LATROBE, Pa. (AP) — This is not Aaron Rodgers' first training camp.
Or his 10th.
Or his 20th, for that matter.
Yet the NFL's oldest player seems to be rejuvenated by camp life with the Pittsburgh Steelers.
It's not just the age of his new teammates, some of whom — such as 21-year-old first-round pick Derrick Harmon — were toddlers when Rodgers was selected by the Green Bay Packers in the first round of the 2005 draft. It's not just the chance to work closely with Steelers coach Mike Tomlin, whom he's admired from afar for years.
It's all of it. From living in a college dormitory at Saint Vincent College — something he hadn't done since the Green Bay Packers stopped going to St. Norbert College during the COVID-19 pandemic — to being part of a practice with live hitting for the first time in at least a decade.
No, the NFL's oldest player wasn't putting his 41-year-old body on the line during the initial full-contact session of the season on Wednesday — quarterbacks are still off limits — but he did get an up-close look at the kind of physical practice that Tomlin believes is vital if increasingly uncommon this time of year.
“I haven’t been a part of a true tackling period in a long time,” Rodgers said about an hour before trotting down to sweltering Chuck Noll Field in his white No. 8 jersey.
And while Rodgers kept his No. 8 clean, he did find himself leaning into the competitive nature of things. During the “seven shots” drill — essentially a series of 2-point conversion attempts by the offense — Rodgers found himself in the thick of things while taking a handful of live snaps with the starters.
His first pass was swatted down by blitzing safety DeShon Elliott. Rodgers laughed in the aftermath and even exchanged high-fives with Elliott before both players made their way back to the huddle. During the four-time MVP's second attempt, he deftly maneuvered around the pocket before finding newly acquired tight end Jonnu Smith for a conversion.
The best-of-seven ended with perhaps Rodgers' finest moment on the field so far during camp. Needing a score to record a “win” for the offense, Rodgers floated a pass to the back corner of the end zone, where DK Metcalf made a twisting grab before tapping both feet down inbounds.
While it hasn't been the crispest start to camp for the offense in general, Rodgers is hardly panicking.
“It’s not a bad thing to get beat up a little bit,” he said, later adding, “sometimes you can learn more from the failures in training camp than getting after it every single day.”
Rodgers, who signed with the Steelers in early June after spending months weighing whether to play in 2025, would like to have the offense down pat by the end of the week but cautioned, “We’ll see.”
Progress on the field isn't the only thing Rodgers is working on. His somewhat late arrival, combined with the likelihood that this is his final season, means there isn't a lot of time to build the kind of chemistry required to thrive once the games start to count.
In that way, being away for camp — a once common practice now only done by a half-dozen teams — has helped.
“I love that we’re out here in Latrobe. I love the opportunity for true camaraderie,” he said. “At nighttime, after meetings are done, guys hang out, you know, guys come to my room. Last night, I was in (linebacker Alex) Highsmith’s room. So that’s it’s pretty cool to see everybody hanging out the way they are. It’s a lot of fun.”
And it is still fun for Rodgers. There will be plenty of time in the future when his career will be in his rearview mirror. He's not quite there yet.
“For me, once it stops being fun, you should probably hang it up,” he said.
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Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Aaron Rodgers throws a pass during practice at the team's NFL football training camp in Latrobe, Pa., Tuesday, July 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar)
Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Aaron Rodgers, left, fakes a handoff to running back Kaleb Johnson during practice at the team's NFL football training camp in Latrobe, Pa., Tuesday, July 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar)
WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal judge Thursday cleared the way for a New York offshore wind project to resume construction, a victory for the developer who said a Trump administration order to pause it would likely kill the project in a matter of days.
District Judge Carl J. Nichols, an appointee of President Donald Trump, ruled construction on the Empire Wind project could go forward while he considers the merits of the government’s order to suspend the project. He faulted the government for not responding to key points in Empire Wind’s court filings, including the contention that the administration violated proper procedure.
Norwegian company Equinor owns Empire Wind. Spokesperson David Schoetz said they welcome the court's decision and will continue to work in collaboration with authorities. It’s the second developer to prevail in court against the administration this week.
