Heatherthepackgirl
16 years ago
By Tom Pedulla, USA TODAY
FLORHAM PARK, N.J. As Brett Favre sought to identify the greatest challenge he has ever faced, he could not help but reflect on all of the obstacles he has overcome in building a storied, 18-year NFL career.

Was his greatest test the summer of 1990, when he was involved in a horrific car crash and willed his way back into the Southern Mississippi lineup one month after having 30 inches of his intestines removed?

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Was it 1992, when he needed to prove that he was worth the first-round draft choice the Green Bay Packers used to obtain him from the Atlanta Falcons and responded by becoming the youngest quarterback to play in the Pro Bowl at 23?

Was it the end of the 1996 season, when he responded to the enormity of the Super Bowl by firing a 54-yard touchdown pass to Andre Rison on a first-throw audible and went on to lead Green Bay to a rousing 35-21 win vs. the New England Patriots?


No, Favre decided, it was none of those. He settled instead on the here and now. He focused on the expectation that, at 39, he can help the New York Jets to soar in what might be an all-or-nothing, one-year stop before he retires once and for all.

"I think it is probably the toughest challenge up to this point," he says.

Heck, he'd barely left Green Bay, had yet to throw his first pass in a different shade of green, when he was presented the keys to New York at City Hall. That's pressure.

But it is typical of laid-back Favre that he hasn't blinked.

Of greater significance, the Jets showed grit they lacked in past years when they ventured to New England and emerged with a 34-31 overtime decision Nov. 13 and followed it up by handing the Tennessee Titans their first loss Sunday.

Favre is not at all content at having helped to transform a 4-12 team into 8-3 AFC East leaders and a Super Bowl contender. "Believe me," he says, "we can get a lot better."

As carefree as the league's only three-time MVP acts, as quick as he is to smile and joke with teammates, the competitive fires that caused him to unretire burn brightly. For many reasons, Favre is exactly what the Jets needed as he commands an offense that averages 29.4 points, second in the league.

"He's got a great way about him at the games, that poise, that confidence, all those things," says Jets coach Eric Mangini. "But during the course of the week, he's also got a very good personality in the sense that he can be focused, get his work done, but keep the group light, keep practice fun, keep the guys excited about each day. He's got that passion for football, that love of the game, that is very contagious."

Favre possesses what few quarterbacks have ever had supreme confidence developed by succeeding for almost two decades.

And that quality helped make the difference in New England.

"Same old Jets!" Patriots fans chanted gleefully after their team forced overtime two weeks ago after trailing 24-6. "Same old Jets!"

But New York won the coin toss to begin overtime and Favre, sensing doubt on the sideline and in the huddle, took over. "The first thing he said," says running back Leon Washington, "is he assured us that we were going to go down there and put points on the board."

And so they did. A precise drive of 64 yards in 14 plays led to a nerveless 34-yard field goal by Jay Feely that rocked the AFC East, if not the NFL. "We know what we're going to get from Brett. He's going to go out and leave it all on the field," says receiver Jerricho Cotchery. "He's going to have fun, and we have to feed off of him."

Despite the ongoing process to learn a new offense, despite the struggle to keep his body together amid whispers that he has a sore arm, Favre continues to prove he can still compete at a high level, completing a league-best 70.6% of his passes for 2,461 yards, 20 touchdowns and 13 interceptions, also an NFL high.

Favre acknowledges that age, when combined with years of pounding, will undoubtedly cause his performance to eventually fall off. "I don't know when that point will be," he says, adding that he will not contemplate whether he will play next year until he has devoted all of his effort to this season.

New York, with an eye toward selling suites, personal seat licenses and corporate sponsorships as it prepares to enter a new stadium, had taken dramatic steps to improve the club even before Favre suddenly became available. The Jets devoted $140 million to player acquisitions before Favre came aboard in August.

That investment, on both sides of the ball, is being rewarded.

It helps, too, that Favre has a much bigger arm than Chad Pennington, his predecessor. "When you have a quarterback who can throw the ball downfield, they have to respect that," says AFC rushing leader Thomas Jones. "You don't have to worry about nine guys in the box."

Same old Jets? Don't think so.

