I am somewhat depressed

Right now, this is where my teams stand:
Minnesota Wild - Lost last night to Colorado
Purdue basketball - Lost last night to Richmond (ugh)
Purdue football - Lost yesterday AT HOME to Indiana (double ugh)
Indianapolis Colts - Lost last week to New England
Want me to keep going? How deep do you want? Let's go overseas.
Rosenborg BK, my favorite soccer club, from my grandmothers home town - Lost to Atletico Madrid in the Europa League, but hey! They tied with Aalesund in the Norwegian league finale
Blackburn, my EPL team - Lost yesterday to Manchester United, 7-1
Further? OK
Minnesota Twins - Swept by the Yankees in the postseason
Heck, my high school, Benilde St. Margaret's - Lost to Totino Grace in the Sectional quarters.

Sports suck. I need something to improve my mood.

Ah, I'll always have you, sad Brett Favre

The Favre Sad Gallery, Week 4

Welcome to the latest edition of The Victoria Times' Brett Favre Sad Gallery! 

The latest installment is from Jim McIsaac at Getty images.

The Favre Sad Gallery, Week 2

Every time there is an update, check back with The Victoria Times for the Favre Sad Gallery

The latest picture is from Jamie Squire/Getty images

History is repeating itself!

I was watching some old school Family Feud, this an episode from 1980 featuring the Dallas Cowboys and their cheerleaders. It featured Danny White (far right) Tony Dorsett (center) Charlie Waters' magnificently feathered hair (2nd from right), and 5 girls who are all now in their 50s. Harrowing.
Anyways, as the game began, Richard Dawson was interviewing Danny White, the new quarterback for the Cowboys now that Roger Staubach had retired. Well, White had some interesting comments on the topic (paraphrasing):
"Well, we hope he's retiring. He says he is, but he could still come back. He may change his mind. He's always been a practical joker."
Danny White is Aaron Rodgers.

Awful

The football game was pretty tough to watch. But yeah, I'm going to get some legs out of this picture.

Oh Sid, you old coot

Remember how last week Brett Favre allegedly said he was going to retire, but then kicker Ryan Longwell almost immediately said "He hasn't said anything of the sort". Then do you remember how his agent and everyone involved said he was going to wait for a trip to the doctor to get his ankle checked out? Remember all that?
Sid Hartman didn't. That's why he broke the news that Brett Favre will be coming back if his ankle is ok. Sid talked to Ryan Longwell to establish this. So, essentially, Sid broke news that was about a week old. Thanks Sid.
The best part is that this was also picked up on ESPN's edition of Sportscenter this morning. Unbelievable. I'm beginning to hate Favre less and less as it becomes increasingly evident that jackasses in suits will fawn over him and leap to conclusions no matter what happens, even if it happened a week ago.

Once again, blame the media

Let's review:
-Favre texts teammates, saying "this is it"
- Someone tells Star Tribune
- Star Tribune says Favre retires.
- Internet explodes
- Favre still hasn't said anything to team
- Favre hasn't said anything to his closest friends
- As of quarter to 1 on Wednesday morning, there is STILL NO TANGIBLE EVIDENCE that Favre has decided to retire.
- Vikings talk themselves into giving Favre a raise anyways.

Well played, whoever is orchestrating this dumbassery. Well played.

Expanding on last night's post

Let's make one thing perfectly clear... What Lebron James did to the city of Cleveland last night, and has done to sports fans everywhere was infinitely worse than anything that Brett Favre did to Green Bay or fans anywhere (I'm more disgusted with Minnesotans greedily aligned themselves with such a hated rival as though they had engineered some sort of coup in bringing him to the VIkings, but that's for a different time). Let's review
Lebron left in the prime of his career, Favre did not.
Favre won rings in Green Bay, Lebron did no such thin in Cleveland
Lebron was a home town hero in Cleveland, Favre was not in Green Bay
The Packers let Favre go because they had a back up plan, the Cavaliers do not.
Lebron drummed up an insane amount of coverage for himself, even creating an hour long special for his decision, Favre was simply indecisive and basked in the attention that was lavished upon him.
Favre was a nuisance, but Lebron James was ruthless.

