Week 2 college predictions, along with a Boise State bummer

You know what makes me furious? Virginia Tech. I like Frank Beamer; he’s a good coach, a good guy and fields a solid team year in and year out. But come on. James Madison? The worst part is, this gives football purists – those who refuse to accept the mid-majors’ potential legitimacy – enough ammo to keep firing away for at least another year, even though we’ve all seen letdowns like this before, and it’s hardly indicative of Virginia Tech’s real talent.

Really, though, I’m not furious. Just a little irritated at how this plays out. This is why a playoff system would be nice. Mid-majors wouldn’t have to rely on loophole scheduling for them to possibly contend for a national championship, while everybody else would have the ability to actually prove there’s still a talent gap between BCS and mid-major. Who am I kidding, though, that goes against profit flow. Never gonna happen. With that despairing thought, here are my predictions for the week:

Week 2 predictions:

Tennessee vs. #10 Florida – Sorry if you’re not a Tennessee fan reading this, but that’s the bias you get stuck with here. The Vols will always be my first and most extensive read on these predictions. Given that, I think it’s about the only victory Tennessee will get this week.

I was not pleased on so many different levels in the Oregon game last week. I knew we weren’t even close to as good as the Ducks, and I knew the score would probably reflect that. I didn’t know, however, that we would play like the better team for a half and then quit. This is not my perspective as a fan; this is the reaction of media and coaches alike.

If you need examples, just look at LaMichael James’ 72-yard TD run and the Ducks’ pick-six – No, I haven’t looked up who picked it off, because the thought of the play still nauseates me. Only Simms made a full-hearted effort to bring the interceptor down on the pick, and only three people made contact with James, even though he reversed direction in the freaking backfield, and none of those three even got close to a form tackle.

How does this tie in to the Florida game, one that’s an actual rivalry and bound to be more intense? Expect about the same. The Vols have made it clear they can play with anyone for a half. But give the other team a little momentum, and add in the fatigue factor – we all knew UT had no depth; it was just one of those things you kept praying we could avoid in the second half – and Florida looks to have the same reaction as in its first two games: Start off slow and look like a team in serious trouble, before blowing up in the second half for a few TDs.

Final score: 28-17 Florida

#1 Alabama vs. Duke – I won’t call the upset here, but I have to say, I’ve enjoyed keeping track of Duke this far into the season. Granted, their opponents were Wake Forest and Presbyterian, the Blue Devils have been explosive on offense. That being said, there’s no way they overcome an Alabama defense that looks just as good as, if not better than, last season’s D.

Final score: 31-6 Alabama

#2 Ohio State vs. Ohio – OK, fine, I’ll get off my “Ohio State sucks, so why do you keep putting them up there?” bandwagon for the time being. What they did to the ‘Canes, whom I believe are a very good team with a chance to win the ACC, was impressive. This is a top-5 team, and that’s the first time in probably three years I’ve conceded that, so don’t expect to hear it again. Don’t expect the Bobcats, who will struggle to get out of the middle level of the MAC, to put up much of a fight.

Final score: 38-7 Ohio State

#3 Boise State at Wyoming – The fact that this is a road game would matter if it weren’t in-conference for the Broncos. As much as I love me some Boise, I can’t argue the fact that there’s no challenge in the WAC. If you play college fantasy, and you have WAC players available in your league, line up the Broncos, because this is going to be fun.

Final score: 45-13 Boise State

#4 TCU vs. Baylor – It’s funny how TCU can start the season ranked in the top 10, put up a solid performance against a notable Pac-10 team (Oregon State), yet receive absolutely no attention for the fact that the Horned Frogs are ranked fourth right now. The defense won’t be as good as it has been in recent years, but it’s a still a solid, Gary Patterson-led defense that’s going to crush most offenses it faces this year, and it’s Big 12 tune-up this year is against a Baylor squad that’s still at least a couple years away from making any serious moves in the Big 12 – if the league is still around then.

Final score: 38-17 TCU

#5 Oregon vs. Portland State – So turns out, Oregon’s offense is legit. Ugh.

Final score: 63-3 Oregon

#6 Texas vs. Texas Tech – I think Tommy Tuberville has a shot at making Tech a perennial contender in this conference, but I don’t see drastic changes coming in one year, even if he inherited a team easily talented enough to reach a bowl game. I watched Garrett Gilbert just about pull off the upset in the national championship game last season, even though it was the first time he’d gotten anything more than garbage-time snaps. I like Texas for this whole season; I like it a lot.

