What big city? Favre should feel at home in New Jersey

New York Jets quarterback Brett Favre (4) visits with teammate Bubba Franks (88) during a training camp practice at Hofstra University in Hempstead, N.Y., on Sunday, Aug. 10, 2008. Franks, also a former Packers player, said he didn't have much trouble adjusting to the New York area and said Favre shouldn't, either. Evan Siegle/Press-Gazette

What big city? Favre should feel at home in New Jersey

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August 10, 2008

What big city? Favre should feel at home in New Jersey

By Rob Demovsky
rdemovsk@greenbaypressgazette.com
HEMPSTEAD, N.Y. – In 1991, when Ron Wolf was the assistant general manager for the New York Jets, he was ready to pull the trigger on a trade that he thought would bring Brett Favre to New York.
The Jets had the 34th pick in that draft and had all the parameters set for a trade with the Cardinals to move up just two spots to jump ahead of the Atlanta Falcons. But when the Cardinals were on the clock, they backed out of the trade and picked defensive end Mike Jones. That allowed the Falcons to take Favre at No. 33, leaving the Jets to take another quarterback, Browning Nagle.

Less than a year later, Favre fell out of Favor with the Falcons, Wolf came to Green Bay as the Packers’ GM and traded a first-round pick to pry Favre out of Atlanta.

That’s all well known, and the point isn’t to rehash what might have been for the Jets, who almost two decades years later finally acquired the 38-year old Favre in last week’s trade with the Packers.

Rather, it’s to wonder what might have been for Favre had he spent the majority of his career in the bright lights of the big city and to ponder how he will fit in here now that he’s a mega-star in the twilight of his career.

Back in 1997, Favre told the Newark (N.J.) Star-Ledger: “I don’t know if I would’ve been too good in New York. That’s too big a city for me.”

For better or worse, the small-town quarterback from Kiln, Miss., is about to find out whether that will prove correct. Since the trade was finalized Wednesday night, Favre’s image has been splashed across the covers of the New York tabloids and on the nightly news. Fans have flocked here in record numbers to watch his first few practices with the Jets.

His every move has been scrutinized so much so that Jets coach Eric Mangini only half-jokingly opened his news conference on Sunday by reporting that Favre’s breakfast earlier that morning included “two hard-boiled eggs, a little bit of orange juice. There was a garnish, I think, and some hashbrowns, and I can take you through minute by minute after that.”

The attention has wowed nearly every Jets player, even those used to the New York ways. Backup quarterback Kellen Clemens surveyed the throng of media at Favre’s first practice on Saturday and said: “This is a lot of people, even for New York.”

“I’m a South Mississippi boy, and it’s a little laid back there,” Favre said. “I know how tough it can be, and I know how great it can be in New York City. Am I ready to face it, handle it and deal with it? I think so. I think it’s a great opportunity.”

In some ways, even though Green Bay has long been the NFL’s smallest market, Favre’s new locale resembles his old one.

Favre got used to living in a fishbowl, where his every motive was noticed in the small city. As far as media coverage, the New York columnists might be more ruthless, the headlines more brash and the tabloids far more willing to exploit chinks in his personal life. But the scrutiny on football on the Packers’ beat is every bit as thorough – if not more so – than it is here in the Big Apple.

“Green Bay is a small market,” Favre said. “But is there a bigger team? I’ve been in front of a lot of media. I’ve been in big games. I’ve won big games. I’ve lost big games. I’ve had my share of criticism and glory. … It doesn’t matter what city it’s in. I’m here for one reason – not to do commercials, Broadway, all of those things. I’m here to help the Jets win. That’s why they got me.”

Favre’s wife, Deanna, has spent the last few days surveying the area for housing. In recent years in Green Bay, they lived in a modest house in Ashwaubenon, where Favre had a 5-minute commute to Lambeau Field, easy access to the airport, golf courses and plenty of land on which to hunt.

Here, they’re likely to settle in New Jersey, near the Jets’ new facility in Florham Park, which is scheduled to open next month. Most of the Jets’ players and staff also are moving from Long Island, where the Jets have been headquartered for the last 40 years.

“In New Jersey, he won’t really have to worry about the big-city thing,” said Jets tight end Chris Baker, a native New Yorker from Queens.

Former Packers tight end Bubba Franks, who signed with the Jets this offseason, also is small-town Southerner from Big Spring, Texas, but had little difficulty with the transition to New York.

“It didn’t take me long to adjust,” Franks said. “Brett’s still going to do what he loves to do, which is hunt and do stuff like that. With us moving to the new facility, he can do all that.”

Jets owner Woody Johnson owns acres of huntable land near Florham Park, and it was a selling point during the trade talks.

Other than Franks, though, Favre knows almost no one here. But he may have made a quick friend in Clemens, who is from a town of 3,500 in a remote part of southeastern Oregon.

“We started visiting a little bit about hunts and different stuff like that,” Clemens said. “I’ll pretty much hunt anything. I’ve gotten deer, elk, and coyote and got a cougar one time, which was pretty cool. I grew up on a ranch, and he told me about his land in Mississippi.”