We are all truly blessed folks, having lived as Packers Fans during the Brett Favre era. Whether you find yourself reading this up here in North-Eastern Wisconsin or amidst the Yukon Wildernesses of Alaska or some other far away place where the Green and Gold are loved, Monday night’s performance by Brett and the continually-surprising Packers marked a great moment for us all. Watching Greg Jennings glide into the end-zone on the first play of over-time, I swear I could feel the ground and the roof-beams pulsating all around. Tweety birds and starry stars circled my noodle-box. And I thought, in my elated state of late-night fever: “Is this not real?”
Of course, dear readers, it was. But I am still rubbing my eye-balls like a child in disbelief.
Experiencing something like that is bound to trigger similar memories. As I stretched out in bed, unable to sleep but for the amazement, but for the blood running up, I thought back to other great Packers moments, to other great Brett Favre Monday Night Miraculous-nesses. Witness, dear readers: The Game for Irv. Witness, my friends: The bouncing ball landing fortuitously in the hands of Antonio Freeman as he rolled around Lambeau’s gracious grasses. Yes. We are all very lucky to have lived in these moments. These are the moments so rare and moving that make being a Packers Fan so rewarding.
It wasn’t just the laser-bombs, though. The game as a whole was an instant classic, from the time Mark Tauscher hilariously introduced Favre as ‘Vinny Testaverde’s Father,” to the bend-but-don’t break defense, to the re-emergence of the running game behind connective line-play and a Thunder-Back named Grant.
The Broncos played well enough to tie the game up with the clock expiring, though, and in the end it came down to a flip of the coin and a perfect completion. After the game, a grinning Greg Jennings spoke with the side-line reporter about that final play.
“This is a game of inches,” he began. “If you give a guy an inch he’ll take the whole thing sometimes. And that’s what happened (tonight).”
And that’s what’s been happening all season for this team, this team that keeps winning, that keeps finding an inch and a way.
The only way it could have been any better would’ve been to hear Max McGee call it on the radio-box like he did for so many years with Jim Irwin. Back when those fellows were calling the game it was tradition in Packerland – for myself and for many, I’m sure – to quiet the television and crank up the AM dial. There was something special about enjoying the game with Max each week. His enthusiasm and his honesty and his matter-of-fact-ness were something you could count on as much as his hands. I’m sure he was watching on Monday, though, thinking back to his most famous catch and enjoying the moment thoroughly, like all us fans.
Staying on the road in the AFC West, we’ve got us a real doozy of a match-up against Kansas City next week. They might not be the Chiefs of the First Super Bowl, but like the Broncos, they are tough to beat at home. Coach McCarthy will certainly have to cut down on the penalties and keep the team from turning the ball over if we want to win down in Arrowhead. And I think he will. Now in his second season, I think more people are starting to realize that he’s a keeper. Mark it, folks: GB 17, KC 10.
Until next week, then.
