Tommy Paul and Paige Lorenze’s money-themed wedding, LeBron rumors, and is Aaron Rodgers putting a strategic end to his ongoing feud with his family?

Testing, testing, testing, testing, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10. Whoa, I like that cadence. It kind of felt like a kid's book. Oh, yeah. You know, something, a counting kid's book. Yep. By Madeline Hill. You never know. You know, maybe we should start a counting child's podcast. Yes. Where we just count. Just count. That's it. 30 minutes of counting. And we'll go 1, 2, and skip a number so the kid can say 3. Yes. So 1, 2, 4, 5. Okay, let's see how that sounded. Hi, Charlotte. Good day, Madeline. We're back. With another episode of the Sports Gossip Show presented by eBay Live. Da-da-dee-da-da-da. Oh. Did you like that? Yeah, I liked the high note at the end. Yeah, I'm just working on my vocal skills. You know what? We went out on a high note. Oh. On that one. Let's see what you did there. Thank you. So nice. Well, you know, another day, another show. We have another episode. We have a jam-packed episode for you all. We will be getting into two athlete wedding flower updates that were sent by Dearshare holders who requested we discuss them and analyze them. So we'll be getting into that. There's also an interesting little development in the world of where is LeBron James playing next. It has to do with the Miami Heat. And we are getting into the latest developments in the Aaron Rodgers family saga heard around the internet. Yes, we've got a comprehensive timeline put together by our listeners. We have a lovely producer, Laura. Yes. Shout out, Laura. Shout out. It's a beautiful document. I wish you could all see this Google Doc. Yeah. Also, just letting you all know that this is Wednesday. I mean, you're listening to it on Thursday, but for us, it's Wednesday. Yeah. So if LeBron James has announced where he's going, again, sorry, but now you know and we don't. Also, there's been a lot of stuff going on with WNBA star Sophie Cunningham. She said some transphobic things in a ESPN. Profile of her that we find irresponsible and gross. We don't want you to think we're not talking about that. We just have a WNBA deep dive episode coming with a special guest on Tuesday. So we are going to address that then. Yes, we are not. If you're not. But first, some flowers, some flowers up first. Tennis, tennis player, tennis, tennis, tennis. Oh, the tennis. That's a new phrase I'm making up. Tennis player. Dream Brody sequel to the pianist. Sorry. The tennis. I'm Jewish. I can say I'm Jewish. Yes. Perfect. Tennis player Tommy Paul married Paige Lorenz, who is an influencer and creative director and founder of Dairy Boy. Unclear what it is. I think it's a clothing lifestyle sort of brand. Yeah. I was asking some a friend of mine who knows what it is. And I said, what is it? And she said, I don't know. Great. So even better. She said, you know, I said, is it anything special or different? It's different from other like clothing candle brands. And she said, no. OK, well, then that's good. So they got married and she wore Carolina Herrera. And what is interesting before we get into the flowers is where did they get married? You know, I'm so glad you asked, because they got married at Old Westbury Gardens, which is the state that was inspired the director, Boz Lerman, to design Daisy Buchanan's home in his adaption of. F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby, which is a movie basically about how the huge divide between classes is bad. Yes. And they said that's what inspired their wedding. Yeah. Page said, Tommy and I always knew we wanted to get married in America, in the state where we met, and somewhere that felt accessible for the people we love most. I wanted the wedding to feel true to who we are and where our story began. OK. You know what? I don't know if I personally would want to get married at a place that was then inspired by the adaptation of The Great Gatsby personally, but I will say pretty venue. It's a pretty venue. And that is what I'm going to say. You know what's funny? So I was clicking through these photos before we get to the flowers. Charlotte, can you click through the Instagram post? The Instagram post I included. Yeah. I would love to. To the, hold on, seventh, I believe, photo with the columns. It's a close-up of them. They're standing at the altar holding hands with the aisles, and they have the big columns behind them with the greenery. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Sure. OK. Right. Yes, I have it. Maybe I'm a sicko with athlete weddings, but I swear we have seen this venue before that backdrop. And maybe it's just my brain comparing this to Taylor. Taylor Swift's, the columns under the gazebo that Travis Kelsey proposed at, which was not this place. But doesn't it look familiar? Yes. Maybe someone in the comments, any shareholders out there, if you have seen a celebrity, maybe it was just a celebrity wedding. It might have been just a celebrity. I'm with you, though. And I think something worth noting about the flowers is that it's almost like they were trying so hard not to do. I just made myself laugh. It was like they were trying so hard not to do. They were trying so hard not to do. Yeah, yeah, no. The flowers that they did, green flowers. They did green. And here's what I'll say, Paige and Tommy, not compressed. No. Not compressed. A lot of grasses. A lot of grasses. And I guess what I would say is we talk a lot about we want athletes to not have compressed flowers at their wedding. But this actually feels like the complete opposite. Like there are flowers at this wedding for sure. Obviously, it's