It’s rare to have a day go by without hearing about Brett Favre, so I’m not going to break tradition and not have a post here.

In the latest news, Favre’s arm is “fatigued,” which is probably a good enough reason for Favre to go back into retirement and then come out of retirement just before Week 1.

“I felt 38 today,” Favre said Wednesday after New York’s morning practice. “I’m not going to lie to you.”

“My arm’s kind of dragging a little bit today,” Favre said. “It’s not really sore, but just fatigued. To be honest with you, I’m surprised that, I don’t want to say I feel good, that I’ve been able to make it through every practice so far.”

Favre asked Mangini for limited practice, but according to sources, Mangini said Favre is no different than any other player, and being fatigued is part of practice.

Nice to know Brett isn’t getting the Bed & Breakfast treatment he got up in Green Bay. And if his arm is sore after three days of practicing, how are things going to be when he’s throwing, getting hit, and getting booed by New Yorkers for tossing so many picks?

And thank the Lord it’s over. My God. That took longer than any of us ever anticipated.

My least favorite team in the NFL is the Patriots — who does like those guys, anyway? — and now I’ll get to see my two least favorite teams play each other twice a year. I never had a problem with the Jets before — Mangini seems cool, and he was the one that let the cat out of the bag on the whole Spygate thing — but Brett Favre is someone I can never root for again, given how long he’s made us put up with his “retirment” talk.

It’s been four years we’ve put up with it, and we all thought we were free from it when he suddenly retired on March 6. Look for another two or three years of this; hope you’re ready, Jets fans. He had no issues screwing over a team that was loyal to him for 16 years. I don’t think he’ll have a probably having you on pins and needles for the next three or four.

I’m going to set the over/under at 20.5 for interceptions that Brett Favre throws this year. And my bet’s on the over.

With Madden 2009 coming out in less than a week, it’s hard for me to focus on work, my social life, or really anything at the moment. Truth be told, I’m just counting down to that day, because it’s the new Christmas in my book, and has been for years now.

This year the cover is graced by Brett Favre, who was thought to be retired (EA was the only silly idiots to fall for this ploy), so there couldn’t be much of a “Madden Curse,” unless it involved a serious injury doing yard work or maybe a head-on car collision.

Just today, though, I thought to myself: If Madden comes back, and it looks like he’s going to, could the out-of-retire legend be one of the many to suffer the Madden Curse?

If he goes to Tampa Bay, as it looks like he will, my guess is yes. I feel the team was pretty lucky to get to the playoffs last year, and it wasn’t so much a statement of their greatness as it was an echoing resoundment of how bad the NFC South was.

My question: Is getting Brett Favre, someone who’s notorious for drive ending interceptions, really the answer to the Bucs question? Jeff Garcia wasn’t bad, and is getting someone who’s had one good year in the last four really going to solve all their problems?

Word to Brett, who often griped at Green Bay because of their talent: The Bucs don’t have much on offense. They’ve got a running back who will never be full strength again, a wide receiver that’s a hundred, and an offensive line that, quite frankly, has stunk over the last three years.

Tampa Bay, enjoy the pill you may be acquiring. You’ll be dealing with it for a while, even if you do think he’s going to retire.

About 3,000 posts ago, I said I was done posting about Brett Favre. That many posts later, here I am, defeated and denied, writing about Brett Favre, that gnat that never seems to go away, the one you can’t quite get your hands on to squash.

As I’m sure we’ve all heard by now, Favre is apparently on his way out of Green Bay, after his meeting with Mike McCarthy, who said Favre’s head isn’t in the “proper mindset.”

I don’t know where the guy is going to end up, but I know he’s never going to leave the NFL, and we’re going to have this discussion — or one very similar — every single year until the year we die. Even if you’re younger than Brett, I’m guessing his immortal irritable tactics will never die.

Lucky us, right? As if the last four years of Favre saying, “Well, this is it, I’m probably done” wasn’t enough, now we’ve been treated to this: Brett Favre retiring, then saying he wants to come back, then us being promised he’d be traded and would never play in Green Bay, and now finding out that he’s coming back, he’ll be in Green Bay, and the coaches seem okay with him competing with Aaron Rodgers for the starting job.

Team president Mark Murphy said in a statement Sunday that the team has a specific plan with Favre in camp that it won’t reveal until Monday, but sources told ESPN’s Wendi Nix that coach Mike McCarthy will announce he’s holding an open competition for the starting quarterback position.

Does anyone really anticipate a competition? You’ve got an icon in Green Bay, someone who’s won MVP’s and Super Bowls, someone who’s thrown more touchdowns than any other quarterback in the history of the NFL, and you want to say there’s a competition? With Aaron Rodgers, who’s got about 300 yards he’s thrown in his entire career?

Painful as it’ll be, it appears Favre will be the starter in Green Bay, and we’ll all go through with this exact same talk next February, right around the time Favre decides he wants to “retire” again.

The Brett Favre saga continues, and thankfully it looks as if he’s done with Green Bay. Maybe not done with football, but done with Green Bay. According to sources, the Packers are entertaining the possibility of trading Favre to another team.

The Packers have asked multiple teams what they would be willing to offer for their team icon and former NFL MVP, the NFL Network reported — a state of affairs once unthinkable in Green Bay.

While it is not known how many teams the Packers have contacted about Favre, they have not limited their inquiries to AFC teams, according to the report.

