Football Insiders:Check out Stewart Mandel's College Football Overtime column.
Each week SI.com's Richard Deitsch will report on newsmakers from the world of TV, radio and the Web.
GREEN BAY, Wis. -- Now that it's over, and the circus portion of the Minnesota Vikings schedule has concluded with smiles and vindication all around, where do Brett Favre and his latest (and, according to him, greatest) team go from here?
My weekly look at key matchups and storylines to watch in one game at each time slot. (All times Eastern).
Maybe I've got the story of the week wrong. In this space, I always try to look at the aspect of the weekend's games that fascinates me the most, and the thing that really hit me the other day when looking over the 13 games on tap was this: Dick LeBeau and the Steelers against the two-headed Brett Favre/Adrian Peterson monster of the Vikings.
My weekly look at key matchups and storylines to watch in one game at each time slot. (All times Eastern).
With everybody from David Letterman to Lamar Odom revealing their most intimate secrets these days, I guess I ought to be up front: I like a woman in a Green Bay Packers sweater.
Click here for Peter King's thoughts on Brett Favre's big game against the Packers.
MINNEAPOLIS -- Dude, this is America.
MINNEAPOLIS -- This is why they wanted him. This is why they went out and got him. For the kind of moment that came on Sunday, and the kind of play that seemingly only he can make. And no, I'm not talking about Greg Lewis in this case.
Football Insiders:Check out Stewart Mandel's College Football Overtime column.
Each week SI.com's Richard Deitsch will report on newsmakers from the world of TV, radio and the Web.
GREEN BAY, Wis. -- Now that it's over, and the circus portion of the Minnesota Vikings schedule has concluded with smiles and vindication all around, where do Brett Favre and his latest (and, according to him, greatest) team go from here?
My weekly look at key matchups and storylines to watch in one game at each time slot. (All times Eastern).
Maybe I've got the story of the week wrong. In this space, I always try to look at the aspect of the weekend's games that fascinates me the most, and the thing that really hit me the other day when looking over the 13 games on tap was this: Dick LeBeau and the Steelers against the two-headed Brett Favre/Adrian Peterson monster of the Vikings.
My weekly look at key matchups and storylines to watch in one game at each time slot. (All times Eastern).
With everybody from David Letterman to Lamar Odom revealing their most intimate secrets these days, I guess I ought to be up front: I like a woman in a Green Bay Packers sweater.
Click here for Peter King's thoughts on Brett Favre's big game against the Packers.
MINNEAPOLIS -- Dude, this is America.
MINNEAPOLIS -- This is why they wanted him. This is why they went out and got him. For the kind of moment that came on Sunday, and the kind of play that seemingly only he can make. And no, I'm not talking about Greg Lewis in this case.
Minnesota Vikings quarterback Brett Favre was fined $10,000 by the NFL on Friday for his crack-back block on Houston defensive back Eugene Wilson in a preseason game.
(CNN) -- The National Football League is reviewing a controversial block made by Minnesota Vikings quarterback Brett Favre during Monday night's pre-season game with the Houston Texans, the league told CNN Radio on Tuesday.
HOUSTON -- "Two weeks ago,'' Brett Favre said, walking out of Reliant Stadium late Monday night, "I was weed-eatin.' I mean, to come out here and move around this way and make a few throws, I'm pretty happy with it.''
EDEN PRAIRIE, MINN. -- The plan going into the Minnesota Vikings' third preseason game is to have Brett Favre play the first half, or slightly less than five innings. Manager Brad Childress and pitching coach Darrell Bevell -- that is, head coach and offensive coordinator, respectively -- will be watching closely from the dugout, or rather, sideline and booth to gauge Favre's velocity and location. Going over signs and getting some rhythm with his young backstop, er, catcher, er, center John Sullivan has been a daily part of workouts for the recently signed veteran NFL passer. If he gives up takes too many hits, Favre could be in for a rough night Monday against the Houston Astros Texans at Minute Maid Park Reliant Stadium.
What I learned on an incongruous night at the Metrodome, when people stood and cheered for a once-hated foe now wearing their colors in their building:
Is there any other professional sport that discards players as briskly and unceremoniously as the NFL? Longtime stars go from heroes to zeros in the blink of an eye. I mean, how is it possible that guys like Edgerrin James, Marvin Harrison and Derrick Brooks can't even get a decent contract offer?