a very expensive, over-the-top wedding. But it almost feels like they were like, we have to do as little flowers as possible, but with a lot of money. The most expensive non-flower flowers you've ever seen. Exactly. It almost kind of feels like, if you go to the beginning of the gallery, the second image which shows the aisles, there's no guests in it. It's like a drone shot. Yeah. You can almost not even see that many flowers. Like there are flowers lining the aisles, of course, but really there are a lot of patches of greenery. Yeah. Which I respect. Yeah, yeah. I respect it. I respect it. And maybe they're just staying true to the venue. Because green is a sign of money, and money is like the great Gatsby, and they are the two rich people getting married. So it's all symbolic. Green is a symbol for money. And, you know, Paige Lawrence grew up in Connecticut. I think her dad's a surgeon. I've seen conflicting reports whether her mom owns a business or her mom is also a surgeon. She went to Burke Mountain Academy in Vermont, which is a ski academy, which is a very expensive place to send your children. Oh. It's like where you train to be a competitive skier. And so, based on that and the fact that she said we wanted the wedding to feel true to who we are. And, like, the great Gatsby is about an old money situation. I'm kind of like, the theme is money. It's money. The theme is money. That's what I'm saying. Yeah. The theme was money. I mean, you can even tell it was an expensive wedding just based on the tent they used for the reception. Yeah. Oh. Those, like, cloth tents. Forget about it. That is not a little pop-up tent you get at Dick's Sporting Goods that you set up a little lemonade stand. That's not a tent, folks. No, that is. That's not. You know what? Remember the tents? Would you ever set up a tent at the beach? Maybe it's only a southern thing. Mm-hmm. These kind of, like, sun tents. Yeah. Sort of thing. And you would spend so long. I feel like the dads would do it. They would just, like, stick the sand in the stand. Sand would keep getting in the side. Dad crash out. It's not one of those tents. No, it's not. This is an expensive tent. Here's a telltale sign, folks, if you're looking for how expensive a tent is. If the poles are wooden and the canvas or cloth or whatever it is is very taut, that tent was not under $100,000. No. No. It definitely wasn't. I don't think that's a crazy thing to say. No. No. No. I mean, also, if you look at their events. You know, these photos we're looking at are from Easton Events, who I'm assuming planned this. Yeah, they did. Planning and event design. Tenting. Tenting. Who did the tenting? Skyline Tent. Skyline Tent Company. Shout out, Skyline. If anyone works at Skyline, I want to know how much that costs. I do, too. DM us. I tried to go to the website where it says something went wrong. Okay. Well, what I was going to say. Hold on. I'm going to Google it. You Google it while I say something to the class, which is our shareholders. Yeah. Something else I feel like an indication that it's a big budget wedding is that they had something called a glam trailer. That they shouted out in the credits. No. Basically, the credits of the wedding. They had printed materials, minted, which is a big company. They had something called on-site dressing, which is someone who I'm guessing is a stylist. So, this wedding, yeah, TSB Styling, they do wedding event and proposal styling. So, this was a production. So, you can tell. Their wedding, to your point, the theme was money. Skyline Tent, the first one, Skyline Tent Company. Skyline Tent Company is a company in Montana. Let's try Skyline Tenting. Yeah. No. I think this is a company based in Montana, which shows, and the tents that they do are, they look like a geodesic dome. They do, you know, like this is some serious. Oh, no. They're based in Virginia. Right. As I said. Charlottesville, Virginia. Montana is Virginia. No, but on their homepage, they have the Montana. Why does it say Montana on the homepage? Montana. I think they're just shouting out. Because what's in Montana? MONTANA. other rich people right so they're using the Yellowstone Club the Yellowstone Tom Brady Tom Brady Taylor Swift Carissa Thompson you know what I feel like right now what I feel like we're doing an SNL skit well we got another comment I think on Instagram recently about are we doing delicious dish if you go back to an early episode we very kindly uh recreate we very you know what I mean homage to them we did and you know what you're right so it's also Lauren if you're listening Lauren if you're listening it's also not on purpose no this is just like I want I want everyone to know how truly this is not an act no but I okay sorry I gotta say something now because I feel like I'm about to enroll I about to go on a deep dive on Skyline 10 company by curated events which is the full name of this company um after we record this on their home page and I'll see you in the next one bye homepage it says if you scroll below it says welcome to premium welcome to luxury in all caps and below it it says we create awe-inspiring spaces that bring your creative vision to life whether you are planning a once-in-a-lifetime wedding or an event for the ages Skyline has the design expertise to scale and make it larger than life that has to be AI yeah it's got to be it's got to be yeah yeah it's I mean a person certainly didn't write that anyways I just love the sentence in all caps welcome to premium period welcome to luxury period that's AI that that's not a thing but anyways you know what else luxury Skyline Skyline tents by curated events is the full name just makes me think