodgers instantly felt pressure coming from Bears DE Julius Peppers to his left. Fullback John Kuhn got barely enough of Peppers in a block to drop him to the ground, and Rodgers skipped away to his left.
Downfield, he caught a glimpse of Randall Cobb waving his arm, signaling a broken coverage in Chicago’s secondary. Rodgers tossed the pass and the rest is history.
How poetic it was to knock out the very team that injured Rodgers in Week 8 with the unlikeliest of touchdowns to the receiver who also had missed the majority of the season. If someone wrote it in fiction, it would be too perfect to believe.
How Will the Story End?
These exciting, memorable games are part of our collective memory as Green Bay Packers fans. We remember where we were and who we were with when these moments occurred. They’re our history as much as they are Packers history.
Now we get to find out how the story ends. Is this Rodgers’ last season in Green Bay? Will they finally get to a second Super Bowl? Will any of the three possible remaining postseason games end up on this list?
It feels like each year, Rodgers has a phrase that becomes the theme for that season. “R-E-L-A-X” in 2014, “Run the Table” in 2016, etc. No matter how this season ends, this year, I think it’s “Savor the Moment.”
“You have to savor these a little bit,” Rodgers said after securing the 2021 NFC North Division Championship. “Enjoy it, savor it, savor these moments. These are special moments.”
