If Brett Favre wants to play another year with the New York Jets, he'll have to work a lot harder to win over his teammates than he did this past season.
"There was a lot of resentment in the room about him," one Jets player told Newsday this week. The player requested anonymity because he did not want to jeopardize his own employment with the Jets, whose owner, Woody Johnson, has already publicly stated that Favre is welcome to return next season if the 39-year-old quarterback wants to keep playing.
But Favre is not as welcome with his teammates, according to this veteran player. The Jets traded for Favre on Aug. 7 and the sure Hall-of-Famer made no effort to ingratiate himself into the already assembled team; according to the player, Favre spent most of his down time at the Jets' practice facility in an office specially designated for the quarterback by the equipment room, and not with his teammates in the locker room, even after the media had departed.
"He never socialized with us, never went to dinner with anyone," the player said. Asked to describe Favre in a word, the player said: "Distant."
There was more of the same sentiment from Jets running back Thomas Jones, who was interviewed on a local radio station on Tuesday. Jones wanted to make it clear he wasn't just blaming Favre but said, "At the same time you can't turn the ball over and expect to win. ... The other day, the three interceptions really hurt us. You don't like it. I don't like it and I know everybody else on the team don't like it, but all you can do is fight [through it.]"
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This reinforces comments from other Jets on Monday, when the team broke for the season in complete disarray following Sunday's 24-17 loss to the Dolphins. Favre reportedly will take until the end of February to decide if he wants to return to the Jets, and the team learned Monday morning that coach Eric Mangini had been fired.
"If he's dedicated and he wants to come back and do this, and do it the right way ... and be here when we're here in training camp and the minicamps and working out with us ... then I'm fine with it," Jets safety Kerry Rhodes said Monday. "But don't come back if it's going to be halfhearted or he doesn't want to put the time in with us."
A foxsports.com report earlier this week said that Favre wasn't happy being called out by Mangini in front of the team, as the coach did with all his players when they made mistakes. The Jets' player quoted above said that didn't seem to be the case.
"If he was hurt by that stuff, I'd be shocked because Eric barely said anything to him," the player said of Favre. "Guys would be getting called out for missed assignments or blown coverages, and Brett would have three picks and no one would say a word."
The player said Mangini addressed the team for the last time on Monday and revealed a much more genuine side than he'd shown before, telling the players he'd only been tough and aloof to get the most out of them.
According to the player -- and backed by very supportive comments about Mangini from other Jets -- very few in the room felt that Mangini deserved to be fired, and that the acquisition of Favre and Favre's subsequent me-first attitude hurt the Jets more than anything.
"Eric wasn't the reason we didn't make the playoffs," he said.
