Brett Favre Vs. Joe Montana

So I know I have been one of the staunchest supporters of Aaron Rodgers, but I have not forgotten all the things to appreciate about Brett Favre. Therefore, I feel compelled to weigh in on his place in history.

Whenever there is a debate over great quarterbacks, there is a large segment of football fans who act like there is no contest. "Joe Montana won four Super Bowls...end of discussion," will often be their opening and closing statement.

Really? That's it, huh? Well, Bart Starr won five titles, but does anyone think he's better than Joe? Trent Dilfer won a Super Bowl, but does anyone think he's better than Dan Marino? If you said yes to either of those things, don't bother to comment on this article.

Championships are won or lost as a team, and they are less important to how good a quarterback is than his statistics that reflect how he performs. John Elway was seen as a choker until he finally had a team around him, at which point he became a repeat champion.

Not winning as many titles generally means you had less to work with. And that is also a factor in one's statistics. What can even the best quarterback do behind a bad offensive line or with pedestrian receivers? How many times have you heard an announcer say, "Give any NFL quarterback that kind of time and he'll pick you apart."

There is a strong and viable argument for any of the following quarterbacks to be considered better than Montana: John Elway, Brett Favre, Dan Marino, and maybe Otto Graham. In about two seasons, I would expect that the case would also be easily made for Peyton Manning and Tom Brady.

Being a Packers fan, I will take Brett's case up. Due to space limitations, let's start with just the two most common arguments for Montana and address them they pertain to Favre:

Winning: Joe Montana has the best winning percentage in modern history. Brett Favre has the most wins in history. During Montana's career, there was limited free agency and no salary cap, so his team could keep all the best players. For all but the first two full seasons for Favre, there was a cap. Few can argue that winning is not harder now, and that makes this a virtual toss-up.

Championships: As previously discussed, Joe has an edge of four-to-one in this category. But during his championship years, the teams whom the 'Niners had to contend with were either the Giants, Bears, Offensively Named Ones (that's that team in Washington), OR the Cowboys.

No other teams made it through the NFC Championship game, rarely was there more than one contender, and no AFC Champion ever won the Super Bowl. This means that to win a title, he had to win that one big game.

During Favre's career, the following NFC teams made the Super Bowl: the Cowboys, 49ers, Eagles, Bears, Rams, Giants, Buccaneers, Falcons, and Seahawks. In each case, more than one of those teams were in contention.

After getting through the NFC, Green Bay actually had to worry about the AFC champion, with Denver being one of two repeat champions (along with New England) in the free agency/salary cap era. In other words, Favre always had to win two big games to get a title, if not more.

Now, I will offer two reasons why I think Favre is every bit as valid in the conversation:

Durability: What makes Favre's achievement all the more significant is that he played every game during the stretch, which may exceed 300 before he is done—including the playoffs. If you can't count on your quarterback to be in, you'd better have a Steve Young to back you up, otherwise the losses the team accrues during your absence are a drawback of having you as the quarterback.

Supporting cast: For most of Montana's career, he had one of the two best lines in the NFL. He had two dynamic running backs behind him, and they were among the best receivers at their positions. He also had the best receiver in the history of football, and aside from Jerry Rice, still one of the deepest and most prolific receiving corps ever: Freddie Solomon, Dwight Clark, Brett Jones, and John Taylor.

And the offense that he ran was so cutting edge that it was almost indefensible. So much so that Favre was still running it years later, and it is the foundation of most offenses two decades after it was first implemented. But, by the time Favre got a hold of it, defenses had begun to successfully scheme ways to stop it.

Favre did have a few Pro Bowl receivers: Sterling Sharpe, Robert Brooks, Donald Driver, Antonio Freeman, and Mark Chmura. But, the sum of those combined players do not have as many Pro Bowls as Jerry Rice alone, and he had each for only a few years.

Freeman did nothing after leaving Favre for a pretty good quarterback in Philadelphia and actually improved when he came back and was over the hill. Sharpe was only around for Favre's first three seasons.

Moreover, the Packers had few seasons with a good running game under Favre, one for Dorsey Levens and four with Ahman Green. By the time they had Green, the receiving corps was sparse, yet Favre made a 1,000-yard receiver out of Bill Schroeder.

The Packers' line was their Achilles' heel in the first half of Favre's career, not one of the best in the game as it was throughout Montana's time in San Francisco. How long could Montana have lasted behind that line when he couldn't even last behind the one he had?

Both quarterbacks took over mediocre teams late in their careers and made them contenders, but Favre was older when he did it. Both of their successors did well with the same cast that they had, but Young got more of his offensive teammates to the Pro Bowl the year Montana sat out with injury than Joe had the previous season.

So how do they match up, statistically?

Favre is 5665-of-9179 (.617) for 64,500 yards (7.03 yards per attempt) with 462 TDs and 303 interceptions. Montana was 3409-of-5391 (.632) for 40,551 yards (7.52 yards per attempt) with 273 TDs and 139 interceptions.

Favre has 2256 more completions, 23,949 more yards, 189 more TDs, but 164 more interceptions. Those are pretty good stats for an entire career for a quarterback. Troy Aikman only threw 165 touchdowns, 24 short of Favre's edge over Montana; he also threw 141 picks, just 23 short of Favre's excess over Joe.

In fact, Bart Starr was 1808 of 3149 (.574) for 24,718 yards (7.85 per attempt), with only 152 TDs and 138 picks. The difference between Favre and Montana plus Starr is still 448-629 for 769 yards, 37 TDs, and 26 picks more for Favre. That's 4000 yards away from being about 20 good games better than two Hall of Famers combined!

And while Favre's TD-to-interception ratio is not as stellar as Montana's, it is still 1.52:1. That is higher than Aikman's, considered one of the most accurate passers of all-time, and about 90-percent of the other quarterbacks in the Hall of Fame.

And he did it with a lesser cast. If you ask me which quarterback I want, it depends.

On a great team, I will take Montana. Favre's gun-slinging mentality will cause an avoidable turnover or two, and only an extra touchdown or two; that's not a worthwhile trade-off.

But if the team is not that good, I will take Favre every time. His ability to improvise, pass from all positions and every angle (Montana cannot complete those ten yard backhand passes!), his ability to scramble to his left and still throw deep to his right with his best-ever arm strength is more than Montana can offer. And his durability means he will be in there no matter the pounding he takes.

Now I'll really mess you up: I would take John Elway over either of them. But that's a discussion for another day.