of Skyline chili which is not old money you know what I think yes yes Skyline chili yes have you had that no but you know because wait wait wait wait wait do you know why I know about that place Skyline chili it's related to the show well but it's a isn't it a it's in Cincinnati right yeah is it a place or is it a dish I thought it was a I don't know and that's a that's not a rhetorical question I really don't know if it's a place okay multiple locations okay they've expanded good for them why do you know about them because yesterday I was served a video from Kelly Finglass's daughter is that her name from the Dallas Cowboys yeah she's a Kelly Kelly's a Dallas Cowboys head coach her daughter moved to Cincinnati and Kelly's daughter took Kelly to go try that chili and Kelly's eating that chili being like oh this isn't very good oh no so that's why I know what Skyline chili is wow that's it from Kelly's daughter's tiktok circle moment so there you go um there's uh the meat hook in in um Brooklyn unbelievable butcher shop they make the best chili Brian makes it you go in there get the chili I joked that Brian's like our personal chef because we just go in there and we're like what did Brian make and we did my husband surprised I came home and he said Skyline chili and he put the chili on spaghetti because that's what Skyline chili is and it was unbelievably delicious that chili is so good try it on spaghetti okay not a potato spaghetti well you can yeah you know you can do whatever you want so earnest but try it on spaghetti try it on spaghetti okay I'll do it anyways okay that was a bit back to our sports show um okay moving right along to another wedding and some flowers to analyze uh you know what I love about this wedding what uh Megan played for the Iowa Hawkeyes and the former head coach who most people who are not diehard college basketball fans might remember uh from the Caitlin Clark years when everybody watched the Iowa team Lisa Bluter the former coach she's not the coach anymore but she was the coach of the Hawkeyes officiated the ceremony I love that and and I think that coaches officiating weddings yes yeah yes because think about it what is what is a what is a wedding officiant a wedding what is the wedding ceremony if not like a pump-up speech for life you know what yeah that's true it really is it really is a halftime talk they're like things might be a little bit different but it's a lot of fun and it's a lot of fun and it's a lot of not be going great i mean you really should have one at a vow renewal mostly it's honestly the ultimate pep talk it's the pep talk of a lifetime yeah it's like you two got each other and that's a sickness and an out sickness and now go out there and crush crush kiss the bride come on um snorted got a little snort i also love they had their dog they have a corgi love that but let's talk about the flowers so click on that link sorry before we talk about the flowers real quick they thought they planned their wedding for for last weekend because they thought it was going to be wmba all-star because it normally is and then the wmba moved it so i'm pretty sure megan had to miss a game for her wedding because they moved the so come on guys get your schedule together kathy um all right the flowers here's what i'll say more on the traditional side we've got some pink and white flowers there is an arch a wooden arch with a little bit of greenery popping through i would give this light to medium compression i agree i don't think my first reaction isn't compressed no it's more traditional it's more traditional than which i think it can be its own category i love the dog collar and the flowers on the corgi yes that's beautiful oh my god they put her in a dress yes i know wow amazing it looks like the corgi's getting baptized so cute now i'm just visualizing a dog getting baptized i'm sure it happens oh it definitely happens probably every weekend every sunday or whenever they when is a baptism do you do that on sunday anyone know someone again i'm jewish and i'm not really religious so you're more jewish than not religious there you go that's true my stepdad's jewish you can do shout out more i can it's true um anyways yes i would say light to medium compression but i think they look nice and i also love a tall couple yes always makes me happy as a tall lady same it's nice to see it's just nice to see it's nice to see nice to see so congrats to them um okay should we talk about lebron real quick let's talk about lebron as of recording this lebron has not announced where he is set to play one of the teams in question is the miami heat where he has played before and won one championship two two yeah two championships with my former field trip buddy chris bosh when we were in the miami heat and he was in the miami heat and he was in the miami heat and he was in the miami heat and he was in the miami heat and he was in the miami heat and he was in the miami heat went to the space went to the space center i had never forget no idea where you were going with that no i was like i almost took a sip of water and i was like with my former pal duane wade and you're like how do you know duane wade we've been doing this for years now no no chris bosh if you've listened for a long time you know that story i won't repeat it again yeah um but anyways so people are like is he gonna play for miami lebron hasn't said yet but some people online noticed that yesterday the miami heat accidentally scheduled a instagram or a youtube live titled lebron james introductory press conference that was set to go live on july 27th a spokesperson for the team did tell espn that everyone try not to worry basically just