The Ballad of a Broken Man: Is This Really Brett Favre’s End?

There is no emptier feeling on a field of play than losing and knowing you’re the reason why. Brett Favre knows that all too well.

His interception today was worse than the one in January 2008, his last pass before his first retirement. Instead of giving the other team a gift in overtime, he gummed up the guillotine, never letting kicker Ryan Longwell get a chance to send a team to the Super Bowl. And instead of underthrowing a ball on a sensible play, Favre gunned a throw across his body, committing a cardinal sin of quarterbacking.

But it is also different because it seems as if Favre will be paying his penance with the impotence of a final retirement. Favre is to a tranquil retirement what Houdini was to straitjackets, of course. But after watching his odyssey over the last two years, it’s hard to believe I didn’t watch the end of his last arc and last act today. That’s a sentiment that may be compounded by the pounding New Orleans’ defense put on Favre, throwing him to the turf at every opportunity, but 320 games of NFL football without missing a start would suggest the pain might not matter.

If this was the last game Brett Favre will play, though, he goes out as he came in. That howitzer arm powered a team to dizzying heights and imploded at the least opportune moment. That legendary fortitude passed one last visceral challenge. And the joie de vivre was evident in the effort up until the moment the other side could yell “Laissez les bons temps rouler!”

And if it wasn’t? Well, wouldn’t that be quintessential Brett Favre, getting up no matter what knocks him down?

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