Published by Linda on 03 Aug 2008 at 07:10 pm
More About Brett Favre, Some More
I highly recommend this piece by Tom Curran, which turned around my thinking about the Favre situation instantly.
I didn’t realize it until he explained it, but Packers management played this perfectly. They have put themselves in a position where they win, no matter what happens. He plays great, they win. He plays terrible, he’s the goat, they win. In fact, not even “terrible.” As Curran points out, he’d better play like he played last season (unlikely, in my view), or else it’s potentially going to make him look horrendous.
He put them in a horrible, horrible position with that little maneuver, and this is the one way it turns out that they win, no matter what. As Curran points out, the person who gets screwed here is Aaron Rodgers, but in all honesty, Aaron Rodgers was probably screwed anyway. The scrutiny to which he would have been subjected had he played after they turned down Favre probably would have sent him to the booby hatch. There was no saving Aaron Rodgers in this situation, because of how absolutely callous Favre was toward him to begin with. Favre basically screwed Rodgers about as badly as you can screw another guy professionally, and that’s yet another reason why the pressure is entirely on Favre. He’d better be awesome, or what he did to that kid is going to look atrocious.
Favre will get the usual “Brett Favre is awesome” press coverage from most of the press, but the way management played this has exposed his questionable loyalty to the franchise (given his apparent eagerness to go play for the Vikings out of spite), how selfish he is, and fundamentally how willing he is to place himself above the team. In the long run, no matter what the fawning people who love to write about Favre tell you, he’s hurt himself here, and now he’s the one with something to prove.
They win either way. He’s great, they win. He’s bad, they win. All he can possibly do now is put his money where his mouth is. What they had to do was put him in a position where he would be tarred and feathered if he quit again in a month and put him in a position where all the pressure of the team’s performance would be on him. Both of those things were accomplished. It’s pretty freaking genius how they did it, even though today is being spent in the fantasy land of “Brett Favre won the showdown.” It’s obvious that Curran is right — his bosses won, and whether he plays great or plays badly, he’s the only one with anything to lose.
Natalie on 03 Aug 2008 at 8:51 pm #
The only drawback for the Packers was the absolute shitstorm of criticism that came from the fans in Green Bay. I mean, when the GM mentions people burning him in effigy and is probably only partially kidding, you know it’s bad. But I agree that in the end, the Packers played it about as well as can be expected, given the no-win situation they seemed to be in.
Joe R on 04 Aug 2008 at 12:38 am #
Aaron Rodgers, in all likelyhood, was screwed even if Favre had stayed retired like he should have. Unless he came out of the gateon some kind of unimaginable hot streak, he’d have been compared unfavorably to Favre on a constant basis.
I was so, so, SO hoping that Favre would take the buyout and sit at home. Would have loved to have seen the sportswriters try to spin that into the most heroic bribe-taking-to-sit-on-one’s-ass in the history of sport.
abjr on 04 Aug 2008 at 2:58 am #
I agree. The Packer’s organization played this masterfully. I’ve been trying to figure this whole thing out over the course of this fiasco. At the end of the day, and I can’t quite point to anything that provides evidence to my conclusion, I think this all may have started with Favre trying to up the ante on the marketing deal the Packers offered him early after he retired by toying with a notion of unretiring. They didn’t think they needed to up the offer, then the whole posturing on both sides blows up in the press. At the end, when the Packers upped the offer, they may have had collateral damage had Favre accepted; he, however, would have had a direct hit–taking a “bribe”–the notion of it wasn’t playing in Peoria (or Burlington), as they say.
Every upside now proves the Packers right (except for the fact they may lose Rodgers). Every downside is on Brett’s head. Well played.
golfnutbucket on 04 Aug 2008 at 9:50 am #
Well said, Linda and thanks for the article. For me, I just want this whole circus to be over so we can get back to talking about real football instead of “As The Favre Turns” (my stomach).
No matter what the outcome, Favre has become a jerk in my book which is 180 degrees from what I thought of him a few months ago. How do you like your legacy now, Brett?
Mollie on 04 Aug 2008 at 5:23 pm #
As a lifelong New Yorker and non-football-follower, I know nothing about this situation apart from your prior post, but when I woke up to NPR reporting it this morning, I thought, “Linda is going to be pissed.” I actually think that Curran is saying something slightly different than what you’re saying (reads to me like he says: they’ve put up with this big baby through all his bullshit and now they’ll play him because he’s better than the other guy for now and they want to win for the fans), but both reads are interesting.
