Aaron Rodgers left France with a win, a milestone, and a message for the NFL’s power brokers.
The Pittsburgh Steelers beat the New Orleans Saints 16-10 on Sunday at the Stade de France in Saint-Denis, wrapping up the league’s first-ever regular-season game in France. Rodgers threw a touchdown pass in the back-and-forth matchup, and that throw pushed him into sole possession of third place on the NFL’s all-time touchdown passes list. He now has 540 career touchdown passes, breaking his tie with Peyton Manning.
The crowd reflected the scale of the moment, with a record-setting 78,488 ticketed fans packed into the Stade de France. But Rodgers didn’t spend his postgame time soaking in the spectacle. Instead, he used his podium session to take aim at the NFL’s approach to international games and the way the league handled the idea in previous bargaining talks.
Rodgers said he believed the league missed a chance to build something bigger. In his view, the best setup would have been an international week where every team played overseas during the same stretch, paired with a universal bye week. He said that idea came up in collective bargaining negotiations before the owners moved away from it in favor of adding a 17th game.
“There was talk about doing a week, an international week, where you had games in 16 different places, and you just added an extra bye week,” Rodgers began.
“So you play 16 regular season, you have two bye weeks, one of those weeks would’ve been an international week, I think it would’ve been phenomenal for the game. Owners wanted to push for 17 games for the extra revenue and because they care so much about player safety, but it would’ve been nice.”
He kept going, arguing there’s real room for the league to grow if it leans into the international side of the schedule the right way.
“I think there’s great opportunities for expansion in those things. It’d be nice to see them have an international week, because I think it’s great for the game and expansion of the game.
I wish there was a mandate, though, from the league - and they would have to open up their pocketbooks too, you know maybe they’re a little tight on money and stuff - I think they should mandate every team coming over Sunday or Monday to really enjoy the culture of the place you’re going. You can do events in those cities and outreach stuff and community work, but they won’t because they’re a little tight [on money].”
Rodgers’ final season means he won’t be around if the league ever does change course on that idea.
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