You can’t have wanted it to end like that

Well, you can’t have wanted it to end like that.

No matter how mad you were at Aaron Rodgers for his vaccination stance, or his ayahuasca promotion, or the way he seemed to shed his surliness like a fat-tailed gecko and emerge all spiffed up and shiny for his New York debut, you can’t have even imagined that his season would end this way.

Especially if you’re a Packer fan. The man took us to the playoffs in 11 of the 15 seasons he played here, including five NFC Championship games. He won us a Super Bowl. He had this ability to make us believe the Packers could win any game with a couple of Hail Marys and, maybe, an 86-yard touchdown pass or two.

So, as mad as you might have been at the man, you still could not have wished a potentially career-ending injury on the athlete that brought us so much.

I’d like to think we’re all united in our sympathies for both Aaron Rodgers and the franchise that had counted so heavily on him. I hope we all wish him well.

In other football-related news, I saw a clip of Pete Sousa’s comments about Kentucky running back Ray Davis. “Eleven years ago, as a foster kid, really nobody wanted him,” Sousa said. “And now here he is, found some love, found football. And he has had an amazing journey.”

Of course that remark made my blood boil. I know plenty of children who have found their way into the foster care system. I don’t know a single one that was unwanted. All kinds of circumstances land children in foster care. Many have parents who love them desperately but struggle with addiction and mental health issues that make them unsuitable to raise them. They love their children, they just can’t raise them until they get healthier and better situated to provide a safe home for them.

Beyond that, there are grandparents and other relatives and friends who love and desperately want to spend time with their little people. And, the foster parents who love them deeply.

I would not want any child to equate foster care with being unwanted.

Sousa later apologized for his comment.

We’re currently riding high here in Titletown, so let’s send a little Packer love out to our former quarterback and to every child who has ever questioned his or her place in this world.

You are loved. You are wanted. You are free to cheer for whomever you choose.

Go Pack Go!