I sincerely hope every one of you watched Monday Night Football this week. If not, you missed the pinnacle of the greatest event in sports, ESPN and probably sports journalism in its entirety: Brett Favre's first game against his former team, the Green Bay Packers — admittedly a particularly surreal sight that could've only been made weirder had it been played at Lambeau.
Still, the Worldwide Leader rose to near-insane levels of hyperbole, unabashedly calling the game the "biggest regular season game in years." Inevitably, the most gushing praise was reserved for the Ole Gunslinger himself. No fewer than three ESPN talking heads referred to him as "magical" on various editions of SportsCenter throughout the day.
The game played out exactly as the network hoped, with Number 4 (apparently) looking like the "vintage Favre of 1997." Granted, Favre did look pretty impressive, making a handful of throws that only three or four other current quarterbacks would've been capable of. However, anyone who wasn't blinded by the Metrodome glare off of Favre's halo could've seen that Green Bay's secondary played as weak a game as any unit in the NFL has this season. And their front seven didn't look much better. On one play, Favre had a full 8-Mississippi to find a receiver. Even JaMarcus Russell could've located an open wideout with that kind of time.
With any other quarterback, this shoddy coverage would've been made clear by midway through the first quarter, but with Favre it was barely noted at all. Apparently some of Brett's magic wore off on the announcers, with Mike Tirico declaring with a full quarter left to play that, "Number 4 has done it one more time," and Ron Jaworski going so far as to exclaim, "no 40-year old [quarterback] has ever won a playoff game; I think he'll get that one too." It's the first week in October!
Never before has a network lavished this level of love on a single player. What makes its warm and tingly feelings even weirder is the disconnect that exists between ESPN and its viewing public, the overwhelming majority of whom abjectly hate Favre. I don't know anyone besides my idiot brother who doesn't think that Brett Favre is an ass. Hell, I want to punch myself in the face just for writing a column about the self-centered turd.
On the other hand, ESPN's blatant over-promotion serves a distinct purpose. Love him or hate him, ESPN has pretty much forced the diehard sports fan to have a completely polarized opinion of the man. And polarized opinions mean a public that's compelled to watch a game that it otherwise would have little to no interest in.
To this end, every word every SportsCenter anchor and analyst uttered about him in the past week paid off. The game drew 21.84 million viewers, which was not only the largest audience in ESPN and Monday Night Football history, but also in the history of cable television. The Worldwide Leader got that way by knowing what it's doing, and the Favre saga is simply the latest example.
So expect more of Stuart Scott asking questions like (to Bernard Berrian), "What was the funniest thing Brett said on the sidelines?"
At least one man, Jon Gruden, understood how comical the situation was and responded by delving into over-the-top satire. Gruden openly declared that leading a second-quarter scoring drive, "cements [Favre] as a living legend." He then opined, over practice footage from 1994 — when Gruden was Favre's QB coach — of Favre hitting wide open receivers, that "I love being associated with this guy," and in a heartrending show of emotion said, "I miss him."
Wait. He was serious? Jesus.
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Ethan Frigon is a junior majoring in economics and international relations. He can be reached at Ethan.Frigon@tufts.edu.
