Greg Jennings turned quite few heads a few days into free agency when he decided to leave the Green Bay Packers and join their hated rival Minnesota Vikings with a new 5-year, $48 million deal. An interesting move from Jennings, who goes from catching passes from perennial MVP candidate Aaron Rodgers to catching balls from struggling young quarterback Christian Ponder.
To his credit though, Jennings appeared to have done his homework on the move and talked about it via Min.scout.com. He also let it be known that another former Packer who became a Viking helped convince Jennings that he should take his talents to Minneapolis.
“Literally, as I got off the plane and (offensive coordinator Bill) Musgrave walked up to me, I’m on the phone with Brett,” Jennings said.“I spoke with Brett two or three times throughout this process. He shot me straight. I knew if there was one person that would shoot straight and tell me exactly what I wanted to hear and things I possibly didn’t want to hear, it would be Brett. He did that for me.”
“Mr. Spielman, Coach Frazier and the Wilf family, they were more in tune to me playing in this color and with this organization than Green Bay was,” Jennings said. “The decision was made and I’m excited about it and, even more so than me being excited about it, my family is excited about it. That always makes it easy.”
Jennings also talked about the transition from Aaron Rodgers to Christian Ponder.
“I was able to see him make all throws,” Jennings said. “He has a very strong arm. He can move within the pocket. If there’s one thing I would say, he probably, as every young quarterback, can work on accuracy outside the pocket. But that will come. To his credit, he had every right to be frustrated with the pieces that were around him – no disrespect with Percy (Harvin) going down and him having a young group of guys around him. He had every right to be a little frustrated, but he played well with what he had and he was able to have success.”
The strained relationship between Brett Favre and the Green Bay Packers has been well documented so I have to wonder if helping Jennings go to Minnesota was Favre’s way of sticking it to his former team.
One thing I do know, is that the match-ups between the Vikings and Packers this season just got all the more interesting.