The NFL season is fast approaching, and, as usual, there are a lot of questions still to be answered. But there is one thing you can bank on—the most interesting division in the league to watch is going to be the AFC East.
One reason is our own New England Patriots, who are coming off one of the most heartbreaking defeats in the history of the game. No one's quite sure how the Pats will react to last February's improbable Super Bowl loss to the New York Giants, but there are some who expect that defeat to leave the team a bit of a "playoff hangover" that could very much impact their chances of getting back to the playoffs.
Of course, for the past few seasons, the post-season has been something of a foregone conclusion for New England, which has dominated the AFC East for most of this decade. But that is by no means a lock anymore. Buffalo is a much improved team, and the Miami Dolphins have taken a big step toward turning that franchise around by hiring Bill Parcells as its new director of football operations.
But perhaps the biggest change in the East this year is in New York, where the Jets have acquired their first marquee quarterback since Joe Namath took his white shoes and left town.
The whole drama surrounding how Brett Favre ended up in Gotham could be fodder for a column on its own. After deciding in the off season to retire from the Green Bay Packers, Favre decided he wanted to continue playing. The problem was, the Packers had moved on and no longer wanted to have an association with the future Hall of Famer. The rub, however, was that the Pack still owned the rights to Favre's services, under the terms of his pre-existing contract. That led to several weeks of jousting in the press by both sides, and rumors of a number of trade scenarios before Favre ended up going to New York for a draft pick.
Personally, I think the way he was treated by a team he brought a Super Bowl championship was disgraceful, but it all worked out in the end. Now Favre is coming into Tom Brady's backyard looking to take the team known as "Gang Green" from mediocrity to potential championship—although he's doing his best to taper those expectations.
"I hope I play at the level that I've always played at, but there are no guarantees," Favre said at his first press conference as a Jet. "To a certain degree, I don't know what I'm getting into."
Those words aren't likely to send a lot of Jet fans running for the Meadowlands box office, but I can see Favre working. Another QB might have come in declaring himself the missing piece to New York's championship puzzle, but that's not the smart move here, because the biggest problem the Jets have had in the past few years hasn't been a lack of talent or even the Patriots. New York's big problem is that they don't know how to win.
Any player who's ever been on a championship team will tell you that there are certain things that have to happen to bring home the big prize. You need talent, obviously, and you need to have some luck on your side. But most importantly you have to have a certain swagger, and a belief that no matter what happens, you are going to come out on top.
That is the intangible quality I believe Favre brings to the Jets, and it's one of the reasons why Patriots fans need to be, if not concerned, certainly interested in what's happening with that franchise, which may have just shifted the balance of power in a division that will no doubt be the talk of football when the first weekend in September rolls around.