KEYS TO JETS' CONTINUED SUCCESS

Good gambles by Favre: Quarterback Brett Favre is the career leader in touchdown passes (462), but there is a significant "but" with him. He's also thrown more interceptions (301) than anyone else in NFL history. While he's renowned as a gambler, there are some balls during the course of his career that should have never left his hand. Even a few ill-advised throws could dash this team's hopes at some critical juncture.

Run, Thomas, run: Top tailback Thomas Jones leads the AFC and ranks fourth overall with 950 rushing yards this season. Now in his second season in New York, the Jets have never lost in the nine games in which he scored a touchdown either rushing or receiving. That's hardly a coincidence.

Special special teams: Special-teams coach Mike Westhoff is as good as they come. The Jets have returned an NFL-high 11 kickoffs for touchdowns since 2002. This oft-overlooked aspect of the game can be a real difference-maker. Even when special teams don't produce points, field position is huge. To that end, return-man extraordinaire Leon Washington is fifth in the league in kickoff returns (28.8-yard average) and sixth in punt returns (12.1).

Keep stuffing the run: New York is not always viewed as one of the top teams at stopping the run, but it is; the 78 rushing yards the Jets allow a game rank third in the NFL. Of greater significance, they are perfect through seven games in which they held the opposition to fewer than 100 yards on the ground.

Withstand adversity: Past editions of the Jets didn't always react well when adversity struck, leading fans to complain they were the "same old Jets." There has been a different feeling around this team since laid-back Favre arrived. It will be interesting to see if those good vibrations continue in the big games ahead.
Heathiee
longtimefan
16 years ago
just a month ago this team was set to take on everyone
Pack93z
16 years ago
Should of.. would of... whatever...

We could drag up 100 articles on the Packers up to about week 8 about how good we are..

They collapsed.. so did Tampa.. so did the Bears.. so did we.. so did the Cards.. so did the Cowboys.. so did the Redskins..

Tampa and the Boys probably collapsed harder than the Jets..
"The oranges are dry; the apples are mealy; and the papayas... I don't know what's going on with the papayas!"
Nonstopdrivel
16 years ago

Good gambles by Favre: Quarterback Brett Favre is the career leader in touchdown passes (462), but there is a significant "but" with him. He's also thrown more interceptions (301) than anyone else in NFL history.

"Heatherthepackgirl" wrote:



He ended the season with 464 and 310, respectively.

5:3 career TD:INT ratio. Ouch.
UserPostedImage
zombieslayer
16 years ago

Should of.. would of... whatever...

We could drag up 100 articles on the Packers up to about week 8 about how good we are..

They collapsed.. so did Tampa.. so did the Bears.. so did we.. so did the Cards.. so did the Cowboys.. so did the Redskins..

Tampa and the Boys probably collapsed harder than the Jets..

"pack93z" wrote:



Heh. Now, THAT would be an interesting debate - whose fans have it worse.

Buc fans, Cow fans, or Jets fans. Who collapsed the hardest this year?

Wasn't there a time in '08 when the Cow O looked completely unstoppable?

EDIT: Never mind. This is such a non-issue. If anyone says it's harder to be a fan of their team than being a fan of the Lions, then they need to be slapped upside the head.
My man Donald Driver
UserPostedImage
(thanks to Pack93z for the pic)
2010 will be seen as the beginning of the new Packers dynasty. šŸ‡¹šŸ‡¹ šŸ‡²šŸ‡² šŸ‡¦šŸ‡·
Cheesey
16 years ago
The only difference is: The Lions are never expected to do anything, the Jets were expected to at LEAST make the playoffs.

