I can’t make this about Brett Favre today because that will play itself out.  What I want to write about today is Aaron Rodgers.  Imagine the pressure this guy has to feel with every snap.  He’s under the biggest microscope in the history of the NFL.  He is following arguably the greatest quarterback ever.  Imagine if someone had to really replace Michael Jordan and was groomed to replace Michael for years what that would feel like.  Rodgers was drafted to replace Favre and has waited patiently for years learning and learning but never really playing and certainly never being a team leader.  Once Brett retired the mantle fell to Rodgers and he’s done well with it.  He says all the right things and is just focusing on things he can control.  Rodgers rallied teammates all off season and is trying to be the new face of the franchise.  He knows the pressure is on him to succeed and he willingly takes that.  He deserves a lot of respect.

Rodgers has to get off to a great start and that includes the preseason.  If he struggles at all early on it will be as uphill a climb as any player has ever endured.  I think he’ll make it.  If not, the Packers drafted a great safety in Brian Brohm from Louisville who is chomping at the bit for a chance. 

Within the next 2 weeks the question of where Brett Favre will play next will be answered and the Aaron Rodgers era will have begun.  Here’s to hoping he has a great season and loses at least two games to my Bears.  I hope Favre beats him as the Bears quarterback but that’s just wishful thinking.

The key to every good football team is line play whether it be offensive or defensive lineman.  Every good QB will tell you how playing with a solid line makes everyone more confident and play better.  Running backs love running with good lines, just ask Emmitt Smith.  Emmitt Smith played behind one of the best lines in the history of pro football and has a ton of records to show for it.  Imagine if Walter Payton or Barry Sanders were able to play behind what Emmitt Smith did.  Anyway, I admit i’m not a Cowboy fan and I’m bitter that Payton lost his record to Smith but that’s life.  Emmitt was a great back but his line had a lot to do with it.

Chris Doyle, the Iowa Football strength coach, put together a 40 minute DVD called Developing a Dominating Lineman: 117 exercises for Success! and as much as I dislike Iowa football i have to back this product.  Lineman are forgotten a lot of times in the DVD series of things while people focus on speed positions.  The core of a team is the line and Doyle shares his insights into developing successful lineman.  What is important to remember is not to get caught up into how many lineman from Iowa have made the NFL because so much of that is talent based and who comes to the school.  With Doyle’s knowledge if he were to be strength coach at a large SEC school this would get much more press.  Doyle knows his stuff and it comes out quickly.  117 exercises in 40 minutes is very quickly done but he doesn’t want to waste time.  It is a great DVD for coaches and players alike and I recommend it.

I wrote that as a question because some things in life just seem funny.  Emmitt as a Cardinal seemed funny.  When Montana wore the Chiefs jersey that was funny.  Favre leaving Green Bay would be funny.  Jason Taylor as a Redskin doesn’t quite seem to fit.

As a die hard Cub fan I have to bear watching Jim Edmonds play for us this year.  It isn’t easy because the guy just isn’t a Cub.  He’s a Cardinal disguised as a Cub.  I keep waiting for him to have a chance to make a routine catch to end a game and have him drop it on purpose and then have some evil laugh afterward while pointing at all his teammates and cackling while they walk off the field dejected.  I can’t help it because the guy just isn’t a Cub.  Jason Taylor isn’t a Redskin.

I think this is a great trade for the Redskins even if they have the guy for only a year or two.  Taylor is a hall of fame player who has been one of the best pass rushers in football over the past decade and all they gave up were two picks.  Picks in football are gold and I get that but the chances of the Dolphins blowing the draft picks are very high and I don’t care if Parcells is picking or not.  Some teams just seem to screw things up and the Dolphins have been on a roll lately. 

Taylor has to be happy about the deal because Miami is going to stink again but is WAshington any better?  I still see them as a 4th place team in their division.  Dallas, Philly, Giants are all better on paper and have better quarterbacks and proven coaches.  Jim Zorn is coaching his first team and Jason Campbell still isn’t a proven NFL player.  Taylor helps an already good defense but I still see them finishing in 4th place.