the social media department was preparing for the possibility that lebron james was going to go play for the miami heat and they accidentally posted the link on their team's youtube page i guess i guess first of all i believe them i don't think that we know that he's going to play for the heat but i don't think that we know that he's going to play for the heat but i don't think that because of this i do think it's a pretty strong indicator that he's been at least considering it 100 yeah i mean i feel like that confirms at the bare minimum that he's considering going back there which the more i think about it that miami is a place we haven't talked about that much but he does already have a house there he does and as we talked about he doesn't want to move well and if he's going to move he wants to move somewhere he already knows and has a house exactly so it's like you already have a place there you played there it's what our dear friend fred cat said last thursday which was you know lebron if he goes to the heat and he doesn't win a championship this time well he's already won two with them right it's not like he goes to a team and doesn't win a championship no that's true that's true so we'll see yeah we'll see you know what we're going to be doing what we're going to be monitoring this we're going to be monitoring the situation keep a close eye on this one close eye and i want to clear clear some things up which some things which is one thing i'm just making myself laugh today um someone posted on twitter that the miami heat had posted a job posting to hire a director of youtube strategy which is true they did i went to their job career center page um but they posted the link go click it it takes you to the job posting but they posted that job listing on july 1st so that was way before this happened you were like oh they fired someone for actually poses like it's like well they've been looking for a head of youtube strategy and maybe this just reinforces the hire i'm gonna say maybe it just shows they really do need they do need someone so i'm trying to see if they have a clear the air on that salary anywhere on here but i anyways before we get to our aaron rogers family timeline deep dive we have our very fun fashion mailbag segment presented by ebay live and guys i must admit i forgot to bring my bag today that's okay that's okay because i have a different thing that we got on ebay live which is a pennant or a felt situation uh depicting the colby college mascot a mule so i'm just gonna grab that real quick oh i'm so excited charlotte's gonna grab it and i think charlotte's gonna grab it and i think charlotte's gonna grab it and i think charlotte's gonna grab it and i think charlotte's gonna grab it charlotte you do the honors with the question today oh why not okay here it is i'm showing the class uh if you're listening audio only um i'm gonna pick the question out of here here we go unwrapping the question uh the question is madeline um i don't remember Do you want me to do the question? No, I remember it. I remember it. I remember it, but I don't remember why. I'll do it. If you can get any used book. First edition. First edition. Yeah. From eBay Live. Yes. Why was that? Because we were talking about The Great Gatsby. Ah. Yes. And we're going to break the fourth wall here. That wasn't submitted by a shareholder. That was just one we wanted to do. We just wanted to do it because we wanted to talk about some books. Yeah. What would mine be? Yeah. I think, you know what this is going to be? Such a wild card. I can't wait. And it will make absolutely no sense to people who know me, including you. I think I'd want, like, a first edition, like, Lord of the Rings book. Never read it, but it feels like something that's interesting to have and crack that baby open, take a little read of it. I think it would be fun. No, I'm not. I don't care for mythical creatures. As Charlotte knows, I don't like animals talking. Do I know it's a Lord of the Rings? I'm not going to like this. Did you see the movies? No. Yeah. You know. But I think, I'm just thinking about, like, a first edition book that has some oomph. It's true. And it's big. It's big. Carries weight. Anyways, that's mine. I think the first edition's a beautiful illustration, too. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. I'm sure the cover's really nice. Yeah. Anyways. All right. Well, it should be. That was about, mine would be, I would get a first edition of Little Women. Oh, God. You know what I thought you were going to say, actually? What? Like a. Oh, a Barbara Cooney, like a children's book? What? No. Oh, sorry. Wait, who wrote Little Women? Louisa May Alcott. Okay. No, I thought you were going to say, like, Sense and Sensibility. Oh. Or an Emily, a Bronte book. Oh. That's also, oh, my God. Can you, a first edition. Okay. A first edition Wuthering Heights would have powers to bring people back from the dead. Like, you could do a seance with that. Yeah. And it would work. We could have that. We could have a first edition. We could have a first edition of Wuthering Heights, and we would know who LeBron James is going to play for. Yes. We'd just open it up, and it would be like, he's playing for the Cleveland Cavaliers. He's going to Cleveland. Yeah. So, okay. So, yes. That's a good one. Either that or Little Women, because it's a book that my mom and I love together. It's a great answer. Yeah. Mine wasn't unhinged, actually. Well, yours was sweet. Yours was good, too. Yours was great. Maybe it also proves I haven't read a lot of books. Well, that's. I don't know that that was going to be my takeaway. I just. I just watched a lot of TV as a kid, I must