The man who has started more consecutive games than any quarterback in league history believes that, last year, his 17-year streak should have ended.
During a Wednesday press conference, Favre said that the Jets should have benched him late in the season, due to a partially torn biceps tendon.
“I was receptive to [sitting] last year,” Favre said. “When we finally did an MRI and found out I had a torn biceps last year, I felt like, with about four or five games left, that even though I was making some pretty good throws and some decent plays, I felt like I was doing the team more harm because I was missing on some throws.”
As Rich Cimini of the New York Daily News points out (and as we’ve stressed in the past), this disclosure of a torn biceps tendon that never showed up on the injury report represents an admission that the team concealed the truth about Favre’s condition.
Then again, the league office likely would explain that, since Favre ultimately played in each game, there was no violation of the rules. Even if he was injured to the point where he believed that maybe he should have exited the lineup.
The other reality is that Favre, who’s already lining up excuses for poor play in 2009, may be exaggerating the situation in the hopes of covering up bad play.
Mangini separately was asked Wednesday about Favre’s struggles down the stretch last year, and Mangini declined to single the quarterback out.
“I don’t think any of us played as well as we could have,” Mangini said. “What I do think is, I could have done a better job coaching. I think the staff could have done a better job coaching. I never look at success or failure as an individual thing. It was cumulative thing. We won games together. We lost games together. There were things that we could improve during that stretch that would have really helped us.”
And while Mangini didn’t acknowledge that Favre was hurt as badly as he now claims, Mangini acknowledged that he was aware of Favre’s condition, whatever it might have been.
“I was aware of the different challenges that everybody on the team had,” Mangini said. “I get that update every day.”
Says Favre: “They knew I had a torn biceps, which we backed off in practice. I took cortisone shots a couple times to try to relieve the pain. I started pressing. I was real receptive to [sitting]. We felt like, after talking with each one of them, that it was best to just -- we’d come this far -- to just finish it out.”
Again, if pushed on this matter, it would be interesting to see whether Mangini agrees, especially since Favre hints that he was a limited participant in practice, something that definitely should have shown up on the injury report.
That said, the league is likely inclined to treat last year as ancienty history. But if the folks at 280 Park Avenue decide to explore the matter, they can get both guys interviewed in a single trip to Cleveland this weekend.