NFL Power Rankings Week 4: Aaron Rodgers looks like a star again, but it probably won’t last

Nothing about this New York Jets season has been surprising so far. The defense remains predictably great. Garrett Wilson and Breece Hall look like youthful, bona fide gamers. Most importantly, after a short, slow start in his first action since tearing an Achilles tendon, Aaron Rodgers has finally started to resemble the four-time MVP on which his entire football reputation is staked.

Against all odds (and all rightful skeptics), you can start to see the Jets’ vision coming together when Rodgers turns back the block like he did last Thursday night against the New England Patriots in a blowout win. At their peak, when Rodgers is firing lasers off his wrist with confidence and the tenacious New York defense is pinning its ears back against overwhelmed offenses, the Jets are an absolute wagon. They do indeed resemble a Super Bowl-caliber team. The immeasurable hype almost seems justified.

The only real remaining question is: how long does Rodgers seemingly tapping back into the fountain of youth last?

No matter what the Jets accomplish over the rest of the year, this is the haunting specter that will hang over Gang Green. The logic there doesn’t have to do with any reckless speculation. The reasoning is simple. Rodgers is 40. He will be 41 in December. He is still coming off a serious injury that sidelines most people his age for much longer. Even if Rodgers’ Achilles tendons hold up, there’s a reason that even the greatest quarterbacks usually are done playing long before they start their fifth decade of life. The punishment and toll on your body is too much, and it grows worse as a long, arduous regular season drags on. Not to mention that when you’re older, frigid, cold weather tends to have a larger impact on your stiffer bones, tendons, and ligaments as 300-pound monsters descend on you in the pocket. One wrong, awkward hit is all it takes.

Tom Brady set an unrealistic expectation, dearest readers, and almost no one will be able to follow his mold ever again.

I genuinely think these Jets are capable of February greatness. I’m not going to rule out Rodgers finally looking like a tortured franchise’s long-awaited pro football hero over the course of an entire year. I just don’t know that it’s going to last because, in the end — football is a young, healthy man’s game. And it always will be.

The Jets, led by a resurgent Rodgers, are steadily climbing up For The Win’s NFL Power Rankings in Week 4. Let’s see where they stand along with some other familiar faces as the 2024 season nears the quarter pole.