I don't know about you, but I was super excited when I heard the news: Brett is back!
Football is the ultimate team game and the dynamics and chemistry in the locker room are critically important to any team's success. Championship teams have a palpable aura and feeling of internal unity to them. That's the main reason I don't like the Vikings' signing of Brett Favre. The messages this move sends to the rank and file are plentiful, and most of them are not good.
MADISON, Wis. -- For 16 seasons, he was the ultimate Packers hero. But now that the Brett Favre era in Minnesota has launched -- at long last, with yet another trademark flip-flop -- the most fascinating question to ponder is whether that instantly makes him Green Bay's ultimate villain as a Viking?
Visanthe Shiancoe tried to edit himself, but it was too late. The Minnesota Vikings' tight end had said it, loud and clear -- "the road to the Super Bowl'' -- in the giddiness immediately following Brett Favre's first practice in purple and red (quarterback jersey), and there was no taking it back.
"I'm sure I'll regret my decision down the road.'' --Brett Favre, to me, on July 28.
Two years ago, in the central Chinese city of Chongquing, the local government set out to build the world's largest bathroom.
MANKATO, Minn. -- You can count Vikings all-world running back Adrian Peterson among those who right up until Tuesday afternoon were dreaming fondly of a Brett Favre era in Minnesota. Peterson, one of the Vikings stars who in recent weeks were openly lobbying Favre to come out of retirement once more, said the club's pursuit of the soon-to-be 40-year-old Packers legend was in essence a no-brainer.
Musings, observations and the occasional insight on the opening day of a Favre-free Vikings training camp at the Minnesota State University-Mankato ...
Read all about it: Michael Vick is feeling sorry for himself. Brett Favre is done ... for now. Enough already. The only thing certain about the Vick and Favre departures is that there is more, and more, and more, to come. I'm guessing about 11 billion of my closest football-following friends have had it up to HERE with both quarterbacks. Let's move on, shall we?
MINNEAPOLIS -- All was right in the Upper Midwest football universe Wednesday in the wake of Brett Favre's re-re-reassessment of his comeback plans with the Minnesota Vikings (spot me a re- or two, since I've lost track).
Minnesota coach Brad Childress, jilted at the altar Tuesday afternoon by Brett Favre telling him he wasn't going to play for the Vikings in 2009, said he had nothing against the quarterback for dragging the story out all offseason and then saying "no" on the eve of training camp.
"It's hard to admit I'm not 25 anymore,'' Brett Favre said late Tuesday night, when what he'd done began to sink in. He still sounded stunned that a few hours earlier he'd called Minnesota coach Brad Childress and shunned his dream job: quarterback on a team with a great defense and the best running back in football, with coaches who run a scheme he could operate falling out of bed.
Former New York Jets and Green Bay Packers quarterback Brett Favre is staying retired, the Minneapolis Star Tribune reports.
The scenario by which Brett Favre joins the Minnesota Vikings, which probably will happen (though might not with a verdict coming as soon as today but maybe not for another week or more), gets portrayed at times as one of kismet.
Brett Favre will be returning to the NFL this week with the Minnesota Vikings, according to my sources. There is also a chance Favre will not be returning to the NFL this week with the Vikings, according to my sources. In either case, here is an up-to-the-minute timeline of Favre's twist-and-turn life since his original retirement announcement on March 6, 2008:
Almost everyone seems to have a strong opinion on the probable return of Brett Favre, the sanity of Chad Ochocinco and other hot topics around the league. But how many of those opinions are based on film work?
The NFL is about winning but there are several parties in virtual no-win trick bags heading into the 2009 season. It isn't that they can't win in terms of victories. It's just perception has a nasty habit of becoming reality and the perception is they have been handed the keys to a Ferrari. If they win the race, it's the car. If they lose, it's their fault.
Like regular people, great athletes retire in all sorts of ways. Some do it gracefully. Some do it tragically. Some do it almost invisibly. And some do it endlessly.
