Aaron Rodgers already has statistics that would qualify him for enshrinement in the Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio. He has also been “on the bubble” over his desire to stay on as quarterback for the Green Bay Packers. Please note that this story has been updated to reflect the current news.

UPDATE: At the time this story was printed, the announcement was not yet out. CBSSports.com has reported that Aaron Rodgers is signing a $200 million deal for 4 years with the Green Bay Packers. The deal will make him the highest annual average salary in history even if the Mahomes package was more money in total for a longer-term. No official news announcement had been seen as of 12:30 pm Eastern time on the Packers’ news site and no announcement had been tweeted by Rodgers nor by the Packers’ official Twitter account.

The question to ask now is whether or not Green Bay can afford this big deal. If not, all the team has to do is go back to history and sell more stock to pay Aaron Rodgers.  As we have outlined, buying stock in the Green Bay Packers is not a real investment like buying a stock in the stock market. Green Bay has one of the smallest total markets as for the cities with other NFL teams as the U.S. Census Bureau counts just 107,395 residents for the city proper. Does that surprise anyone that Green Bay has one of the lowest payrolls as well?

It is easy to see how and why Green Bay would want to keep Rodgers in place as the 4-time MVP winner. At 38 now, his last season was equivalent to his prior two season with a 13-3 record each year. His completion percentage in the last two years has been above his career average of 65.3%. He passed for 37 TDs and gave up just 4 interceptions in 2021 and the prior year was 48 TDs and just 5 interceptions. And even now, he has been the league’s MVP for each of the last two years. And Rodgers now has 55,360 career passing yards, 449 TDs, a 65.3% completion percentage and only 93 career interceptions.

About all anyone can criticize about Rodgers’ offensive play is that his rushing yards, rushing first downs and rushing TDs are down. Then again, teams don’t want to pay this much out for a super-star quarterback to get hammered by 300-pound linemen and linebackers who love smashing QBs into the field.

According to the MGM website, the Dallas Cowboys had the highest 2021 payroll at $205.6 million. The Kansas City Chiefs were down at 21st place with a $184.8 million total payroll, and they have the largest football contract ever in a nearly $500 million deal for Patrick Mahomes through the rest of the decade with an annual value of about $45 million. Green Bay ranks 29th place out of the 32 NFL teams.

The figure that was already rumored was that Green Bay was prepared to offer as much as $50 million per year. That’s also what CBSSports has said is the annual value.

When investors buy shares in Apple, Microsoft, 3M, Verizon and most other great public companies, they are entitled to an actual piece of the company and they are entitled to votes. And while those votes are extremely limited on an individual ownership basis, they also come with rights to dividends. There was a harsh reality here in the actual terms of what “ownership” and “shares” really meant in Green Bay’s sixth stock offering late in 2020 here:

• Although Common Stock is capital stock of the Corporation, Common Stock does not constitute an investment in “stock” in the common sense of the term.
• Common Stock does not provide shareholders with any opportunity to participate in the economic performance of the Corporation because, among other things, no dividends or distributions upon liquidation can ever be paid to shareholders.

The last stock offering even contained this specific warning:

As a result, it is virtually impossible for anyone to realize a profit on a purchase of Common Stock or even to recoup the amount initially paid to acquire such Common Stock.

If Green Bay had to raise cash to help toward the longevity of Lambeau Field, the fans and “investors” may have to help pay this mega-salary. It sure makes you wonder what the other teams were willing to pay Aaron Rodgers to come lead their teams.