Right now I’m just trying to get my head around what the Jason Taylor McFarlane toy will look like.  Maybe they’ll make a ‘Dancing with the Stars’ Taylor instead.

Every single day this summer I’ve turned on sportscenter and had to hear about Pac Man Jones this and that and it was ridiculous.  The guy is an average football player who made some bad choices and got more press than OJ did after he ‘allegedly’ killed his wife.  The daily ‘is pac man going to be reinstated’ or ‘is Pac Man going to Dallas’ got so old when i saw his giant head on his little body I had to turn the channel.

Brett Favre is getting to that level now.  I’m waiting for the ‘Favre walked outside to get his mail’ headline with a story about Brett reaching down to pick up a dropped letter and possibly straining a hammy.  Favre acknowledges it is ridiculous.  He knows he is one player on a team but it seems nobody else does.  All players have opinions but not all players are Brett Favre.  He is in a tough spot and all he wants to do is play football.  I don’t even think he cares where he plays at this point but you’d have to think he wants to stay in Green Bay. 

I look at sports very open minded and I know that on a professional level the best players will play.  If Favre is still better than Aaron Rodgers than he should be behind center for the Packers.  It’s that simple.  If he is better than Rodgers I honestly believe Favre will play and that’s the way it should be.  The reason Joe Montana went to the Chiefs was because Steve Young was better than him at the time and he was going to the bench.  All the best players that change teams aren’t forced out because they are old, they are forced out by their teams because the team has a better player to replace them.  That’s normal.  Brett Favre could still be the starting quarterback for half the teams in the NFL with one of them being the Packers.  If the Packers release Favre and he has a better season than Rodgers then it is going to be a major story in Green Bay and around the league.  They won’t release him and Brett will be the starter for the Packers in my opinion when the season starts. 

Recently i wrote that Favre should stay retired and recently i had a change of heart.  I’m getting older myself and even playing city league basketball hurts now.  I play back to back softball games and I can’t walk or move my arm for a day afterward.  I still want to play though and I’m going to play as long as I can.  I know that one day I won’t be able to anymore and I don’t want to take it for granted.  Brett Favre can still play and play at a high level and should as long as he can or even wants to.  I don’t even care if he ends his career holding a clipboard for the Detroit LIons because he’s earned the right to play the game as long as he wants to. 

It isn’t about a ‘legacy’, it’s about a love for the game.

Being an Illinois football fan I haven’t had many Fall camps to be excited about but I’m excited for this one, in fact I’m excited for this season to begin.  3 more weeks and campuses will be full of hope for another season and Heisman discussion will start again with teams dreams of National Titles won’t yet be dashed.  It’s a great time around the nation.

I couldn’t help but notice this week that Kellen Lewis, Indianas starting quarterback, was reinstated to the program after a 4 month suspension.  Coach Bill Lynch may be on to something here.  He has a great college quarterback who was second team all Big Ten last season causing some team problems or violating team rules.  He suspends him after the season ends and then reinstates him right before the season starts.  Genius.  Kellen Lewis really is Bill Lynch’s job security but Bill couldn’t let certain behaviors slide so he suspends him knowing full well he could reinstate him in time for the season to start.  Hopefully other teams catch on to this.  I’m serious.  Most teams wait until it is too late but Lynch took care of the issue in the offseason when it wouldn’t hurt him or his team and really help the player.  I promise we’ll see issues during the season that players/coaches could trace back to last year and it could’ve been fixed but wasn’t.  I hope Kellen Lewis has a great season this year but still loses to Illinois.

Michigan has decided to help pay Coach Dick Rod’s buyout at West Virginia.  I imagine that was a fun conversation.  I sat in an office last week and listened as an employee asked for a 10k cash advance because he didn’t like credit card debt.  I can’t imagine Dick Rod walking into the office asking for 2.5 million to be paid on his behalf to his old school.  Had to be a little uncomfortable or maybe it wasn’t.  I’m sure they had talked about it before but maybe he’s the type of guy that had a sense of entitlement with the money.  He had better be worth it and I personally think he will.  He was a very good hire for Michigan.

