Davante Adams would welcome catching passes from Aaron Rodgers again, but he insists he’s happy with the Raiders and isn’t pushing for a trade to the Jets.
Adams addressed the trade rumors on the newest episode of Shannon Sharpe’s “Club Shay Shay” podcast released Wednesday, a day after the wide receiver’s agents issued a statement denying that any trade talks were taking place.
“Well, I’ll answer it like this: If I’m gonna be reunited with anybody, it would be Aaron — or relocated and be anywhere, it’d be with Aaron,” Adams said. “But that’s not really my — there was a lot of that stuff going on last year in the media and them asking, ‘What are you gonna do about this? Are you thinking about going here?’ And they talk about whatever without me even being involved in it.
“And it ended up getting all the way to the point where it got in the locker room, and people was thinking that I was the driving force, and I’m like, y’all just don’t understand, man. When you — and I hate to say it like this because it makes me sound like I’m trying to put myself on a pedestal — but when you’re a certain level of player, it don’t have to come from you, and oftentimes it’s not coming from you.”
What the 31-year-old six-time Pro Bowler does want out there is that he’s committed to the Raiders, who are coming off an 8-9 season but went 5-4 under Antonio Pierce before he was promoted from interim to full-time head coach.
“I’m actively on the Raiders. What do I look like sitting here talking to other people about being on another team? And that’s how I still feel about it right now,” said Adams, who’s entering the third season of a five-year, $140 million contract. “I’m locked in with the Raiders and I really feel good about this team, and as far as I know they feel good about me. If that ever changes, if that got to a point where they weren’t feeling the same way, I ain’t done playing, so obviously we would figure out whatever we needed to figure out.”
Still, it’s hard for Adams to not wax poetic about what it was like — and what it would be like again — to pair with Rodgers, who is trying to lead the Jets to a Super Bowl after suffering an Achilles tear just four plays into his first year with the team last season.
“The thought of playing with Aaron is obviously amazing,” Adams said. “I already know what that’s like — which is similar to why I came here and reunited with Derek [Carr] was ’cause I had familiarity with him. And anytime you have that, it gives you a little bit more confidence than starting fresh with somebody you’ve never played with before, and it helps when they’re the best to ever play the game — or at least that’s how I feel. I don’t know how you feel about that, but that’s certainly how I feel, and [Rodgers has] given me an opportunity to show the world what I can do.”
During eight seasons with the Packers and Rodgers, Adams had 669 catches, 8,121 yards and 73 touchdowns, which included five double-digit touchdown campaigns and three years of at least 1,374 yards.
In his first year with the Raiders in 2022, with Carr the quarterback most of the year, Adams had 1,516 yards and 14 touchdowns.
Adams doesn’t feel he needs Rodgers to be a great player.
“I’m not afraid to say that he definitely made me better, but he definitely didn’t create me — you see it was the same numbers the very next year in Vegas,” he said. “So, obviously I didn’t ‘need him’ but it makes life a hell of a lot easier, that’s for sure.”
Last season with Jimmy Garoppolo and rookie Aidan O’Connell, Adams had 1,144 yards and eight touchdowns.
Adams’ frustration with how the Raiders’ season was going before Josh McDaniels’ midseason firing was shown in Netflix’s new “Receiver” series, in which Adams said he “signed off on” the team benching Garoppolo.
That is part of the reason ESPN’s Dan Orlovsky said Tuesday on “Get Up” that he thinks Adams playing for the Jets this season is a “done deal,” a day after WFAN’s Boomer Esiason said he was “hearing” a potential Adams trade could be done in late August or early September.
Rodgers helped fan the flames over the weekend at the American Century Championship golf tournament when asked about Adams, saying he “can’t wait to play with him — again.”
The Jets signed receiver Mike Williams to a one-year, $10 million contract in free agency to be their No. 2 behind Garrett Wilson.