Brett Favre may not have been the best there ever was at quarterback — notwithstanding his slew of career records — but he sure was lots of fun.
Perhaps appropriately enough, his last pass was an ill-conceived fling that resulted in an interception in overtime and the Giants defeating the Packers 23-20 in the NFC Championship.
He owns the career interception mark, too.
That toss merely encapsulated the mind-set of a quarterback forever trying to make something out of nothing. He often did just that. He could provoke heartburn and elation all on the same play.
That possibly was the mood of coach Mike McCarthy late in the first half of the Packers-Seahawks playoff game.
Favre somehow avoided what appeared to be a certain sack, only to stumble free in the Lambeau Field snow and make an underhanded toss to Donald Lee before falling to the turf.
That no-no-no-yes sequence led to a first down and the Packers taking a 28-17 lead on the next play with 26 seconds left in the first half.
That was Favre. And that is what made him a joy to watch.
It is true he had a cannon for a right arm.
And his durability was equally remarkable.
Talk of Favre pondering retirement became something of a sideshow in recent offseasons.
Favre would return to his home in Mississippi, commune with his family, NFL observers would assess where he was in his career and then the announcement relieving the Cheeseheads of their concerns would be made.
The retirement talk was mostly muted this offseason because few could imagine Favre departing after he had shown he had so much left and the Packers had exceeded everyone’s expectations by compiling a 14-4 record.
And yet the 38-year-old Favre is doing just that after 17 seasons in the NFL, nine Pro Bowl selections, three MVP awards and one Super Bowl championship.
He was what Tom Brady and Peyton Manning never can be — an outrageous risk-taker in the risk-adverse NFL.
He leaves the game to them: Brady the clinician and Manning the egghead.
Favre fit neither style. He had that human dimension about him, all the more so because of the personal travails that cursed him in recent years.
The dead father. The dead brother-in-law. His wife’s battle with breast cancer.
Even Hurricane Katrina paid a damaging visit to his home in Hattiesburg.
And there was the ultimatum from his wife that either he quit drinking or she and their two children would be out of his life. So the good old boy quit the juice.
And there was his addiction to Vicodin, a painkiller that he popped like breath mints to play through his assorted injuries. He beat that addiction only after checking into a rehab center in Kansas.
Favre readily acknowledged his foibles, which ingratiated him with much of the NFL Nation.
Even as he matured and shed the excesses of his youth, he never lost that little-boy-playing-on-the-sandlot appeal.
His enthusiasm never seemed contrived or forced.
It was as if he recognized just how fortunate he was to be playing a game for a living.
Or at least fans could project that notion on him.
No, Favre is not the best there ever was or even the best of the last generation, if you consider the accomplishments of Joe Montana and John Elway.
But he was one of a kind, the ultimate improviser who would abandon the playbook and the game’s axioms to make that next improbable play.
He routinely broke so many of the rules. He threw off his back foot. He threw into double coverage. And it sometimes seemed he would rather go deep and come up empty than complete the high-percentage dump-off pass.
That was the high-stakes poker player in him.
Now the Cheeseheads have a new Favre-induced question to entertain this offseason: Will he stay retired?
They can hope this is not the end.
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