I’ve talked about all kinds of different products in the past and one of the products that I want to cover again is the 2 lb heavy football.  The average football weighs 15 oz with this ball coming in at 30 oz which is just short of 2 lbs.  It will do wonders for the quarterback or player interested in increasing arm strength and throwing power. 

When I was a young basketball player i used a heavy basketball to improve my basketball skills and this is no different in a number of ways.  The heavy basketball isn’t recommended for players who want to shoot the ball from long distances because if you practice from long distances with the heavy basketball it will wreck your shooting form.  The same is true with heavy football.  Don’t use it for throwing 40 yards because you will do things that your body isn’t used to doing to get the ball that distance.  You can get improved strength by using correct mechanics at reasonable distances.  Once you notice that you are compensating in other ways then you are throwing the ball too far.  If used correctly and consistently a regular football will feel like a feather in no time.

The Heavy Football comes with a recommendation that it isn’t to be used for catching practice but I disagree.  While it is a heavier ball and brings some risks with it you’ll be just fine playing catch with it at short distances. 

Well worth the money and like I always say about my heavy basketball, this is a great conversation piece and anyone who picks it up will want to throw it and see how it works.

Rich Rodriguez is finally agreeing to pay the money that he should have paid months ago.  Rodriguez or DickRod as I like to call him has decided that it is better to live up to what he signed than go through a bitter trial that he would end up losing anyway.  West Virginia wasn’t going to back down at all and was really not holding back on bringing up anything negative on the guy.  They weren’t afraid to possibly discredit the coach and hurt any recruiting efforts that he would be making. 

Here’s what I don’t get.  I don’t get why the guy didn’t step up and pay the buyout right away.  This is a guy that gripes about players not keeping commitments when a kid goes elsewhere as most college coaches do.  This is a guy who preaches ethics and honesty in peoples homes when trying to get a kid to his school.  He’s a guy who signs an agreement and gives his word that he won’t leave the program and if he does he’d pay some money to the university.  He’s a guy who tried every avenue to get that agreement overturned and now is trying to save face by finally agreeing to pay it. 

I’ll go on…he’s a guy who is going to now use this as a recruiting tool.  He’ll say he’s changed and that he learned his lesson and can be honest and do the right thing.  If I’m a parent I hope I would be able to see right through this.  I hope he has a buyout agreement with Michigan and a pro team comes calling for his services and he leaves and tries to do the same thing again because we know he will.  He hasn’t learned his lesson, he’s still the same guy and hopefully we all wouldn’t act the same way but do the right thing from the beginning.  That’s a guy I would want my son playing for.  How can anyone learn accountability from someone forced to learn it from a bad situation?

I love Brett Favre.  He’s an amazing football player.  As a serious Bear fan I grew to respect this guy more and more over the years and he’s very hard to dislike.  I find myself cheering for Favre like I cheer for pitchers on my fantasy team that are pitching against the Cubs in a series.  I mean that I want him to do well but for his team to lose.  Favre is a legend and it needs to stay that way.  Brett needs to officially retire and hang them up.

Espn devoted a section today of 32 situations for Brett Favre to step into if he left or stayed in Green Bay.  Someone ‘wasted’ hours putting that together and looking at roster situations for a guy that said he isn’t playing anymore.  If Favre plays it will be for the Packers or nobody else.  Remember how funny Emmitt Smith looked as a Cardinal?  Favre would look worse as a Chicago Bear.  Some things aren’t meant to be and this is one of them.

The Packers need to move on and all this speculation only hurts the team.  Aaron Rodgers is really trying to take over and lead this team and the team needs it to happen.  In all honesty, it had to be a bit of relief to not have the constant ‘is Brett staying or going’ talk all the time.  Then this happens and it is a bunch of all new distractions. 

Favre has come out and said that ‘these are only rumors’ but he could squash them at any time by simply saying that he is retired and turn in his paperwork to the league office.  He hasn’t done that yet because he is having understandable second thoughts.  Like I said, i love Brett Favre but he needs to move on for his team, his family and himself.