Brett Favre has been playing football long enough to know the potential impact of an opponent who gets a little too loose in the lips.
And so he’s now trying to throw water on the import of a potentially inflammatory comment he made a day ago.
“Honestly, I see us sitting here next week having this press conference again,” Favre said during a Wednesday press conference. “If that doesn’t happen, to me, it will be a shock.”
Widely interpreted as a guarantee of sorts, Favre now insists that he was guaranteeing nothing.
“Well, first of all, I’m not guaranteeing anything and the last thing I ever want to do is be bulletin board material,” Favre said Thursday, according to Rick Alonzo of the St. Paul Pioneer Press. “Of course, I gave the Cowboys a ton of respect, as they deserve. They are playing outstanding. That’s not B.S. They are playing, and I’m speaking NFC, as well if not the best, maybe in the league. San Diego, obviously, would argue that. But I was not guaranteeing.”
It might be too little and too late to prevent the Cowboys from being charged up to disrupt Favre’s plan to talk to reporters in advance of the NFC title game. Dallas safety Gerald Sensabaugh already has responded, and the Cowboys already have proven the power of external motivation, given the way they’ve played since Tony Dungy of Football Night In America said they had “no chance” to beat the Saints.
Cowboys play-by-play announcer Brad Sham told Tim Brando of Sporting News Radio earlier this week that Dungy’s comments had a real impact on the Cowboys, who knocked off the Saints and haven’t lost a game since.
Whether Favre’s comments have a similar impact remains to be seen.