Nightmare Favre Scenario Beginning to Unfold

The nightmare Favre scenario was always more than just Brett raising the hopes of Vikings fans and then failing miserably, it was that his prima donna attitude and overall selfishness would undermine locker room chemistry and scuttle what could’ve otherwise been a successful season.

Sadly, it looks like that nightmare scenario is beginning to unfold.

Reports of rifts, ruptures and even “schisms” in the locker room are coming in almost too fast to digest.  The most disheartening one, via ESPN’s Adam Schefter, says Favre has “little support” among Viking players, and uses terms that conjure images of the Catholic church being rent in twain by factionalism during the reign of Pope Leo IX.

Hopefully no heads will end up on pikes.  It’s bad enough that, as of right now, the team seemingly has as much faith in Brad Childress as the right has in the federal government.

Of course this is all ChillPill’s own fault.  He was the one who had to have Brett Favre at all costs.  He was the one who allowed Favre to string the team along for months before his bogus “decision” to not play.  He was the one who made it seem that T-Jack and Sage would be competing for the starting job, only to rip that chance from them and hand it to his buddy Brett on a silver platter, without Brett taking a single training camp snap.

And we’re shocked that there are guys in the locker room who don’t appreciate the way the situation was handled?  Actually, the whole thing was spelled out pretty clearly when Favre originally said he wasn’t coming.  Veterans like Jared Allen said they wanted Favre, but that he had to be in camp to build rapport and win respect, and if he wasn’t going to show up in Mankato, it would be better to just move on without him.

Chilly disagreed.  He thought Favre didn’t need camp.  He thought Favre could come in cold, start getting practice snaps, jump right into the preseason rotation and everything would be fine.

It became obvious pretty fast, however, that everything was not fine.  Tarvaris and Sage were obviously not happy with how things went down.  And then there was the peculiar behavior of Adrian Peterson, who refused to comment on Favre for several days.  Almost like he was mad.

Does that sound like a happy, harmonious situation to you?

Childress’s reaction to these schism reports has been typically chilly.  “Business is business and whether they like it or not that’s the way it is,” the coach said of apparent discontent among the employee base.  “As I told Tarvaris, ‘I don’t expect you to like it.’”

Chilly’s curt tone will come as no surprise to those who remember the way he denigrated Marcus Robinson‘s skills and abilities right after cutting him.  Or the way he dealt with Troy Williamson being late getting back from his grandmother’s funeral.  His people skills have always needed work.  But, his arrogant, sometimes standoffish attitude has never resulted in out-right mutiny.  That may be about to change.

And one has to wonder what Brett thinks of all this.  Is he aware of any hostility toward him, or is he so far up his own butt that to him everything smells fine?  It won’t matter a lick…if he goes out Monday night and plays like the Brett Favre of old.  If he stumbles and staggers?  Both he and Chilly might start feeling the heat.