Brett Favre retired earlier this week.
He played in the NFL for 18 years. He set numerous NFL records during the course of his career. The most impressive has to be the fact that, as a quarterback, he started a record 269 consecutive regular season games.
Peyton Manning is second on the list, his streak currently standing at 176 games. Third on the list is
Ron Jaworski, his streak having ended at 116 games.
Tom Brady is next on the list, but his streak ended in the first game of last season at 110 games. Peyton Manning needs another 94 games - he would have to start every single game through the 14th game of the 2014 season to break Favre's record. In addition to the four mentioned above, only two other quarterbacks in history -
Joe Ferguson (107 games), and
Dan Marino (95 games) have started that many games consecutively. I suspect Favre's record will never be broken.
People are fascinated with Favre. Many consider him to be among the all-time greatest to ever play the game. Some consider him the greatest ever. I do not belong to either group.
The media loved Favre. And vice versa. He never met a camera he didn't like, always seeking an opportunity to get into the limelight (of course, the media loved that). He also seemed intensely competitive, and the combination is what I believe led him to his unfortunate decision to come back for one more season in 2008.
Let's start from the beginning.
In 1991, the Atlanta Falcons took Favre in the second round of the draft. With
Chris Miller as their starting QB, in 1992, the Falcons traded Favre to Green Bay. Favre started the season as the back-up to the 'Magic Man',
Don Majkowski. In the third game of the season, against the Cincinnati Bengals, he replaced the injured Majkowski in the first quarter. With 13 seconds left, he threw a 35-yard touchdown that helped the Packers come-from-behind to win 24-23. He started the next game against the Steelers, a game the Packers won. The rest, as they say, is history, as he started every game for the Packers until his trade to the Jets following the 2007 season (for a detailed history of, or, more aptly, a tribute to Favre, see
here).
The table below shows how Favre did each year.
Before we go on, some explanations.
In order to be able to truly compare
Brett Favre to other quarterbacks so that we can properly gauge his place in history, we can't simply look at the
NFL's passer rating system. First, we know that the average NFL passer rating in the NFL has been increasing over time. So, by simply using the NFL's passer rating system, the more recent quarterbacks would appear to have done better than quarterbacks from earlier years (see
here and
here for evidence). Second, we have to agree that the NFL's passer rating system is an accurate, if not adequate measure of a quarterback's performance. I have previously introduced a metric,
CMI, which I believe is a better, if not more understandable measure of performance. CMI, however, also has the same bias as the passer rating system. One way to adjust for, and remove the bias favoring more recent quarterbacks is to look at each year's performance for each quarterback, and relate that to the average performance that year. The measure that we use is the standard deviation. I have
discussed previously how using this measure tends to "normalize" performances across years. In other words, when a given year's performance by a particular quarterback is "normalized" to the average for that year, and we do that for every year, we can very easily see how that particular performance compares to other performances across years. Since
CMI is very similar to the passer rating system, when using standard deviations, it shouldn't really matter whether we use CMI or the NFL passer rating system (there will be differences, and, I often include both so that you can see the differences). The two graphs below show how using either the "normalized" NFL's passer rating system or "normalized" CMI as measures compare to a standard normal curve with 1,451 observations (that's how many qualified quarterback seasons there have been over the past 69 years).
Ok, so back to the table.
Favre had a "pretty good", or, "above average" first year in 1992. Using the NFL passer rating, he finished 0.57 standard deviations above the average that year. Using a standard normal curve, that would mean between the 71st and 72nd percentiles. If we used CMI as the standard, then his performance that year, 1.24 standard deviations above the mean, would place him between the 89th and 90th percentiles.
He followed that with a sub-par year in 1993, finishing between the 30th and 31st percentiles according to the NFL passer rating system, or between the 35th and 36th percentiles using CMI. Then followed several "above average" to "very good" years (1994-1998), depending on your perspective, followed by a couple of mediocre years (1999-2000), followed by four above average years (2001-2004), followed by his two worst years (2005-2006). He finished his Green Bay tenure with an "above average" year in 2007.
He should have taken the opportunity to retire then.
His last year, his first full season not with Green Bay, was "below average". So he finished his career with 3 "below average" years out of 4. Perhaps the Packers brain trust was on to something when they decided that
Aaron Rodgers was their future at the end of the 2007 season.
