Aaron Rodgers, 42, Declares 2026 His Last Season, Crediting Coach Mike McCarthy & Mysterious ‘Wife’ For One More Run

Aaron Rodgers erased any lingering ambiguity about his football future this week, telling reporters at Pittsburgh Steelers training camp that his 22nd NFL season will unquestionably be his last.

Asked directly whether there was any chance he’d reconsider and return for 2027, the 42-year-old quarterback didn’t hedge. “No. Zero debate,” he said Tuesday. The blunt answer puts to rest months of speculation that has trailed Rodgers since he first floated retirement a year ago, only to change course once Pittsburgh made a coaching change over the offseason.

That coaching change, Rodgers explained, was the deciding factor in coming back at all. He’d been leaning toward walking away, he said, until the Steelers brought in Mike McCarthy — his former head coach in Green Bay — to run the sideline.

“I thought last year might be it, and then Mike got hired, and I talked to my wife, and she said you can do one more year, see if it works out, and then it kind of all came together,” Rodgers said. The reunion gives him a coach with whom he won a Super Bowl and shared nearly a decade of Packers history, a familiarity Rodgers has cited as part of what made an extra year appealing. Completing this season will make him just the eighth player in league history to log at least 22 years in the NFL.

Not everyone in the locker room is convinced the door is fully closed. Receiver D.K. Metcalf, entering his second season alongside Rodgers in Pittsburgh, offered a more skeptical read on the finality of it all. “People just say things, end of the year, not knowing how the year could go,” Metcalf said. “He may not even get hit or touched this year, and he may say, ‘Hey, let’s go out there and do another one.'”

Metcalf added that shedding the uncertainty seems to have freed Rodgers up mentally, letting him “play free” alongside teammates he’s grown close to over the past two years.

Health permitting, Rodgers is looking to close out his career on a stronger note than last season provided. He started all but one game in 2025 despite playing through a fractured left wrist suffered in Week 11, guiding Pittsburgh to an AFC North title before a Wild Card-round loss to Houston. The Steelers open preseason play Aug. 13 against Green Bay, with the regular-season opener set for Sept. 13 at home against Atlanta.