A Priviliged Career

By: D.K. Wilson

It was fitting that on a Monday night, the day after Brett Favre’s father Irv died of a heart attack at age 58, Favre threw for 399 yards and four touchdowns. It might have been the best game of his football career.It was equally fitting that Brett Favre’s final pass as an NFL quarterback was an interception.

The two examples personify Favre as a quarterback and define his persona. Each is fitting because they personify his gun-slinger, try to fit the ball in places it shouldn’t fit into - and places other quarterbacks would never think of attempting to fit the ball into - mentality. Part of Favre is also his “everyday man” persona. There was an “aw shucks-ness” to him that he portrayed to the public.

And the public ate it up.

Though some local Green Bay writers knew that he played up that image and was much smarter than the average bear (both his parents were high school teachers), not even they would burst the balloon that was and will remain the idea of Brett Favre: the everyday man who hated suits and looked bad in them, who would rather tend to his farm than go to a nightclub, who loved to play pranks and played professional football as if he was still in his back yard. The man who, if you asked him how he succeeded on a certain play would much more likely reply, “Hell, I don’t know,” and give you that wry smile, than embark on a dry and lengthy explanation of formation, defense, and what he saw as the play developed.

And those two examples also define how he was inordinately deified.

From all accounts Brett Favre made many more plays on talent than he did from film study and knowing the Green Bay Packers playbook. In a “career of Brett Favre” NFL Films documentary, Favre admitted that one-time Packers quarterbacks coaches Marty Mornhingweg and Steve Mariucci often took the heat for Favre’s mistakes. A clip was shown, with Favre watching, of Mike Holmgren screaming at Mornhingweg about a blown play where Favre threw to the wrong receiver. Favre says, “he’s (Mornhingweg) covering for me.”

In the same documentary Favre talks of asking Mark Brunell a football question. Favre was drafted in the second round by the Atlanta Falcons in 1991. He was traded to the Green Bay Packers the following year. Brunell was a backup to Favre in 1994. Now, the question: “What does nickel defense mean?” Brunell replied with the appropriate definition - removing a linebacker and replacing him with a defensive back - to which Favre replied, “Is that it?”

Three years into his career, Brett Favre did not know the definition of a nickel defense.

This is the Favre that some sportswriters knew. However, this is the Favre the public did not know. As much as the legend of Brett Favre is interesting, the protection of that persona is just as interesting.

One of the complaints about Michael Vick was that, because of his athletic ability, he didn’t study the playbook as much as he should have. Ironically, this is the very reason Favre himself gives for his “Good Brett” “Bad Brett” performances. Again, referring to the documentary Favre admitted that for the first five years or so of his career that when he watched film, he sat and watched the game like a fan. When Packers head coach Mike Holmgren would say to Favre, “Did you see so-and-so rotate over to cover the weakside,” Favre said he would shake his head and say, “Yeah,” never noticing a thing.

In his Favre eulogy for NFL.com today, Adam Schefter writes of Favre:“When Packers wide receiver Javon Walker considered holding out of training camp a few years ago, Favre ripped him the way callers to sports talk radio would. Favre didn’t like the idea of a player not honoring his contract the way we don’t like the idea of a player not honoring his contract. Favre spoke for us.”

Because of the nature of NFL contracts, that they are non-guaranteed and heavily skewed in favor of the team owner, writers have become sensitive to the needs of players to get all the money they can from teams; sportswriters and NFL pundits, as a rule, do not criticize players who holdout. This make Schefter’s statement all the more incredible - and irresponsible. Except. He was talking about the irrepressible Brett “Everyman” Favre and can therefore be excused for his over-exuberance.

When it was revealed that Favre had an addiction to the painkiller Vicodin, the press rushed to his defense and, much like we see from Andy Pettitte and his HGH admission today, Favre was and is hailed as a hero who conquered the evil drug. Though Favre admitted that at first he took Vicodin for pain and then recreationally which led him to addiction, the press excuses his addiction. Abusing the painkiller just to get high is not mentioned.

