Green Bay Packers quarterback Brett Favre, at age 38, announced on Tuesday that:

I know I can still play,” Favre told ESPN’s Chris Mortensen. “But it’s like I told my wife, I’m just tired mentally. I’m just tired.”

Some persons, myself included, are wondering how serious he is and crossing our fingers that he, well, might be hedging his bet in some fashion. From the San Jose Mercury News:

Instead, he has called it quits after a season in which he proved he is still among the elite quarterbacks. A season when his team was one overtime interception (as much a part of the Favre legacy as the thrills) away from the Super Bowl. He created a uniquely Favre memory in the playoffs, throwing a snowball as the clock wound down in the blizzard at Seattle. He didn’t look like a guy ready to retire.

Perhaps I’m being greedy or selfish; alright, I know I am, I concede. Because when Favre retires that’s simply another acknowledgement that I’m getting older and more things around me are disappearing, retiring, dying, going away, changing, evolving. Mortality. Finalism. And on some days I’d simply rather not cogitate much about all that.

Favre holds any number of Green Bay and NFL records. And once Vinnie Testaverde recently retired Favre became the oldest starting player in the NFL.

Favre also holds, after 17 seasons (in 2007), the record for passing TDs (442), passing yards (61,655) and wins by a starting QB (160) and interceptions (288). Including the playoffs, he played in 275 consecutive games.

A surefire first-ballot Hall of Famer, Favre put the Packers back among the NFL’s elite. He retires with 5,377 career completions in 8,758 attempts for 61,655 yards, 442 touchdowns and 288 interceptions, passing Dan Marino’s touchdown mark last season.

I don’t believe there was another player in the entire NFL who took more sheer joy in playing the game, who still played like a kid and showed his enthusiasm and exuberation like a kid when his team was hot during a game.

You could tell that, along with his remarkable talent, he just loved to play the game of football.

ESPN’s Wright Thompson has a great column about Favre’s retirement here, writing in part:

I’ll miss believing anything is possible. That’s why watching a football game he played in was fun. You just never knew what he might do, either brilliant or idiotic, and you got the sense he didn’t really know either. A lot of people, me included, will tell you pro football is boring. It’s predictable and balanced and risk-averse. But there was always one guy who played the pro game like he was still in Hattiesburg at Southern Mississippi. We will all miss that.

We certainly will. Myself included.

Take care Brett Favre, the True Gentleman of Football — and a man I’d hold for any youngster to emulate. There are so damned few in sports.

P.S.

Another great article here.