As I heard about Brett Favre's streak ending at 297 consecutive starts made, a myriad of images from my childhood came to my mind. I saw a young Brett Favre running around like a little boy with his helmet off during Super Bowl XXXI. I saw Favre tossing touchdowns with tears in his eyes as he played the Oakland Raiders on Monday Night Football the day after his father passed away. I saw a bearded and disheveled Favre throwing an overtime interception against the New York Giants, but none of these images were the image that stood out in my mind.
My brain was instead focused on an image from the future. An image of Brett Favre standing on the stage in Canton, Ohio six years from now. An ESPN camera shot looking over Favre's shoulder into a sea of green and gold, but the sea would not be pure, instead it would be dotted with purple and a weird shade of green that doesn't quite fit in. Then my brain started to question my imagination's image. Would that sea really be green and gold? How have things become so bad that I question if the sea would be green and gold?
After 16 incredible seasons with the Packers, Favre became a member of the New York Jets in 2008 and the breakup was not pretty. Depending on who you listen to you will either here the Packers moved on to the greener pastures of Aaron Rodgers or the team forced Brett to leave and did him wrong. No matter who you listen to you, there is no denying how ugly it has gotten. Upon hearing the news of Favre's streak being broken, I received a text from a friend and lifelong Packers fan reading: "I hate his f*%king guts. I guess it is safe for Goodell to suspend him now. A Fraud End to a Fraud Career. May he enter The Hall a Vikqueen." As I read the text, I started to comprehend just how much things had changed. A Packers fan was willingly rejecting arguably the team's greatest player and the player that brought the team its first Super Bowl trophy since Lombardi. The most disturbing thing is that this sentiment is not uncommon.
I'm not saying it is unusal for an athlete to be hated by fans because there is a long list of athletes fans love to hate. Barry Bonds. Kobe Bryant. Tom Brady. These guys have been hated by fans for years, but have always had the undying support of their fans. Any Lakers fan will tell you exactly why Kobe Bryant is better than Michael Jordan. Any Patriots fan will tell you why Tom Brady is undoubtedly the greatest quarterback of all-time and definitely better than Peyton Manning. But when it comes to Favre? I don't see any more than 25% of Packers fans defending him to the death.
It's very rare for a player once loved to become so hated by a singular fan base. The only company Favre has in this club is Lebron James and James has is whole career to make up for the mistakes he made this past year. That's what makes Favre so interesting. Six years from now many people will assume that Packers fans will have forgiven Favre because time heals all wounds, but I don't know if it is necessarily the same with sports.
Mention Bartman to any Cubs fan and be prepared to be thrown out into the blustery winter winds of Chicago. Mention Buckner to a Red Sox fan and get ready to be dangled off the top of the Green Monster by your heels. When you bleed the colors of your favorite teams, wounds take a long time to heal. If you are cut open by a player you love, you need a lot of band-aids to fix the wound. In the case of Packers fans, they not only were hit with a massive uppercut when Favre left, but they have been receiving a series of jabs ever since he has left.
As we flash-forward to that fateful day six years from now, there will undoubtedly be a sea of green and gold in Canton, but the question is whether or not the support will be full-fledged. Though the image is easy to imagine, my imagination struggles to match the image with a sound. In the back of my mind, I find myself asking, "Was that a BOO?"
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