Epic Retirement speech by Favre right now

[MoLewisrocks]

I don't care what players say. Players voted Bruce Armstrong into the Pro Bowl year after year. Players are just as likely to be starry-eyed fans as...well...any of us.

I only brought up stats because typically people toss out Brett Favre's cumulative career stats as proof of his all-time greatness. The trouble with that is that if you play more games than anyone else has ever played at QB by a pretty decent margin then...yeah you are going to rack up a lot of cumulative stats.

When the game is on the line does anyone other than brainwashed Cheeseheads really, really want the ball in Brett Favre's hands? Maybe as a neutral observer you would because you knew the game was either going to end on a fantastic play or (more likely) a boneheaded INT. What a QB can do with the game on the line is truly the test of a QB's mettle to me and that's where Favre is at his most inconsistent.

Yeah...but that is because he was a gunslinger. That's what they do. They either pull the great play out of their ass or they kill you. Still, they play the game and for a long time those were they guys who won games. It's different today, it's a coaches league where cerebral players with solid talent surpass uber talents with no head for the game within the game. Brett is a dinosaur or a throwback, but players play and that's why they will always admire him. Great players have won games and titles in spite of poor coaching, it's seldom happened the other way around although great coaches have occasionally won more with less...

 

[tobias funke]

I only brought up stats because typically people toss out Brett Favre's cumulative career stats as proof of his all-time greatness. The trouble with that is that if you play more games than anyone else has ever played at QB by a pretty decent margin then...yeah you are going to rack up a lot of cumulative stats.

Testaverde is widely regarded as a great, consistent QB. He played more years than Favre and doesn't come close to him stat-wise. Unitas played a similar amount of time, and has a higher INT percentage than Favre does, and doesn't come close in yardage or TDs.

I'm not really comparing Favre to Testaverde or Unitas specifically, but the idea that all you have to do is play for 20 years and you'll have a bunch of records is kind of stupid. And wrong.

 

[MoLewisrocks]

Bret Farve is going to play in the 2008-09 football season.

No, I don't believe he will. If you listened to him, he's done. He knows he can still sling it on Sundays, but he also knows they didn't win at all when he did. For the last year and a half he became Tom Brady, and it wore him out. He wouldn't do it in his youth because he didn't believe he had to. His arm was enough to get past more limited defenses. As his skills eroded and defensive coaching developed more complex schemes, it became the only way he could win. But it's just too stressful for him, it takes the fun out of his game which was meet me at the 50 and start runnin' cause I'm gonna sling it. He was also pretty clear that while some say you stay on the field until they drag you off, he doesn't want to end his career being dragged off the field. I think he came back and modified his game so he wouldn't have to be. Two years ago too many people were saying he already stayed too long. He wanted to wait until he proved they were wrong so they couldn't say that.

 

[Sivy]

No, I don't believe he will. If you listened to him, he's done. He knows he can still sling it on Sundays, but he also knows they didn't win at all when he did. For the last year and a half he became Tom Brady, and it wore him out. He wouldn't do it in his youth because he didn't believe he had to. His arm was enough to get past more limited defenses. As his skills eroded and defensive coaching developed more complex schemes, it became the only way he could win. But it's just too stressful for him, it takes the fun out of his game which was meet me at the 50 and start runnin' cause I'm gonna sling it. He was also pretty clear that while some say you stay on the field until they drag you off, he doesn't want to end his career being dragged off the field. I think he came back and modified his game so he wouldn't have to be. Two years ago too many people were saying he already stayed too long. He wanted to wait until he proved they were wrong so they couldn't say that.

yea, he was crying after the bears game 2 seasons ago too. He's not done, he decided this to quickly and now he has months to think about it, thats to long, he will change his mind.

 

[363839]

Has Brett finished up yet?
I'm at the shop here. No access to the tube.
I'm curious as to how much time he takes for this speech.
Dude can gab.

 

[unoriginal]

Has Brett finished up yet?
I'm at the shop here. No access to the tube.
I'm curious as to how much time he takes for this speech.
Dude can gab.

The chosen one is here! Just as I foretold.

 

[dhamz]

Testaverde is widely regarded as a great, consistent QB.

Say what? The last time the word "great" and Testeverde were used in the same sentence was when he was a Miami Hurricane.

 

[tobias funke]

I don't see the point in getting into another "good" or "great" argument. Ignore the superlative and my point still stands: playing for 20 years doesn't guarantee you records, adulation, or the Hall of Fame.

Changing the subject won't get you anywhere.

 

[dhamz]

I keep hearing the "yeah but he was a gunslinger, that is what made him great" stuff. I disagree. It might have made him fun to watch but that wasn't what made him great.

The parts of his career when he was great were when he toned down the gunslinger stuff - when Holmgren fully realed him in during his prime (94-98). Favre's game fell off significantly in 1999 when Holmgren left. After that there were a couple good years and some bad years, but mostly up and down years.

When he was in full gunslinger mode he was a feast or famine guy alternating between the guy he was in his prime and a guy who might have been worse than Aaron Brooks. Sometimes it was week to week, soemtimes series to series. It might have been fun, but it wasn't great quarterbacking.

