Thread: Favre has no friends

Favre's flying solo: It's been a lonely camp for aging warrior

By Rob Demovsky
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Last season, Craig Nall was there for hunting and Ryan Longwell for golfing.


Before them, guys like Doug Pederson and Billy Joe Tolliver were his sporting buddies. And before them, when his off-the-field activities were drinking and partying, Mark Chmura and Frank Winters were always up for a good time.


Brett Favre, the 36-year-old quarterback, has outlasted them all.


As he prepares for his 16th NFL season (15th with the Green Bay Packers), Favre has come to the realization that he is without a close friend in the locker room. Gone are all of his buddies from the glory days, a fact reinforced this week when he sat alone at his locker for 10 minutes and not a single player came by to chat. The only person who bothered to stop by was a member of the equipment staff.


A few minutes later, Favre was asked a simple, yet sad, question: Does he have any friends left on this team?


"Not really," Favre said. "No one I go play golf with or anything like that."


It didn't used to be that way. Last year, Favre and Nall went hunting whenever they had a day off. If it was golf Favre wanted, Longwell was game.


During the summer of 2001, when Tolliver was in camp with the Packers, he and Favre escaped to the golf course at every opportunity.


"As I've gotten older," Favre said, "I've become more a loner. I think I've played golf twice since January. When (Tolliver) was here, we'd play every day ? every single day. The new (training camp) schedule has a little something to do with that, but I wouldn't mind going out there and hitting some balls or something."


Such is life when you're the second-oldest player on the roster. Only long snapper Rob Davis, 37, is older than Favre. Of the 88 players on the Packers' roster, 68 of them are at least 10 years younger than Favre.


"It's different for me around here now," Favre said. "At one time, there was Frankie and Doug and Billy Joe and Ryan. We used to have good times. You look around and all of a sudden, it's like they're gone. These guys here still do the same things I used to do. I just don't know much about them. Me and Corey Williams went hunting a couple of times last year, but that's about it.


"As you get older, some of the things you enjoy doing maybe you still do, but you do them on your own terms."


Favre's lack of a close friend on the team entered his mind when he was deciding whether to return or retire. During his period of indecision, he watched Nall sign with the Buffalo Bills and Longwell with the Minnesota Vikings.


"From an outsider's perspective or a fan's perspective or the organization's perspective, they'd probably say, 'What's that got to do with anything?'" Favre said. "But I can't expect them to see that from my perspective."


If Favre has anything resembling friends on this team, he can count them on one hand. Receiver Donald Driver often attends Favre's charity golf outing in Mississippi. Favre occasionally chats in the locker room with fullback William Henderson or Davis. During a minicamp this offseason, Favre and Davis could be heard chatting near Favre's locker about digging ditches in the yard.


"Landscaping is kind of my hobby now, and those are the kinds of things us old folks talk about I guess," Davis said. "But I don't go out of my way (to talk to Favre) just because his friends left. I've had friends leave, too. Our talks aren't choreographed. We've got a great working relationship. We've never gone out and broken bread or shared a beer or anything like that, but I think we've got mutual respect for each other."


Players typically spend more time with their position group than with anyone else on the team, and the other three quarterbacks on the Packers' roster are 22 (Aaron Rodgers), 23 (Ingle Martin) and 24 (Brian Wrobel).


"His daughter (Brittany) is almost 18, so I'm closer to her age than to his age," Rodgers said. "But we still can have a good time and joke around."


But for Rodgers, like almost everyone else on the team, it ends when they leave Lambeau Field.


"I don't have his phone number," Rodgers said. "Ours is strictly a working relationship and a very good one."


Martin, a rookie who only met Favre for the first time about four months ago, asked Favre to go fishing on Sunday, the Packers' most recent day off.


"I knew he probably wouldn't go," Martin said, "but I just asked him because he's been around and I wondered if he knew of any good spots. I guess he's not a big fisherman."


So what will Favre do on his days off this season?


"We always used to do something," Favre said. "I guess now I'll just do it by myself."


His wife, Deanna, and their daughter, Breleigh, 7, are scheduled to arrive in Green Bay later this month. Brittany once again will remain in Mississippi for school, where she is a senior in high school, while Breleigh will start second grade at Holy Family school.


"They'll be here most of the season but like three or four times (Deanna) will go home," Favre said. "We bought a little house not even a mile from (Lambeau Field). It's small, kind of like where we used to live in Park Place. It's just one story, right in the middle of a regular neighborhood, but I don't go out much."

:lol:, nice title. Fitting.

A few minutes later, Favre was asked a simple, yet sad, question: Does he have any friends left on this team?


"Not really," Favre said. "No one I go play golf with or anything like that."

Good. When he finally hangs em up from throwing interceptions and everyone he's close with dies (which at this rate will be soon) maybe he'll kill himself

Wow, thats kind of sad. What a way to end your career.

Losing fans, has no friends, and delaying his appearance into the HOF all at the same time. Good thing he didn't retire.

I think that we should give him a trophy at the end of the season no matter how bad he does:

http://www.cnn.com/2006/HEALTH/08/08/parenting.protecting.ap/index.html

:evil4:

wrote:

Favre's flying solo: It's been a lonely camp for aging warrior

Why is this word always used to describe this scumbag? I'm f'ing sick of it. How does running from tacklers and avoiding contact at all costs (including throwing absurd numbers of ints and allowing intercepter to waltz right by because he's afraid to go after him) make someone a warrior. There was only one warrior in the modern era of the NFL and that was Pat Tillman. Of guys being labled as warriors on the field, farvrrver should be ranked near the bottom, right behind the brothers Gramatica

He has no friends because alot of his teammates were probably in grade school when he was a rookie.

He has no friends because he has become the crabby old man in the neighborhood.

awwww...poor Brett...he jumped the shark in "There's something about Mary". Now he's staring in Grumpy Old Men III: Where's my Viagra