The NFL offers the world, and the United States in particular, so much entertainment value that people get depressed when the season is over. Fans call it the February blues, noting that once the Super Bowl is over, there’s no more football available for what seems like forever. It’s actually about seven months, which, well, can seem like an eternity. In addition to the games, the stories that are created within the league attract viewers at all times. Fans watch college players rise through the ranks on the professional stage with great fervor and tenacity. Some college players turn out to be exactly the talented NFL superstars fans hoped for, and some are disappointed. When they’re lucky, fans get to witness a small-town kid being selected in the middle of the second round of the NFL Draft and become one of the best quarterbacks to ever play the game.
Brett Lorenzo Favre is that guy. Born and raised in a small town outside of Gulfport, Mississippi, by his schoolteacher parents, Brett was a natural talent for sports. He played baseball and soccer growing up, and earned five varsity letters in baseball in high school. He also played soccer during those years, with his father as coach. With his versatility, he played numerous positions, quarterback being one of them, as well as strong safety, punter and placekicker, just to name a few. Oh how different the NFL landscape would have been today, if Brett Favre was a placekicker, instead of the “Gunslinger” he became the center.
After high school, Brett was offered a scholarship to the University of Southern Mississippi, and he immediately accepted the offer. The problem was that they wanted him to play defense, where he, like most brash youngsters with a good arm, wanted to play quarterback. His wish was his command, and immediately he was listed as the quarterback of the seventh (yes, he read that right). Fortunately, Southern Miss saw something in him that the rest of the world would later witness in awe, and landed him the coveted position in the third game of his freshman year. He went on to play the position during his college years, before entering the draft in 1991. The Atlanta Falcons, under the coach’s protest, selected Brett Favre with the 33rd pick in the second round. He threw four total passes in the year he was on Atlanta’s roster, completing none. Adding insult to the scorn he felt from the sideline, two of those passes were intercepted. He was summarily traded to the Green Bay Packers for a first-round pick in 1992. The rest, as they say, is history.
After a difficult first year at Lambeau Field, Favre’s quarterback prowess came to the forefront, allowing him to lead his team to its first playoff berth in a decade. The fans were jubilant. Even more so when the following year they went back to the playoffs, something that had not happened in those parts since the great Vince Lombardi was in charge. In 1995 the Pack was unstoppable. Brett was winning MVP trophies and leading his team to the NFC Championship game. They lost, but it was a sign of great things to come in Green Bay.
The following year, Favre won the MVP award again, this time leading his team to Super Bowl XXXI and winning against the New England Patriots. They repeated their trip to the Super Bowl in 1997, losing to the Denver Broncos, but keeping their team intact to dominate the NFC segment of the NFL for the next decade. In 2007, Brett Favre became the third player in NFL history to beat every one of the league’s 31 teams in the league, joining the illustrious company of Peyton Manning and Tom Brady. After that season, Brett announced that he would hang up his shoes, as a result of the Packers asking him to be a backup quarterback and retire from the game. This announcement was met with mixed emotions from fans around the world. The Gunslinger was quitting, which made for a sad day in the life of anyone who grew up watching his fun-loving playstyle over the years. The sadness didn’t last long…
In 2008, the Packers traded their beloved All-start to the New York Jets, which was their wish as an alternative to playing second fiddle to Lambeau. His season in New York didn’t go as planned, as interceptions were more frequent than touchdowns. At the end of the season, Brett Favre announced his retirement from the league, again. Well not so fast…
In 2009 Brett signed for the Minnesota Vikings and showed a spark of the old Gunslinger, donning his spurs. That season he usurped the co-title status of two other NFL legends and became the only player in NFL history to beat all 32 NFL teams. Quite a feat, considering he had already retired twice! Before officially retiring in 2011, he definitely—or so it seems—he racked up a record that’s even more amazing on paper. He is the only quarterback in NFL history to throw for 70,000+ yards, 500+ touchdowns, 300+ interceptions, 6,000+ completions, and 10,000+ pass attempts. Above all, and most impressive to some, he was an Ironman, starting in 297 consecutive NFL games. 321 if you count the playoffs. Both are NFL records. No wonder it was so hard to say goodbye to number four.