GREEN BAY -- Cliff Christl, a longtime reporter and columnist who has written about the Packers for several years, had an excellent column in Friday's Green Bay Press-Gazette.
It takes an in-depth look at how the "messy divorce between Brett Favre and the Packers is just history recycling itself."
There are many among us that like to think the world began when we became old enough to remember things. Therefore, Favre's ugly breakup with the Packers often is treated as though it's the worst in the history of the Packers, if not the entire NFL or mankind in general. Christl reminds us with details that destroys that argument.
He chronicles the even-more-bitter breakups between the Packers and the two guys the franchise erected statues of outside Lambeau Field: Co-founder Curly Lambeau and coach Vince Lombardi.
Lombardi's breakup was so nasty that he refused to participate in the 1969 draft. He sent Phil Bengtson to pick the players, and it turned out to be one of the worst drafts in franchise history, as Christl notes. Lombardi was gone shortly after that, on to coach the Redskins.
It's a great history lesson and another reminder that there actually was a world before we all got here.
There will be a day when Favre walks back into Lambeau Field to cheers as his name is unveiled in the ring of honor. Heck, Ted Thompson might even be the guy who shakes his hands.
There will be a day when his stop in Minnesota will be but a footnote. Heck, there will be a day when a younger person says, "Brett Favre played for the VIKINGS?"
