Favre’s Injury Could Indeed Be Serious

We’ve struggled with the question of whether we believe the stated excuse for the dramatic drop in Brett Favre’s play late in the 2008 season, when his passer rating went from three straight games in three digits (117.7, 119.4, 103.6) to five straight games well below the mythical Kordoza line: 60.9, 60.8, 61.4, 48.7, 45.1. Favre claimed on the heels of a Week Seventeen loss that he had been struggling with an arm injury. We looked back at the injury reports for the last five weeks and saw his name mentioned not once by former Jets coach Eric Mangini -- not even as having a “leg” injury. So what gives? Was Brett really hurt, or was he simply trying to suggest that his sudden string of sucking arose from fictitious physical limitations? In this regard, Dolphins radio announcer Joe Rose mentioned during out Friday morning spot with him on WQAM that Favre looked fine in the Week Seventeen pregame warmups, throwing the ball with the same zip he has shown throughout his career. But now there’s evidence to support the notion that Favre secretly was injured. And that it might be serious. According to Greg Bedard of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, one source described the situation like this: “If you put your finger in [Favre’s] shoulder it goes right through. That’s not a good sign. There’s a reason why he hasn’t picked up a football yet.” [Editor’s note: If the user who goes by the handle “mikehigs” hadn’t already won a copy of QBF, he’d get one for this comment: “And if you put your finger in Brett Favre’s ear, it goes right through.”] Two sources tell Bedard that the fear is one of the following three injuries will be found: (1) additional damage to the rotator cuff; (2) a biceps tendon that has come out of its groove, possibly due to a rupture in the sheath that surrounds it; or (3) cartilage damage to Favre’s shoulder. So when Favre said in February that he “finally can’t throw the ball like [he] once threw it,” he might have been telling the truth. With the Brett Favre we’ve all seen over the past 12 months, the concept of truth is a lot more vague than it should be.