cat named pig

(Laura’s note: Matt really needed an outlet, and since I’m on a writing deadline, he agreed to post to the neglected front page. Enjoy.)

Sorry for the length, but I need to process.

Brett Favre. The name that has been the rival for the Minnesota Vikings team and fans for 17+ years. Sure he played for the Green Bay Packers, but it was really Brett Favre that we, the Vikings fans, despised, loathed, and hated on the field. I’m sure he’s a fine person off the field and in the locker room, but in the green and gold, he was the enemy, the quarterback we needed Chris Doleman, John Randle, or the Williams Wall to absolutely destroy two Sundays each season. He is also the QB I wanted to lead the Vikings into the 2009 NFL season, but as he has done so many times before, he has left Vikings fans wondering what could have been.

Wanting Favre on the Vikings was a complete turnaround for me from last summer, before he went to the Jets. Then, it was too soon after he was a Packer. The team had Adrian Peterson, Antoine Winfield, Jared Allen, and a good-to-great line on both sides of the ball, so I was willing to roll without him and see what happened. This summer, I wanted Favre to see if he had anything left after arm surgery for one more season. The team needed him, instead of rolling with T-Jack or Rosenfels, in what could be one of the last seasons with this team nucleus that should be ready to explode for 11-13 wins.

And just like that, as of about 3pm on July 28th, three days before training camp opens, the Vikings are basically the same team they were last year. Now Favre is gone forever, Harvin is a joint away from being suspended, and the Williams Wall (Kevin and Pat), are at the mercy of a judge, or they are gone for the first four games. As Rick Pitino famously said when he was the coach of the Boston Celtics, “All the negativity that’s in this town sucks!” VIVA EL SENOR ROSENFELS!

The news was only a few hours old, and I was trying to put this whole mess in perspective when I put on Pink Floyd’s Pulse as I played with the kids Tuesday night before putting them to bed. Pulse is their two-disc live concert album from 1995, where the entire second disc is almost an exact replay of Dark Side of the Moon, plus three encore songs. As the disc played, and I sang far too many words while the kids spun around in the yard, I was thinking of the song titles and some of the lyrics and realized that, for me, they might be able to explain the whole Brett Favre flirtation. I know that you can start The Wizard of Oz and Dark Side of the Moon at about the same time and the music turns into a sort of soundtrack for the movie. I’ve never done this, but I’ll take others’ word for it. Indulge me a little as I try to explain this, being as brief as I can as I go from song to song.

1. “Speak to Me”: short song with few lyrics, but very powerful. “I’ve been mad for !@#$%^& years, absolutely years…been over the edge…” Favre tortured the Vikings for 16 years as a Packer and for two more the last couple summers. Fans can’t take him any more, and he may end up being the most hated sports figure in Minnesota history.
2. “Breathe”: Knowing Favre’s inability to make up his mind, the team and Vikings fans needed to breathe, deeply, after the Jets released him in the spring.
3. “On the Run”: As the summer wore on, the media was after Favre, hoping they could run him down and get an answer. The song is mostly instrumental, but has these lyrics, “Live for today, gone tomorrow, that’s me, HaHaHaaaaaa!” What a slap in the face to fans. Maybe this one should have been the last song in the saga.
4. “Time”: I’ll let the first stanza speak for itself. “Ticking away the moments that make up a dull day. You fritter and waste the hours in an offhand way. Kicking around on a piece of ground in your home town. Waiting for someone or something to show you the way.”
5. “The Great Gig in the Sky”: I think this song title equates to the main reason why Favre took so long to decide, and ultimately, walked away. He’s 38 years old, and if it wasn’t for the streak of consecutive games started, he may have walked away sooner. From what I read, he loves being at home in Mississippi. He’s ready to walk away from one great gig to another. But not playing may kill him.
6. “Money”: Possibly one of the reasons to come back and play another year. Who wouldn’t have a hard time leaving $10 million plus on the table. He has enough money, but the cash and chance at a Super Bowl ring had to be enticing. He wouldn’t have had the surgery if he wasn’t seriously thinking about the comeback.
7. “Us and Them”: This could go so many ways. Vikings fans versus Packer fans. Vikings fans wanting him to play and those who didn’t. Appropriate that a line of lyrics is, “Black and Blue, And who knows which is which and who is who.” This is how most fans felt as training camp neared. We just wanted it to end, so the bruising could heal.
8. “Any Colour You Like”: All instrumental. We waited…and waited…and waited for something to happen.
9. “Brain Damage”: Starts out, “The lunatic is on the grass…remembering games and daisy chains and laughs…” We all saw the footage when Favre could start throwing again after surgery, and he was on the field with the high school guys in MS. I really wanted him to remember the the games and the laughs in the locker room and on the field.
10. “Eclipse”: Something got in the way, so he retired. Song ends like this, “…and everything under the sun is in tune, but the sun is eclipsed by the moon.” This Vikings team is on the verge and in tune to do something special. Is Favre deciding not to play their eclipse?

I could end it there, but the three encore songs on Pulse might be similar to the stages of grief.
11. “Wish You Were Here”: I admit that I did. Who knows, training camp might leave us still feeling this way.
12. “Comfortably Numb”: How we’ll probably feel going into the pre-season games with TJack and Rosenfels at QB. The Vikings team is good, but we don’t know how to feel about these two guys leading it.
13. “Run Like Hell”: Sad to say, but what Favre better do if he encounters anyone wearing a purple jersey, if the Vikings don’t win their division and at least one playoff game this year.

Favre said that he didn’t think his body could handle the physicality of another season. I wonder if he had had the arm surgery earlier, if he would feel differently. Now, we’ll never know.

Note: to make sure I had lyrics correct, I visited this site.