Welcome to the national stage Joe Posnanski! Now you should be fired

Know who Joe Posnanski is? Neither did I until reading his wikipedia page which includes these entries:

"Thanks to his wit, observational humor and interest in both the human and analytical side of the game, many consider him one of the finest baseball writers working in the mainstream media. In 2003 and 2005, Posnanski was named the best sports columnist in America by the Associated Press Sports Editors...On August 19, 2008, he announced that he was joining the staff of Sports Illustrated.He currently writes a weekly online column for Sports Illustrated, and his blog is reprinted on www.si.com."

A fellow blogger, eh? Maybe we should cut him some slack? No, never, not after this article:

Favre is a throwback to what great quarterbacks used to be

So, before the article even begins, we're to assume that there's something inherently wrong with the way every QB except Favre plays the game. This should be informative.

Still, here goes: Bob Griese wore glasses in Miami; Steve Grogan ran around like mad in New England; Richard Todd was getting booed in New York; Joe Ferguson was more Buffalo than the wings; Bert Jones had this amazing arm in Baltimore; Pittsburgh's Terry Bradshaw used to hold his index finger on the point of the ball when he threw; Dan Pastorini loved to throw deep in Houston; Brian Sipe was my hero in Cleveland even though his passes wobbled in the wind (even when the wind was behind him); Kenny Anderson never seemed to miss a pass in Cincinnati; Dan Fouts piloted Air Coryell in San Diego -- I loved the way he shuffled back into the pocket; Craig Morton was ancient in Denver; Jim Zorn used to duck under and spin away from defenders like Shaggy and Scooby Doo running from ghosts; Kenny Stabler was the Snake in Oakland; Steve Fuller was boring in Kansas City.

That would be a list of every starting quarterback in the AFC in 1979. I was 12 then and didn't have to look up any of them. Twenty-nine years later and their names all come back as easily as the number nine multiplication table.

I can name the entire starting lineup of the 1993 Baltimore Orioles. Lotta characters on that team. They didn't win shit, but man did I enjoy watching them play. This has nothing to do with modern day football, but neither does anything you just said.

Now, as I mentioned, there is nothing that sounds more grumpy-old-man than rambling on and on about how quarterbacks used to be better. But that's not what I'm saying -- I doubt very seriously that quarterbacks used to be better. I just think they used to be more famous, more easily remembered, more beloved, more representative of their cities...The only two things I knew about Tampa was that DisneyWorld was there and that Doug Williams was the quarterback, and only one of those two things turned out to be correct.

I can't tell you anything about Minnesota except that they have lakes and Tavaris Jackson is their quarterback. I have proved absolutely nothing about the quarterback position.

That has changed, I think. There are only a handful of quarterbacks these days who pierce the imagination--

I don't know what you're trying to say, but you're probably hitting too close to home for Peter King's liking.

with Tom Brady going down in New England and Peyton Manning looking just a wee ancient in Indianapolis, it's more like a carpool.

We hold these conclusions to be self evident after WEEK 1 OF THE REGULAR SEASON.

You have Eli Manning in New York, of course, though you get the sense that some Giants fans are waiting impatiently for the statute of limitations on the Super Bowl miracle to end so they can start booing again.

New York fans would prefer to boo Eli Manning, than for him to be successful and win them another Super Bowl.

You have Donovan McNabb in Philadelphia, though he has not started every game in a season since 2003.

And therefore, no one associates the current Eagles team with McNabb despite the fact that he threw for about 1,200 yards on Sunday.

You have Tony Romo in Dallas, though he might want to win a playoff game at some point.

Or he could just keep on being a celebrity, which was your original desire for NFL quarterbacks at the beginning of the article.

You have Drew, Matt, Carson, Jay, Rivers, Roethlisberger -- good quarterbacks all, but they're probably not sweeping the nation.

They should be out stumping! November 7th is less than 2 months away!