These are not easy times for the NFL fan, your headlines co-opted by two quarterbacks who bother you for very different reasons.
I couldn't sleep much last night. I just had too many Favre-related thoughts percolating on the brain. I found myself thinking I must record them in Snap Judgment fashion...
First, a Brett Favre prelude. A semi-brief Favre prelude. I don't know what he's going to do. But I, like some of you, am suspicious. There's no good reason to ask for his release from the Jets unless it's to leave open the option to play again. I am told he may be feeling the urge to play again.
Lots of e-mail this week about Brett Favre and whether he might return to football. I've tried to reach him by phone without success, and the only on-the-record reaction to the latest brushfire about a possible comeback seems to have come in a text message to ESPN's Trent Dilfer. Favre reportedly responded "no'' when Dilfer asked if he was coming out of retirement. So we'll see.
We've got a lot going on for what's supposed to be a dead time -- Michael Vick's on the block while in the cell block, Julius Peppers is trying to politely talk himself out of Carolina, Alex Rodriguez is lying about Selena Roberts (which enrages me), we're on the verge of another thrilling NFL Scouting Combine (how many of you brain surgeon college players are not working out this year?), a 10-year-old dog won Best in Show at Westminster ... and oh yes, Brett Favre retired. Again.
Brett Favre is finally retiring, which means millions of New Yorkers are dancing in the streets and 501 New Yorkers are heartbroken.
Were Brett Favre to hold another retirement announcement news conference -- and he says he won't, saving us the sight of more tears -- I'd have just one question for him: Was it really worth it?
After a rocky season with the New York Jets, quarterback Brett Favre has decided to retire, his agent says.
Speaking to Brett Favre Friday night from Mississippi, I got the distinct impression that he was going to retire from football, this time for good. But they don't sell insurance for this kind of thing, obviously, as his flip-flopping of the last three years shows.
1. Brett Favre had the look of a man who had played his last game after the Jets' 24-17 loss to the Dolphins. Favre repeatedly referred to his age, 39, his shoulder pain and his struggles down the stretch. "Am I old and washed up? Maybe so," Favre said. "If that's the case, maybe it's time to do something else."
Breaking down Sunday's Miami Dolphins at New York Jets game (1 p.m., Eastern, CBS) ...
After leading the Jets to their most impressive win of the season last Sunday, a 34-13 demolition of the previously undefeated Titans on their home field, quarterback Brett Favre ran off the field wearing a broad smile. When he got beneath the stadium and turned left toward the visitors' locker room, a female team employee was standing outside the doors. Favre jogged up to her and acted as if he were going to deliver a chest bump before stopping and arching his eyebrows as if to say, Gotcha!
NASHVILLE -- Five things we learned from the Jets 34-13 dismantling of the previously undefeated Titans (Recap | Box Score) at LP Field on Sunday.....
Brett Favre has done it again. He's involved in yet another controversy with his former team. Only this time he may be losing the respect of some of the guys who used to be his teammates, to say nothing of other NFL players and officials.
There is a real deception going on right now. It comes dressed up in a showy, color brochure that bears the heading, "The New York Jets Coaches Club Seat Auction, Oct.19-27, 2008," and was mailed to the club's season-ticket holders. It describes the auctioning off of 2,000 prime seats.
You can't drive a block in this town without bumping into something that reminds of you Brett Favre -- a yard sign, a steakhouse, a jersey in a storefront window. One of the first shops you see when walking into Austin Straubel International Airport is a Packers store stocked with Favre shirts and posters. Even the Barnes & Noble on South Oneida has a section dedicated to the Packers in general and Favre in particular, commemorative tomes, animated picture books and everything in between.
Breaking down Sunday night's Dallas Cowboys at Green Bay Packers game (8:15 p.m., NBC) ...
Here's a fogeyish thing to do. It's the sporting equivalent of babbling about those days when we all had to walk five miles to school through the snow, uphill, both ways.
The Patriots are at the center of the NFL universe again, for lots of reasons. Five questions, one very insightful E-mail from a Central Michigan Chippewa, five answers:
MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. -- After 16 seasons in Green Bay, Brett Favre admits there are still times he walks into the New York Jets huddle and has his mind go blank as he's grasping for the necessary terminology required to make the next call.
EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. -- Strange night, in a lot of ways. Strange to see Brett Favre in a slightly different shade of green, with the white helmet and black wristbands and nary a cheddar-cheesehead in sight. "Somebody told me they saw green cheeseheads!'' Favre exclaimed afterward.
SI.com has dispatched 10 writers to report on the 32 NFL training camps across the country. For the complete schedule of postcards, click here.
SI.com has dispatched 10 writers to report on the 32 NFL training camps across the country. For the complete schedule of postcards, click here.
With no football to play for the first time in 18 years, former pro Ross Tucker is passing the time reading about his favorite sport. What follows are a few links to NFL-related articles he found and his take on them.
As he walked down the tunnel in Cleveland Browns Stadium Thursday evening, seconds before meeting his new team, Brett Favre looked beat. Could you blame him? Twenty hours earlier, he'd made a life-altering decision, welcoming a trade to the New York Jets. Ten hours earlier, he'd boarded a plane in southern Mississippi with his new general manager, Mike Tannenbaum, for New Jersey. Four hours earlier, he'd taken a helicopter tour of the Jets' new practice facility and suburban New Jersey. And now, after a one-hour flight to Cleveland -- in khaki shorts and gray T-shirt, the whites of his eyes pink from fatigue -- Favre paused a few steps from the entrance to his new life.
Four SI.com writers share their thoughts on how the Jets offense will look with Brett Favre at quarterback.
Now that Brett Favre is finally an ex-Packer, here are 10 things to know about him being a Jet:
The Green Bay Packers traded the face of its franchise, Brett Favre, to the New York Jets for a conditional fourth-round pick. Please take a moment to share your thoughts on this deal.
One of the biggest stories in recent sports history just got a lot bigger: Brett Favre is a New York Jet.
The Packers have confirmed that they have traded Favre to the Jets.
Brett Favre left Lambeau Field just before Green Bay Packers practice Tuesday afternoon, taking a right turn out of the stadium's back gate -- away from the field
So let me get this straight: It has just today dawned on Brett Favre the Packers neither want him around, or want him playing for anybody in their division?
Ten nights ago, I sat in Brett Favre's Mississippi home, and a couple of times during our discussions he said he wanted Packers general manager Ted Thompson to release him. Folly, I thought, and I told him so. "Brett," I said, "the Packers will release you over Ted Thompson's dead body. They're not going to give you the chance to run through the tunnel opening night as a Viking." Favre was not moved. He heard me, but I don't think he believed me.
With Brett Favre back in a Packers uniform, Green Bay team president and CEO Mark Murphy referred Sunday to the team now having to revise the "many actions and assumptions'' that resulted from Favre's retirement announcement in early March.
It isn't easy for Steve Young to keep up with the ongoing Brett Favre soap opera out of Green Bay. Like watching a heart-wrenching drama that hits a little too close to home, he has to flip the channel after awhile.
When the NFL reinstated Brett Favre on Sunday, it begged the question: Did the Packers tell Favre he could compete for the starting quarterback job?
Brett Favre will be reinstated and added to the Green Bay Packers' active roster Monday
NFL commissioner Roger Goodell hopes to have Brett Favre's standoff with the Green Bay Packers resolved by Monday -- even if he has to force the issue
EAST HEMPSTEAD, N.Y. -- Musings, observations and the occasional insight as the second week of my NFL training camp tour winds to a close after one-day stops at the Steelers, Browns, Eagles and Jets...
Does your department need a ringer for the next company softball game? Barry Bonds is available, and from what we hear, he's willing to work cheap. If you need someone to throw passes to your kids in the backyard when your arm gets tired, Brett Favre just might be your man. At last check he had a job with the Green Bay Packers, but something tells us they would be willing to give him all the time off he needs.
SUMRALL, Miss. -- Nicest house and property I've ever seen in my years covering the NFL, I thought as I drove from the Favre place early Sunday morning. Good thing Favre loves it so much, because I bet he's going to be spending a lot of time there in the next month or so.
PITTSFORD, N.Y. -- Musings, observations and the occasional insight as the first week of my NFL training camp tour winds to a close after stops at the Redskins, Ravens, Patriots, Giants and now Bills ...
