Jets quarterback Aaron Rodgers and Giants defensive end Jihad Ward had a brief exchange in Saturday night’s preseason game with referee Alan Eck stepping between the players.
Since Rodgers was mic’d up, the chirping between the two was shown on “Hard Knocks” on Tuesday night.
Ward lightly pushed Rodgers at the end of a play, prompting Rodgers to bow up on Ward. He told Ward to show some respect and added he didn’t even know who he was. Later, after a touchdown throw, Rodgers sought out Ward to tell him, “Don’t poke the bear!”
“See, the thing is, they’re going to entertain,” Ward said Wednesday, via Jordan Raanan of ESPN. “They’re going to show his part -- HBO, whatever stuff is going on, ‘Hard Knocks.’ They’re going to show his part. They weren’t even in the whole scenario of what really went down. They’re going to show his side of the story. . . . It’s all about Aaron Rodgers at the [end] of the day. They sign him; it is what it is. They’re going to show his part and make me look like a sucker. But I ain’t going for that.”
Ward explained he was upset Rodgers and Randall Cobb were laughing in the huddle after the receiver had an illegal blindside block on Giants safety Bobby McCain, who entered concussion protocol.
“Everybody going to get pissed off at that. The whole team was pissed off, you know what I’m saying?” Ward said. “It’s preseason and all that stuff and you’re going to do some reaction like that?
“It’s cool, though. That’s how they roll. I think we play them soon. It is what it is.”
Rodgers said after the game the players were laughing “because that wasn’t a penalty when we started playing. It has been a penalty for a while. So, not the smartest play.”
The teams meet for real on Oct. 29 at MetLife Stadium.
