Brett Favre's advice for Peyton Manning

Retired NFL great Brett Favre has some advice for current NFL great Peyton Manning who is considering whether or not to retire before next season. “I think the numbers he’s put up the last few years are staggering. Can he do that again? I guess that’s a question these teams have to ask if he chooses to play.”

“Initially he said this is gonna be a quick decision and it hasn’t been so quick,” said Favre. No one knows better than the NFL great how tough it is to decide to retire following a legendary career. The multiple-MVP quarterback is known for his career with the Green Bay Packers. After he made the decision to retire in 2008, he changed his mind and filed to be re-instated. He then went to play for the New York Jets for a year, told the team he was retiring and was released. The next year he played for the Packers’ NFC rival – the Minnesota Vikings (and led them to a division championship and was a game away from making it back to the Super Bowl).

“I sympathize with him since I’ve been there,” said Favre. “Part of you really wants to redeem yourself, not that you need [to]. That’s the thing, you don’t need the redemption, [Manning]’s done everything, but there’s something, you know, I don’t want to go out like that.” Favre did say there’s a physical component to the decision as well, and that’s one thing he can’t comment on, since only Peyton Manning knows how he feels psychically about playing. But he had some advice for the elder Manning (who played 14 seasons for the Colts before going to Denver): “If he feels like, ‘Well I can play, I can still play regardless of what people think and I just don’t want to go through the struggles of what a normal season presents… If you think that’s gonna just weigh heavy, you need to play.” Favre said the goal is to avoid asking the question, “What if?”

This past Monday the Green Bay Packers announced that Favre will have a new title as far as the team is concerned – Packers Hall-of-Famer. He will return to the stadium to retire his jersey later this year.

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“The last time I walked out on the field, I was an enemy and it was not very good, understandably so,” he said. But the response since the announcement has been positive for Favre. “I will be remembered as a Packer, that’s how I want to be remembered,” he said. “I mean 16 years, you can’t take that away. And as it gets closer, the goose bumps grow.”

We asked Favre behind the scenes if he planned to do a Lambeau leap on his return and he said, “Maybe.” Favre doesn’t recall ever doing a leap during his time with the Pack, though we scrounged up one account of it. He told Yahoo Finance that if he does do one, “I’ll have to find the low end.”

Favre was speaking to Yahoo Finance as part of his new venture post-NFL, a social media site for athletes called Sqor. Favre is on their board of directors.

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