The Pack is back to back.
Brett Favre bounced up from the tackle, the only sack the 49ers would get on the Packers quarterback the long miserable day. Favre whacked Bryant Young, the sacker, good-naturedly on the shoulder. Favre shook another 49er, Kevin Greene, by the face mask, pounded him on the shoulder, grinning all the while.
Greene is a professional wrestler when not earning money as a pass rusher.
“Bryant made a good hit,” Favre said. “Real good. I just wanted to let him know I wasn’t fazed by it.
“Kevin was doing a little of that wrestling crap. Jawing at me. I was just letting them know that I knew this was a fight and I planned to be there all day.
“Hey, this is what makes the game fun.”
No one these days can be having more fun than Favre. Certainly nobody on this day had more fun than Favre. Definitely not the 49ers, outmuscled, outventured, out-Favred, for the fourth time in a row now, for the second year with the Super Bowl at stake.
This was not two dynasties passing in the spume. This was one dynasty waving farewell for good. The student, Packers coach Mike Holmgren, six years after leaving the 49ers, has become the headmaster.
“I would hope we have our own identity now,” Holmgren said. “Our own thing. I hope we are recognized now for being the Green Bay Packers. It has been long enough.”
These Packers are Holmgren’s, sure. In design and in presentation. But they are Favre’s in expression, daring and lusty. They will last as long as Favre does.
“I can play the big games,” Favre said.
Maybe it is time to just change the name of the NFL to the Nobody but Favre League. Three times MVP, second Super Bowl in a row, the very best player at the very hardest position.
We are in the very heart of the Age of Favre, and even on a day when it was impossible for quarterbacks to make a difference, Favre made all the difference.
On the home field of Steve Young, himself the standard against which quarterbacking used to be measured, Favre fairly pranced through the puddles, taking a crisp victory out of a soggy day.
“It felt like home out there,” Favre said. “Except for the lack of cold weather.”
Winter was Green Bay’s weapon, according to 49ers coach Steve Mariucci. The 49ers had El Nino, he said, in this case damp, dank bay drizzle, as wet as tears, as helpful as soaked socks.
El Nino, it would appear, eats cheese. And not Napa Valley brie. Good, old-fashioned Wisconsin cheddar.
Favre lost an argument with the officials over grounding the ball. He grinned over at his old coach and close friend Mariucci, who was yelling at Favre to get off the field.
“I said I’d go,” Favre said. “But I would be back.”
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Back to back. From last year’s Super Bowl to this one, this is how it was supposed to end. The Green Bay Packers against the Denver Broncos in the Super Bowl. This was the chalk and that is how it finishes, even if the Broncos had to do it the hard way, on the road, as a wild card.
The Packers, too, were reminded of an old athletic truth. There’s room at the top, but not enough to sit down.
“The record looks the same,” Favre said, “like it was just as easy as last year. But it sure was not.”
“The season was pressure-packed,” Packers safety Eugene Robinson said. “Can we do it again? Are they prima donnas? Are they charlatans? They are going to fall off, just wait, just wait.”
“I’ve always preached to enjoy the journey,” Holmgren said. “When you are repeating, some of joy of the first time is just not possible. It is just hard to have fun when the expectations are so high.”
Not for Favre. Favre finds the fun.
“I came into this game knowing we go on or we watch,” Favre said. “I wasn’t going to watch.”
We’ll do the watching. Lucky us.