Manning has a chance to beat them. He is not taking the pounding and will not be as beat up. I doubt the consecutive record will fall but all the rest, sure. The point that 14 active players are ranked ahead of Favre tells me since he is the oldest one of the bunch and they all are out perfoming him, if they hang around long enough every record will fall. Except maybe the int record. Although Cutler is on pace to match every one of Favres records. Sacks, Ints and Fumbles.

Rodgers is already breaking Favres single game and single season marks.

Favre's single-season and single-game records were never exactly stellar anyway.

For example, as far as I know, he has only thrown for 400 yards once in his career (December 5, 1993), a game in which the Packers were trounced by the Bears 30-17. In fairness, he did once throw for 399 yards on December 22, 2003, a game in which the Packers destroyed the Raiders 41-7. Contrast those numbers to, say, Dan Marino, who had 15 such games in his career (which was, by the way, much shorter than Favre's), or Peyton Manning, who has had 9, or Joe Montana, who had 7.

Other than his consecutive-starts record, I think Favre's most impressive record may be consecutive seasons with 3000 or more passing yards. Peyton Manning has set the standard, though, by passing for 4000 or more yards almost every season of his career.

Clip somewhat related:

[mp3 width=400 height=20]http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2010/images/01/25/FavreINT.mp3[/mp3]

By the way, Aaron Rodgers' passer rating (121.3) for his 422-yard performance against the Arizona Cardinals on January 10, 2010, was the third-highest for a 400-yard game in NFL history, behind only Peyton Manning's 145.7 rating on January 9, 2005 (458 yards) and Dan Marino's 135.4 rating on January 6, 1985 (421 yards).

Here's an interesting statistical anomaly that may only appeal to a dorky mind like mine: All of the 14 highest-rated 400-yard performances were played between December 29 and January 30 of the season in which they occurred. I would be curious to see an explanation of this phenomenon.

You call me a Favre lover but I don't think the stats QBs put up these days are real. Favre had a 107.2 QB rating at 40?! Is he THAT much better than he was in 1995-1997 or has the system changed? I made a thread in the NFL section about this but I think everyone needs to take the QB stats these days with a grain of salt given the QB friendly league.

The league favors the rules towards better passing.

The rating system has not changed recently, RedSoxExcel. Though my above post did contain a glaring error: The 14 games I mentioned were not the highest-rated 400-yard games but in fact the 14 postseason 400-yard games in NFL history. That explains the odd clustering of the dates. ;)

Those games, by the way, span the years 1968 through 2010. So it's not like 400-yard games are a recent phenomenon.

Favre did play better than he has his entire career. He took care of the ball more than any other year. That makes a huge difference in rating.

In the '96 super bowl, he had a pretty blah game. 14 of 27 for 246 yards and 51.9 completion percent. Free and Rison had 75 yards in YAC so he really only threw the ball for 176 yards.

He didn't turn the ball over once and ended up with a 107.9 rating. So the fact his career average is only in the mid 80s is a testament to how often he turned it over.

If an 18 game season becomes a reality then I think Manning has a much better chance at breaking every meaningful record Favre holds.

If the NFL moves to 18 games, it needs to start publicising its records as rates (per-season, projected out) instead of merely trumpeting the raw numbers. Otherwise the records will cease to have any true relevance. Major League Baseball had the sense to do this when they pointed out that yes, Babe Ruth's homerun record had been broken, but he'd still managed the feat in fewer games than anyone else. Likewise, Manning and Favre's career-accumulation records pale in comparison to Marino's, since he set his in fewer seasons.

Yes, the rating system has not changed but the numbers being inputted into that rating system have changed significantly. In the other thread, someone pointed out that 13 of the 15 all time passer rating leaders are active players. Are the QBs today that much better than all of the other QBs in NFL history? I doubt it.

In 1996, Favre had 39 TDs, 13 INTs, 3900 yards and a 95.8 rating.

In 2009, Favre has a 107.2 rating. Even if everyone accepts that Favre was better in 2009 than 1996, is he really 11+ rating points better than he was in 1996??? He would be ranked the 10th best QB according to QB rating in 2009 with the 1996 numbers.

In 1997, in a league that had Marino, Young, Elway, Aikman, Favre, Moon, etc. Favre was 2nd in the league with 3,800 yards. In 2009, 1997 Favre would be 11th (just barely in front of Kyle Orten). Thats nuts.

There is clearly something going on with QBs ratings, yards, etc.

Exactly.

Several changes - OT is now one of the most important positions in the game, period. LT especially. That's huge when it comes to pass protection.

League rules favoring passing. Truth is, football sells well in America because it's NOT soccer. You don't have games that go 0-0 into OT and win with a penalty shot. That's exactly what the NFL is trying to prevent. So even in Favre's career, rules have made it easier to complete passes and harder for defenders to defend passes.

One of the major changes is that the NFL is making protecting QBs a high priority. Just note the number of games starting QBs play in '09 and compare it to the number of games starting QBs played in '92. HUGE difference.

Heck, NSD mentioned Joe Montana. Are today's QB's all tougher than Joe Montana? I doubt it. Better protected by better OLs and stricter rules on protecting QBs? Yup. If Montana had been born 20 years later, he would have played more games.

Favre's 94-97 campaigns were perhaps the best consecutive QB campaigns in NFL history. Ratings? Whatever. He threw TD passes that other QBs couldn't have thrown. '09 was amazing, but you can't convince me that he was better in '09 than he was in '95, '96, or '97.

Getting an 18 game schedule could alter records in the future too but not sure how many seasons Manning will ever see 18 games. I still think it's a few years away

Favre was better in the 90s. I'm with Red here. Last year, he was great, but he played within the system, which is why the INTs were down. He didn't create as many plays. Now, I'm not saying he never created plays last year, but in the 90s, he made things happen all the time.

I don't remember all these games, but I recall quite a few. I actually have a couple of tape/dvd of some of these performances. Favre's run from 94-98 was the best five season run a QB EVER had IMO.

http://www.pro-football-...xscores/199409250gnb.htm

http://www.pro-football-...xscores/199512160nor.htm

http://www.pro-football-...xscores/199510220gnb.htm

http://www.pro-football-...xscores/199511120gnb.htm

http://www.pro-football-...xscores/199609010tam.htm

http://www.pro-football-...xscores/199609090gnb.htm

http://www.pro-football-...xscores/199809270car.htm

Take a look at some of those games and see if it jump starts a memory. Some did for me and yeah, you can remember some ridiculous stuff. I'd also argue the 90s was the greatest decade of pro football. I think some of those teams would've killed some of the great teams today. Although, I do see this decade being pretty strong as well. There is a lot of great young players today in both the pro and college game.

This prediction was made Feb 9, 2010. Which is before Peyton Manning lost a full season with a neck injury.

And I still don't care who holds the record..


But I will say this.. when Peyton hurt his neck.. I thought that was the end of it. Still can't believe anyone cleared him to play.

agreed. Almost every record eventually gets broken by someone.

It would have bothered a little if Brett retired as a Packer but I have no emotional investment is his stats at this time. One of the reasons is he played so often when clearly he shouldn't have. His thumb injury being just one of those times.

Coming back from retirement only seemed to indicate Brett cared more for the records than he did for the team. Whatever that team may have been. I bet Brett thought they were safe from Peyton when he was injured.