It’s been three years since Aaron Rodgers looked around Lambeau Field alongside his teammate Randall Cobb and walked down the tunnel together. Now heading into the 2026 preseason with the Pittsburgh Steelers, with the same head coach who helped build his Packers’ legacy, A-Rod has a chance to play against his old team Thursday night. His only regret – location.

The Green Bay Packers are taking on the Steelers at Acrisure Stadium this Thursday for their first preseason game. While it’s still unclear whether Rodgers will play in the game or not, he wishes the game were happening at Lambeau Field. That’s the message he relayed in a Zoom meeting with several reporters.

“Aaron Rodgers says he was ‘really hoping’ this preseason game was at Lambeau after last year’s game in Pittsburgh,” noted The Athletic’s Matt Schneidman on X. “Said he’s ‘bummed out’ it’s not. Wanted to play in Lambeau, visit his old trainer’s room, visit his favorite restaurant Chives, and get a quick nine in at GBCC.”

Through his two years with the New York Jets and last season with the Steelers, Rodgers never got a chance to play at Lambeau. Last season’s schedule gave Rodgers a home game against the team that once drafted him. What’s more, after this preseason game, the Packers aren’t facing the Steelers again in the regular season. Considering this is Rodgers’ last NFL season, that means he’ll never get to play in Lambeau again.

Now, head coach Mike McCarthy had noted that he’d like Rodgers to be on the field for 30 or 40 snaps this preseason. While Rodgers has said he’ll play if McCarthy wants him to play, AR8 has also clarified his stance on preseason games in a recent presser.

“Preseason’s a lot different. Teams don’t run anything anymore; they just really don’t,” Rodgers said, via Steelers reporter Chris Adamski. “Even joint practices, I mean, the first year we were doing them, it was fun. Because you got to play a team that wasn’t gonna play how they’re playing in the preseason. They’re gonna show you a lot of different things they’re working on. It was like a real day at camp.

“But as that got on, it just stopped being like that, just turned into fights. And nobody showed anything because somebody’s brother is on the staff and they might show them the film and blah, blah, blah. So I think those are a waste of a day. And I think preseason football is good to see guys with the pads on, under the lights, how they react to the nerves. But it’s not real regular season football.”

But if this preseason opener was happening in Lambeau, Rodgers might have seen things differently. In that same interview, per, WBAY-TV’s Dave Schroeder, Rodgers also looked back on the importance of building relationships with people – something he tied back to Green Bay.

“If you miss out on the relationships in this game, you’re kind of missing the whole gist of what we’re actually doing,” Rodgers said. “Obviously, we’re judged on our wins and losses and paid based off our production. But the thing that actually lasts the longest is those people that impact your life. And there’s been a lot of those people, especially in Green Bay, that had a huge impact on my life. So think about those people a lot.”

In Aaron Rodgers’ first game as a starter at Lambeau Field (September 8, 2008), he scored two touchdowns (one passing, another rushing), and did a Lambeau leap into the fans screaming with joy. Had this preseason opener happened at Lambeau, Rodgers might have gotten the chance to walk out that tunnel once again, see the locker room that was his home for eighteen long seasons. That’s the regret he faces now, and perhaps the lost hopes of doing another Lambeau leap.