Aaron Rodgers Slams Family and Brother Jordan for ‘The Bachelorette’ Involvement: ‘Bulls–t’

Aaron Rodgers had some choice words for younger brother Jordan Rodgers eight years after the sports commentator appeared on The Bachelorette. The NFL star discussed his estrangement from his family in his Netflix docuseries, Aaron Rodgers: Enigma, which premiered on Tuesday, December 17.

“There was a lot of times when I became real famous [and] I heard from a lot of people – including family members – who [were] like, ‘Your life is too big. We need you to be smaller. Be smaller,’” Aaron, 41, recalled. “Like, ‘Don’t talk about your life.’ And it always hurt me because I just feel like you don’t see me. This is not something I ever desired or wanted, other than playing on Sundays.”

He admitted that the fame and notoriety “can be intoxicating,” which led to changes in relationships with friends and family members. “It wasn’t like I was super duper close with everyone in the family. I was close with my little brother,” he said. “But in actuality, it goes back to stuff from high school that made me feel different. Stuff from college. Stuff from post-college. And I was quiet about it. Because I thought the best way to do it was just don’t talk about it publicly.”

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Aaron then slammed his family members for how they portrayed the family estrangement on The Bachelorette. “And what did they do? They go on a bulls–t show and leave two empty chairs,” he ranted. “They all agreed that this was a good thing to do to leave two empty chairs at a stupid dating show that my brother just went on to get famous. His words, not mine. That he ended up winning. But, like, a dinner that was during the season I was never asked to go to? Not that I would’ve gone.”

Jordan, 36, got engaged to JoJo Fletcher during season 12. They tied the knot in 2022 after postponing their wedding twice due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

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When the former college football player took JoJo, 34, to meet his family on The Bachelorette, there were two empty chairs at the table, which were implied to be for Aaron and then-girlfriend Olivia Munn. While Jordan didn’t talk much about his relationship with his famous brother on The Bachelorette, he did tell JoJo, “At every step of my life, I was kind of disappointed. No matter what I did, it was never good enough because I was being compared to someone who did it best. Football didn’t define me and not having a great relationship with my brother Aaron didn’t define me.”

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At the time, the brothers hadn’t spoken in two years and have yet to reconcile. However, Aaron hasn’t ruled it out. “People ask me, like, ‘Is there hope for reconciliation?’” he said in the doc. “Yeah, of course. I don’t want them to fail, to struggle, to have any strife or issues. I don’t wish any ill will on them at all. It’s more like this – we’re just different steps in the timeline of our own journeys.”

In 2018, Aaron revealed that he had spent some time with his parents, but they seemingly became distant again after comments he made about religion in a 2020 interview. The New York Jets quarterback said he was seeking a “different type of spirituality” than the Christian faith he was brought up with. “I don’t know how you can believe in a God who wants to condemn most of the planet to a fiery hell,” he said. “What type of loving, sensitive, omnipresent, omnipotent being wants to condemn his beautiful creation to a fiery hell at the end of all this?”

The comments upset Aaron’s parents, who are “dedicated to [their] Christian faith,” according to People. In 2022, Aaron said he “believed in the possibility of reconciliation at some point,” but it appears that the relationship has not fully been healed yet.