Favre in Miami

[Brando19]

Packers' QB Brett Favre has thrown a touchdown pass in 35 different stadiums, but has never thrown one at Dolphin Stadium.
This is according to foxsports.com

Let's hope this changes Sunday!

[Tony Oday]

here is to THREE TDs

[Scott Campbell]

Wow. Touchdown passes in more stadiums than there are teams. That's how you know you are old.

[woodbuck27]

Re: Favre in Miami

Packers' QB Brett Favre has thrown a touchdown pass in 35 different stadiums, but has never thrown one at Dolphin Stadium.
This is according to foxsports.com

Let's hope this changes Sunday!

He can't have played there often.

Not many games even, that he doesn't toss a TD pass.

Here's to Packers and Favre and TD pass's Sunday.

[Freak Out]

Wow. Touchdown passes in more stadiums than there are teams. That's how you know you are old.

Amazing stat. I think he gets one or two in..what is it called "Pro Player Stadium"?

[Charles Woodson]

Heres to a win, so i can bitch out all my lil miami friends who have been talking smack All effin week

[MadtownPacker]

Thats a funny stat considering that the stadium has been in the NFL longer then him. Doe anyone know how many times he has played there?

[MadtownPacker]

Heres to a win, so i can bitch out all my lil miami friends who have been talking smack All effin week

Woodson - WHy arent you playing on Sunday? Isnt this what the problem was when you played for the raiders?

[Charles Woodson]

Idk but ill be watching the game on the 30 yard line row 4 bitches!!!!

[GrnBay007]

I didn't know where to throw this in but came across this article and thought it was really good. long...but good read.



Favre's wild ride
By Hal Habib

Palm Beach Post Staff Writer

Sunday, October 22, 2006

After 37 years and 15 1/2 NFL seasons, "I wonder, sometimes, what I'm doing here," Brett Favre says.

It could be construed as a woe-is-me revelation in a 1-4 season that no Hall of Fame quarterback should put up with, but Favre follows that by admitting he feels he has let down the Green Bay Packers and that, whatever he is doing there, he should be doing more.

The rest of us see a quarterback who arrives today at Dolphin Stadium 17 touchdown passes shy of the NFL record Dan Marino cherishes most. Perhaps during warm-ups, Favre will glance toward the east end zone and see Marino's name in the Dolphin Honor Roll, alongside a "420" symbolizing that record.

Maybe around that time, the question won't be, "What is Brett Favre doing here," but "Why wasn't he here — in Miami — doing it more often?"

The career paths of Marino and Favre crossed just twice on the football field, neither time in Miami, but both under notable circumstances. In 1994, a confounded coach wondered whether he should bench this wild Favre kid, and in 1997, Marino's coach questioned the wisdom of sticking with him.

To imagine what would have happened had Marino and Favre met twice a year rather than twice in their careers is not to fantasize as much as you might think.

Picture Favre in a green No. 4 jersey. Easy.

Now picture that jersey in New York Jets green.

It almost happened. Could have happened. As far as the Jets were concerned, it did happen, until the Cardinals backed out of a draft-day trade that would have changed NFL history.

The Atlanta Falcons and the Jets both were trying to trade up to select Favre in 1991, and when the then-Phoenix Cardinals reneged on a deal with New York, it allowed the Falcons to use the 33rd overall selection on Favre, one spot ahead of the Jets, who landed Louisville QB Browning Nagle as a consolation prize.

Make no mistake how much a lock "Jets quarterback Brett Favre" was. The New York personnel man pushing for this, Ron Wolf, became the Packers' general manager a year later and shipped a first-round pick to Atlanta to acquire Favre.

As it was, fans saw Marino vs. Buffalo's Jim Kelly in the AFC East, but imagine the shootouts if Favre had jumped in the fray.

"Oh, my God," says Ken Herock, the Falcons' vice president of player personnel who drafted Favre. "All the guys he had shootouts with are all gone. He shot 'em out. They're history."

Job security for defensive coordinators in the division would have been nil, regardless of their results, Wolf jokes, since "if you could stop them, you'd be a head coach in a hurry."

Wolf was an assistant to Jets GM Dick Steinberg at the time and, like his friend Herock, was eager to select Favre out of Southern Mississippi.

"He was rated the best player in the country by the Jets," Wolf says. "All that turned out to be true. Unfortunately for me in the long run, the Jets did not have a first-round pick."

The Jets had expended it on Syracuse receiver Rob Moore in the supplemental draft, but that almost didn't matter.

"A career expectancy of maybe seven years." That was the book on Favre coming out of college, Herock says, because of a hip injury. "That's probably one of the reasons he lasted into the second round."

Favre, supposedly so brittle, didn't miss a day of school for 10 of his 12 years, has started 226 consecutive games, surpassing Marino's 95 straight and setting an NFL record for quarterbacks.

That explains why Favre ended up in Atlanta for one long-forgotten season (four attempts, zero completions, two interceptions). Another irony explains how he landed in Green Bay.

Still standing

Today, Favre is the consummate pro, combining an aw-shucks attitude with a competitive fire that has enabled him to win three of the past four Harris polls as the NFL's most popular player.

"To me, it's quite a privilege to still be able to dress out," he says, as if "dressing out" for a professional football game is on the same plane as third-grade dodge ball. "I look at every time I get to throw a pass — it's something that a lot of people would love to do. And being able to throw touchdown passes in Lambeau Field is a great honor, so to be able to throw 400 is icing on the cake."

That's now. Brett Favre, the Atlanta Falcons rookie in 1991?

"He didn't pay attention to the game plan, he gained weight, he was drinking, carrying on, sleeping in meetings — everything," Herock says. "Everything was going wrong."