Bunting on 04 Aug 2008 at 10:08 pm #
I still can’t really believe how pathetic this whole kerfuffle makes Favre look. Even if he’s telling the complete, unvarnished truth when he says that management pressured him to make a decision one way or the other…what are you, six years old? You, a voting adult with teenage children, can’t tell the team, “I know you’re eager to put a plan in place for next season, but I’m not ready to decide my future yet”?
Because if that’s true, that’s sad. I’m sure they did pressure him; he’s not a rookie, and he should be able to withstand that sort of pressure, if only to avoid dicking everyone around and ending up a punchline, which is what’s happening, kind of.
And if that’s not true, and I suspect it isn’t — I suspect, like Clemens, that once the valedictory tongue-bath had dried, Favre realized he had nothing else like it in his life, and was not prepared to move on to the next phase and learn to live without that sort of affirmation, so he changed his mind and made up some BS about why — it’s still sad. If that’s how it went down, and he really can’t live without the attention and the rush and whatever, it’s like…son, eventually you really will be too old to do this for a living, and it’s waaaaaay past time for you to have figured out a Plan B, found something else in your life, and accepted that, one day, it has to end for you.
Doesn’t he have anyone in his life who could sit him down and say, “Homes, I know it’s hard to walk away, but you’re making an ass of yourself”? Nobody to remind him what happened when Ruth went to the Braves? Because if I’m Mrs. Favre, I would consider it a dereliction of my spousal duty not to point out that he’s shanghaiing the entire pre-season and acting a fool.
I don’t live in a part of the country that’s inclined to pay more attention to Favre than he would get aside from in Sports Illustrated, and I don’t know that much about football, really, but just from a psychological standpoint, it’s like…get therapy and accept reality, Favre. When ESPN has devoted an entire ticker section to you, you’re over the line.
Bo on 05 Aug 2008 at 9:08 am #
Am I the only person out here who wonders why the NFL didn’t say, “Wait, you can’t bribe someone not to play.” Yes, guys get marketing or personal services deals when they retire all the time. But that’s usually to make the team look good and have a guy who was key to the team’s history stay on board and keep making nice for community relations or as part of the broadcast team. The idea of specifically paying someone not to play so even if you aren’t interested in having him play for you he can’t play for a competitor seemed anticompetitive to me.
And yes, this is about as well as it could have ended for the Packers. Although I don’t see the season playing out well for them.
Linda on 05 Aug 2008 at 9:27 am #
Well, I think the thing there is that the Packers already had the ability to keep him from playing. They can keep him and bench him — and as unlikely as that outcome seems, Brett Favre already can’t play for anybody else unless they decide to let him, because by the time his contract expires, he’s very likely done. So basically, it’s not anticompetitive to give him an alternative contract, because they don’t have to let him play either way. If he were a free agent, I think they’d absolutely pick up on that issue. But as it is, the Packers already own the exclusive rights to Brett Favre for the remainder of his viable playing career unless they decide to give them up. I’m not sure at all that this is the right analysis or that this is why it’s not as problematic, but that’s my read. If they want to give him his money over 20 years instead of two or three or whatever, and change the terms of his contract so he’s a PR guy instead of a player, I don’t know that they’ll stop that. Though, again, I’m speculating.
abjr on 05 Aug 2008 at 9:16 pm #
Okay, at this point, I have no idea what is going on, no potential winners now, but I wll say: I think Aaron Rodgers is screwed–no way he can live up to the pressure this season; Packer’s likely now screwed for the season without Favre; Favre–who knows–unless he goes somewhere quick and gets into a good chemistry with a team, has really fouled up his reputation. ESPN–totally without programming once this is settled.
Jeanette on 05 Aug 2008 at 10:59 pm #
I’d really love to know what the real story behind all this is about. Seriously, I can’t figure out what real benefit it is to Brett to continue playing. Does he really think he can play at least as well as last season or better at his age? Does he really think that this whole debacle makes him look good? Or was he so annoyed at the Packers for ‘forcing’ him out that he feels that by not playing it diminishes himself in some way? Even if the Packers did ‘force’ him out, its not like he wasn’t going out a near hero, on an upswing, rather than after a poor year, and surely could get a good amount of endorsement deals to stay in the money. Maybe his wife was sick of hearing him moan and groan about not playing, how much he misses the game, etc. and told him that if he missed it so damn much to do something about it (and I could get behind her on that, but maybe she thought he’d do something smaller like coach a Pop Warner football team or something). I’ve always admired Favre, so I hope he comes out of this alright, but I can’t help but feel that he made a huge mistake.
Bo on 06 Aug 2008 at 8:56 am #
Ack. You’re right about them controlling him for the rest of his contract term, Linda. What was I thinking. But it looks like the Favre-fest will be over soon. Maybe he can crap out in Tampa Bay and we’ll never have to hear the tongue baths any more.
