Aaron Rodgers and Mike McCarthy spent 13 years together in Green Bay, so sideline friction isn’t new for them. But few expected it to resurface this early in Pittsburgh. Cameras caught Rodgers snapping at McCarthy over a slow play call, with the coach appearing to fire back, during the Steelers’ 27-24 loss to the Browns.
Watch What’s Trending Now!
Now, former NFL center Jeff Saturday is explaining what Rodgers was feeling in that moment.
“He’s still got the red heiny, and I’m trying to church it up because we’re on Disney, but he got the red Heiny, bro,” Saturday said on The Rich Eisen Show. “He’s still a little angry. And he should be, bro. You’re losing. Nobody wants to freaking lose, man.
“He wants to get to the line of scrimmage, you know? He is a throwback, for lack of a better term. He wants to get to the line of scrimmage like Peyton [Manning], Tom [Brady], Drew [Brees], and you know, all the guys who have played a long time because they want to assess and if they need to make a change, they feel like they have enough about them that they’re going to get themselves in the right play. If it comes in short, you lose that ability.”
That context helps explain what happened in the first quarter of the Steelers and Browns game on Thursday night, October 1. Rodgers got frustrated because the play was reaching him too slowly, and a microphone picked up his reaction.
He turned to the sideline and angrily said, “What the —k?” followed by, “Call it.”
The Prime Video cameras then cut to McCarthy, who seemed to say, “Fu—-g a—ole.”
“Communication sometimes is not the best choice of words, but everybody’s competing on the field,” McCarthy said later on. “I think, you know, what’s said on the field, the way I grew up in this game, you know, usually stays on the field. That’s not the case today. I understand that. But, yeah, any negative communication on my part, I wish I wouldn’t use those words.”
Rodgers addressed the moment with reporters on Wednesday. He said emotional exchanges between teammates are actually ‘positive’. When asked whether things were ironed out with McCarthy, he answered right away.
“It’s always ironed out,” Rodgers said.
Asked if that was the normal way the two communicate, he said, “Sometimes, yeah.” He also agreed that their style works.
“Yeah,” he said, “we’ve had a lot of success together,” he added.
Saturday landed in a similar place.
“Aaron’s Aaron, too, right?” he added. “He likes to get little jabs in when he can. So he’s putting a little salt on it, and I think Mike’s trying to calm it down. They’ll be fine, dude. They know what they want to do. I don’t know if they’re good enough to continue to win, but they’ve won a whole lot of games together, and I don’t think a little squabble on a Thursday night’s going to affect that.”
The numbers back him up. Before reuniting in Pittsburgh, McCarthy and Rodgers won 107 games together, playoffs included. They spent 13 seasons together in Green Bay, from 2006 to 2018 (McCarthy was fired midway through the 2018 season). In that span, Rodgers won the MVP title four times, and one Super Bowl title.
Clearly, this partnership goes well beyond one heated argument.
However, it wasn’t just Rodgers who was frustrated in that game. We also saw a visibly angry Cam Heyward and an exasperated TJ Watt, who borrowed a coach’s headset to talk to defensive coordinator Patrick Graham up in the booth.
The Steelers are now 2-2 and have loads to work through before their next matchup. However, it is time that the Rodgers-McCarthy rapport works to the team’s advantage.