Final score: 42-28 Texas

#7 Oklahoma vs. Air Force – This is where it gets fun, ladies and gents. Oklahoma proved last week that it’s either a very good team or that Florida is a very overrated team. I think it’s a combination of both, but you can’t argue 47 points against a solid FBS program. However, you can’t argue Air Force putting up 35 on BYU either. This is still a run-centric team, going up against the progenitors of the Wishbone offense, but I like Air Force’s chances. I don’t see an upset happening in Norman, but you can be sure this is going to be a great game.

Final score: 41-31 Oklahoma

#8 Nebraska at Washington – The Cornhuskers are an enigma for me. Western Kentucky shredded their defense two weeks ago for almost 300 yards – though having possibly the nation’s best rusher probably helps – then stifled a high-powered Idaho passing attack, which had a -9 point differential at half time. And then there’s the question of the team’s offense: Is Taylor Martinez really the answer? For the time being, I think yes, he is, and I think both sides of the ball will be enough to stop a team whose only real playmaker is Jake Locker.

Final score: 28-14 Nebraska

#9 Iowa at #24 Arizona – Every year Arizona starts off with hype, and every year it either just manages to meet that hype or slightly fails to reach it. Given that most of the Wildcats playmakers are returning, I really don’t see any difference in this, especially against a stifling Iowa defense. Don’t look for the Hawkeyes to run up 40 on a pretty good Wildcat defense, but Ricki Stanzi is a solid game winner, and Adam Robinson has looked impressive in his first two starts. If nothing else, the runners’ duel between Robinson and Arizona’s Nic Grigsby should be amazing to watch.

Final score: 23-17 Iowa

#11 Wisconsin vs. Arizona State – Remember all the hype surrounding Dennis Erickson’s Sun Devils a few years back? Yeah, that’s dead now. The Sun Devils are the only team, as far as I’m aware, to actually play two FCS-division opponents – only one of those games count towards the team’s bowl eligibility, so I’m lost on this one – and that’s about as much hype as they get this year. As far as my not-so-extensive knowledge of ASU goes, the team has no players or units of note. Look for this to be just another tune-up game for John Clay and the Badgers.

Final score: 35-14 Wisconsin

#12 Arkansas vs. Georgia – Can someone please explain what exactly Arkansas has done to merit a No. 12 ranking? Yes, the Razorbacks have Ryan Mallett, yes they have the best passing attack in the SEC, but this is a defensive-minded conference and the team did little last year and has played no teams of note so far this year. I believe the Hogs will be a good team; they might even be able to upset Alabama later in the year, but Georgia’s coming off a conference loss, it’s playing at home, and the defense looks fairly solid so far. Expect tears and dashed hopes in Fayetteville come Sunday night.

Final score: 28-24 Georgia

#13 South Carolina vs. Furman – If Marcus Lattimore still hasn’t grabbed your attention, this is just another chance for you to watch the best contact runner in college since Adrian Peterson. Steve Spurrier said he thought Lattimore broke around 40 tackles in the Georgia game, which is a lot. And I don’t doubt it either. I watched the Gamecocks’ victory-sealing drive against Georgia, and one two consecutive players, Lattimore should have been stopped for a loss but both times broke tackles to gain 10+ yards. Total, he broke about eight tackles on those two plays. Enjoy watching him run over Furman.

Final score: 56-14 South Carolina

#14 Utah vs. New Mexico – Remember Utah from two weeks ago? Beat Pitt in overtime and all that? Remember New Mexico from two weeks ago? Gave up 70 to Oregon and all that? Yeah, that’s about all you need here.

Final score: 49-10 Utah

#15 LSU vs. Mississippi State – If for nothing else, I love the SEC for games like this. The Bulldogs are a solid team who manage to play SEC foes very close, even if they usually do come out on the bottom. Unfortunately for them, LSU has a solid defense, even if it collapsed against UNC in the second half two weeks ago, and a solid run game. Mississippi State will stay in contention for most of the contest, but Dan Mullen’s first marquee victory won’t come at Tiger Stadium.

Final Score: 24-20 LSU

#16 Auburn vs. Clemson – I have my reservations about Auburn. The Tigers looked like one of the nation’s top offenses last year until defenses caught onto Gene Chizik’s game plan. I have even more reservations about Clemson, though, and for the first time in years, I think they’re ranked where they should be: out of the top 25. This should be a good test for Auburn’s defense before it hits the meat of the SEC, though.