We were 5-5 at one point, and collapsed too.
UserPostedImage
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Mucky Tundra (27-Jul) : Golden with two TDs in red zone drills today
Mucky Tundra (27-Jul) : @JacobMorley Shoutout to Quinn Ewers for allowing Matthew Golden to be available when Green Bay picked.
Zero2Cool (27-Jul) : The menu you expanded to log in, it's the first icon under "PackersHome" .. maybe i should add text to it
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Zero2Cool (27-Jul) : if you're on mobile, open the menu and its the "sun" icon
dfosterf (27-Jul) : Can't find the toggle, lol
dfosterf (27-Jul) : I can find that the Microsoft lady rep for Titletown Tech is the philanthropy boss for the entire Microsoft corporation, but. .
Zero2Cool (27-Jul) : There's a toggle for light/dark theme. Super easy.
dfosterf (27-Jul) : The white background beta was hard to read, especially the quotes
dfosterf (27-Jul) : Hopefully the color scheme remains the same
dfosterf (27-Jul) : *Friday*
dfosterf (27-Jul) : 100 million would be 539 million as of Fridsy
dfosterf (27-Jul) : Heck, they could have taken a hundred milliion and invested in DAVE inc. last year (semi random, humor, but real)
dfosterf (27-Jul) : Beer brat and ticket is where the money comes from
dfosterf (27-Jul) : The 40th is Titletown Tech itself. This is a pet project of both Ed Policy and Mark Murphy
Zero2Cool (27-Jul) : New site coming along nicely. The editor is better than what we have here. Oh yeah!
dfosterf (27-Jul) : No profit that I know of. 0 for 40
dfosterf (27-Jul) : The woke reference has to do with the makeup and oftentimes objectives of the companies they invested in
packerfanoutwest (27-Jul) : beer and brats woke? say whom?
beast (27-Jul) : I don't want to get into politics, but how is, beers and brats considered to be "woke"? Food is food...
beast (27-Jul) : That being said, I'm not saying all 100% should be that way, but not surprised if majority are Wisconsin based
beast (27-Jul) : And if everyone has heard of them, then it it probably has less growth potential and less community based
beast (27-Jul) : Well isn't the investing person supposed to invest the money?
dfosterf (27-Jul) : I swear if I were to discover that one of them has invented a virtue signalling transmitter I will not be surprised, lol
dfosterf (27-Jul) : 39 companies so far that I bet no one has ever heard of.
dfosterf (27-Jul) : -Not saying woke, but should- borderline philanthopist venture capital excercise
dfosterf (27-Jul) : Well for one, they are pouring resources into Title Town Tech. Investing beer, brat, hot dog, ticket money into what is pretty much...
beast (27-Jul) : Wow, 95% drop in investment revenue? Would be interesting to hear the details of why...
dfosterf (25-Jul) : It's my one day deal complaint dept. on shareholder meeting day
dfosterf (25-Jul) : Probably a homer access credential intimidation kinda thing
dfosterf (25-Jul) : Meathead "journalists" skip this, concentrating on operational revenue when convenient. They switch when net revenue is more favorable.
dfosterf (25-Jul) : Resulting in an actual drop of net revenue of 12.5%. She is from Minnesota. Just sayin'
dfosterf (25-Jul) : Any plans to hold Maureen Smith (CFO) accountable for a 95% drop in investment revenue?
Mucky Tundra (25-Jul) : In your face, HBO!
Mucky Tundra (25-Jul) : @ByRyanWood Mark Murphy: ā€œA great source of pride of mine is that we were never on Hard Knocks.ā€
Mucky Tundra (25-Jul) : *years
Mucky Tundra (25-Jul) : @mattschneidman Mark Murphy says he anticipates ā€œmany Packers gamesā€ being played in Germany, Ireland and/or the U.K. over the next 5-10 yea
dfosterf (25-Jul) : *cafeteria* I have hit my head also, so I sympathize
dfosterf (25-Jul) : Possibly hit his head leaning into the glass protecting the food in the cafateria
dfosterf (25-Jul) : Maybe a low flying drone
dfosterf (25-Jul) : Did Savion Williams run into a goalpost or something?
Mucky Tundra (25-Jul) : also, no bueno when a guy starts getting concussions right off the bat in his career
Zero2Cool (25-Jul) : Concussion is worse. Banks probably vet off day via back booboo claim
Mucky Tundra (25-Jul) : @AndyHermanNFL Jordy Nelson out at camp today. No word if he’s in play for one of the two open roster spots ; )
dfosterf (25-Jul) : Is that better or worse than Banks bad back?
Zero2Cool (25-Jul) : Savion concussion ... not good.
packerfanoutwest (24-Jul) : Aaron Rodgers’s first pass of first team period was picked off
Mucky Tundra (24-Jul) : tbh I didn't hear of his passing
Zero2Cool (24-Jul) : Cosby Show. Malcom Jamal Warner I think is real name
Mucky Tundra (24-Jul) : I was thinking of Ozzy and Hulk
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