Earlier on NFL Live, ESPN reported that “one team from the NFC” had been contacted, but did not know the team (my guess is the Vikings, given earlier reports). This means that Brett Favre might once and for all be done with Green Bay. However, given Coach Mike McCarthy’s comments, saying, “Brett Favre has four to five good years left him,” it looks as if the “Will he retire, will he not retire?” won’t end until about 2013. It may be an annoying next half decade.

It’s the early odds on team’s chances to make the Super Bowl. What are your team’s chances? Just look below. My team, the Falcons, well, they’re pretty much as long a shot as there is, and at 100-1, I think that’s kind of unfair (this one should be somewhere in the thousands or millions). Pats at 7-2? Chargers at 7-1? I like that action. . .

Arizona Cardinals 50 - 1
Atlanta Falcons 100 - 1
Baltimore Ravens 75 - 1
Buffalo Bills 50 - 1
Carolina Panthers 40 - 1
Chicago Bears 35 - 1
Cincinnati Bengals 60 - 1
Cleveland Browns 25 - 1
Dallas Cowboys 6 - 1
Denver Broncos 50 - 1
Detroit Lions 80 - 1
Green Bay Packers 25 - 1
Houston Texans 60 - 1
Indianapolis Colts 7 - 1
Jacksonville Jaguars 12 - 1
Kansas City Chiefs 100 - 1
Miami Dolphins 100 - 1
Minnesota Vikings 18 - 1
New England Patriots 7 - 2
New Orleans Saints 25 - 1
New York Giants 15 - 1
New York Jets 35 - 1
Oakland Raiders 50 - 1
Philadelphia Eagles 20 - 1
Pittsburgh Steelers 15 - 1
Saint Louis Rams 75 - 1
San Diego Chargers 7 - 1
San Francisco 49ers 80 - 1
Seattle Seahawks 25 - 1
Tampa Bay Buccanneers 40 - 1
Tennessee Titans 40 - 1
Washington Redskins 50 - 1

It’s the last post about Favre. Honestly. I don’t like the guy, I think he’s overrated, I feel that he’s one of the more selfish players I’ve seen in the last decade — yes, more selfish than T.O. or Chad Johnson; at least they’re not holding back the players behind them and making a team wait on pins and needles at the end of each year — and I’m tired of giving him the attention. But this is great.

Aaron Rodgers, say goodbye to starting this year. Brett Favre is thinking of showing up to training camp.

“It’s tempting just to, as everyone said, you know, call their bluff or whatever,” Favre said, according to an excerpt provided to The Associated Press. “I think it’s going to be a circus in itself already, whether I go there, whatever.”

You’ve gotta love this: The guy is told that they don’t want him, and he’s so egotistical that he thinks they’re bluffing. And they say athletes have huge heads. These people have never met Mr. Favre, who’s clearly as grounded as they get.

I guess it’s about that time. I’ve tried to stay away from it, but it won’t go away, and this is a sports blog. As much as I don’t want to contribute to the useless stories that are Brett Favre, I suppose I’m going to swallow my pride and do it anyway.

So guess what: The guy wants to come back.

If there’s anyone out there that’s say, “Man, I can’t believe it!” then you clearly haven’t been paying attention to the last decade of what has been Brett Favre’s long awaited, neverending retirement game. I want to quit, I want to come back, I want to quit, I want to come back, I want to quit. . . I’m really gonna quit, no wait, I’m going to come back.

Regardless of where your allegiance is, at some point you’ve got to start feeling sorry for Aaron Rodgers. The guy may be the best QB out there, but no one will ever know because Brett Favre just won’t hang it up.

The word yesterday was that the Packers said Favre can come back, but he’ll have to be a backup. This would be the absolute worst idea in the world, because every time Rodgers threw an incompletion, he’d be booed.

Now, after speaking with Fox, Favre is clearing it up: He wants to play, but not for the Pack.

“I am guilty of retiring early and there is a reason for that,” Favre said, according to an excerpt provided to The Associated Press. “And the major issue is ‘Why did he retire,’ and ‘He asked for a release because he doesn’t want to play in Green Bay.’ That’s not true. And I hope people are hearing this and saying ‘OK, that clears it up.’ ”

“Them moving on does not bother me. It doesn’t. I totally understand that. By me retiring March 3rd I knew that could possibly happen. All I was saying is you know I’m thinking about playing again. The ‘itch’ has been used. That is the word that has been used if you want to say itch, or the fire is coming back, or whatever.

“If I’m going to play it’s going to be 100 percent commitment. … And so if you move on, you tell me one thing, don’t come back and tell the public … just say it. ‘You know, we’ve moved on and we’ll work with Brett on whatever it is.’ Don’t make up a lot of stuff or give half of the truth.”

Brett: Leave the poor city alone. Leave football alone. You were there — you were right on the edge of it, and you’d actually jumped — for retirement. . . stay retired. We don’t need to have the debates every year from this year forward if you’re going to be around anymore. And when you do retire, we don’t need to continue debating if you’ve really retired.

There. I’m done. No more publicity for the guy. It’s what he wants. Brett, I hope you go to a team and throw another pick in the playoffs, ultimately ending your team’s chance at a Super Bowl. Just give it up, man. Just give it up.

There’s never enough Madden 09 previews, and with that said, I present you with yet another. As long as these things keep popping out, I’m going ot keep showing them.