The Favre Spectacle Rears Its Ugly Head, Again
The latest episode of the Brett Favre will he or won’t he retirement spectacle has reared its ugly head once again with reports that he began texting teammates he was going to be retiring. What makes this go around different is it seems to be a bit more entertaining.
In the past we were treated to ESPN sending some poor soul to hang out on his front lawn and schlep around Mississippi following him down to the local high school to watch him wing passes to the local high school kids, hoping to score some face time with him and coax an answer out of him. The latest escapade caught everyone off guard.
Up until know we had all assumed that since Favre was seen working out with the high school kids again that he was prepping himself to come back for the upcoming season. Brad Childress even made a special trip down to visit with Brett prior to camp opening to get a feel for how he was doing. Childress seemed more than happy letting Favre hang out and rehab his surgically repaired ankle on his own time and even implied that Favre was probably coming back for another season. After all he missed all of camp last year and still managed to put together one of the best seasons of his career. ESPN had not even bothered to send anyone down to monitor the goings on.
What makes this whole scenario so bizarre though is the fact that his own teammates are going on record saying they received text messages from the man himself saying he was retiring only to have Favre go on record today saying he had not yet decided what he was going to do. He then went on to say that if his ankle heals to the point where he feels comfortable enough to play on it he would be back with the Vikings for the upcoming season.
What has me scratching my head about this recent development is what the motivation is behind the whole thing in the first place? So what gives here? Why would he text his teammates one thing and then do a complete 180 with the media and deny he even sent the messages in the first place?
Or are his teammates all in on the gag? Did he promise these guys a hunting trip next spring if they went off and told reporters about the text message they got from Brett? Or, is Brett just jerking everyone’s chain right now?
I cannot imagine why a bunch of his Vikings teammates would just fabricate this whole thing, but I suppose they very well could have. But, then again, why do something that potentially alienates your meal ticket back to the playoffs? Sure they were a playoff team without him but they really were not a legitimate Super Bowl contender without him, so why potentially alienate the guy and upset the apple cart so to speak?
Could it be that Brett is lonely down in Mississippi without the satellite trucks camping out in his neighborhood following him around town? Is it that he was waiting for the LeBron circus to die down before making his move? Was it that Brett did not want to compete with his fellow attention whore in the NBA for the attention?
What makes this even more entertaining for some of us is the way ESPN got absolutely played by Brett this go around. They spent the better part of yesterday afternoon getting every available analyst on camera or on the phone to wax poetic about Favre and tell us how much his retirement changes the landscape of the NFC for the coming season. With Favre telling reporters that he has not decided what he is going to do ESPN is left with a bit of egg on their face after taking the bait hook, line, and sinker.
What makes me wonder how ESPN fell so hard about this was that there were some tell tale signs that Favre may not be retiring. I guess the initial reaction to Childress’ response was one of the guy is simply in denial about it all. Honestly, if Favre had officially informed the team of his decision don’t they think someone would have been in Childress’ ear within five minutes of finding out? Why is it that the team did not issue any sort of a statement signifying Brett was retiring, and why was there no retirement press conference in the works?
The only way ESPN can possibly redeem itself now is by placating Favre’s need to have his ego stroke. I say they host a program similar to the one they did for LeBron. They can make a huge event out of it. Let’s get John Madden and John Gruden down to Mississippi and they can co-host a huge cookout on Favre’s front lawn and he can tell the world whether he is going to play next season or not.
Better yet, let’s make a whole weekend out of it. ESPN can pick up the broadcast rights to the Vikes preseason game against Seattle and have it moved down to the University of Southern Miss where Brett can sit out on the 50 yard line in front of his adoring fans with Madden and Gruden and tell the world of his intentions to return then he can suit up and play the next to last preseason game for Minnesota.
However this all plays out over the next couple of weeks Brett Favre has managed to keep himself the center of the sports world for just a little while longer which is probably all he really wanted. After all it has been a good six months or so since we really had a good heart wrenching moment over Brett Favre and that was simply far too long for us to be deprived of some Brett Favre time.
