The story, many people believe, is of an aging, self-absorbed quarterback who doesn’t know when to let go.
The story offends them because, really, who does he think he is, retiring and unretiring like that, toying with their emotions, wasting their time, upsetting their apple carts?
The better question, besides wondering why they have apple carts, is why Brett Favre’s waffling angers so many people. I’m thinking it has something to do with deep-seated trust issues. Counselors are standing by.
Question: If you’re a Vikings fan, would you rather have Favre or either of Minnesota’s current “established” quarterbacks, Tarvaris Jackson or Sage Rosenfels?
Answer: No matter how much you dislike Favre and loathe his inability to stick to a decision, you know the answer.
Question: If you’re a Bears fan and want to win games (not fantasy leagues) this season, would you rather have Favre, Adrian Peterson and Bernard Berrian on your team or Jay Cutler, Matt Forte and Devin Hester?
Answer: Despite the declarations of undying love for Cutler in these parts, you would be insane not to go with Favre, et al. If the option were Rosenfels, Peterson and Berrian, you might think differently.
This is all about winning, not about whether Favre is an egomaniac who can’t bear the thought of living a quiet life in Hattiesburg, Miss. He signed a contract Tuesday with the Vikings, automatically making them one of the teams to beat in the NFC.
Is he disturbing the team’s continuity by signing this late? For a while, perhaps, but he’s going to make the Vikings better.
Is he selfish? Very likely, but he’s going to make the Vikings better.
Is he the quarterback he once was? No, but he’s going to make the Vikings better.
All the crazy, ill-advised passes he throws — he really is all about himself, isn’t he? I attribute those passes to an incredible belief in himself, but the bottom-line answer is — yes, that one again — he’s going to make the Vikings better.
He might even make them a Super Bowl team. So if you’re the Vikings, you don’t give a flip about all his flip-flopping.
Favre turns 40 on Oct. 10. Five days before that, he will play his former team, the Packers, on “Monday Night Football.” Think you’ll tune in? Yeah, me too.
Three weeks ago, Favre said he planned to stay retired. Most people took it with a grain of salt because the guy seems to stay retired the way Paris Hilton seems to stay celibate. You’re tired of the Favre story. You get mad about it every time you think about it, and you’re mad because it’s taking up the time normally reserved for pondering the proper ratio of cheese to refried beans on your pregame nachos.
But Favre maneuvering his way out of three weeks of training camp — that’s a veteran move. Those were three more weeks in which he could get his arm ready — the arm that required arthroscopic surgery in the off-season. He already knows the offense. Vikings offensive coordinator Darrell Bevell was his quarterbacks coach in Green Bay.
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He is less than two years removed from playing in the NFC championship game for the Packers. He is less than two years removed from finishing second in voting for the NFL’s most valuable player award.
True, he is one year from looking awful after hurting his arm with the Jets. That’s a roll of the dice the Vikings had to take.
If they weren’t the favorite to win the NFC North, they are now. If Favre can stay healthy and play the way he did in the first half of the season for the Jets last year, the Vikings will be a big threat in the playoffs.
Whether he stays healthy is a huge “if.” According to ESPN, he still has a slight tear in his rotator cuff. But if you’re the Vikings, you don’t shy away from him because of it.
And all his waffling over the summer? A distraction, and nothing more.
If Favre’s legacy is tarnished by another return, so what? It’s his legacy, just as it was Michael Jordan’s legacy when he decided to come out of retirement twice, the last as a 38-year-old with the Wizards. No one thinks of the Washington years first when they think of Jordan.
The Vikings already have a great defense. Now they have a quarterback.
The chorus says the quarterback should go away.
If he wants to keep playing and even one team wants him to keep playing, why should he go away? And what’s it to you anyway?
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