admit. So. You've read many more books than you give yourself credit for. I have read a lot of books, but you know what I mean. If you go to Madeline's apartment, she's got all the books. That's true. I have a lot of books. So. Anyways. Don't miss me with that. Miss me with the negative self-talk. Okay. Well, thanks to our mailbag sponsor, eBay Live. Can't miss live streams, heart-pounding auctions, iconic fashion and collectibles. Whatever you're into, you can bring it home right now. Don't miss another second at eBay.com slash eBay Live. If you think eBay is just a marketplace. If you think it's just a marketplace, you're missing a whole side of it. eBay Live is where real-time excitement meets rare, exclusive, hard-to-find cards, collectibles, sneakers, watches, and so much more. You can bid in live auctions, catch exclusive drops, and buy directly from trusted sellers while it's all happening live. And it feels like a show, not just shopping, with great hosts, creators, and streamers. Stream, shop, and score by downloading the eBay app and tapping the eBay Live button right under the search bar. All right. All right, folks. It's time. We're going to tell you about the fact that Aaron Rodgers doesn't talk to his family. We're going to give you a timeline. The reason that we are talking about this is because there is an Instagram post on Aaron Rodgers' account, which he famously said recently he only kept because his girlfriends made him. This does not seem like anything anybody's making him do. He posted a photo with his mother, Darla, his father, Ed. His brother, Luke. It doesn't seem like his brother, Jordan, is in these pictures. No. And he wrote, Which he's done a couple of these loosies before. Just want to point that out. That's a whole other thing. I don't know what's going on there. No. Is it hashtag, like, open to interpretation? I'm a mystery. I'm an enigma. You know, that's a generous interpretation because I think it's a mistake. Well, if it's a mistake, he's done it. He's done it on Instagram posts dating back to June 30th, 2024. Okay. Which is, again, because he doesn't post that much, so I could find that really quickly. But the past one, two, three, four, now five Instagram posts have had this weird second blank hashtag. So. And you can also edit a caption. He's up to something. So, for people who do not know, Aaron Rodgers has a strange relationship with his family. That has been going on for a long time. That has been going on for quite some time. Yes. Appears to potentially have been going back to as early as 2014. Yes. But I think something that we will talk about but want to caveat at the top is Aaron Rodgers, it's often unclear what is true, what it has to do with this man. Because he will contradict himself, as we've talked about on our deep dive episode about him, which you should go and listen to, and his documentary, the Enigma documentary. But so it's often hard to figure out what exactly is the truth. Yes, I think that we are approaching this timeline as like postmodern literature. You know, this is, this is like some, you know, the opposite of new criticism where you separate the author from the work. The author is the work. Yes. In this case, I also think that everybody has an agenda in this situation, and it is unclear what that is. I think the most puzzling thing. The most puzzling thing about Aaron Rodgers is that it can be very difficult to figure out what his agenda is because, to your point, he contradicts himself so much because the agenda mostly just seems be in the public eye and make noise and then say you don't want that. Right, right. That's like kind of the whole thing, but it's, it's, it's confusing when there's not much more substance behind it. No, exactly. So, so the nuclear family, as we mentioned with that Instagram post, his mom is Darla, his father is Ed. He is brothers Luke and Jordan. And this, the first time we learned about this estrangement was in 2016. And this happened, and I, this was a huge part of my career, actually, because I was recapping The Bachelorette as if it were football in 2016 because Aaron Rodgers' brother, Jordan, was on it. He is now an analyst for SEC Network and ESPN. So, you know. He, it's all in the Disney family, The Bachelorette's on ABC. Jordan ended up winning that, which I did not see coming. So, I got real deep in the Rodgers family, and there was an episode, which we talked about when we did the Enigma documentary, because there are seats empty for Aaron Rodgers and, at the time, his girlfriend, Olivia Munn, who are not there at the family hometown date. Yes, and that was when Jordan was on with JoJo Fletcher, if any. Bachelor, Bachelorette, people are out there. And I remember when that happened, that, they made that a pretty big storyline, from what I recall, on the show. And that was, I think, the first time, too, that not only was it public, clearly there were some issues going on with this family, but it also kind of crossed, it crossed into the pop culture sphere. Aaron Rodgers, he's also, was dating Olivia Munn, who was an actress at the time, and still is at the time. But I feel like that was kind of the first moment, too, of like, Aaron Rodgers. Aaron Rodgers entering, like, the pop culture space, and whether he wanted to be in it or not. Yes, I think that's very true. There was also, then, reports that, in 2017, reports came out that the last time Aaron and his father had spoke was 2014. Yes. And so, you know, that kind of sparks this whole storyline. I think one of the major storylines in Aaron Rodgers' life has been his estrangement from, his family, and it's worth noting that JoJo and Jordan got married in 2022, and