Even today Adam Schefter and others at NFLN indicated that Favre took the drug to be out there with his teammates. Jim Mora, Sr., now an NFLN analyst said reverently of Favre: “Even though he was addicted to Vicodin, he did it for the team. And all through that time not only did he not miss a game, but he didn’t miss a practice.”

The stark reality of the addiction situation with Favre at that time in his life is that he was a “functioning drug addict.” And for almost any other person who finds him or herself there, functioning drug addict is how the person is characterized. For a parallel, Rush Limbaugh’s addiction to Percodans and later Oxycontin is exactly what Favre went through. Limbaugh did his show, made appearances, and appeared for interviews. Yet he was addicted to prescription painkillers.

Limbaugh - politics aside - was not characterized as a hero. He was a functioning drug addict. The heroic nature in which Favre’s addiction was and is depicted does the NFL a disservice; not management and the league office, but it does a disservice to the players.

Professional football is a purely violent sport. In an older documentary, the first to illustrate the devastating effects of playing football on the human body, a defensive back said that every play in which he comes into contact with other players, he sustains an injury. To this player, an injury meant anything from muscle contusions (bruises) to a sprained finger.

A deep enough muscle bruise can be severe enough to cause a normal male adult to miss a day or two of work. A football player will likely not miss one play - not one 35-second expanse of time. In a Sports Illustrated article Marcus Allen, who wore - other than shoulder pads - no padding on his body when he played football, talked of his intense post-game regimen. It began with a deep tissue massage so that he could get the bruises rubbed from his body as soon as possible. This way, Allen was told, his body could immediately begin healing from the punishment he took during a game. He indicated that when he first began this treatment, the pain was acute enough to make him cry. The tradeoffs for Allen were and are: when his peers were still hobbled deep into the following week, by Tuesday Allen was physically fine. And Allen is now not subject to the effects of the repeated “small” injuries which NFL players largely overlook but get to a point in every player’s career where they do not heal.

Most NFL players do not undergo this type of treatment.

About 6.5% of adults in the U.S. are addicted to prescription painkillers. As adults become older, the percentages nearly quadruple. Though the NFL estimates that 10% of players are addicted to prescription painkillers, with what we know of the culture of abuse among athletes that statistic is probably much higher.

And one of the reasons we do not have accurate statistics for current or ex-NFL players is due to the willful turning a blind eye to this abuse by members of the media - even when, as in Favre’s case, there are photos of him popping a handful of Vicodin (seen in the NFL Films documentary).

Yet, because a matter as serious as drug addiction was swept under the rug until Favre himself divulged the problem, the “gun-slinging wild man from Kiln, Mississippi was given a pass.

And today Brett Favre does not exist as a cautionary tale, if not a triumphant one, he exists as an exalted football deity.

A question that has been asked often in these first few moments of Brett Favre’s retirement is, “Will we ever see another Brett Favre?”

I, for one, hope we never see a quarterback who is drafted in the second round and gets traded for a first round pick the following season without playing. I hope we never see another quarterback who, three years into his career, has no idea what a nickel defense is. Please let there never be another quarterback who becomes addicted to painkillers which nearly costs him his family and his career. Let there never be another quarterback who, instead of watching film to learn about the opposition for an upcoming game, watches the game like a fan.

Let there never be another NFL quarterback who spends so much of his career wasting it, only to understand what it truly takes to play the game in his final season in the game; who is able to get away with not studying film, throwing interceptions, and not shouldering all the blame.

Sure, Brett Favre “had fun” playing the game. How many players don’t? Sure Favre ad-libbed like few other quarterbacks in this day of tightly-controlled by the coaching staff offenses. But Favre himself says that the 2007-08 season was stressful because the team was winning; that he found himself studying film more and more each week because there was more pressure each week to win and that got to be too much for him. And though he’s relatively fine physically he does not want a repeat of those feelings from last season - all with the possibility of not winning 13 games and not winning the Super Bowl…

Well damn it all to hell, Brett. That must be what that crazy Peyton Manning must have been doing every week. How ’bout those crazy fellers like Donovan McNabb or Tom Brady? Those fools have been winnin’ almost every week for years. They must be ’bout to gosh dern ex-plode in their plum in-sane brains! Heck they should’a re-tired after their fourth or fifth years - as soon as all the winnin’ an’ the pressure and the film study and the expectations got to be too much.