The Trump administration froze five big offshore wind projects on the East Coast days before Christmas, citing national security concerns. Trump has targeted offshore wind from his first days back in the White House, most recently calling wind farms “losers” that lose money, destroy the landscape and kill birds.
Developers and states sued seeking to block the order. Large, ocean-based wind farms are the linchpin of plans to shift to renewable energy in East Coast states that have limited land for onshore wind turbines or solar arrays.
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul applauded the court decision, telling reporters the projects had been “stopped under the bogus pretense of national security.”
“When I heard this I said one thing: I’m the governor of New York, if there is a national security threat off the coast of New York, you need to tell me what it is. I want a briefing right now. Well, lo and behold, they had no answer,” she said.
On Monday, a judge ruled that the Danish energy company Orsted could resume its project to serve Rhode Island and Connecticut. Senior Judge Royce Lamberth said the government did not sufficiently explain the need for a complete stop to construction. That wind farm, called Revolution Wind, is nearly complete. It’s expected to meet roughly 20% of the electricity needs in Rhode Island, the smallest state, and about 5% of Connecticut’s electricity needs.
Orsted is also suing over the pause of its Sunrise Wind project for New York, with a hearing still to be set. Dominion Energy Virginia, which is developing Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind, plans to ask a judge Friday to block the administration’s order so it can resume construction, too.
Trump has also dismissed offshore wind developments as ugly, but the Empire project is about 14 miles (22.5 kilometers) offshore and the Sunrise project is about 30 miles (48 kilometers) offshore.
The fifth paused project is Vineyard Wind, under construction in Massachusetts. Vineyard Wind LLC, a joint venture between Avangrid and Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners, joined the rest of the developers in challenging the administration on Thursday. They filed a complaint in District Court in Boston.
In contrast to the halted action in the U.S., the global offshore wind market is growing, with China leading the world in new installations. Nearly all of the new electricity added to the grid in 2024 was renewable. The British government said Wednesday it secured a record 8.4 gigawatts of offshore wind in Europe’s largest offshore wind auction, enough clean electricity to power more than 12 million homes.
Robin Shaffer, president of Protect Our Coast New Jersey, said the Trump administration was right to stop construction on national security grounds. He urged officials to immediately appeal the adverse rulings and seek to halt all work pending appellate review. Opponents of offshore wind projects are particularly vocal and well-organized in New Jersey.
Empire Wind is 60% complete and designed to power more than 500,000 homes. Equinor said the project was in jeopardy due to the limited availability of specialized vessels, as well as heavy financial losses.
During a hearing Wednesday, Judge Nichols said the government’s main security concern seemed to be over operation of the wind turbines, not construction, although the government pushed back on that contention.
In presenting the government’s case, Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward, Jr. was skeptical of the perfect storm of horrible events that Empire Wind said would derail their entire project if construction didn’t resume. He disagreed with the contention that the government’s main concern was over operation.
“I don’t see how you can make this distinction,” Woodward said. He likened it to a nuclear project being built that presented a national security risk. The government would oppose it being built, and it turning on.
Molly Morris, Equinor’s senior vice president overseeing Empire Wind, said in an interview that the company wants to build this project and deliver a major, essential new source of power for New York.
McDermott reported from Providence, Rhode Island. Associated Press writer Anthony Izaguirre contributed to this report from Albany, New York.
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FILE - Wind turbines operate at Vineyard Wind 1 offshore wind farm off the coast of Massachusetts, July 19, 2025. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster, File)
FILE - Wind turbine bases, generators and blades sit along with support ships at The Portsmouth Marine terminal that is the staging area for Dominion Energy Virginia, which is developing Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind, Dec. 22, 2025, in Portsmouth, Va. (AP Photo/Steve Helber, File)
FILE - A sign for the company Equinor is displayed on Oct. 28, 2020, in Fornebu, Norway. (Håkon Mosvold Larsen/NTB Scanpix via AP, File)
Blades and turbine bases for offshore wind sit at a staging area at New London State Pier, Wednesday, Jan. 14, 2026, in New London, Conn. (AP Photo/Matt O'Brien)
