NFL star Rodgers exits early with serious injury in Jets win
Four-time NFL Most Valuable Player Rodgers suffered a left ankle injury early in the first quarter after being sacked. An X-ray showed no broken bones but he wore a walking boot on his left foot into the locker room.
Jets coach Robert Saleh and the team fear an MRI exam on Tuesday will confirm that the 39-year-old has a torn Achilles tendon that would end his NFL season.
"Concerned with his Achilles," Saleh said. "MRI is probably going to confirm what we think is already going to happen. So prayers tonight, but it's not good."
Saleh said the Jets are resilient and tried despite losing Rodgers to enjoy the victory, which came on a 65-yard overtime punt return by Xavier Gipson.
"I'm going to enjoy this win," Saleh said. "I don't hurt for me. I don't hurt for our locker room. I hurt for Aaron and how much he has invested in all of this."
More than 83,000 spectators watched Rodgers, who spent 18 years with Green Bay before being traded to the Jets in April, leave after just over three minutes.
After a run play, Rodgers threw an incompletion. Another incomplete pass was wiped out by a Buffalo holding penalty.
On the next play, Rodgers was sacked by Buffalo's Leonard Floyd for a 10-yard loss and his left leg twisted awkwardly on the play.
After spending a minute on the ground in pain, he was helped off the field, examined and carted to the locker room.
Gipson's dramatic punt return rescued a victory for the Jets in the same clutch fashion Rodgers had taken so many Packers' triumphs.
"I seen the ball in the air and I seen I had a shot," Gipson said of his remarkable runback. "I had an opportunity and I just took it."
Rodgers made an impact on a Jets team that trailed 13-3 at halftime.
"The energy got low," Gipson said. "In the locker room, he didn't show no signs of disappointment. He encouraged me. I looked in his eyes. He gave me a look.
"I was thinking, 'Let's win this game for A-Rod.'"
And they did, the Jets defensive unit forcing four turnovers from Buffalo quarterback Josh Allen and getting a touchdown pass from reserve quarterback Zach Wilson to Garrett Wilson in the fourth quarter.
"There's no recovering from something like that, with a guy who has an impact like he does in our locker room," Garrett Wilson said.
"Seeing him go down and then going in and seeing him at halftime, it's tough and it's something you hate to see. I'm praying for Aaron and his recovery.
"Zach rallied the troops, did what he had to do and we rallied in the second half. Zach brought us together and that was everything we needed."
'Hurts us as a team'
Zach Wilson was hopeful the man he replaced, Rodgers, might yet recover.
"I have so much love for him. My heart goes out to him," Zach Wilson said. "I have no idea what has happened. I know he'll find a way to get back. It's tough. It hurts us as a team."
Rodgers, the 2011 Super Bowl MVP when he led the Packers to a title, is among the NFL's all-time passing leaders and hoped to revive a New York squad that won its only Super Bowl in 1969 and hasn't reached the NFL playoffs since 2010.
That made his early setback all the more emotional for long-suffering Jets supporters and players.
The Bills took a 13-3 half-time lead on Allen's five-yard touchdown pass to Stefon Diggs and field goals of 34 and 40 yards by Tyler Bass.
New York's Greg Zuerlein kicked a 26-yard field goal in the second quarter and a 43-yarder in the third.
The three-yard Wilson to Wilson touchdown lifted the Jets level and the teams traded late field goals to force overtime, Zuerlein hitting a 30-yarder and Bass banking in a 50-yarder off the left upright.
