Hey Brett, No Pressure

It’s debatable whether Brett Favre is an abject failure if the Minnesota Vikings don’t win the Super Bowl this season. In total, the evidence would suggest otherwise – individually he’s had one of his best seasons and he’s already taken a Brad Childress-coached Vikings team further than it’s ever been.

Still, Favre supposedly went to Minnesota to do one thing – win a championship. Although we believe otherwise, it’s been stated that his main motivation for signing with the Vikings was not to get revenge on the Green Bay Packers.

For that reason, Sunday’s NFC Championship game against the New Orleans Saints is being drawn up as this — if Favre and the Vikings lose, Brett Favre is a failure.

Take these words from Vikings tight end Visanthe Shiancoe, for instance.

“When it comes to pressure, I have no idea who has the most pressure. All I know is that we’ve got to win this game. We’ve got to win this game,” Shiancoe said. “We have high expectations of this team. We feel like it’s Super Bowl or bust.”

Sure, Shiancoe is putting pressure on the entire Vikings team, but this is a Vikings team that is only going to go as far as one Brett Favre takes them.

The feeling is mounting in the media, too, where NFL.com’s Steve Wyche writes this.

The pressure will mount on Favre soon, because he’s good enough to make this Minnesota’s year. Any mishap against the Saints will make it seem like he’s not good enough. A loss and history will make Favre’s journey to Minnesota look like Johnny Unitas closing out his career with the Chargers, Joe Montana going out as a Kansas City Chief, or Joe Namath spending his final season with the Rams.

So, hey, Brett, no pressure.