Admittedly, this is not Favre's fault

The annoying thing about the past two years was that he claimed to retire, then weaseled his way out of town and tried to force his way into others. He spent a lot of his time playing the media until he got what he wanted, and was a drama queen the whole way.
This offseason, he's not trying to pull anything on anyone. I think everyone in the world expects him to return. He had the ankle surgery, he hasn't filed for retirement or whined about not being a starter after jerking around a team for year. He hasn't done all the things in an offseason that make everyone hate him. He just can't say he is coming back yet because he's old and can't take training camp. He's got a gentleman's agreement with the Vikings that will help him be healthy and help the Vikings not be terrible.
Seeing as everyone acknowledges this and its a mere formality back, and recognizing that he can't come out and SAY that he has decided, anyone that would interview him trying to get an answer would be an asinine grab for attention. I'm looking at you, Biloxi Sun Herald. You know what you did.

Ugh, seriously?

Now you have to play coy, while leaving your decisions up to a college baseball team? You worthless old f**. We all know you are coming back, even if Southern Miss doesn't. The worst part? You are making people who actually believe your sh*t either root for or against Southern Miss. And who in their right mind would make other people root against a team of college athletes they would otherwise have nothing against. You're a scumbag Favre. I hope you DO come back, then get benched for being f'ing terrible

Brett Favre is haunting my dreams

In many regards, I am a similar writer to the Pacifist Viking, in that we write succinct posts that get to the point rather quickly. Now, apparently, we are both dreaming about the Vikings during the offseason.
All the dream was was an argument with a coworker on the merits of Brett Favre. I continued to insist that the team would be good even without Favre, and if they had a decent QB they could still be elite. In fact, the team will be worse than last year, because Favre's season in 2009 could be labeled as nothing other than a fluke. He slowly came around, my subconscious coworker, but was pretty vehement before that. Also, we were watching the Colts play the Patriots on whatever TV we were watching. It was 3-2 Patriots approaching the half with the Colts setting up for a field goal. It was blocked.
Anyways, back in the real world. the Star Tribune talks about the Vikings potentially wanting Tim Tebow. Enjoy that.

Story sounds familiar

 

Let's compare the story of Chinese figure skaters Shen Xiue and Zhao Hongbo with local, recently beloved hero Brett Favre.

- Retired, then came back to compete.

- In love with themselves (Shen and Zhao are married)

- Competing well into their 30s (beyond, in Favre's case)

- Throwing is an important part of the job description

- Have been know to wear purple

- Won them most prestigious championship in their sport this year..... oh wait, no. Shen and Zhao yes, but well, you know.

FAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARVE

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Time for the NFL Season to finally commence

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The NFL season begins in earnest about a half hour from now. The Vikings get to show off their new, shiny prize in Cleveland. Frankly, all the glitter in the world isn't going to make him good again. As for the rest of the games, the one I'm most concerned with is the Indy-Jacksonville game. The first step in proving Steve wrong! Go Colts!

Retire, verb, stop working

American Heritage dictionary states that to retire means to stop working, to retreat, to fade away.

Someone needs to explain this to a couple of athletes.

There are many schools of thought. There are players who try to get a position as they’re fading into the twilight, and upon the realization that there’s no demand for their waning talents, decide to retire.

Then there are those who in peak ages, decide to retire because they’ve decided their done. I still recall Brad Radke’s retirement speech, wherein he said that he was done, and he was not one of those guys that retired and then changed his mind. He also stated that "When I make a decision, I make a decision.”

Many years ago, when Ryan stated that he had a general principle in sports that he never drafted a player within three years of retirement. We pointed out in 2007 that he could draft Roger Clemens, who retired for the first time in 2003. In early 2006, he said he was going to retire after the World Baseball Classic, but he made no formal announcement. For the best, really, because he ended up signing again in late May 2006 (and for his first start, fans packed the stadium in Houston to see a dominant left-hander make the opponent look silly…unfortunately, the left-hander they wanted to see, Roger Clemens, only did an okay job. The left-hander making them look silly was a young kid making his major league debut. His name is Francisco Liriano). In 2007, he was again convinced to come out of retirement to pitch for the Yankees—he signed in May.

This all comes to light because an article I read this week proclaimed that Brett Favre is the worst flip-flopper in the history of sports. Brett Favre retired after the 2007 season (so, in early 2008). I understand it was a tear-filled event, probably similar to Bradke’s. These things happen when great players decide to retire. But Favre ultimately caved and decided not to retire. By this point, the Packers had a new quarterback, but Favre was still under contract to the Packers (yes, he retired while under contract. Go figure). They ended up trading him to the Jets. After the season with the Jets, he decided he was really done…but eventually he decided he might want to play again, so he asked the Jets to remove him from the Reserve/Retired list. And, as made major headlines in Minnesota, and minor headlines (at least) elsewhere, he signed with the Vikings.

