Oh. My. God.

Well, well, well.  Here we are again.  It is only fitting to start back up in the good old blog today.  I really didn't think I'd be starting up the season where I finished it but, alas, I am, with Mr. Brett Favre.

At 8:50pm tonight I received a text that said only, "Whoa, looks like Favre's a Jet."

At 8:52pm, I replied, "Holy crap.  Week 2 - Tommy vs. Brett.  That's INSANE."

At 9:10pm, the computer was open.  I was ready to return to the blog.

Where to even start.  There is so much going through my head I can't even put the pieces together.  I admit that I never even thought that Brett would un-retire.  I really thought the timing was right and he seemed secure in what he was doing.  I naively thought if he did come back, the Packers would suck it up and take him, and it would all be like nothing ever happened.  But instead the entire nation was thrust into Brett Favre Hell, being punished day after day having to listen to the ESPN talking heads drone on and on and on and ON about every little, tiny detail of this ordeal!  Part of me is happy there is just any outcome so I can stop having to hear about it.

Then the reality of what has just happened hits me.  Wait one second...number 4 isn't a Packer anymore?  Their quarterback is Aaron Rogers?  And Favre is a....a....J-E-T???  This is the moment where I have to remember to keep breathing.  Favre's in MY DIVISION?  On our biggest rival team in the division?  (Breathe Lisa breathe!)  We're going to play him twice this season?  (Breathe dammit!)  

OK wait.  This could be kind of cool.  Yeah, that's right...it could be fun, historic even.  We're going to get two amazing divisional match-ups this season between two future Hall of Fame quarterbacks who have never played in the same conference before.  And I mean, the Patriots are better than the Jets no matter what.  Let's not get carried away now.

I guess I just wish that one of my all-time favorite football players didn't have to play for one of my least-favorite teams.  However, the man wants to play, and he should be able to play somewhere.  I've been upset through the whole ordeal, as much I wished it would go away, I mostly wished it would end for Favre's sake.  What I saw was a man who was lost.  A man who's life had been all about football, and once football was gone he didn't know who he was anymore.  The man couldn't not play, and then couldn't understand how the team he'd given his life to could turn him away.  Looking into his eyes, the sparkle that was there always seems dimmer.  It seems jaded and lonely.  To me, that is the worst part.  That's what I loved the most about Favre - his passion and pure joy.  It is just not going to be the same.  My poor Grandpa.

Nothing like a little drama to slam you back into football season!  It's back with a vengeance and so am I!  I admit it took me a little longer than I expected to be excited but its coming up.  I know that once I get in front of the TV and see my baby Brady tossing a long ball to Randy Moss, I will be on cloud nine again.  And there will be fantasy football...oh yes, there will be fantasy.  I have a title defend, and you will not see any Super Bowl hangover here either.

An Ode to Brett Favre

Brett Favre is loved, deeply. Just this week, I sent out an email to some of my female readers, asking them for suggestions on their favorite (ok fine, hottest) athlete of all time for a big post I am planning for the near-future. The first three responses were all Brett Favre. 38-year-old Brett Favre.



Talk about aging well. I found this on some photographer's website who works in Mississippi. Too good to not post as a comparison.



I agree - hotter now.

I awoke on the morning of March 4th to a text from one of these friends, who later admitted she'd sat on it for half an hour as to not wake me up, to make sure I immediately knew, that our dear Favre was retiring.


My first thought was to email my Grandpa. I've mentioned him before, he is a life-long Packers fan. He grew up in Wisconsin and has been witness to every era of Packer greatness - the 30's with Don Hutson, the 60's with Lombardi, and 90's with Mr. Favre. I emailed him and this is what he said. I was touched.

It is a sad day for me. He was such a great player and person. Just think, every game since September 1991 when he went in the Bengal game and won it in the last two seconds he has been the Packer QB. I loved him, got mad at him, but always knew he would be in there fighting his heart out for the Pack. He is my favorite Packer of all
time and that goes back to 1936. We will not be as good with Rogers but we will
be good.

After all of it, all of this team's history, he is his favorite Packer of all time.

I kind of expected this. I don't know why, but there was something about his demeanor in the last few weeks following their loss to those-that-shall-remain-nameless in the NFC Championship. It was like he became his real age. He was beat up, both mentally and physically. Remember, he got pretty decently hurt mid-season, and that 38 year old body doesn't heal itself the way it used to. In his first public statement (which in typical Favre form was via a rambling voicemail left to Chris Mortensen of ESPN), Favre admitted that he'd feel that another season would be a waste without a Super Bowl win. Dramatic as that sounds, that's a brave admission. I am thrilled that he'll go out on his own terms, at the top of his game. He'll get to look back on his last season with incredible pride. He broke three huge records, and had his best statistical season ever. There were amazing moments. Remember that 80-something yard touchdown pass to Greg Jennings on the first play of overtime on Monday night in Denver? It was incredible.

