Madden Monday: 'I'm tired of Aaron Rodgers, and he has not taken a snap yet for the Steelers'

The “Madden Monday” podcast with Mark Madden of TribLive and 105.9 The X will be off next week. I’ll be back with Madden again on June 16. That’s when “Madden-Benz: Unfiltered” will come back as well.

That certainly feels like a long time from now. One question I have heading into the two-week break is whether or not Aaron Rodgers will finally be the starting quarterback of the Steelers by the time we return.

Mandatory minicamp starts June 10. However, it’s only mandatory if a player is under contract by then. And Rodgers is not.

As a result, Madden doesn’t see the reason for Rodgers to sign at this point.

“I think the purpose of him not signing for this long was to avoid OTAs and minicamp,” Madden said during this week’s edition. “Once that’s done, then, yeah. He’ll probably sign. But it really does make you wonder if this could yet fall through — how long it’s taking and how Aaron Rodgers is going totally dark. Very incommunicado.”

Madden says Rodgers’ willingness to play out this extended waiting game should bring his motivation into question.

“It’s not a matter of what he’s obligated to do. It’s a matter of what he should be doing,” Madden stressed. “It’s a matter of his commitment level and a matter of whether we can rightly assume that (his) commitment will even be there after he signs — whether he really wants to play at all. Because if he really wanted to play, he would have signed by now. If he really wanted to play.”

One thing that Madden believes Rodgers might be underestimating is how much the fans in Pittsburgh may be quietly resenting this elongated decision-making process and how that may manifest in how Rodgers is treated around here if he does eventually put on the uniform.

“Following this team, let alone talking about it and writing about it for a living, is just exhausting,” Madden said.

“I’m tired of Aaron Rodgers, and he has not taken a snap yet for the Steelers. But I think he’s probably doing the non-stooge football media a favor. If he comes in and starts out slow, I think the fan base turns on him decisively and quickly, and he’ll rise to the bait. The yokels will want Will Howard to play, which makes it even better. There is the potential for this to even be a bigger excrement show than it already is.”

We also look into the crystal ball to see if the Penguins will have a new coach by the time our next podcast airs. We try to figure out if Bubba Chandler will be called up by the Pirates. And we attempt to determine what will happen in the Stanley Cup Finals between Edmonton and Florida.