Aaron Rodgers was not there. So, November 2018, Madeline, is sort of the next time that this, once again, comes into public view. Yeah, so Aaron Rodgers announces that he's donated a million dollars to those affected by some California wildfires that were going on at the time. And Jordan responded on Twitter, saying, quote, Oof. Doing that publicly, saying, like, calling your brother out publicly for basically saying, he's basically saying, you donated a million dollars just for show. Just to make you look better. Not saying he didn't really donate a million dollars, but he's not actually caring about whether his family is safe during that time. And clearly, Jordan, at least in my opinion, was so fed up, and there's clearly so much hurt and strain with their relationship that he's willing to put that on Twitter publicly? And that, that's a little bit of my question here. Everybody, there are ways to have issues with your family and not make them public. Yes. Everybody in this situation, Aaron Rodgers claims he didn't necessarily want this public. from when the bachelorette such a big deal about it which you could argue maybe is true because he hadn't really spoken about it until abc blew it up into this huge thing it does make me think there is an aspect of this if you're jordan you know that this tweet is going to get picked up there you can't do something like this without thinking about the attention you are then calling back onto yourself and making yourself look self-righteous in a way or or it's like again the then the and i'm not saying that this isn't true either and i understand being so fed up but at the same time this is a pr move yes certainly and it can be both it can be both a genuine frustration with your brother and a pr move yes but you can't say it isn't also oh yeah i mean you're you are a public figure and you're calling out your brother who happens to also be a public figure on a public platform yeah so right whether he thought about it or not it is a pr move yeah yeah i agree so december 18 this is where things it's a little confusing uh because aaron rogers was playing for the packers at the time um and mike mccarthy who was the head coach of the packers is now the head coach of the cowboys um was fired and aaron was reached for comment he said i was at home with my folks in town for my birthday when i found out i was as shocked as i was when i found out that i was as many of you were i'm sure so you're like wait you were at home with your folks folks i would assume mean your parents unless it's folks who are friends but i don't think it could have been my folks my my people his buddies that he goes on his ayahuasca perhaps groups with we don't know i guess but i i think something that sort of started swirling um i i just this is this is the aaron rogers story it's the first time that i've ever seen a person toss out a sentence as if it's casual knowing the context that in the context of your life people are going to have questions about it yeah to me it reminds me of when he casually tossed out that he was married to a woman named britney with an eye and everyone's like wait what right and then when people were trying to ask follow-ups he's like stay out of my personal life exactly it's like well no you said it publicly you know what you're doing so either he was with his parents or he wasn't which is the magic of aaron rogers it's and because he's only posted about five times since 2024 on instagram we'll never know there's no photos no we don't know that we have we don't know um so so he may or may not have seen them he says he saw them but then there's no follow-up right right a year later a year later uh december 2019 he then makes an appearance on his new girl well then his new girlfriend ish at the time danica patrick's podcast race car driver yeah race car driver pretty intense um and on that podcast he spoke a lot about his religious upbringing and talking about how the church felt like an obligation to him and everyone he grew up with so then you're like okay that's a kind of indication of he's opening up about his upbringing and personal life um and he goes into it by saying ultimately it was that rules and regulations and binary systems don't really resonate with me and i slowly started moving away from that stuff slowly started learning about other religions meeting the dalai lama okay casual drop there okay it's been a fun you know it was gone yeah exactly just chit chatting um it's been a fun path uh to a different type of spirituality which to me it's been more meaningful so you're like okay he's clearly trying to show that maybe he lives his life differently than his upbringing and i think that this is a through line that you can trace in his life since then he clearly is someone who is searching for something it is unclear to what extent that is for attention it is unclear to what extent um you know i don't i believe him that he is searching for something and i think growing up uh in a very strict religious household can definitely um leave a mark on people um his parents are reportedly evangelicals we're not entirely sure you know what kind he talked about this in the documentary too but um in that podcast he says i don't know how you can believe in a god who wants to condemn most of the planet to a fiery hell what type of hell do you want to condemn most of the planet to a fiery hell what type of loving sensitive omnipresent omnipotent being wants to condemn his beautiful creation to a fiery hell at the end of all of this so it seems like um that could be a fundamental difference uh people reported that his parents were disappointed uh he's to them quote you know this is an