To give Clemens some credit, he went to his hometown team first after coming out of retirement, and he also went to a former team for his final come-out-of-retirement phase. But really, I don’t see either as being worse than the others. I see them both as attention-whores. They needed to make their decision and garner the press conference before they were fully committed to retiring. I’m sure at the moment of their press conference, they were pretty sure what they wanted to retire, but clearly it was the end of the season fatigue, and as their colleagues started heading back to the stadiums in the summer, they realized they still wanted to be part of it.

I can understand that. But once you announce your retirement once, and go back on it, I think you shouldn’t announce your retirement again until you are positive—and by positive, I mean sitting out a full season. If you don’t get antsy to go back and play again, then maybe you’re ready for retirement.

Or the leagues need rules that once a player announces retirement, he cannot come back to play. These players that think they want to retire would then be forced to seriously consider their actions. Some could fade away. Some might announce that they’re not playing the next year, but they’re not retiring yet. At any rate, we don’t need dramatic emotions only to have a guy say, “Well, nevermind. I’m going to play again.”

How is your day going?

Here are the first three links I had sent to me today.

http://wcco.com/vikings/brett.favre.minnesota.2.1133319.html


http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2009/08/18/report-favre-is-on-a-plane-to-minnesota/


http://www.wdam.com/Global/story.asp?S=10948310

Not that the whole situation is oversaturated or anything. Seriously, next time I get on a plane, it's getting it's own post here.

The final straw was when WCCO came up with a breaking news crawl on the Price is Right. When I am watching one of Barker's Beauty's and finding out about the Hyundai Elantra, I definitely don't care about Brett Favre.

Oh, one more:

http://blogs.startribune.com/vikingsblog/?p=3183


The Vikings are now officially my least favorite team in the NFL. I hope they go 8-8 so they miss the playoffs, don't fire Childress and don't get a top draft pick.

In which Ryan does his happy dance

Brett Favre isn't coming to Minnesota! I don't have to hear about the Vikings on every channel, even when they aren't playing!
I am not a Vikings fan, and often take glee in their failings. That said, it's bad enough that I have to hear about them on the local channels, but at least this takes them out of the headlines on the national news for a while.
I promise you, my next football post will be about a team I actually like. Go Colts!

Let's get this over with.

This NFL off season, the Indianapolis Colts have....
- Let go of a future Hall of Fame receiver Marvin Harrison.
- Saw future Hall of Fame head coach Tony Dungy retire.
- Promoted Jim Caldwell to head coach, and tried to create a seamless transition between coaching regimes.
- Failed to create a seamless transition between coaching regimes.
- Saw their offensive coaching staff retire.
- Had their star quarterback express displeasure with the coaching situation.
- Are heading into the next season with a myriad of problems

That's a busy offseason if you ask me. Why do I bring it up? Because you haven't heard about any of it, because of this guy:

Even the death of a better, less annoying quarterback in a horrifying but grotesquely interesting homicide wasn't able to keep Favre out of the headlines. If he signs with the Vikings, I am never coming back to rooting for them.

Position in the Spotlight: Wisconsin

The next largest market for the Position in the Spotlight brings us to Milwaukee. Milwaukee is an interesting sports market because the most popular team in town...isn't in town. You have to head up north to Green Bay, home of the Packers, for that. In my opinion, a cheesehead is a cheesehead, no matter what city you live in, so this Position in the Spotlight entry will cover the entire state of Wisconsin.

When making the pick for each city, I think the first thing you need to take into consideration is what is the most popular sport in town, which in turn tells you the most popular team in town. Some cities are fairly equal, but in Wisconsin, football is king. Sure, the state has seen 1 championship each in baseball and basketball (Braves in 1957 and Bucks in 1971) but the Packers were so good and so popular in the early days of the NFL, that as teams migrated from towns like Decatur and Dayton to big cities, the Pack stayed put, and are still there today. Now, you pretty need to narrow it down to 2 spots within the Packers.

Currently, there is no doubt that Packers QB is the Position in the Spotlight because of all of the drama that Brett Favre caused, but in reality, the Packers have only really had 2 great QBs, Favre and Bart Starr. Aaron Rodgers has some huge shoes to fill right now, but it will be interesting to see what the expectations are for Packers QBs in the future. Over the course of Packers history, though, there is one position that may have even bigger shoes to fill, and that is Green Bay Packers Head Coach.