The two graphical illustrations below show each of Favre's seasons in terms of standard deviations from the mean. In case you haven't noticed, as much as I love statistics, I find that graphs are better way to illustrate a point than a table of statistical measures. I show the CMI graph first and the graph based on NFL passer rating next, for reasons that will become plainly apparent when you read on.
Ok, so until now, we've been looking at
Brett Favre's career in a bit of a vacuum. Yes, we have compared his performances to an average, and yes, we have tried to put it into historical perspective, but I haven't given you any 'perspective'.
First, let's compare
Brett Favre's career to some individual careers. The biggest problem we face in comparing Favre's career to any other individual career, is obviously the length of his career. There have been only 5 individuals who have thrown enough passes to qualify in at least 15 different seasons. Those are
Fran Tarkenton (18 years),
Brett Favre (17 years),
Dan Marino (16 years),
John Elway (16 years), and
Johnny Unitas (15 years). So how does Favre's "picture" compare to these quarterbacks, all of whom are in the Hall of Fame?
Fran Tarkenton - a picture of "excellence". With a couple of exceptions, Tarkenton exceeded his peers consistently for a very long time. Quite remarkable. Without question, Favre's picture does not resemble that of Tarkenton.
Dan Marino - Marino was "above average" for many of his years, tailing off towards the end of his career. He was "very good" very early in his career. He really didn't have a "bad" year until his last, and wisely decided to hang it up after that. Although closer in resemblance, Marino's picture still looks better Favre's overall.
John Elway - Elway underperformed his peers much of his early career, exceeding the average in only two of his first ten years. He then was "above average", or even "very good" his last six years. He went out on top, having retired following the Broncos having won back-to-back Super Bowls (
Super Bowl XXXII and
Super Bowl XXXIII). I think it's safe to suggest that Favre's picture looks better than Elway's.
Johnny Unitas - In my opinion, Favre's picture most closely resembles that of Johnny Unitas. They both started out well, had a couple of mediocre years, then had several years where they outperformed their peers, and ended their careers with a few sub-par years.
What if we compared Favre's average performance (in other words, average each of his year's performance in terms of standard deviations), to other players? Well, over his career, in terms of NFL passer rating, Favre averaged 0.42 standard deviations above the mean (0.26 when looking at CMI). Tarkenton averaged 0.65, Marino averaged 0.63, Elway averaged 0.06, and Unitas averaged 0.51 standard deviations above the mean.
Let's expand the comparison list to players who qualified in at least 10 different seasons. 41 different quarterbacks make that list. The two graphs below illustrate where Favre ranks on those lists.
The same graph as above, except looking at it Using CMI as the measure of performance.
Looking at his career statistically, it is hard to make the argument that he belongs in the truly elite group of all-time quarterbacks - those that would be ranked in the top 3 or top 5
all time. I think it is fair to suggest that Favre has had a
very good career. It was certainly a lengthy one, and, in that regard, it was exceptional. But as far as his actual performance on the field, there isn't a measure, or set of measures, that suggest that it was exceptional.
People will suggest that he holds the all-time record for yards, or touchdowns, for example. But that is merely a function of his longevity, just as much as he holds the record for interceptions thrown, all-time.
I also don't discuss measures frequently used as evidence of greatness. MVP awards, for example - these are popularity contests more than a reflection of outstanding statistics or an individual's value to a team (the
NFL MVP award is given by the Associated Press). Pro-bowl selections for example are another popularity contest - just look at who got selected this past year in the AFC. Another measure frequently used is Super Bowls. Dan Marino didn't win any Super Bowls.
Trent Dilfer won a Super Bowl. Winning percentage is also frequently used - last time I looked, a quarterback doesn't play defense, return kicks or punts, or kick field goals. These pieces of evidence would never enter any serious discussion in terms of statistical evaluation.
My eventual goal is to identify the greatest passer of all time. I will use several statistical measures, many of which are mentioned in this post, to identify the most worthy candidates for consideration. As far as my research is concerned so far, Favre would not make that list. There are several other quarterbacks, not mentioned in this post, nor even displayed in either of the last two graphs that would make more worthy candidates, but that is for a different article.
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