WASHINGTON (TND) — Aaron Rodgers, considered a favorite to win the National Football League’s MVP award, is being counted out by one of the award’s judges who thinks the Green Bay Packers quarterback is a “jerk.”
One of the 50 members of the media given a vote in the official NFL MVP race, Hub Arkush, went on 670 The Score and said he already decided he would not be giving his vote to Rodgers despite him potentially being the most valuable player “on the field,” according to Pro Football Talk.
I don’t think you can be the biggest jerk in the league and punish your team, and your organization and your fan base the way he did and be the Most Valuable Player,” Arkush said. “Has he been the most valuable on the field? Yeah, you could make that argument, but I don’t think he is clearly that much more valuable than Jonathan Taylor or Cooper Kupp or maybe even Tom Brady. So from where I sit, the rest of it is why he’s not going to be my choice.
Arkush said he still thinks Rodgers will win the award, but “a lot of voters don’t approach it the way I do,” he said, “but others do, who I’ve spoken to.”
“There’s no guidelines,” Arkush continued. “We are told to pick the guy who we think is most valuable to his team. And I don’t think it says anywhere, ‘strictly on the field,’ although I do think he hurt his team on the field by the way he acted off the field. They’re going to get the No. 1 seed anyway, but what if the difference had come down to the Chiefs game, where he lied about being vaccinated, and they ended up getting beat?”
After testing positive for COVID-19 in early November, it was leaked Rodgers was not vaccinated. The leak of his vaccination status led to a flurry of criticism arguing he misled the public after allegedly saying at the beginning of the season he had been immunized, according to The Athletic. Rodgers said he believed the backlash was the result of a “woke mob” and “cancel culture.”
I realize I’m in the crosshairs of the ‘woke’ mob right now, and before the final nail gets put in my ‘cancel culture’ basket, I think I’d like to set the record straight on so many of the blatant lies that are out there about myself right now,” Rodgers said in November after his vaccination status was revealed.
Rodgers explained he had not been vaccinated because he claimed to be allergic to one of the ingredients found in mRNA vaccines, like Pfizer and Moderna, and has been avoiding the non-mRNA Johnson & Johnson vaccine because of concerning complications he says others around him have experienced.
The Packers quarterback has gone on “The Pat McAfee Show” several times and discussed his frustrations regarding COVID-19 and the NFL’s response to it. He admitted on an appearance his vaccination status and off-the-field views about COVID-19 could very likely get in the way of him winning the league’s MVP. “Let’s not put the cart before the horse,” Rodgers warned host Pat McAfee, who was already calling Rodgers this year’s MVP.
