Packers think healthy Favre can be cure

Pro Football

When Brett Favre has a cold, the Green Bay Packers get pneumonia.

The Packers plunged to 8-8 last year when Favre was bothered with a thumb injury all season and wasn't close to his Most Valuable Player form.

They were hoping he'd make a complete recovery this year and give them a shot in the division where the other four quarterbacks are youngsters: Shaun King, Cade McNown, Charlie Batch and Daunte Culpepper.

But Favre has yet to return to his old form. His thumb has recovered, but he's been bothered with tendinitis in his elbow and blisters on his hand this year. He has been wearing a rubber sleeve in practice and hasn't been very effective.

Favre, who gets his next shot today in a game on national television at Denver, completed only three of nine passes in two series against the New York Jets last week.

The Packers think that treatment and rest will cure the problem, and they've limited some of his work in practice.

The doctors "said it's not a big deal," said general manager Ron Wolf. "That's exactly what they told me."

When Favre's not throwing the ball with zip, though, it's always a big deal in Green Bay.

And Favre obviously wasn't happy about all the speculation at his weekly news conference last week.

"I don't enjoy all these questions," Favre said from the podium where his elbow was wrapped in ice. "I don't know if any of you would be standing here."

Favre conceded that the elbow hurts right now "when I try to throw the ball hard."

He added, "But there's no sense in trying to throw the ball hard [right now]. Nothing counts in preseason except for guys trying to make the team."'

But the regular season is just three weeks away, and Favre knows the radio talk show types in Green Bay are speculating that backup Matt Hasselbeck should get a shot if Favre isn't healthy.

"As far as I know, I'm still the starting quarterback, and they're paying me for it," Farve said. "When they stop doing that, I've got a tractor, and you can all start talking about somebody else. I mean, there'll be another backup quarterback that comes in and the whole phenomenon will start over again."

Comparisons

Barry Sanders and Ron Dayne both won the Heisman Trophy, but the comparisons seem to end there because Dayne is a bigger back while Sanders was known for his moves.

But Lomas Brown, who blocked for Sanders in Detroit and is now with the Giants, insists they're similar."[Dayne] has some of the quickest feet I've ever seen. His feet remind me of Barry's. He's not as quick as Barry, and his jumping and cutting are not as explosive as Barry's," Brown said. "But his vision is awesome, and he sets up blocks, which Barry used to do. He has all the tools to become a great back. He just needs the experience."

Big transition

When Miami rookie Terrance Huston was guilty of an illegal procedure penalty last week against Pittsburgh, coach Dave Wannstedt was unhappy.

Wannstedt said he asked him on the sideline, "Is this the first time you've ever played under the lights and in front of a crowd?"

The rookie replied, "Yeah, coach, it is. The biggest crowd I had ever played in front of was 300 people."

Wannstedt knew Huston had played for a small school, but didn't realize that Butte College in Oroville, Calif., was quite that small.

Life after football

Former Maryland quarterback Scott Milanovich is destined to be the answer to a trivia question:

Who was the quarterback the Cleveland Browns selected in the expansion draft over Kurt Warner?

The Browns cut Milanovich before training camp started, and you know what Warner went on to do with the Rams.

But Milanovich said getting cut was a blessing in disguise because he spent much of last season as an unpaid high school quarterback coach and loved it.

"It might be the best thing that ever happened to me because I found out I love working with kids," he said.

The Tampa Bay Bucs, who had left Milanovich unprotected, called him back Dec. 1 when both Trent Dilfer and Eric Zeier were injured.

He then played in NFL Europe this spring, throwing 11 touchdown passes to six interceptions, but is likely losing the third-string quarterback job to rookie Joe Hamilton.

Milanovich, though, is ready to move on.

"When a lot of ballplayers are done, they don't know what they're going to do. ... I know where I'm going to go [coaching] when I'm done [playing]," he said.

A must-see?

If there's one exhibition game worth watching this year, it's the first half of tomorrow night's Super Bowl rematch between the Rams and Titans. When these two teams scrimmaged recently, it was a spirited affair.

After the ratings for the 49ers-Patriots Hall of Fame game plunged 28 percent from last year despite all the Dennis Miller hype, nervous ABC executives will be watching the ratings for this game closely.

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