Having registered at least 80 receptions and 1,200 receiving yards in each of the last two seasons, Donald Driver and the Green Bay Packers have agreed to a contract extension.
"I take my hat off to the Packers organization first of all for even looking into it," said Driver, who had two years remaining on the contract he signed in 2002. "I really appreciate what they did because they didn't have to do it. I'm happy that I'll be a Packer for at least another four years."
The extension comes on the heels of Driver's most productive season in which he set career bests with 86 receptions and 1,221 yards, and will keep him entrenched within a community he has grown to love.
"I've always said that once I got to Green Bay I knew I wanted to retire here and that I always wanted to be a Green Bay Packer," said Driver, a native of Houston, Texas. "The tradition here is tremendous and the people here are like no other."
Driver, 31, begins his eighth season in Green Bay. The Packers' No. 1 receiving threat is looking forward to another finger-breaking season with the Packers' most heralded gunslinger.
"I don't know if he'll stay for four more years, that's a decision Brett (Favre) will have to make on his own," Driver said. "But once I told him that I had gotten a deal done it put a smile on his face, just as it put a smile on my face when I heard he was coming back."
Like Favre, Driver is one of the elder statesmen on the team and knows that his days with No. 4 are limited, but he's also excited about what the future holds for the quarterback position.
"I think Aaron (Rodgers) is a great quarterback," Driver said. "It's just going to take some time for he and I to gel. I think the trust has to be there. He has to trust me that, regardless of where he throws the ball, I'm going to be there to make the play and I have to trust that he is going to throw the ball to a spot where I can make a play.
"That's the trust that Brett and I have after playing together for seven seasons and I'm sure that once he does retire, I can have that same trust in Aaron. He's behind a great quarterback and after that great guy leaves, he is going to have to show his greatness. And Aaron does have the ability to be great."
Meanwhile, Driver, a seventh-round draft pick from Alcorn State in 1999, will continue to go about his business with the team he loves with hopes of one day being remembered as one of the Packers' all-time greats.
"I'm just excited to have the opportunity for my name to go down in the Packers history books with some of the greatest guys that ever played for the organization," Driver said. "That's a dream that a guy like me has always wanted."
