Luke Getsy was a 30-year-old offensive quality control coach, beginning his first season in the NFL, when Aaron Rodgers and the Packers lost their 2014 season opener in Seattle by 20. Playing on “Thursday Night Football” against the defending Super Bowl champs, Rodgers had an 81.5 passer rating. The Packers won five of their next six, though, and five of their next six again, and finished 12-4.
Getsy was the Packers’ quarterbacks coach/pass game coordinator last season when the Packers lost their season opener 38-3 to the Saints. Rodgers had a passer rating of 36.8. Rodgers won 13 of his next 14 games, though, and the Packers landed the top playoff seed.
So when Getsy, the Bears’ new offensive coordinator, saw the Packers lose to the Vikings 23-7 last week — Rodgers had a 67.6 passer rating — he knew what to expect next.
“Listen, there are 17 games, and it’s a season of progress,” Getsy said Thursday. “And to panic over one game, to panic over one thing, it’s a long year. … You stick to the details and what you want to be good at. And that guy is good at a lot of things, so they’re able to do a lot.”
“That guy,” Rodgers, is unflappable. Getsy knows it from experience.
“Eighteen years, and he’s been the best in the business most of that time,” Getsy said. “So his confidence is probably pretty good.”
Getsy first met Rodgers in 2014, when he shared a position room with then-quarterbacks coach Alex Van Pelt, then-coordinator Tom Clements — who came out of retirement this offseason to replace Getsy — and then-head coach Mike McCarthy.
“That was a great opportunity for me and a good moment in my growth, for sure,” he said. “Relationship-wise, I think we have a ton of respect for each other for the work ethic we have, the passion.
“And then, ultimately, I think [Rodgers and I] care about each other a lot. I think that part of it, we always knew we had each other’s backs. We proved it to each other all the time. That part of it — when you’re coaching a guy and you spend that much time and you care about somebody.”
Rodgers calls Getsy, who is two months his junior, a confidante. He’s spent time with Getsy’s wife and four kids.
“He’s a great father, husband,” Rodgers told reporters Wednesday. “Phenomenal coach. He’s fun in the room. He was younger than me, slightly, different stages of life, though, for sure. But I loved our constant dialogue during the week, loved being coached by him and just kind of watching his development—go from kind of a quality control guy all the way up to offensive coordinator and the next stop for him is probably head coach.”
Bears receiver Darnell Mooney sees that step, too. If Getsy can solve the Bears’ offensive woes — one of the most difficult mountains to scale in the NFL — he’ll have his choice of coaching jobs.
“We’ve really only got two years with him,” Mooney said. “If everybody does their job, he’s gonna be gone for sure. He’s a genius. I cannot speak highly enough about him. He just has that demeanor and brings energy to the room. He’s not a rah-rah guy. He’s calm and collected. ... He says it’s a process. Some things are not up to his standard, but we’re seeing how the process goes. We’re happy with how it’s going — but it’s not where he wants it yet.”
The Packers aren’t where Rodgers wants them, either. When the Packers were 0-1 last year, the Bears saw what happened next.
“I remember last year watching TV, the media was crucifying [Rodgers],” defensive coordinator Alan Williams said. “They were crucifying the team. They were saying they were done. They were crucifying him. And you can’t buy into that.”
Jason Lieser contributed to this report.