Historic Lambeau Field. The Vince Lombardi Trophy. What do these things have in common? They were both legendary Packers coaches. Over the 90 year history of the team, the Packers have only had 14 head coaches. Curly Lambeau started the tradition of great Packers coaches when he started serving as player-coach in 1921. He wound up coaching the Packers for 29 years, leaving with 6 NFL championships in 1949. He is known for helping to popularize the forward pass in the NFL, having witnessed it in action at Notre Dame under Knute Rockne. The 1950s were pretty rough on the Packers, but Gene Ronzani was the first to push for the Packers to wear their famous green uniforms.

In 1959, Vince Lombardi was next to step in line to try to achieve what Lambeau accomplished, and he turned the organization around. In just 9 seasons as head coach, he won 5 championships, including the first 2 Super Bowls. Only John Madden and some guy that coached in the 20s have a better winning percentage than Lombardi, and he was 9-1 all time in the playoffs. He could possibly be the most famous coach in NFL history, and is still quoted frequently. The Super Bowl Trophy was named after him shortly after his death.

The 24 years that followed Lombardi's departure threw a wet blanket on just about any legacy left by Lambeau and Lombardi, but the Packers still had some intriguing head coaches. Dan Devine left the Packers for Notre Dame, where he won a national championship with Joe Montana. Legendary 60s QB Bart Starr coached the team from 1975-1983. He wasn't all that great as a coach, but he is definitely a celebrity in Green Bay. Starr was replaced by another famous Packer, Forrest Gregg, who also led the Bengals to the Super Bowl in 1981 before going to Green Bay.

Everything started to change again in Green Bay in 1992, when Mike Holmgren and Brett Favre came to town. Holmgren led the Packers to the playoffs 6 out of 7 years with the team, and made 2 trips to the Super Bowl, winning the first one. He turned the Packers into a force to be reckoned with as the great 49ers and Cowboys teams of the early 90s started to decline. After Holmgren left, the Packers still had a reasonable amount of success under Mike Sherman, but were not as dominant as they were under Holmgren. Mike McCarthy is the current head coach, and the heat is on him now not for trying to live up to the greatness of past coaches, but because he had a negative 7 win swing after helping to run Favre out of town last year.

Honorable Mention:
Green Bay Packers Quarterback: Like I mentioned before, this was a tough call. Favre's legacy will live on for a very long time, and he left much more recently than Holmgren and especially Lombardi. Right now this definitely is the position in the spotlight, but if the Packers go another couple of decades without a great QB like between Starr and Favre, those expectations will start to fade, and Packer fans have almost always had at least an interesting head coach. Ten years from now, Coach Favre?
Milwaukee Bucks "Big Man": The Bucks have had some good "big men" over the years, especially in the early 70s when they had the legendary Oscar Robertson and maybe the even more legendary Kareem Abdul-Jabbar as teammates. In the early 80s, they had hall of famer Bob Lanier, and in the late 80s, they had Terry Cummings. In the mid-late 90s, they had Glenn Robinson, and currently they are led by Andrew Bogut and Charlie Villanueva. This is probably the first time ever the Bucks have been mentioned on this site.

Brett Favre.... evil genius?

Is Brett Farve an evil genius? My rudimentary knowledge of these things says yes. Let's review:
Once golden boy who doesn't get his way. Even though he is in the wrong, he feels that everyone else is to blame. He seeks revenge. After an initial set back, he finally hatches a hairbrained scheme that might be crazy enough to work. Then, after meticulous planning, the now insane madman is able to exact his revenge on the people he so despises.
Now, the story of Brett Favre, simplified, with a little conjecture thrown in at the end. He changes his mind after retiring and really wants to come back to play some more football, but the Packers have mved on. He feels the Packers are to blame, and he wants to no defeat them just to show that he can. He tries to get to a team that will play them, but is instead traded to the Jets. Now (conjecture!), with the Packers implementing all sorts of rules on the Jets in order to execute the trade, Favre begins hatching his plan. He needs to both be decent for the Jets, but somehow get his release at the end of the year. How does he do this? Retire. Sure, there is the torn bicep, but he can recover, no doubt. When he does, he will still be worthy of a contract and able to sign with whomever he wants. Did anyone stop to think that maybe Favre isn't wishy washy and attention whoring, that maybe, just maybe, the gunslinger is diabolical?