And I think that he has reached a point where he trusts that his team will be alright without him. Maybe that sounds silly but I read a lot of Favre articles this year, and looking back, it seems like he was almost training his young team to go on without him. After some lean years, the Packers have rebuilt their defense into what I would say is a top 5 defense in the NFL. They found a great young running back. And of course, a group of solid young budding stars as receivers. This season, Favre didn't have to do it himself. He didn't have to put this team on his back. And now he can step back and look at this team and say, they'll be ok. So my bold prediction (which I am sure I will deny making on Week 5 when the Packers are last in the NFC North), is that that Packers remain a solid team in 2008. They certainly won't win 12 or 13 games, but 9, 10? I'm gonna stay positive for my Grandpa!

I will miss him so. A week rarely passed that I didn't mention him in this very blog. I love that his last season was so spectacular. No one is as cool as Brett....not even my Tommy. Thanks for the memories, Brett. Enjoy doing nothing.

Dead Air

This sucks.

Your team suffers a massive and historic loss in the championship. Bad enough. Then you and your friends that you used to obsess over every minuscule football-related bit of news with decide to boycott all things relating to the NFL henceforth. Well, until September.

And then you realize, rather quickly, that you miss it. I admit it! I'm sorry, I can't give it up. I just can't. I'm weak, I can't help it!

But of course, its February, the deadest time of the year in sports. Free-agency hasn't even started in football yet. Spring training is just beginning. The NBA exists but I mean, who really cares about the NBA. ESPN is so desperate to fill time that they're running this ridiculous Greatest Highlight Ever special. Ooh how exciting - which highlight is better than the other? I'm on the edge of my seat. We've all seen these clips 8 million times. I can maybe for about five minutes get into the NCAA Tournament next month. And if I actually had a channel on my cable system that showed any hockey games ever, I'd maybe be able to get into hockey again but, alas, I don't.

I'm booooooooooored. And I don't know what to write about in my blog.

My friends and I are attempting to replace sitting on the couch for 12 straight hours in front of the television every Sunday with hiking various Los Angeles trails on Sundays instead. But of course, we've already been rained out on week two. Thank goodness for the Oscars...oh wait, no, that wasn't nearly as fun as a football game. Was it me or was that the most utterly dull Oscars ever? Thanks again, writer's strike.

I've also replaced my 11pm Sports Center viewing with The Daily Show and Colbert Report. That's at least a perhaps better option than before. The election is providing plenty of amusing fodder for them and that's enjoyable. Nothing like a little Mike Huckabee right before bed to give you some good dreams.

I have no doubt that I'm only a few weeks from the inevitable "watch the AFL with me" conversation with my one and only friend who does indeed, watch the AFL. I'll yet again explain to him that Arena football is boring as all hell and yes, I've tried to watch a game, and no, I would not like to try again.

Hmmm...it's 11pm. It's a weekend so no Comedy Central shows on now. Sports Center is on...maybe I'll just try it out for a second. I'm sure I'll be totally bored by an hour's worth of highlights that I don't care one bit about. I just miss those cheeky bastards at ESPN.

Great, an ad for the Sports Illustrated Giants Super Bowl DVD.

I forgot, this is why I'm not supposed to be watching ESPN for a while.

Oh cool, a new episode of Girls Next Door! That works.

I hate when the Boys are right.

In the Blink of an Eye

It is funny how things can go from so good to so bad so quickly. One moment you are happy as can be, and the next everything you've dreamt of is gone. This is how my could-have-been football season ended.


It has taken a lot of mental stablizing to be able to even write this entry, but I feel it is my duty to at least wrap up the season in some way. I'm not going to lie - the last week has not been easy. Everything my team worked for all season was taken away in just a few short minutes. Some team that had absolutely no business taking it from us did. You see this is painful - I can't even use names and the correct terminology.


You know what...forget that. This is the part where the record stops with a big screech. I have my platform and I have a lot to say. So forget the sadness and the not talking about it, I am going to rant. And if you happen to be someone who knows me well, you know when I rant, I rant big.


