About to be inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame, Brett Favre revealed a rather dark secret about his mindset as it relates to his competitive nature.
When he was a backup quarterback, which didn’t happen much during either his college or NFL careers, he wished injury upon the starter so he could play.
“I’m not afraid to say it now, every time the quarterback got tackled I was always hoping he got hurt,” Favre said on the eve his induction into the Pro Football Hall of Fame on Saturday, per Rob Demovsky of ESPN.com. “Call it what it is; I wanted to play. However I got in the game, so be it.”
Of course, an injury to Green Bay Packers quarterback Don Majkowski in 1992 is exactly how Favre got his shot to start as a second-year quarterback out of Southern Mississippi. Once he got the opportunity to start, he never relinquished his spot, no matter what, for 297 straight games.
His record-breaking starts streak was aided in great part by the use of narcotic painkillers for a portion of his career, something Favre has opened up about recently.
Throughout the streak, Favre was worried his backups had the same mindset he did, hoping he’d get injured so they’d have a shot to play.
“I was never going to lose my spot,” Favre said. “So every time I got tackled I thought, ‘I wonder if they’re over there [clapping but saying], ‘He got up, damn.’”
Of all his backups, Favre believes the one who wanted to play the most, and therefore who might have wished for him to get injured, was Matt Hasselbeck. Despite many brutal injuries to Favre, Hasselbeck and all the other backups never had a chance.
Favre’s iron-man streak won’t likely ever be broken, especially now that NFL players and teams are so much more aware of the dangers playing while hurt present.