insider which i don't know who that would be for the rogers family but i'm sure they have a go-to someone to them his comments are basically a slap in the face to the fundamentals of who they are and i think that's a good thing i think that's a good thing i think that's a good it's basically him turning his back on everything they've taught him which is again the public back and forth between he said his family said right right so again another another moment of contention and that was in 2020 so then in um flash forward a bit in 2023 it appears that maybe aaron rogers and his dad uh are potentially reconciling maybe they're they acknowledge each other yeah ian o'connor sports writer he is an unauthorized biography of aaron rogers it comes out called out of the darkness which is genius because aaron went into a darkness retreat to decide whether or not he should go to the jets and then he did and then he tore his achilles and then that was bad um but he talks about how in july of 2023 aaron rogers um was at this golf tournament uh the american century championship golf tournament where fathers and sons what do they do there they bond yeah because that's men bonded over golf right cure family problems via golf having trouble golf golf who needs family therapy when you can golf golf honestly though there is something to be said for taking a walk with people that you're having an issue with if you take a walk and talk with someone it's much better than just sitting there because everybody gets fidgety you know what that's true that's a good point maybe there's something to be said for golf yeah that's true um although i think golf courses too much public they should be public land public land and there are some public golf courses but i don't know how that works you should be able to walk there and like yeah there should be like a walking path through a golf course yeah that's not just for maybe we just get rid of golf maybe that's it maybe maybe golf had a good run maybe it did anyway uh so apparently aaron's dad ed went to this golf tournament to see his son aaron aaron didn't know that ed was going um apparently though he saw his dad and was like okay and they said i love you let's spend some time together and he said i love you and i'm gonna go to the golf course and i'm gonna go to the golf course um so this isn't it's just unclear how true any of this really is uh because whether that counts as like talking or not is unclear in different reports we've seen um so take all of this with a grain of salt yeah but 2024 brings us to enigma yes so aaron rogers releases enigma and he addresses a lot of the things that we have just been discussing he talks about the bachelorette and he said they go on a bull show and leave two empty chairs they all agreed this was a good thing to do to leave two empty chairs at a stupid dating show that my brother just went on to get famous his words not mine that he ended up winning but a dinner that was during the football season i was never asked to go to not that i would have gone so he addresses a bachelorette so he's claiming that a he wasn't invited to the show where they put two empty chairs to signify his absence right and it was during football season so how could he and jordan his brother who called him out about the fires and not checking on his mom only went on to get famous yeah he also addresses the religious elements saying quote i grew up in a very white dogmatic church and that just didn't really serve me it was a very rigid structure i'm not a rigid person and continues on so again he addresses that talks about his childhood um and then he starts talking about you know his ways he's been an ayahuasca and exploring other religions by saying quote when i started looking into other religions and plant medicine i also found a lot of resistance doing things compared to what i grew up in would be considered an alternative lifestyle so he's basically showing hey i'm an enigma i'm uh different from my family i don't conform to their standards and to me it all implies he's trying to indicate like we have a riff yeah but again we also don't know what exactly is true with what's just taken it from what he said and what has been reported well the thing about documentaries madeline is you'd like to think that it they would present um multiple versions of the situation which is why enigma was not really a documentary as we talked about at the time it was a you know aaron rogers pr move uh for a man who says he doesn't want to be in the public eye he made a netflix doc right doc um aaron rogers also goes on the pat mcafee show on espn quite a lot uh he's weekly during football season i believe um and he in i guess also not in football season because this was in march of 2026 um he said if you look at the saga with my family for years it was one-sided they were making shots in the media saying bull i never said anything until it got to the point where i'm like all right enough is enough and and then somehow uh eno connor who wrote the the book about aaron that aaron did i think give a give an interview for although it wasn't like the official authorized one um aaron a month after he said that on the pat mcafee show aaron invited his parents into his into his high school's hall of fame yeah and according to ian o'connor he thanked them for their support um so you're kind of thinking all right maybe they're turning a new page in their relationship um and that obviously brings us to the instagram post where clearly it appears that maybe they are turning a new page in their relationship for him to think that it was a smart pr move to post that publicly yep because as we've said like any move a