There is one main thing that is bothering me now that the game is over, and that is the utter cruelty and meanness that the general sporting world has shown toward my beloved (yes, they are still my beloved) Patriots. I have never seen such a thing on a national scale. I get that Spygate is clouding everything but everyone seems to have conveniently forgotten how anything relating to this season was wrapped up in the first half of the first game and has no bearing on what they accomplished. I even get that if you are a Rams fan or a Kurt Warner fan, maybe you're angry at these new allegations. Let's not even get into the conveniently timed relevations regarding 2001. But still, I'm disgusted by the behavior and comments I've seen and heard. At the Pro-Bowl last Sunday, the Patriots that participated were loudly booed upon their introductions. How horrible. These players earned a right to be there, and many of them decided to brave returning to the public eye following what can only be called an embarrassing loss, in order to take part in an honor they worked hard to achieve all season. The Pro-Bowl may be sort of meaningless these days, but its still an honor to be named to the team, and some of the Patriots wanted to revel in their reward. They never know if they'll get there again. And then they get booed. For what? Being big fat losers? They don't need the fans at the stupid Pro-Bowl to tell them that. Who knows how many of them have slept a full night since. Might I remind everyone that part of the Pro-Bowl berth is from FAN VOTING. Leave these poor guys alone. We get it - you all think we cheated and you're happy we lost. Trust me, no one felt it more than the team and its fan base. This is the option we feared the most as the wins kept piling up. Just leave us alone, you got your way.


So just when I thought I couldn't feel any worse about it all, I found that I could. Fellow Patriots fans, if you've been trying to avoid it all, this is where you should probably stop reading. I'm going to share my most horrendous experience of this last week.


One day last week I went to the gym. I'd managed to avoid pretty much every mention of the Super Bowl all week - I didn't watch TV or look online. Its a strange feeling to stop so suddenly but I couldn't bear it all. I got on a treadmill and there was no way to avoid the giant TV showing ESPN. PTI was on, which I usually enjoy, and I scanned down the headlines they post on the side to see if any of them were football-related - they weren't. I figured I was safe. I'm walking along, sweating away the calories, and the show goes to commercial break. And then I see it. A commercial begins to play, with a little logo at the bottom from the NFL Players Association - you know, the union, not the league. It's the old '72 Dolphins, having a lovely little backyard picnic in their jerseys. They're laughing, happy, having a gay old time if you will. Suddenly a truck pulls up, it says "Giants Delivery Service." The delivery man comes out and hands a box to Mercury Morris. He opens it. Inside is a football with a card that says, "Enjoy it one more year. Love, Eli." And then they flash to a billboard - "Perfectville, Pop. 1, Est. 1972."


I was in shock. Complete and utter shock. Literally I was standing there on the treadmill with my mouth wide open for a solid two or three minutes. Its just...its just...so mean!!! This commercial was made by the players' own union!!! Is it not good enough for them to just lose?? They also have to be made fun of and booed and embarrassed? It's just gross. I really want those stupid Dolphins to go away. They revel in other people's sorrow. No one is trying to take away what they accomplished. Records are meant to be broken, its just how it is. And by the way guys, lets not overlook the fact that the Patriots did win 18 consecutive games to your 17, and also played a much harder schedule than you did. I know, I know...its all meaningless unless you win the big game, but I'm trying to make myself feel better people!


Whew! That felt good! I could go on but for fear of sounding more insane than I already do, I'll leave my rant at that. All I ask, my dear readers, is that you give us just an ounce of respect. In fact, you don't even have to respect us, just don't disrespect us to our faces. I suppose the lesson has been learned. Life can change in the blink of an eye, and no one (well almost no one) is perfect. And in the end, as I have preached before, football is game. It will go on again as it has before, and the best part is that in September, the slate can be wiped clean and the stats go back to 0-0.

I want to thank everyone so much for reading my blog this year. It has been so much fun for me and I hope to keep it alive. I won't be writing weekly, but I'll be doing a few entries here and there during the offseason, while I contemplate just how both Manning boys ended up with Super Bowl rings in consecutive years.


Go Pats!


(tear)


(sniffle)


(wailing sobs)

Oh Happy Day

BEST. WEEKEND. EVER.


Incredible, just incredible. I had not even fathomed that the Divisional Playoffs could work out so perfectly (for me at least, I am sure there are many disappointed fans this week, and I understand your pain). The two teams I don't like were eliminated, embarrassingly - Dallas and Indianapolis. My team - the Patriots - won. My second favorite team of the playoffs - Green Bay - drilled their opponents in a blizzard. There are just so many more things to talk about, I'll get started!


- Tom Brady throws for the best completion percentage in the playoffs EVER. Two incompletions out of 28 attempts. 27 was a drop, and some journalists are saying that 28 was a missed penalty call. I don't care if they were short passes. The point of football is to win in whatever way you can. If that means short, you do it short. As much as we like the fancy, we don't need it. Also amazing that the Patriots can win with Randy Moss having one single catch the entire game. I guess doubling him is a pick your poison kind of situation.