Final score: 28-17 Auburn

#17 Miami – Bye. Smart move, especially given what happened to Virginia Tech.

#18 USC at Minnesota – I have three words for Minnesota fans: South Dakota. Sorry.

Final score: 42-14 USC

#19 Stanford vs. Wake Forest – I’d like to know why a solid Stanford team that absolutely pounded UCLA last week is ranked lower than a USC team that has looked icky at best in its two wins, but that’s not my place to say. UCLA may be a cellar-dweller in the Pac-10, but it’s still a solid program, and the goose egg on its side of the board last Saturday is scary. However, Wake lost a track meet with Duke last week, so it’ll be interesting to see which is the stronger force. I say Stanford’s defense.

Final score: 24-14 Stanford

#20 Michigan vs. UMass – Did you see Denard Robinson? I have no adjectives for this man! Yes, I’m aware it’s early in the season, and I’m sure teams will catch on, but 500 yards is a really big number to ignore, especially for the poor Minutemen.

Final score: 63-14 Michigan

#21 West Virginia vs. Maryland – Well this is interesting. You have the one team (WVU) that’s already struggled against a mid-major this season, while the other team (Maryland) perennially struggles with mid-majors. This is another game where I think home-field advantage is the difference-maker. Maryland is a much better team than its record last year indicates, while I believe West Virginia is a worse team than its record indicates. The amount of skill-position talent on that team should lead to BCS contention annually, yet the team looked sloppy against Marshall.

Final score: 27-20 West Virginia

#22 Penn State vs. Kent State – Like Miami, smart move with the lax scheduling right after a big game. The Nittany Lions need this one after being pounded unceremoniously by the Crimson Tide last week. Completely unrelated, but if Penn is short for Pennsylvania, how come Kent isn’t short for Kentucky (Kent State is in Ohio)?

Final score: 41-13 Penn State

#23 Houston at UCLA – I would love to say this is a sure bet for Houston, but I can’t bring myself to accept a Case Keenum-led letdown for a third year running. That being said, if the Bruins couldn’t stop Andrew Luck, they sure can’t stop Keenum.

Final score: 45-35 Houston

#25 Oregon State vs. Louisville – I’ve never been a fan of dropping a team completely out of the rankings for losing a thriller against a top-10 team, so I’m glad the Beavers are back in this week, because they deserve to be here. The Rogers brothers -– if you haven’t seen them by now, I judge you. Seriously, youtube them –- are some of the most dynamic players in football, and they will score on anyone, especially Louisville. I have faith Charlie Strong can get the Cardinal turned around, but this test will simply be too much for them.

Final score: 30-17 Oregon State

Overdue predicting time

Hi peeps, been a while. Sorry about that. I swear I planned to follow up that last post, but I got busy, then I got sick, then I just plain forgot. See, I like to think I’m awesome and don’t need to write things down to remember them – the truth being closer to I’m so forgetful when it comes to agendas that I forget to even write things down – and sometimes things just slip my mind. Or I completely and utterly forget. Whatever.

Anyway, I am back, for a little bit. I won’t make silly promises such as I’ll be updating regularly, until I actually am updating regularly, but for now, here’s what’s left of that last post.

Tennessee predictions:

Sept. 11 (1-0) – Oregon: Loss. I don’t know how many of you paid attention to last week’s college football scores, since there were maybe three legitimately interesting games on over the course of three days, but Oregon beat the ever-living daylights out of New Mexico. Granted, UT-Martin found itself in a similar situation against the Vols, losing 50-0, but there’s one key difference: New Mexico is an FBS team in a legitimate conference (MWC, though the Lobos are bottom feeders), while UT-Martin is an FCS team that finished with a losing record in 2009.

Also, Oregon did this with an unproven starting quarterback in Kenjon Barner and second-string running back Darron Thomas. Add starting back LaMichael James into the mix at Knoxville, and you get about what Vegas predicts: a 14-point line in favor of the Ducks, 3,000 miles from their home field.

Final score: 42-20

Sept. 18 (1-1) – Florida: Win. I’m going to get gutsy here. I am by no means convinced that the Vols even have a real shot at finally beating Urban Meyer, but after watching the Pouncey-Brantley exchange fail an astonishing 14 times out of 40 shotgun snaps, I really think the Gators have the ability to allow anyone to beat them. The Vols will be the first legitimate opponent the Gators face, and Meyer is confident, possibly arrogant, enough to believe he can get away with continuing to try to fix the team’s obvious shotgun problems instead of opting for the safer game plan of sticking John Brantley under center.