Three new storylines emerged in the Brett Favre Saga Saturday night, as the 38-year-old temporarily unemployed quarterback decided to smoke the peace pipe with Packers general manager Ted Thompson -- for now -- and shelve plans to show up at the opening of Green Bay's training camp Sunday.
Brett Favre apparently won't be among the Packers showing up for the opening of Green Bay's training camp, saying that general manager Ted Thompson had asked him for "a couple of days" to resolve the situation
Brett Favre has told the Green Bay Packers he plans to report to training camp this weekend, according to an NFL Network report Friday
Who would have thought that my innocent little trip down memory lane, with Brett Favre, would have generated the heated response that it did? But it did, yes it did. Either that or Dominic B., who selects and forwards the chosen mail, is trying to provoke your faithful narrator... naaah, he wouldn't do that.
The Cold, Hard Football Facts copy of the 2007 NFL Record & Fact Book was so tattered and abused that we confused it with Dan Marino's playoff legacy.
LOS ANGELES -- It's easy to knock the ESPYs. Just the self-serving name deserves to be mocked like a "McLovin" fake ID. Factor in the slew of corporate sponsorships, the parading of on-air personalities on stage as if they were celebrities and the four-day tape delay and you're talking about a target as easy as Paris Hilton trying to sing.
With the Brett Favre un-retirement drama now entering its third fun-filled week, the topic has unquestionably risen to the status of deserving of its own separate edition of Snap Judgments, with all the accordant musings, observations and occasional insights that you've come to know and love (or at least tolerate) ...
Brett Favre says he's tempted to show up at the Green Bay Packers' training camp just to call the team's "bluff"
Here's the question in the Brett Favre saga as we wade through his request to be released and the Packers' denial and the firestorm it's created in Wisconsin: How will the endgame play out?
The fact Brett Favre asked for his release from the Packers is not a surprise. What would be a huge surprise is if the Packers granted Favre his wish.
I gotta say thank heaven for the rise of the once-lowly Rays, the Cubs' quest for a Series title in the 100th year of their drought, the Nadal-Federer epic at Wimbledon, Tiger Woods' one-legged U.S. Open triumph, and that amazing Giants-Patriots Super Bowl. It's really nice to get a little sports with your sports these days. That ain't always easy in this age where the mind-softening wealth and fame of athletes have made them residents in the madhouse of pop culture and celebrity, with all of the gossip page nonsense that goes along with it.
We are early in what I can guarantee will be a very tumultuous month in the recurring Brett Favre will-he-or-won't-he saga, and what I can tell you for sure is this: No. 4 wants to play football again, and the Green Bay Packers desperately do not want him to.
Brett Favre, startled this morning to see the enormity of a report on a morning sports show that he might play football again, said he is not considering coming out of retirement.
Just say I'm somewhere in Afghanistan," Army Special Forces Team Sgt. Scott Olson told me one night last week, near the front lines of the war with the Taliban. Nothing more specific than that, he said, because people are trying to kill him, and the less they know of his whereabouts the better.
In the end, Brett Favre did it his way, as he always has. When he was on the field, quarterbacking the Green Bay Packers, it was impossible for fans to take their eyes off him because so much of his genius was improvisational. And when it came time to walk away from football, Favre was just as unpredictable.
A few of us were standing around Brett Favre's locker on the Friday before the Giants' playoff game, and he was telling stories of what it was like playing for his father at Hancock North Central High in Kiln, Miss.
Strangely enough, the screaming headline news of Brett Favre's retirement led my thoughts in an unexpected direction: to the lowly Falcons, and some reflection on how different the fate of two franchises might have been had the Packers never wrested Favre away from Atlanta in their memorable February 1992 trade.
There will be better quarterbacks than Brett Favre. But his bond with fans may never be repeated
BISHKEK, Kyrgyzstan -- As it turns out, it's not about Randy Moss, it's not about being hurt, it's not about any dissatisfaction with something the Packers did or did not do.
Today belongs to Brett Favre, the Green Bay Packers' iconic quarterback who is retiring after 17 seasons with every major statistical passing record, three MVPs and one Super Bowl win.
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