Oh, and apparently his wife did sit him down, and tell him he was driving her crazy, so he should go back to playing football. Maybe when he really does retire, they need to live in a livelier place so he has more to do than ride the tractor around.
Natalie on 06 Aug 2008 at 9:14 am #
@ Bunting: Also on the “What are you, six years old?” front is now his assertion that his feelings are simply too hurt to play in Green Bay anymore. Dude, this is a business. I had to laugh when whoever it was on talk radio who heard that said “Turn in your ‘man card’.”
Linda on 06 Aug 2008 at 9:54 am #
The thing is, I think what’s happened now kind of underlines Curran’s point. Favre came back and realized that basically, what he’d done was force his way into a situation where everybody was sick to death of his antics and a good part of his patina of aw-shucksy nonsense was gone, and the ONLY WAY he was going to work his way back into everyone’s good graces was to be totally awesome. When I heard that they asked him if he was 100 percent committed, and he came back by asking if they were 100 percent committed to him…are you kidding me? He’s the one who retired! Of course they’re not 100 percent committed to him; he retired and hasn’t taken a snap with the team since he told them he didn’t want to play anymore!
I realize it’s all rank speculation — I openly admit that. But to me, it feels like he honestly believed, sitting down there in Mississippi, that as soon as he said he wanted to come back, it would be nothing but excitement, exactly like every other time he decided to keep playing instead of retiring. I think that he read way too much of the sports press and had absolutely no clue how sick to death so many people were of his behavior, including Packer fans. Of course he has devotees, yes — but look at how irrational they have to act to make a point. The other night, they were booing Aaron Rodgers. That makes absolutely NO sense. The only person you cannot even argue has done anything wrong in this situation is Aaron Rodgers; the fact that they were taking it out on him kind of demonstrates that the most stubborn Favre loyalists are struggling to figure out where to put their anger — other than on Brett Favre, where it belongs.
I’m not suggesting that the management handled this well, because they didn’t. But frankly, I think his whole “give me my release” thing has been ridiculous from the start. They don’t have to do that. They don’t have any reason to do that. I read a column (one of so many, I can’t remember it now) that said that the columnist realized at one point that the Packers would actually rather sit Favre on the bench than trade him to the Vikings or release him. I’m not sure that’s true, but I think he wildly underestimated their resolve, and he wildly underestimated the impact of the fact that he has an active contract that gives them a lot of options and gives him very few.
In the end, I think if the current speculation goes through and Favre is traded to Tampa Bay, it’s going to be utterly obvious that he got schooled in this situation — they probably never cared a whit if he wanted to come back and play for Tampa Bay. He’s the one who came back pretending that he could set a list of conditions — I’m not coming back unless I start, if you’re not going to start me you have to release me — that he had absolutely no way to back up.
I think he’s just so ridiculously accustomed to getting his way that he completely overplayed his hand and didn’t remember that he can’t actually make people do things, because he’s not actually a god, despite what way too many sports journalists keep telling him.
t2ed on 06 Aug 2008 at 11:37 am #
The Onion had a great article where Brett is quoted as “I’ve Always Had A Passion For Stopping Things, Then Starting To Do Things Again.”
Genius.
Latest rumor was the Tampa Bay trade. Circle 9/28 on your calendar as the Green Bay is on the road at Tampa Bay that day. I’m sure no one will harbor any ill will at that point in the season.
Martillo on 06 Aug 2008 at 4:34 pm #
Not to defend his actions because… make your mind up already dude, but I can’t agree that it is 100% clear that he absolutely should be retired at this point.
No, I don’t claim he is a god. And I don’t even claim that he will certainly do as well as last year (though I don’t rule it out automatically either). I do think that even if he has a sub-par Brett Favre year, he will still be better than some pretty large percentage of the QBs in the league this year. And that’s the rub. He could play on several teams this coming year and improve those teams by playing on them – even at his advanced age.
And while I totally agree that he is so ridiculously accustomed to getting his way that he completely misunderestimated how bad this would make him look, I also think it must be incredibly difficult for anyone within spitting distance of 40 years old to be told that their best days are behind them and that they are in effect washed up. Nobody wants to be told they can’t do it anymore, or they’re not what they used to be. That has to hit especially hard when it is someone that is still mentally quite young. Doesn’t excuse the behavior, but it’s still gotta suck!
emmo on 07 Aug 2008 at 12:54 am #
As a die-hard Tampa fan, I was greatly relieved to see Favre go to the Jets instead of Tampa… I don’t know if I could have made myself like him after all this… although I managed to convince myself that Keyshawn wasn’t so bad when I had to, so maybe anything is possible…