NFC Notes: Lions, Aaron Rodgers, Packers, Vikings

Lions

• Lions first-round DE Aidan Hutchinson said he received some trash talk from Packers QB Aaron Rodgers on his first career interception: “Aaron was talking some sh** to me after saying he gave me a ‘freebie’ and I was like, ‘Hey, freebie or not, I’ll take it.’” (Eric Woodyard)
• Hutchinson also noted that he had a learning experience going against Rodgers: “I thought he was really hard to keep in the pocket. It made me respect him. If I countered, I had to pop back outside and then pop inside so I had to keep great awareness of his pocket awareness.”

Packers

On Sunday, the Packers suffered another terrible loss and QB Aaron Rodgers was willing to shoulder the blame for his role in the team’s poor offensive performance.

“I had some s—ty throws, for sure,” Rodgers said of his three interceptions, via ESPN.com.

Rodgers told reporters that they will need to “dig deep and find a way” to turn things around.

“I’ve been counted out many times in my life as have many of my teammates, and I hope we just dig deep and find a way,” Rodgers said. “We will truly be underdogs for many games moving forward. Hopefully we can embrace that. We have two games at home. We’ve got to go win those two games in a week, and then this thing looks a little different.”

Rodgers was clearly very frustrated during the game, but he says he never gave up.

“I played s—ty, but I never gave up,” Rodgers said. “We moved the ball well in the first half, and I threw a couple picks in the end zone, took points off the board,” he added. “That, obviously, came back to hurt us down the stretch.”

Reporters asked Rodgers whether he felt now he should have retired during the offseason.

“I think that’s an exaggeration,” Rodgers said. “Frustration and miserability are two different emotions. So, when I decided to come back, it was all-in, and I don’t make decisions and then hindsight 20/20 have regrets about big decisions like that. So, I was all-in, and this is a lot of life lessons, for sure, this year, but luckily it’s not over. There’s still a lot of games left. We’ll be counted out, probably by many, and we’ll see how we respond.”

Vikings

Vikings TE T.J. Hockenson detailed his trade from the Lions to Minnesota and then played for his former rival that same week.

“I got the call about 1:30 on Tuesday and got on a plane about 7:00 on Tuesday night, landed at about 9:00 in Minneapolis, went to the facility, got my iPad, woke up at 6:00 AM on Wednesday for a physical and kind of hit the ground running,” Hockenson said, via Pro Football Talk. “It was a big offensive install[ation] on Wednesday. [Tight ends] coach Brian Angelichio, Coach [Kevin O’Connell], all of them did a great job just helping me learn the offense. Helping put me in a position to be successful… I stayed pretty late on Wednesday just trying to make sure I knew everything in the base plan and then Thursday it’s third-down [package], same thing. You’ve got to be in there early, stay late just to learn it. And then Friday, it’s a ‘fast Friday’ they say, but I was in there for a while after everyone was gone, too, just trying to make sure that I had the whole game plan down. Making sure that I was able to be out there and be part of this when they needed me and there was no, ‘Hey, he doesn’t know what’s going on,’ or, ‘Hey, he doesn’t know that.’ I just really wanted to not have that be the emphasis and that’s just something that I put on myself right when I got here.”

“Just being able to kind of revert my mind quickly and understand what’s going on with like what our objective is on each play and just trying to figure out the whole scheme and the whole concepts,” Hockenson said of learning the new offense. “Hearing it come out of the mouth is a little different than reading it. I’ve read it every night on my phone, voice recorded it, put my headphones in at night and listen to it coming back to me. . . . Being in four different offenses, that’s just tricks I’ve learned to be able to memorize things a little quicker and be able to execute.”

• Hockenson on his Vikings debut: “Hearing the fans out there and how they travel. Walking out and they’re already yelling my name. This is pretty sweet, so I’m just really happy to be part of this organization… nowhere else I’d rather be. It’s been awesome.” (Andrew Krammer)
• Vikings HC Kevin O’Connell said the team is “hoping” to have DL Dalvin Tomlinson back for Buffalo but doesn’t know if that will happen. (Chris Tomasson)
• Vikings CB Cameron Dantzler is a “long shot” to play at Buffalo, according to O’Connell. (Kevin Seifert)
• Vikings fourth-round CB Akayleb Evans is looking forward to getting his opportunity to start with Dantzler likely out: “I feel great about the opportunity. I’m looking forward to taking advantage of it.” (Tomasson)