GREEN BAY — As expected, Aaron Rodgers was not at the mandatory mini-camp Tuesday.
The Packers hand out this roster each and every time you walk into practice. Nearly every player on this roster is on the field. The injured players and other players are accounted for, so only one is missing. And that is number 12, Aaron Rodgers.
"I'm not going to get into my conversations with Aaron and the communication," Matt LaFleur says. "And I think you know, I'm naturally optimistic. But you know again, we'll take it day by day and just do whatever we can to help remedy the situation."
"That is between another player, that which you have no control over. And the organization, which you have no control over," David Bakhtiari says. "So I learned that early on. I mean, I have a very close relationship with Aaron. But this is something that, is not, I'm not going to inject myself in the middle. This is between them and whatever they come to. I mean, hey, the show must go on."
"Obviously I'm praying that he comes back. We all want him back," Davante Adams says. "I think everybody in this building has that same mindset. But you know, I can only control what I can and I can't control any of what's going on with that situation. So you know, I'm just kind of sitting here, doing what I gotta do. When and if he's back, you know obviously we'll welcome him with open arms."
"The best thing for Aaron and I mean, people that know him well know that he just, he loves you when you have his back. So, I mean that's how I am naturally so it's not forced," Adams says. "But I got his back through everything so he knows at the end of the day, if there's ever a wonder of you know, he's lost a teammate or something because all this has come out. Like he knows where I stand. I'll stand on a mountain and scream on a mountain top you know, that I got his back."
"Aaron's gonna speak when he wants to speak," Bakhtiari says. "The Packers and the people making those decisions are going to speak to us when they want to speak to us and tell us what's going on. Other than that? That's behind closed doors and that's out of our control."
It's officially a stalemate.
"Man you can go back two years ago," Devin Funchess says. "When I was in Indy. And found out in the third or fourth quarter when Andrew Luck retired. So, going into this situation I've already learned from a situation by leaving a Hall of Fame quarterback who retired on me. So, to go into this situation it's the next man up. And everybody needs to stop thinking about everything and everybody needs to understand. Mind each other's business. And we play with the 11 that we have in the building."
For missing the mandatory mini-camp, Aaron Rodgers can be fined a little more than $15,000 per day, $93,000 in total. But that is forgivable and maybe an olive branch if Aaron Rodgers ever does come back to the Pack.