I hope there is never another quarterback like Brett Favre.

And come to think about it, what’s going to happen to Favre in his NFL afterlife? For the past 17 seasons this man has live a fantasy life. He has never missed a game - no matter what. Hell, there were time when he should have missed games, but he played like he was running from something.

But then again, it sure seems like he was enabled by coach after coach after coach to stay a little boy. Could you imagine a black quarterback playing the pranks Favre did? How about coming to his coach’s house in a team jersey and a mask; a 6′2″ 225-pound black man with his black wideout friend and their children ring their coach’s bell and yell trick-or-treat. And when the coach says he just ran out of candy the two adult men get an attitude and start backing up the coach and wanting to come in the house. In Green Bay, Wisconsin.

What would a white head coach do?

I mean, besides force the door closed and call the police.

How long would a black quarterback last if he conducted himself like “Buckhead Brett?” You didn’t know that was his nickname in Atlanta because Buckhead is where all the bars were and that’s where Brett spent most of his evening hours?

Then again he wasn’t married to Deanna, yet. I mean they lived together and had children and all for 10 years before they got married. Can you imagine that being a black QB? Or a noted black athlete from any major sport? Ask Orlando Magic center Dwight Howard about the local scrutiny that comes with - gasp! - having a child “out of wedlock” with a woman you are living with and with whom you are very much in love.

How long would a black quarterback last if he conducted himself like Brett Favre? How about a black player in the NFL at any position?

And how is the magical, Peter Pan-Syndrome man that is Brett Favre going to react to his NFL afterlife?

A real dad, he’s never been. He’ll be the first to tell you that. He’s been a “live-away” husband for the time he has been married to Deanna. Every offseason he goes down to the farm and putts around on his tractor and goes fishing with the boys, just biding his time until the next training camp begins.

Brett Favre has been a pretend-partner, pretend-daddy, pretend-husband —— damn, almost forgot, he was a pretend-quarterback, too. Okay okay, perhaps “pretend” is too harsh; “part-time,” “sorta,” those are better. But still. What happens when he’s forced to be full-time at something?

Ex-USFL, Tampa Bay Bucs, and SF 49ers Hall of Fame quarterback Steve Young, who played 17 years in the pro ranks, understands what it’s like to suddenly stop. He’s also seen the men who were of Favre’s status after their careers ended:

“Every time we see a player of this magnitude decide to retire, he falls off a cliff. I’ll tell you, in June and July he’ll be dying to come back.”

Oh boy.

———————–

All-in-all Brett Favre has lived a damn charmed life. All he’s had to do is play every day for the last 21 years, if you count college. Now he’s 38 and play time is about to end. He has been handed any and everything he’s wanted: an illustrious pro football career, a beautiful wife who has put up with him, beautiful children, and the adoration of millions of football and sports fans across America.

There’s not much more a man can ask for, other than an equally easy life after the game.

But that is not going to happen. Brett Favre now must learn how to live, really live. For the first time Brett Favre will have to work to make something work; do more “film study” than he ever did in the NFL. And he won’t have an enabling press or adoring fans to fall back on when he fails. Which is kind of curious-odd anyway. Because Brett Favre never should have been afforded that chance; not in a million years.

And if Brett Favre was black, what again do you think his career would have looked like? Not what, in your idealized uo topos of a world, but in the reality in which we live?

Oh ———– thought so, yup. It would be the old NFL for a black QB, huh?

He’d be Not For Long.

Thought so.

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D.K. Wilson is a freelance sports writer. He is better known on the internet as "DWil," and writes for Sports On My Mind.

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