Terry Bradshaw Goes Scorched Earth on Aaron Rodgers AND the Steelers for Still Thinking About Signing Him

Aaron Rapoport. Getty Images.

It's a commonly held belief that growing old is only good when compared to your other option. That gradually your life becomes all about which body parts aren't working the way they used to, doctor's appointments, conversations about your prostate health, and falling asleep in your chair in front of the TV shows where all the ads are some forgotten celebrity even older than you telling you to put all your savings into physical gold. 

But that's not the whole story. Not by a damned sight. Getting old can be liberating. It can be the Lame Duck Presidency of life, where you're not running for reelection so you get to say and do anything you want. Where you can spend all your days coming up with new and ever more inventive fucks to not give. 

Consider Terry Bradshaw. He's 76 years old. A legend. Still the face of the Pittsburgh Steelers franchise, even 42 years after his retirement. Despite the fact in his playing days it was said of him "He couldn't spell 'cat' if you spotted him the C and the A," he's been a constant presence on network TV since the day he walked away from the field at the age of 35. And by golly, he's earned the right to NOT filter himself, mince words or feel like he's got to play nice with others.

So with his former team still doing an elaborate mating dance with pro football's most famous free agent quarterback, even though we're practically into June, Bradshaw is not holding anything back. And it's a beautiful thing to behold:

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The full quote from the podcast:

"That's a joke. That to me is just a joke. What are you gonna do? Bring him in for one year, are you kidding me? That guy needs to stay in California. Go somewhere and chew on bark and whisper to the gods out there."

That is the liberating aspect of being 76. Of not having to worry about how awkward it might be for your bosses at Fox if Rodgers does come back and they're trying to hype the ratings for a 4pm game. Bradshaw earned the right to speak his mind by surviving 14 years under Chuck Noll. In an age when dicking around in late May deciding what your future will bring was unheard of. Because to do so instead of going full pads at two-a-days in the spring meant you were about to embark on a career of selling Term Life policies to rich dentists. Which at times must've sounded like a better option than facing another autumn of getting your brains bashed in by John Matuszak and Otis Sistrunk because it was legal to hit quarterbacks back in your day. 

For the record, Bradshaw went onto blame the Steelers for creating this mess instead of investing in a guy they already had:

"I liked Kenny Pickett. I liked him at Pitt. I know him, I know what he's like. When they got him to Pittsburgh, they didn't protect him, they didn't get him an offensive line. They wanted to run the football, but they didn't have an offensive line that could protect and they didn't have weapons. He had no wide receivers to speak of. 

"Then they throw a kid in there for two years and you've got an offense that doesn't fit and doesn't work, and they can't run because their offensive line's not even good enough for a run blocking team. Now, they're saying Kenny Pickett is a failure. He wasn't a failure, the Steelers were a failure." 

Harsh words, but 100% honest. And it's got to be galling to a guy like him to see the franchise he helped make great reduced to pinning their hopes on getting a 41 year old Rodgers to be interested in football again. Though for the record, it's pretty clear Bradshaw never liked Rodgers:

OK, so this hasn't aged well. Not to fight the same battle from half a decade ago, but that "dewormer for cattle" Bradshaw is ranting about won its creators the Nobel Prize, is on the WHO's Essential Medicines List, and is so safe it's given to pregnant women. But Bradshaw being wrong is beside the point. What matters here is his utter contempt for Rodgers and his unwillingness to make any attempt to hide it. 

In a way, this makes me want to root for the Steelers to sign Rodgers. His arch-nemesis sitting on the Fox panel every Sunday, seething at the thought of watching the uniform he wore proudly being desecrated by this man. It would make Steelers football fun again in a way it hasn't been for far too long. Make it so, Pittsburgh.