The Falcons' starting QB was Chris Miller, who made the Pro Bowl, yet Herock was hearing complaints from all sides.

"He would always come to me and say, 'Listen, I'm better than that guy,' " Herock says of Favre. "And the coaches used to just tell me, 'God, this guy is horrible.' I used to hear these stories every week from the coaches and I would say, 'Well, I made a mistake. I liked this guy so much.' "

When then-Falcons coach Jerry Glanville demoted Favre to third string, Herock knew the Favre era in Atlanta would never happen.

Herock called a meeting with the coaches and club owner and said, "You guys tell him what you think of Brett Favre, so that they (onlookers) know when I go to trade him, it's not going to be me trading him."

In a last-ditch effort to undermine his own deal, Herock set the price at two first-round picks. He later figured no one would give up one first-rounder. He thought wrong. Wolf had been watching. And waiting.

"When I told everybody I can get a first for him, they said, 'Wow! You're a genius!' " Herock says.

"Yeah, I'm a genius. I traded Brett Favre. I always look back at history. I'm from Pittsburgh and I remember when the Steelers traded Johnny Unitas. I always thought, 'How could you get rid of a guy like Johnny Unitas? How could anybody make that mistake?' What goes around comes around. I should have known better."

It turned out best for Favre, Wolf and even Herock, who later served as vice president of player personnel in Green Bay and says Favre has thanked him for the fresh start.

By the fall of 1994, Favre still was settling in as the Packers' quarterback when Marino and the Dolphins visited Milwaukee's County Stadium. Cheeseheads still hadn't warmed up to Favre, nor him to them. Sometimes, he received mock standing ovations when he threw the ball away instead of forcing a ball into coverage for another interception.

By halftime, Marino had thrown two touchdown passes and given Miami a 17-0 lead. Packers coach Mike Holmgren nearly gave Favre the hook in favor of Ty Detmer.

Favre and Holmgren had been through two reasonably successful seasons together, but the coach still wasn't sure what to make of his QB. The December before, the Packers were playing the Oakland Raiders at Lambeau on a bitterly cold day — the wind chill was 22 degrees below zero — with a shot at the playoffs on the line.

During a timeout late in the game, Holmgren realized Favre wasn't hearing a word he was saying and had a "goofy" look on his face. He grabbed Favre by the shoulder pads to get his attention. Didn't matter.

"Coach, you should see your mustache," Favre said.

Favre later explained to Minneapolis' Star Tribune, "He had snot frozen in a shield of ice completely over his mustache. I couldn't help but laugh. I had never been in that kind of cold. Thank God we won, because he couldn't believe I wasn't all business."

Favre's first meeting with Marino didn't end happily. Although Favre had 362 yards passing to Marino's 177, the Dolphins won 24-14.

Skip ahead to best part

So much had changed when they met again three years later. Favre was a two-time league MVP who had just guided the Packers to a Super Bowl title.

Meanwhile, Jimmy Johnson had replaced Don Shula as Dolphins coach and made a shocking acknowledgement the week before. He considered benching Marino for Craig Erickson.

The talk must have startled Favre, who once had Marino's picture on his bedroom wall. He called Marino the smartest quarterback he had seen and said Marino's single-season record of 48 touchdowns in 1984 surpassed even Roger Maris' home-run record of 61.

In a game that teases a rivalry that could have been, the Packers recorded their first victory against Miami, winning 23-18 amid five lead changes. Favre threw for 253 yards and two TDs; Marino had 240 and one TD.

"It's really unbelievable that he hasn't won a Super Bowl with all those stats," Favre told the Wisconsin State Journal. "It just shows you how hard it is to win one. I bet Dan sometimes goes, 'Son of a gun, he got one.' You look at Jim Kelly, who's a good friend of mine. Every time we get together he puts me in one of those headlocks and says, 'I can't believe you got a ring.' ''

Now, Favre not only has a ring, he also might take Marino's record. Might. At his career pace — nearly identical to Marino's — Favre would tie Marino after 10 more games. But at his pace in the past 1w years, Favre would need 14 games to share the mark. The Packers have 11 games left this season, including today's game.

Having endured the media circus that is when-will-Brett-retire, Favre says he won't discuss his future until after the season. As difficult as losing has been, he talks about laying a foundation for future Packers teams, even if he's not a part of them. Right now, he's able to smile. To dress out. To dress up.

"Am I color-coordinated today?" he asks at the start of his weekly news conference with Packers reporters. He's wearing a Packers-gold T-shirt and a pink cap, in honor of wife Deanna's foundation, which helps low-income women afford breast-cancer screening and treatment. Deanna is coming off a public battle with the disease.

"My wife told me if I didn't wear this, I'd be in a lot of trouble," Favre says. "So, hey, I had to wear it."

What will Favre be wearing in a year? Jeans, as he mows his farm? Herock can picture Seattle's Holmgren showing interest if anything happened to Matt Hasselbeck. Wolf says, "It would be nice if he went out as a Packer." Some wonder whether Washington might show interest.

Favre merely says he's "99.9 percent sure" he wouldn't go to another team if the Packers decided to start Aaron Rodgers in 2007.

Meaning, today likely is the last time you'll see Brett Favre against the Dolphins.

The last time to see the rivalry that nearly was.

[Zool]

Ouch....Browning Neagle.

[vince]

I really enjoyed that article. The part about Holmgren having snot on his 'stache cracked me up! I also wasn't aware of the draft day history there with the Jets and Falcons fighting to trade up to get him.

Thanks 007.

[SD GB fan]

Herock can picture Seattle's Holmgren showing interest if anything happened to Matt Hasselbeck.

..oh the irony