Final scores of the games in which Aaron Rodgers tossed an INT in the last 5 minutes:
Opponent Score Pt Diff Driv Std Tm Int
Tampa Bay 30-21 -9 2:26 2:19
Atlanta 27-24 -3 7:19 4:42
Carolina 35-31 -4 1:30 1:19
Jacksonville 20-16 -4 1:56 0:46
A glance at the table above reveals that these drives started, on average, with 3:18 remaining. Moreover, that number is skewed by the Atlanta game; if we leave that game out, the average drops to 1:57. He threw the interceptions, on average, with 2:16 remaining; again leaving out the Atlanta game, that number drops to 1:28.
Bear in mind, too, that in each of these games except the Tampa Bay game, the Packers
lead or were tied after the possession prior to the possession in which Rodgers threw the interception.
Regardless of what skeptics want to believe, you cannot rationally expect a quarterback to consistently win games when he is forced to come from behind in the final 2 minutes of a game. Statistics prove that these kind of last-minute comeback victories are in fact the aberration, not the rule.
Favre himself only won about 25% of the games in which the Packers were tied or losing in the final 8 minutes of games. What frustrates me the most about this whole pointless conversation is we wouldn't even be having it had Favre not been lucky enough to make a huge impression on the desperate fans of Green Bay by coming from behind in his first game as a Packer.
Either way, the worst that can be said about Rodgers is that in 3 out of 10 losses this year (
in all of which he had lead the Packers to a tie or lead in the prior possession), Rodgers threw an INT in the last 5 minutes and the margin of defeat was 4 points or less. In other words, it could be argued that in 30% of the losses this season, Rodgers' throwing an INT in the closing minutes sealed the team's defeat. That doesn't even take into consideration the fact that in the Atlanta game, on the very next drive,
Rodgers threw a TD with 2:00 remaining to bring the team within 3.
Each of those losses was in a non-divisional game and thus had little or no impact on the playoff picture. Even if by some miracle, the Packers had scored a TD on each of those drives and won those games, they would have finished 9-7. End result: they would have watched the playoffs from home, same as the rest of us.
Forgive me if I happen not to hold those 3 interceptions against our first-year starter.
What I hope for next season is it won't come down to last-minute drives. I hope our offense won't go invisible in the 3rd quarter and we'll have our boots firmly on our opponents' necks by the time the 4th quarter rolls around. š