Finally, there's Brett Favre.

Ah yes, because when you think of Green Bay, New Jersey, New York, you immediately think "Brett Favre."

He is the last quarterback standing, the one guy out there who inspires some of the feelings of those old-time quarterbacks. This is in part because he IS an old-time quarterback; the guy was flinging passes in the NFL before the Soviet Union collapsed.

In Soviet NFL, pass flings Brett Favre.

But there's something else here too, something about the way Favre still plays the game, something in the way he flings footballs into double coverage, the way he seems indestructible, the way he throws TERRIBLE interceptions but then comes back and throws absurd touchdown passes.

It's called being inconsistent; most people aren't lauded for it.

That's the way it used to be. It's stunning to go back 30 and 40 years and look at the statistics of the quarterback heroes. In 1979, Terry Bradshaw threw 25 interceptions, and he didn't even lead the NFL in that category (that would be my hero Brian Sipe with 26).

Terry Bradshaw is also the only quarterback ever to receive more undeserved praise than Brett Favre. Take away that defense and his receivers and you've got Joey Harrington 1979.

The only guy to throw 25 or more interceptions in the last seven years ... yeah, that would be Brett Favre in 2005 when he threw 29 of them.

And it was a truly dreadful year that most Packers fans would like to forget. That's not to say that it was Favre's fault, but seriously, that's absurdly bad.

In 1979 Grogan led the NFL in touchdown passes, but he completed only 48.7 percent of his passes. You know how unthinkable it would be now to have an every week starting quarterback who completed fewer than half his passes? And he wasn't the only one. Williams completed 41.8 percent of his passes that year (a quarterback should be able to hit that many passes at night with the lights out) and took Tampa Bay to the NFC Championship Game.

You're complaining that NFL quarterbacks are now held to a higher standard in completion percentage?

In 1979 quarterbacks threw deep. The yards per completion numbers were significantly higher then (12.7 yards) than now (11.3).

Here's a funny fact, Brett Favre has averaged 12.7 or more yards per completion all of 1 times in his career.

That meant quarterbacks dropped back deeper, got sacked more, and they turned the ball over like crazy. That's probably why America loves Favre so much, he's the last of the throw-hicans, he's up at the top of nearly every quarterback category, good and bad, most touchdowns, most interceptions, third most fumbles, seventh-most sacked, he's been thrilling fans and driving them crazy for 17 years now.

I can't believe this needs explaining. The object of football is to score more points than your opponent. By throwing interceptions, fumbling, and taking sacks that lead to punts, not only are you surrendering an opportunity to score, but you are allowing your opponent the chance to gain points. Therefore, turnovers/sacks= bad = something you don't want your qb doing.

That's what it used to mean to be a quarterback. That changed. Coaches took over the game. Geniuses started calling plays. Everyone started demanding more prudent football. Defenses got more sophisticated and specialized. Sackers got bigger and stronger and faster and more dangerous. Quarterbacks were told to "manage" the game rather than "win" the game.

What a crying fucking shame that NFL quarterbacks have been forced to accept that pro football is a team game, and every team is much better off if their quarterback doesn't throw interceptions in attempt to play the game like it used to be played.

Fantasy football became the rage so that now every David Garrard interception in Jacksonville infuriates some doctor in Ann Arbor, some insurance person in Toledo and some farmer in Kansas and some home builder in Orange County.

You know who's probably also a bit peeved? Jacksonville fans because their team now has a statistically worse chance of winning.

Peep this # of interceptions to % chance of victory chart (this is for playoff games in the Superbowl era):

0 = .790
1 = .567
2 = .318
3 = .161
4 = .037
5 = .000
6 = .000

So let me close by asking, if you were at Lambeau Field on January 20th, 2008, which of the following were you more likely to hear a Packers' fan say after Favre threw that second interception:

A. Man, I just love watching Favre play the game like it used to be played.

B. We are totally fucking boned right now.