Sept. 25 (2-1) – UAB: Win. I would love an explanation as to why in the world the Vols have a nonconference foe on the fourth Saturday of September. It’s bad enough they scheduled an FCS opponent this year, but the middle of the schedule should be reserved for conference and tough nonconference opponents only. Either way, there’s no question about this. The Blazers return to Knoxville for the first time in two years and without one of the best weapons in their history: Joe Webb. This will probably wind up as no more than a great opportunity to work out any flaws coach Derek Dooley sees in his team before it hits the road for arguably the hardest stretch of games in the country this year.

Oct. 2 (3-1) – LSU: Loss. Any confidence the Vols may have gained during the month of September is going to be sucked away in the Bayou. LSU looked shaky against a much-depleted UNC team Sunday, but the Tigers are still one of the better teams in the SEC, they will be playing at home, and defensive coordinator John Chavis gets his first chance at exacting revenge for the way he and the rest of Fulmer’s staff were unceremoniously ousted in 2008. The Vols should put up points, but turnovers and an inability to hold off what seems to be a much-improved Jordan Jefferson-led offense will be too much.

Oct. 9 (3-2) – Georgia: Loss. The Vols have a knock for being a huge buzzkill to the Bulldogs during any promising season, but that won’t happen this year. I’ll be honest: I haven’t heard much about Georgia this year, but I know that, even without A.J. Green, the ‘Dawgs have a formidable offense, and their defense should be good enough to keep the Vols offense away from the end zones enough to ensure a victory.

That being said, don’t be surprised if Tennessee hits its stride here. The only real questions the Volunteer offense has are how Matt Simms can handle heavy pressure and how well the highly touted but highly inexperienced offensive line can gel in a couple months. Far more questions lie on the defensive side of the ball, but a strong offense will be the key to the Vols walking out of the Hedges with a win – but don’t count on it.

Oct. 23 (3-3) – Alabama: Loss. It’s nice that the Vols get a reprieve in the middle of their four-game road stint. Unfortunately, it’s to host the defending national champs. The Crimson Tide only return roughly half their starters from last year, but those starters, like Greg McIlroy, Mark Ingram and Julio Jones are invaluable. Don’t expect the Tide to walk into Neyland Stadium undefeated, but don’t expect them to walk out with an extra loss, either. The score will be closer than the last time Alabama visited Knoxville, and there should be significantly more passion, but that’s not enough to win a game against a simply better team.

Oct. 30 (3-4) – South Carolina: Win. The great thing about the Gamecocks under Steve Spurrier is that expectations are always high, and they always fail. South Carolina is notorious for not being able to finish down the stretch, and, like I said earlier, expect the Vols to have found their stride at this point. Tennessee’s largest flaw this year is its raw inexperience and lack of depth. Both of these can be overcome with experience and hard work. Couple that with the fact that Tennessee simply has more talent than USC, and the Vols should be able to stop their losing skid in Columbia, S.C.

Nov. 6 (4-4) – Memphis: Win. If what Mississippi State did to Memphis during the opening week is any indication, Memphis’ hopes of a successful season were a little bit overstretched. The Tigers have, as of right now, no legitimate threats on either side of the ball, as well as a fresh coaching staff with less experience than Dooley’s gang. It won’t be a cakewalk, but the Vols should be able to run their in-state mark to 2-0.

Nov. 13 (5-4) – Mississippi: Win. This is where I’m glad I didn’t sit down to write this until today. In the last week, I’ve changed opinions on Ole Miss more times than I can count. First Jeremiah Masoli was suspended for a year. Then he won his appeal. Then the Rebels just flat collapsed against Jacksonville State. Then I heard Jacksonville State’s quarterback being interviewed. OK, so that last one didn’t change my opinion; it was just funny. His voice would’ve been more at home in a Rebels uniform than in a … well, I don’t exactly know what JSU’s nickname is.

Anyway, this is not a team set up for success this year. Even without their fourth-quarter collapse, the Rebels looked shaky at best against a sub-par FCS team. Add to that fact that every Vol remembers the pounding Dexter McCluster and Co. laid on the team in Oxford last year, and the Rebels have a steep mountain to climb if they want to pull off a second straight win against UT. And with this, the Vols will find themselves unexpectedly bowl eligible with two weeks left to play.

Nov. 20 (6-4) – Vanderbilt: Win. Don’t know if any of you watched Vandy play Northwestern Saturday, but the Commodores made a decent-at-best Wildcats team look like an efficient machine. Vandy wasn’t exactly hammered, but the game was never close either. With Bob Johnson’s offseason resignation, the Commodores are as shaken up as the Vols, and they have absolutely no talent to make up for it. Enjoy this game, Vols fans, because this is where it gets interesting.

Nov. 27 (7-4) – Kentucky: Loss. Yup, you read that right. I laughed when Zac, our editor-in-chief marked the Wildcats as a loss in his preseason predictions for our paper. Then I watched the Wildcats throttle Louisville.

Let me be perfectly clear here: Randall Cobb is. a. freak. And he’s not even the best player on the team. That distinction goes to Derrick Locke. The scary thing about Kentucky is that the team can completely redefine the word ‘Wildcat.’ Both Locke and Cobb can line up under center – although Mike Hartline is no slouch as QB – and Locke can actually throw, giving them a stupid number of options on offense. Along with that, Joker Phillips, former offensive coordinator, seems perfectly capable of filling Rich Brooks’ shoes. Basically, it doesn’t really matter what the Vols do, because the Wildcats are going to score, and they’re going to score a LOT. If Tennessee is going to stand a chance, they’ll have to match the Locke/Cobb duo every touchdown of the way.

Alrighty, there’s my predictions for the year for the Vols. I’ll try to start doing weekly predictions for Top-25 teams as well, but we’ll see how consistent I am with that. Also, I hope none of you have made plans for Thursday night, because there’s this little thing called the NFL, and it’s starting its season that night. It’s only the single most important date of the fall.

Settling into a rhythm

I’m having a problem. For the last two days, I’ve had a twitch in my right eye. It’s not simply a tic; a tic would be OK. This a full-on, flat-out twitch. My eyelid keeps half-closing and fully opening so fast it’s like watching the world through a 1920s movie camera. Interesting, and it keeps me from getting upset about the twitch, but it’s getting old.

You know what else is getting old? Nothing, I have no segue. I just wanted to talk about my twitching eye, because I find it worth mentioning. I find a lot of things worth mentioning – most of them aren’t – and the advent of social media has made me able to mention these things without concern of whether people care. I simply assume they do.

Just like I assume there are people who care about this blog. After all, I have one follower, so he must care, right? And speaking of this blog – just kidding, here’s the segue – it’s time for me to actually get serious about it. Good timing, since football season officially begins in four days. Are you excited? ‘Course you are. You’re reading my blog and thinking about football. What’s not to be excited about?

UT’s first home game this year is against UT-Martin. This game makes me a little sad, because it means Tennessee will officially be one of the 120 FBS teams that have scheduled an FCS team in an attempt for an easy win – only one other team has yet to play an FBS team, as of last time I checked, and that's been a little bit. Technically, it’s the end of an era, albeit an era no one really cared about.

Not so technically, it’s the start of a brand new one: the Dooley era. I’m going to go ahead and assume your response to Dooley’s hiring was like mine: “Who?” And if you say it wasn’t, you either know way too much about Louisiana Tech, or you’re lying. But having been to a couple practices, interviewed him a couple times and paid attention to him since his hiring, I have to say, I really like this guy.

Lane Kiffin, even if he is a … well, he’s a horrible person, knew how to excite. He brought potential with him in truckloads, and it was obvious by the end of the ’09 season that the Vols could win under him. Dooley’s not like that. He’s quiet, he’s efficient, and he’s effective, but most of all, I think he’s still going to win.

Don’t judge him by his statistics. La. Tech was a ridiculously good team at home, even if it was in the WAC, and Dooley handled both the football team and the entire athletic department during his final two years there. I can’t imagine the amount of stress he would’ve had to put up with.

Compared to that, the UT job won’t be a cakewalk, but it will certainly be more manageable. This guy knows how to lead a college team and he knows what to say to the media and the fans. The only real question remaining is: Does he know how to win? And I think yes. It’ll take time – he’s working with scraps here – but I think he’s going to give the Vols two things they never truly had under Fulmer: turnover efficiency and discipline.

Unfortunately, I also think this is going to take years. So, when you read my season predictions, please keep this in mind. I’m not saying two different things. I’m saying UT will be good again, just not right now. That being said, I’m predicting no more than a 6-6 record for the Vols, and that’s if the entire team stays healthy.

Sorry for the (relatively) short blog. I had a rare, and very welcome, break between my usual 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. run today and thought I’d get this thing written. I didn’t, then I got lazy and didn't start writing against until nearly 2 a.m. I swear I will write predictions tomorrow, and give you a concrete estimate of what the Vols’ record will be, and continue to keep pretending people out there care. (You should. I’m usually pretty good at these.)

For now, though, enjoy my column defending the shift in UT’s schedule for 2011: http://dailybeacon.utk.edu/showarticle.php?articleid=57112

With his announcement, Favre shocks ... no one!

Starting this blog – and not updating it, as you can probably tell – has shown me something: I suck at blogging. It’s not for lack of trying; I’ve actually sat down to write something at least five or six times since I first posted. It’s that I really can’t keep a serious train of thought for more than a few hundred words.

But I’m going to try here, so let’s talk about something comforting like … Brett Favre!

OK, that’s not comforting in the slightest, but it is something I think I can go on for ages about.

If you haven’t heard, Mr. Favre (I feel I owe him this title, because anyone who’s old enough to retire three times surely commands a great amount of respect.) has decided to return to the NFL. Again. For the third time.

He said he’s “doing it for the guys.” He’s doing them a favor. Not because he gets $16.5 million and continues a record starting streak that could eclipse 300 this year. It’s really not about him, or so he says.

I think we can all say back to Favre, in unison, that that’s just bull. I truly believe Favre meant it the first time he retired. I also think he realized what kind of gold mine he had stumbled upon when he stirred up rumors that he wanted to return and realized that people would pay him millions both to go away and to play for an opposing team.

Now? Well, now he’s just milking it until he’s too banged up and sore to milk anymore. And right now, his particular Heifer of choice is Brad Childress. If it’s not bad enough that Favre is taking advantage of the fans, the media and his teammates, he’s taking advantage of one of his best friends.

I don’t pretend to like Childress, and I honestly think he’s the reason that Adrian Peterson hasn’t yet eclipsed 2,000 yards, but I will admit he is a truly stand-up guy. And Favre is taking him for a ride. Childress isn’t going to put his foot down on the situation because Favre is a close friend, he will win you games that Sage Rosenfels and Tavaris Jackson cannot and because he’s not going to do that to a guy he knows.

Favre knows this, just as surely as he knew he could use the Jets’ turmoil last year to come out, if not squeaky clean, at least avoiding looking like a BP oil spill and still being able to sign with another team.

For those of you that don’t remember, it was leaked – more likely quietly whispered by Favre himself – that No. 4 played with an injured throwing arm for most of the second half of the Jets’ 2008 season. Looking at the performance of the team, it’s really not surprising at all. Favre has since stated, though, that he would have been more than willing to go injured reserve, but Eric Mangini refused to place him on IR.

Favre said this, of course, after Mangini had been fired, after the Jets were embroiled in numerous other issues and after his shoulder had completely healed. Favre, go on IR and risk snapping his consecutive starts streak? I was, and still am, extremely disappointed with the number of media outlets who bought this. That’s baloney. Favre knows it, I know it and you should too.

Now, he’s coming out with the whole I-was-really-going-to-retire-but-I-owe-these-guys-a-favor story. Again, I have to call bull. The man had the best statistical season of his career last year. His team was a shoo-in for the Super Bowl until his costly game-losing error. He was offered $16.5 million, with the acceptance that he was going to miss all of the spring and summer and probably much of the preseason. Of course he was coming back; now he just has a story to spin so he doesn’t seem quite so dastardly (Sorry, I’ve always really wanted to use that word in a sentence.).

I used to love Favre. The first NFL game I can remember watching in its entirety was Green Bay against Carolina in the 1997 NFC Championship Game. His I’m-going-to-fit-it-through-that-hole-and-logic-be-d***ed mentality helped me fall in love with the game.

But what’s left of the formerly glorious green-and-yellow No. 4 is a bloated and now-purple-and-yellow No. 4 that’s either too prideful or too selfish to realize what he’s doing to everyone else around him. Either way, it’s childish and it doesn’t befit a man that holds a legitimate claim as the greatest quarterback of all time.

I, along with millions of other NFL fans, grew up with Brett Favre. It’s just a shame that, during that time, he didn’t grow up with us.