Rodgers to benefit from Monday grudge match

When Aaron Rodgers(notes) takes the field at the Metrodome on Monday night, 63,000 fired-up fans will boo him ruthlessly, yelling for his downfall at the hands of the hometown Minnesota Vikings and the transplanted legend he displaced.

Years from now, were Rodgers able, he’d personally thank every last one of them.

Rodgers, in his second season as the Green Bay Packers’ starting quarterback, doesn’t yet understand why he should be excited about being reviled. After all, on Monday in Minneapolis, he’ll feel like a suspect being interrogated while having a flashlight as bright and hot as the sun shining in his eyes.

Rodgers and Favre during the Packers’ playoff run following the ’07 season.
(Morry Gash./AP Photo)
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He’ll have to contend with a charged defense in a rivalry game between a pair of teams gunning for first place in the NFC North division. Even more daunting, he’ll be engaged in a mano-a-mano clash with Brett Favre(notes) – the most beloved player in Packers history, an almost-40-year-old future Hall of Famer who last Sunday won over any remaining skeptics in the Twin Cities with an incomprehensible game-winning touchdown pass in the final seconds.

For Rodgers, it has all the potential for playing out as a personal nightmare of colossal proportions.

Now here’s the cool part: Whether Rodgers succeeds, whether he wins, this will be the greatest thing that could happen to him short of winning a Super Bowl.