GREEN BAY — Aaron Rodgers doesn't know what Greg Jennings might say to him when the two former teammates run into each other at some point during Sunday night's game between his Green Bay Packers and Jennings' Minnesota Vikings.
But if there comes a time when the two find themselves in an awkward face-to-face moment at Mall of America Field at the Metrodome, well, Rodgers knows what he wants to say to Jennings, who spent part of his offseason criticizing his former quarterback after signing a five-year, $47.5 million free-agent deal with the Packers' NFC North rivals.
He's not sure what Jennings might say to him, but that's OK, he said.
"I'm not going to approach it with any bitterness or any malice towards him," Rodgers said during his weekly radio show Tuesday on 540 ESPN and ESPNWisconsin.com . "I choose to remember the great times that we had together, the great wins, the incredible moments. That's what I like to focus on.
"Regardless of what he wants to remember, (those are) the things, the positive things that I focus on."
Jennings' running offseason commentary on his former team and quarterback began when he called Rodgers "the guy they have now" in an interview with the St. Paul Pioneer Press in early June, then went on SiriusXM NFL Radio and made similar comments shortly thereafter. Jennings then appeared on ESPN's First Take and again took his former quarterback to task ("You get respect when you give respect") and said that one of the reasons he left Green Bay was to give other receivers a chance to spread their wings.
In a Minneapolis Star Tribune interview in July , Jennings compared the Packers' environment to that of the Vikings and called the Packers' approach "cookie-cutter" and said players "walk on egg shells" in Green Bay. In the full interview published in the newspaper the following Sunday , Jennings claimed Rodgers made it about him and not the team.
"Don't get me wrong, '12' is a great person," Jennings said in the interview. "But when you hear all positives, all positives, all positives all the time, it's hard for you to sit down when one of your teammates says, 'Man, come on, you've got to hold yourself accountable for this.' It's hard for someone to say that now because all they've heard is I'm doing it the right way; I'm perfect. In actuality, we all have flaws."
Jennings later issued an apology ("I don't really recall saying anything negative about Aaron or anyone over there, but hey, I apologize") at training camp after Vikings coach Leslie Frazier gave him a talking-to . Jennings' last noteworthy public comment came in a KFAN radio when he claimed the Packers "brainwashed" players into thinking their franchise was better than everyone else.
"I think we're definitely past all that stuff," Rodgers said Tuesday. "He's with them, and I'm focused on the guys we got and getting those guys ready to play."
The Packers enter the game 4-2 and atop the division, while the Vikings are coming off a Monday Night Football loss to the New York Giants and are 1-5, in last place in the division. Jennings has played with as many quarterbacks (three — Christian Ponder, Matt Cassel and Josh Freeman) in six games as he played with in seven seasons in Green Bay (Brett Favre, Rodgers and Matt Flynn).
Jennings is scheduled to speak with reporters who regularly cover the Packers in a conference call Wednesday. Each week, reporters do conference calls with the Packers opponent's head coach and a selected player.
Jason Wilde wrote: