Brett Favre

Congrats to the Green Bay Packers for winning the Super Bowl. I was mildly surprised by this outcome because I came to believe that Ben Roethlisberger and the Steelers were one of those teams that win big games like the Super Bowl. Also, I remember my visit to Lambeau this year where I saw a completely mediocre Dolphins team beat the Packers. Anyway, this post isn't about Roethlisberger, the Packers or anything related to the game last night.

The content of this post is a player that always seems to be in the media's attention no matter what he does. He is one of the all-time greats, who helped lead a Midwestern team to the title. During that time he won multiple MVPs, set many all-time records and gained more than a few million devoted fans. However, some negatives associated with this athlete included his really large ego, his commercialization and his many retirements with multiple teams. Why would an all-time great ruin his legacy by waffling so much with retirement? Why would he tarnish our image of him by playing in another team's colors?

I'm writing about Brett Favre, but I'm also writing about Michael Jordan. Somehow, I think the criticism of Jordan has had less of an impact than the criticism of Favre. Right now when Favre's name comes up in conversation there is a better than average chance somebody will complain. They will complain about the pictures he allegedly took and sent to Jenn Sterger. They will complain about how he should have retired a long time ago and how his the soap opera every off-season about how he may or may not play is tiring.

Michael Jordan cheated on his wife and paid the woman $250,000 to keep it quiet. Don't believe me then check out what Michael Jordan acknowledged in this article on cnn.com. His wife and him divorced in 2006 and the last we saw of Jordan's love interest he was escorting a 3o year old Cuban model at his Hall of Fame induction. Did Brett Favre do worse in his relationships with the opposite sex?

Michael Jordan retired from basketball three separate times and each time he seemed to hurt his former team more. The first time he left the Bulls they went from winning the title to losing in the playoffs two straight years. The second time he left the Bulls they went from winning 75% of their games to losing almost 75% of their games. The last time he left a team was the Wizards and he gave them Kwame Brown as a consolation prize. For all of those who write about how Favre strung the Packers and Vikings along and left them in a terrible position, they might want to look at closer at Jordan.

Then their is the ego and commercialization. Whatever you say or write about Favre must also be written about Jordan. In fact the only difference I can find between them is that Jordan played himself in a movie (Space Jam). Oh wait Favre had There's Something About Mary. What about selling cheap goods sold at Wal-Mart? Jordan sees Favre's Wrangler jeans and raises him some Hanes underwear.

Michael Jordan is lucky he came along when he did, because some of the stuff he did (gambling debts, punching teammates) would probably look a little differently under the 24/7 news light. Right now he is viewed much more favorably than Favre and I just don't understand it. Whatever negative press Favre has received needs to be applied in retrospect to Jordan.