GREEN BAY — David Bakhtiari doesn’t know what the future holds for him.
He wants to keep playing football, but the now ex-Green Bay Packers five-time All-Pro left tackle knows that there is no guarantee that his perpetually problematic, five-time surgically repaired left knee will allow him to do so.
He is much more confident predicting what’s in store for his former team and its emerging star quarterback, Jordan Love — even though Bakhtiari’s difficult post-injury journey allowed him to actually block for Love in a game only one time.
So, while Bakhtiari might’ve had his doubts about how good Love was going to be — while watching him struggle during the 2020 and 2021 training camps, and when he ascended to the starting job this past season after Rodgers was dealt to the New York Jets — he will be pulling for Love to continue his late-2023 success in the years ahead, even though they won’t be teammates anymore.
“Jordan, for anyone who hasn’t really met him, he’s a guy you want to root for. He’s such a good dude, he’s such a humble guy,” Bakhtiari said in an interview on ESPN Wisconsin’s “Wilde & Tausch” late last week, after the Packers released him at the start of the new league year.
“You just have to tip your hat to him, his wanting to grow, wanting to get better, to keep striving for more. I think it showed throughout his play of being a young quarterback, and it’s something that I really appreciated.
“I think Green Bay’s really going to enjoy their time with Jordan. I wish him nothing but the best, honestly, and I think nothing but the best is going to come to him.”
That’s not to say that Bakhtiari is putting Love on the same Pro Football Hall of Fame trajectory as Rodgers, who is set to return to action with the Jets in 2024 after missing nearly all of last year after he ruptured his Achilles’ tendon on the Jets’ fourth offensive play of 2023.
But, while Bakhtiari doesn’t see the same innate talent in Love that he saw in Rodgers from the moment he arrived as a 2013 fourth-round draft pick in Rodgers’ sixth season as the starter, he does see a quarterback who has what it takes to lead the Packers to a Super Bowl title like the one they won with Rodgers in 2010 — and the title Bakhtiari is hoping to keep chasing with another team.
“All of our eyes are tainted because we’ve seen a generational guy attack the position. And it taints your view,” Bakhtiari said. “You cannot evaluate the quarterback position (comparing them to Rodgers). Aaron’s going to make at least one throw a day that is going to taint your view on how to evaluate (other) quarterbacks. And I strongly do believe that.
“Those are really hard shoes to fill, because Aaron is so amazing at what he can do. But there’s different ways to play the position to be extremely effective. So, I think while Jordan doesn’t have what Aaron has — which is OK to say — he does make up in other areas that are fantastic and play to his strengths.
“I think he’s going to start blowing through his ceiling and going to start raising his floor. I think that’s fantastic, and that’s what you hope for. He’s a fantastic, young, ascending player. He’s an unbelievable person.”
As for his own football lot in life, Bakhtiari said he is “almost at the halfway mark” since his November surgery, the fifth he’s endured on his left knee since tearing his ACL during practice on Dec. 31, 2020.
Although he wouldn’t say specifically what that surgery entailed, he said it was a form of cartilage regeneration but one that was “very different, more novel in that space” and was performed by Dr. Brian Cole, a Chicago-based specialist in such procedures.
“I didn’t realize how much pain I was really in until after I let the dust settle from the surgery,” Bakhtiari said. “Now, at least in my daily life, I’m like, ‘Wow. I was harboring and holding onto a lot of pain that I was trying to justify.’ I’m glad that I’ve gotten over that hump, and now I’m just waiting and crossing my fingers that he’ll clear me back to play.”
The Packers released Bakhtiari on March 11, a move that got his $39.99 million salary-cap number off his books and created nearly $21 million in cap room, which helped give the team the fiscal wherewithal to sign running back Josh Jacobs and safety Xavier McKinney.
Although general manager Brian Gutekunst called Bakhtiari “one of the premier tackles of his generation and one of the best linemen in the history of the Packers,” his knee only allowed him to play in one game last season — the Packers’ season-opening Sept. 10 win at Chicago, in which he played at his usual elite level.
He wound up on injured reserve shortly thereafter, though, and after starting 118 of a possible 127 games to start his career, he’s now played in just 13 of a possible 57 games since the injury. He said he could sense the frustration inside 1265 Lombardi Ave. as his knee problems lingered.
“I think I saw the writing on the wall, saw the nonverbal actions displayed to me when I decided to put my health first and that needed to get the surgery,” Bakhtiari said. “I mean, it’s not ideal. If we had to do it over again, obviously probably would’ve done this the first time. It probably would have saved us two years of trying to work around (the underlying issue).
“I think it was more of a miscommunication. I don’t think anyone understood the magnitude of the surgery I had and the fact that I was non-weight bearing for eight weeks. Just coming back (to Green Bay), it was like, being welcomed but not at the same time. That’s the best way to describe it.”
Set to turn 33 on Sept. 30, Bakhtiari’s existing résumé might be enough to eventually get him into the Pro Football Hall of Fame, although joining a contender, winning a Super Bowl and adding a few more accolades would surely strengthen his case.
“I definitely have ambitions of what I want to accomplish still, personally. But I have to clear the final hurdles from the health side and get cleared by the doctor,” Bakhtiari said. “I would love to keep playing, but I’ll cross that bridge when I get there. The juice has to be worth the squeeze; it has to make sense for both sides. That’s the business, and if it works out, then obviously it’s the right place for me to be.
“If you saw the scar where they cut me open, it’s not small. I think a lot of people would be like, ‘Are you kidding me right now?’ It’s unfortunate, the timing and the circumstance. And I do wish it had happened differently.
“But sometimes you’ve got to play the hand that you’re dealt. Sometimes you know you’re going to lose to the house, and sometimes you’re going to win. That’s just the way it goes.”
