For Packers quarterback Jordan Love, self-confidence and trusting the process will be vital

It stood to reason, of course, that such questions would come. The newly minted Green Bay Packers starting quarterback has ascended to that role — and all that comes with it, including replacing a departed four-time NFL MVP in Aaron Rodgers and being next up in a lineage that has delivered an astonishing three decades of virtually uninterrupted Pro Football Hall of Fame-caliber quarterbacking with Brett Favre and Rodgers — with limited experience or on-field evidence of how good he might be.

What he does come in armed with, other than his natural talent and the widespread support of the team’s front office, coaching staff and locker room, is a belief that he is up to the task.

And make no mistake, Love does not lack for self-assuredness — he just doesn’t feel the need to be overbearing about it.

“I’ve always been a big believer in myself,” said Love, whom Packers general manager Brian Gutekunst traded up to pick in the first round of the 2020 NFL Draft (at No. 26 overall), thereby starting the countdown clock on the end of the Rodgers era. “I believe in my arm talent, and I like to make plays.

“I have confidence in myself, I have confidence in the team, and we’re just going to take it day-by-day. I mean, I can’t say what might happen this year, what might happen next year. I mean, who knows?”

Actually, there is one thing that Love does know: There will be tough times. He’s self-aware enough to know that he won’t have all the answers to what defenses throw at him this season, and the Packers probably aren’t going 17-0. They went 6-10 in 2008 when Rodgers succeeded Favre, and even the ultra-confident Rodgers had his struggles that year.

“We all know that it’s ups and downs in sport,” Love said during a 17-minute Q&A session with reporters at Lambeau Field. “It’s not easy in this league. I know it’s not going to be easy this year. But one thing I do is, I tell myself every day that I’m good enough.

“Like I said, I have really high confidence in myself.”

Joke if you must about Love’s Stuart Smalley daily affirmation routine, but much like Al Franken’s self-help character on “Saturday Night Live,” Love comes to this moment with a thin résumé to bolster his belief that he’s good enough.

The sum total of Love’s regular-season NFL experience consists of 157 snaps, one start (a 13-7 loss to the Kansas City Chiefs in 2021 when Rodgers was out with COVID-19) and one 10-snap relief appearance in Philadelphia last November (6 of 9 for 113 yards and a touchdown and 146.8 passer rating when he replaced an injured Rodgers in a 40-33 loss to the Eagles) that ignited everyone’s imagination about how good he could be if the team moved on from the 39-year-old Rodgers.

But head coach Matt LaFleur, who did his best to tamp down unrealistic expectations for Love during the annual NFL Meetings in March but spoke glowingly about him after last weekend’s post-draft rookie minicamp, along with veterans Kenny Clark and Aaron Jones, who both spoke with reporters after Love on Wednesday, clearly have Love’s back.

“He believes in himself, first off. That’s No. 1,” Jones replied when asked what gives him confidence in Love after playing six seasons alongside Rodgers. “You’ve got to believe in yourself, or nobody else is going to believe in you.

“He believes in himself, he cares about everybody around him, and we’ve seen him just come in consistently and just work, work, work. As an athlete, you want to come in and play right away — and that wasn’t Jordan’s case. He didn’t have that opportunity. And he did it the right way.

“He waited his time. And you never heard one peep or complaint out of him. We all love Jordan here, and he has everyone’s full respect. And we’re all going to go lay it out on the line for him.”

Said Clark: “I know he’s hungry. He’s hungry to ball out. I can only imagine being in the situation that he’s in, to not be able to play (and now) to get a chance to go out and show what he’s all about. That’s what you want. He’s hungry, and he’s a guy that’s going to put in the work and get it done. So I’m excited about it.”

Love said he doesn’t remember the exact moment when he learned that Rodgers was indeed being traded to the New York Jets last month, and he said he didn’t alter his offseason regimen one bit knowing that this time, the starting job might indeed finally be his.

He called his own improvement as a quarterback “drastic” from when he arrived as a rookie first-round pick in 2020 amid the COVID-19 pandemic to now, and said the wait as Rodgers’ apprentice didn’t seem any longer than the three years it actually was. He admitted “the first year was the longest” but said “the next two years kind of flew by,” even with the will-he-or-won’t-he uncertainty of Rodgers’ offseasons.

The toughest moment, Love confessed, came last spring, when Rodgers — coming off back-to-back NFL MVP seasons — signed a three-year, $150 million extension. While the Packers’ 8-9, playoff-less 2022 season might’ve opened the door for the changing of the guard at quarterback, at the time of Rodgers’ new deal, it felt to Love like a harsh blow to his hopes of finally getting on the field.

“When I got drafted here, I knew exactly what situation I was being put in, who I was behind,” Love said. “I’ll admit, I think the hardest time was when he re-signed the contract last year. It was kind of like, ‘OK, well, where do we go from here? What do I do?’

“I just came back with the approach (of), ‘Let’s just go ball out, any opportunity I get and try and become the best version of myself. I can’t really control what happens after that, so let it play out.’”

Love also said that he and Rodgers spoke after the trade became official, and while they wished each other the best moving forward and Love expressed his gratitude to Rodgers for the mentoring he received, Rodgers told his protégé that he’s “always there for me if I need anything, if I have any questions or anything.”

For Love, though, the greatest gift Rodgers gave him — besides treating him better than Favre treated Rodgers during their first two seasons in the same quarterback room after the Packers unexpectedly took Rodgers in the first round of the 2005 NFL Draft — was the example Rodgers set, from how he played the position to how hard he worked to how he never let his own confidence dip when times were tough.

“I’m always just grateful to be around him and for the time I had with him, to be able to learn and be behind him,” Love said. “I don’t think there’s any one piece of advice that sticks out more than the other. I honestly just think watching him, just watching the confidence he has, watching how he operates every day, how quickly he makes calls and is able to process information, how well he knows the system. Just all those little things.

“You get to see a guy who’s been doing it for a long time, just get to see how he does it and it elevates your game by building that into it.”

And now, Love’s challenge is to continue growing and continue building — not in the relative anonymity of Rodgers’ shadow, but while the spotlight shines brightly upon him.

Not only will his teammates be relying upon him, but the bridge contract extension he signed last week — a hedgy, one-year contract that saved the team from giving an unproven player the $20.3 million fifth-year option he was in line to receive — isn’t exactly a full-confidence vote.

The message it sent? The Packers like him, but they aren’t sure about him.

Love understands that. He knows he has plenty to prove, and he understands he must show everyone that his self-confidence is well-placed.

He described his leadership philosophy as “to try to bring guys along, trying to give everybody else confidence in themselves, confidence that I believe in them.” And that means under all circumstances, including when things go bad this season — as he knows they will at times.

“My thing is just keep growing,” Love said. “I know it’s not going to be easy, I know there’s going to be ups and downs. And the thing I’m going to tell guys (is), ‘Stick together, stay together through the whole process, and the tighter we can get a bond together as a team, the easier it’s going to be to face these challenges.’”