 

[unoriginal]

I only brought up stats because typically people toss out Brett Favre's cumulative career stats as proof of his all-time greatness. The trouble with that is that if you play more games than anyone else has ever played at QB by a pretty decent margin then...yeah you are going to rack up a lot of cumulative stats.

Once again, here are Brett Favre's key stats along with the stats of the last five 1st-ballot Hall of Fame quarterbacks, organized according to TD/INT ratio:

Name		G	Comp	%	YD	Y/A	TD	INT	[B]TD/INT[/B]	Rush YD
Steve Young	169	2667	64.3	33124	8.0	232	107	[B]2.17[/B]	4239
Dan Marino	242	4967	59.4	61361	7.3	420	252	[B]1.67[/B]	87
Brett Favre	257	5377	61.4	61655	7.0	442	288	[B]1.53[/B]	1786
John Elway	234	4123	56.9	51475	7.1	300	226	[B]1.33[/B]	3407
Warren Moon	208	3988	58.4	49325	7.2	291	233	[B]1.25[/B]	1736
Troy Aikman	165	2898	61.5	32942	7.0	165	141	[B]1.17[/B]	1016

As you can see, Favre's TD/INT ratio, completion %, and yards per attempt all compare favorably with other excellent modern quarterbacks. He was neither a stat complier nor a wild, inaccurate quarterback.

 

[unoriginal]

And here for you now are the Att/Int ratios:

Name	Att	Int	Int %
Young	4149	107	[B]2.58[/B]
Aikman	4715	141	[B]2.99[/B]
Marino	8358	252	[B]3.02[/B]
Elway	7250	226	[B]3.12[/B]
Favre	8758	288	[B]3.29[/B]
Moon	6823	233	[B]3.41[/B]

Given that a .5% difference means only 1 more interception every 200 pass attempts, the only safe conclusion you could make is that Steve Young was a more accurate passer than Warren Moon.

For playing so many games in pass-adverse Lambeau weather, Favre's accuracy stats - and overall stats - are pretty remarkable.

 

[fnordcircle]

I'm not really comparing Favre to Testaverde or Unitas specifically, but the idea that all you have to do is play for 20 years and you'll have a bunch of records is kind of stupid. And wrong.

No you're right, plenty of QBs start for 20 years and compile no stats whatsoever. I don't know what I was thinking.

Are you braindead or are you trying to seriously argue that playing for considerably more games than his peers and previous QBs has no bearing on his cumulative stats?

Then again you also state that Vinny Testaverde is widely regarded as great and consistent so that pretty much answers my question whether or not you're braindead.

Look at Brett Favre's career stats. Under 2 TDs a game, over 1 INT a game. Argue all you want about stats not meaning anything but I'll be damned before I annoint someone with those stats and for a well-documented penchant for throwing the ball to the wrong team with the game on the line as a Top 10 all-time QB.

If Brett Favre was playing almost anywhere except GB fans would have been calling for the backup years ago.

 

[tobias funke]

Under 2 TDs a game, over 1 INT a game. Argue all you want about stats not meaning anything but I'll be damned before I annoint someone with those stats and for a well-documented penchant for throwing the ball to the wrong team with the game on the line as a Top 10 all-time QB.

OK, so basically you don't consider Dan Marino, Troy Aikman, or John Elway top-10 all-time.

Why don't you list your top 10?

P.S. The sheer fact that he played more games than his peers and previous QBs is in itself a 'stat'. One that you're ignoring. I guess it's easy to be an NFL QB for 18 years and never miss a game, playing in Wisconsin. And maintaining HoF numbers and breaking records.

 

[Wildo7]

The SB ring is the dealbreaker here I think.

 

[unoriginal]

Look at Brett Favre's career stats. Under 2 TDs a game, over 1 INT a game. Argue all you want about stats not meaning anything but I'll be damned before I annoint someone with those stats and for a well-documented penchant for throwing the ball to the wrong team with the game on the line as a Top 10 all-time QB.

If Brett Favre was playing almost anywhere except GB fans would have been calling for the backup years ago.

Find me a tenured QB with a TD/game ratio over 2.
Go on.
Do it.

Your demands for QB excellence are ridiculous.

 

[363839]

Somebody's going to come along and tell us how this speech is overhyped and how Favre is a drama queen who went on way too long and should have stopped long before he did.

Ok yup that was me. Now I understand you're response.

GFY

 

[unoriginal]

Ok yup that was me. Now I understand you're response.

GFY

To come completely clean with you, I actually did not predict your arrival in this thread, it was in an ancient Zoroastrian gatha my father recently brought back from an archaeological excavation in the Medean desert.

So I apologize for being tart.

 

[unoriginal]

Find me a tenured QB with a TD/game ratio over 2.
Go on.
Do it.

Your demands for QB excellence are ridiculous.

Still waiting on that "2 TDs per game" Top 10 QB list, fnord.

 

[363839]

To come completely clean with you, I actually did not predict your arrival in this thread, it was in an ancient Zoroastrian gatha my father recently brought back from an archaeological excavation in the Medean desert.

So I apologize for being tart.

Fair enough. Apology accepted.
But you got to admit Favre DOES go on and on.

Reminds me of an SNL TV funhouse skit.