NFL Thread (2008 edition)

[Central Scrutinizer]

Good riddance. I haven't been able to stand him in about 6 years. I hate the way the media has always covered him, and he's always come off as a douche to me. And the last few years of jerking the Packers around has just made me feel stronger.

 

To expound on why I hate him, he gets credit for being "a gunslinger who makes things happen", and while the way he plays is surely fun to watch, he's not a very good quarterback, and he too often would make decisions that hurt his team. Every once in a while he'd get lucky and the underhand throw as he's being sacked would be caught for a touchdown (see the dolphins-jets game in week 1 of this season), more often than not his "playmaking" was just hurting his team. There's a reason he's thrown so many interceptions. Sure, he was a great quarterback, but he was vastly overrated, and the media's ballwashing of him over the past 5 seasons has grown unbearable. He doesn't deserve to be in the discussion for greatest quarterback ever, in my opinion. I think he just played for a really long time and was very good, but not great, for the vast majority of that time. Oh, he had seasons where he was great particularly in the mid 90's, but he's mostly just been very good for a very long time, thus allowing him to rack up stats.

I agree with most of what you said here -- and this from a life-long Packer fan. But Favre is one of the greats for one reason -- his ability to play for so long, play through injuries and maintain the streak. His style of play had as much to do with keeping him from getting seriously injured -- although in later years his rep helped him as much (good ol' boy, gift sack to Strahan, opposing players would pull up and not take the cheap shot on him). You can't discredit him for staying healthy. But, yeah, all the records -- including most interceptions -- came as a result. Despite how he cheapened himself last year, the biggest negative from Favre is the demonstration how shallow most sports casters and "journalists" are because they clung to the "gunslinger" phrase and did as much to nuture Favre's stereotypes as he did himself.

 

I can't discount how he cheapened himself with the whole retire/unretire/blame Ted Thompson and Packers management for doing their job debacle. He needs to get over it and mend that fence because despite the HoF cred, public sentiment is going to erode the longer he whines about it.

[PigSooie]

 

So much here.