public figure is making on their public instagram account with millions of people who follow it is a pr move at the end of the day even if it's something related to your personal life yeah it's still a pr move and and given how little he posts his choice to post this right makes it louder yeah i would say also i just want to i want to note two things one people will remember when aaron rogers said he was immunized against covid which didn't mean he was vaccinated because he wasn't um , and so that is also another example of him not telling the truth or telling a version uh that suits him because he claims he took a bunch of herbs and stuff yeah supplements whatever not the same um his also his his instagram what do you call it profile the little circle profile pic avatar whatever yeah is him as a jedi and i just think that an illustration of him as a jedi um and i just think that's worth well that's how he views himself apparently i think you're right he views himself as a jedi and so i think now it brings us to a point where this is a man who he's going to play one more year with the steelers and then i believe retire uh he's in his 40s he is maybe taking stock of where he is in his life there is a version of this where it's a lovely family story even though all sides seem to love talking about each other in the press and it's messy and who knows what they believe about what maybe there is a version where it's like oh well a man is reuniting with his family wouldn't that be nice yeah because it's aaron rogers and because he's so calculated with the media it's you you're kind of like well what's going on here well what i go to is because he's nearing the end of his playing career and this very well could be his last season right we don't know um that he is priming the audience which is us the public for what his post-retirement brand will look like and maybe part of his post-retirement brand whether that's a podcast as we said please don't start a podcast maybe it's a show we have no idea what it's going to be a book um will have something to do with his family and in a lot of ways he needs his family to help with his own public image and to curate the public persona he wants to do that's and i think he wouldn't have posted that if he didn't think about it and i think he would have posted that if he didn't think about it and i think he think about those things i think that's a great point because he has confirmed that that 2026 is going to be his last year so this is kind of his retirement tour um you know he's had an unbelievable career you can't say he hasn't um and i think that athletes when they get to go out not necessarily on their own terms because it's hard to do that but clearly aaron has in his mind primed himself it's not like you know lebron after playing um this past season he was like i don't know if i'm going to play or not we're pretty sure he knew he was right but rogers is saying like no at the end of this i'm done which gives him that ramp that time to then this year what because because he knows as a as an athlete you are never going to be more famous than when you're playing your sport so this year this last year of playing gives him a whole season to be in the spotlight the way he wants to be in the spotlight afterwards and set the tone for what he does next while he's still has the platform that being an athlete affords him 100 and i think that we will get at some point this season a britney with an eye hard launch on instagram i'm calling it now you think he's going to put his wife on his instagram i think he's going to i think he's going to by the end of the season maybe it'll be like an end of season post where she's like hugging him or something and it's like the back of her head and maybe we don't see her face but i do think that there's a if he is publicly showing that he is reconciling with his family that he has been estranged with for years and has been a point of conversation around this man for over a decade i certainly think there's a chance that we will get a britney with an eye post you know what the season calling it now i think you're right and i think that what do you do you start the training camp with a picture of you with your parents that you haven't been seen within forever and then the whole season ramps up and when the season ends whether they make the playoffs or not you launch your wife you are once again in the news cycle this woman no one has seen nobody knows anything about that woman that some people don't think exists and then you are in control of your narrative going forward yes yes yeah yeah that's what's going to happen so look all i guess what i'll say to that is that if britney doesn't exist now she she there will be a woman named britney with an eye by the end of this season 100 he's got a season to find himself he's well he's got a season to be the bachelor if he hasn't already won already allegedly he has there you go there you go britney well if you're listening come on the show come on the show come on the show i think this might be the last show on i green earth that you would go on i'm gonna guess that she won't come on the show but never say never you never know you never know you never know well i think that's it i think that's it folks well as always please rate review like and subscribe it makes a huge huge difference you can follow us on instagram at sports gossip tiktok at sports gossip show you can subscribe to our sub sack at sports gossip show at sub sack.com you can buy merch linked below in the description or in our instagram bio and i think that's it so good at that it's just etched into your brain oh stop it oh man um yeah that's it okay bye