- What a time for Lawrence Maroney to come into his own. We've seen flashes of his ability last year and earlier this year, but he's come alive in the last few weeks. When Jacksonville figured they couldn't allow Tom Brady to beat them himself, they left open wide holes for Maroney to push through.


- I love snow games! Green Bay is the hands-down best football town in America. One of my friends has been there for a game, and said there is nothing like it. It's the purest football one can experience. I loved how the network showed a picture of the field at kickoff and then a shot of its current state. It must have snowed 5 inches by the end of the game! And it was pretty, fluffy snow - the perfect environment for the Pack to show what they could do. Poor Seattle was barely in it. When you have a team that can recover from not one, but two fumbles in the first quarter, and end up scoring over 40 points after being down 14, you know that team is for real. I said fairly early on in the game that they could hit 40 and I was sort of laughed at, but lo and behold, who was right??


- Brett Favre is awesome. That almost-sack that became a shovel pass to Donald Lee for a first down was sick. Just sick. It will pain me if I have to root against him at some point, i.e. future time that I will not speak of too much for fear of jinxing it.


- I was one of those people who believed that the Colts defeat of the Chargers would be the lock of the weekend. How (happily) wrong we all were. I'm still wondering how the Colts managed to lose that game. They had everything going for them. The lack of media pressure, one of the loudest home fields in the league, the Defensive Player of the Year. Heck, they even knocked LaDainian Tomlinson out of the game in the second quarter, and Phillip Rivers out in the second half! How much more advantage does one need? There were several times during that game that I was just in complete and total shock. The interceptions were crazy, the officiating even worse. It felt like the league was trying to hand the game to the Colts.


- Phillip Rivers is a punk and I do not like him. Just shut up, man. Stop running your mouth. What exactly have you done again? Oh right, nothing yet. I forgot.

- A lot of people are commenting on the fact that all of the teams who rested players over the last few weeks of the regular season have been eliminated from the playoffs. There is a point there, I think. To me, there is definitely something to the idea of continuity and momentum in sports. Sure, resting the body is important, but I can see how some players or teams might just fall into a bit of a lull. I'm not one who will say that Tony Romo played badly because he was in Cabo with Jessica Simpson, but I would say that it seemed like he put it in neutral for most of the end of the season. He never appeared to regain full speed. It's easy to get caught up in the idea that your team has it together and that you don't need as much at the end as you do at the beginning. But I am starting to agree with the idea of 60 minutes of 16 games. The end is not the time to screw with momentum.


- Speaking of Tony...oh Tony. Tony, Tony, Tony. Please tell me this banner didn't really fly over Texas Stadium yesterday.




Because if that is real, then I will never stop laughing at you for the rest of the time you play in the NFL, and probably after that. As I just said, I don't think that being in Cabo with Jessica Simpson last week had anything to do with the actual game played yesterday. However, I do think it was just about the stupidest thing he could have done for his own image. I just don't get why you even open yourself up to that. Keep your personal life personal. Yes, Tom Brady dates celebrities, but do you ever see more than a picture of him out to dinner on a normal night?


- The New York Giants are playing in the NFC Championship? Excuse me...did I say that out loud? Since I wanted anyone but Dallas to win yesterday, my friends and I all rooted for the Giants, but that warmth has worn off today and now I am left with the fact that the Eli Manning-led Giants are in the NFC Championship game. Ugh. At least now we get a game in Lambeau (and they're saying single-digit temps for Sunday). But still, now that the ridiculous happiness that came along with the Cowboys' loss is receding, I'm left with the astonishment that Tom Coughlin will be keeping his job. Great.


- R.W. McQuarters has the best name ever. It sounds like he should be an 1880's newspaper mogul.


- By now if you haven't seen the clip of Terrell Owens crying about Tony Romo on national television, you live in a cave. If you are one of the crazies who haven't seen it yet, do yourself a favor and go to ESPN or NFL.com and find it. It might be the best video clip I have seen in a long time. Add to that the fact that, as one of my friends noted yesterday, he's wearing a cast-off outfit from the music video for "Beat It."


So those are my highlights from probably the best football weekend in a very long time. My apologies if it is a little disjointed, I was writing off pure giddiness. I could probably go on more. The teams I hate most lost and the ones I love won! The games were all competitive and were fun to watch. And we ended up with a combination of teams in the conference championships that give us the best chance for an incredible Super Bowl. For all the bad that the NFL has had to deal with this year, we're lucky as fans to have it end this way. I can't wait for next week!