We were thinking quite a while yesterday about a post on Cal Ripken's 2,632 game consecutive games streak in MLB vs. Brett Favre's 291 (and about to end?) streak in the NFL. Honestly, we really were. It seems, though, that ESPN -- and dastardly former colleague Kevin Seifert -- beat us to the punch with a pretty thorough breakdown of the discussion.

So instead of re-saying everything they said, we'll grab the key snippet from Seifert's argument -- during which he concludes that Ripken's streak is more impressive -- that was to serve as our central premise in the debate:

Unlike Favre, Ripken didn't have recovery time between games. Nor did he have a seven-month offseason to clear his head.

Ripken dealt with the ebb and flow of his job within the parameters of doing it every day. His time for reflection, study, conditioning and rehabilitation came on game day, not in the six days between football games. I'm not much of a seamhead, so I'll compare it to building a brick wall every day for eight months. You have to have some serious concentration skills to keep yourself engaged.

That's the game, set, match of the argument as far as we're concerned. Surely Favre is exposed to more of a beating during his 16 games than Ripken during his 162. And sheer volume is hard to measure since Cal got to play 10 times as many games every year -- and thus has a streak about 10 times as long in terms of games.

But there's something to be said for handling that daily grind and playing through everything every day, no matter what. That's not to take Favre's endurance or ability to play with pain lightly. But the six days between Sundays are important. Ripken never had those, and that's what makes his Iron Man streak more impressive to us.

Your thoughts, please, in the comments.