FanHouse Darrell Bevell

Outside of Sunday being a day many Packer fans have dreaded for months, it's just another football Sunday in Green Bay.

The hype surrounding this regular-season battle of NFC North rivals surpasses anything most fans will see in their lifetimes. The reality is that football fans in Wisconsin are stuck in the middle of the tension that developed between Brett Favre and the Packers. It was this way in August of 2008, when the whole thing blew up, and it isn't going to change for some time.

The seemingly never-ending saga of Brett Favre and the Minnesota Vikings will eventually end, right? After all, if Favre really wants to stick it to Ted Thompson take one more shot at a Super Bowl, he should at least show up for training camp.

As the Vikings approach the start of camp July 31, Favre is still unsigned. Let's just assume for a second that -- despite reports of a contract being in place -- this whole thing isn't a done deal. Exactly what is taking so long?

According to agent Bus Cook, no one has called Brett Favre to talk him into playing in 2009.

That seems plausible. Last spring, approximately 45 minutes* after announcing his retirement, Favre promptly took it back, forced the Packers to trade him to the Jets, where he looked every bit the 39-year-old, 17-year veteran on the downside of a great career.

New York waived Favre off the retired list last week, which could mean nothing. Or, since this is the ole gunslinger we're talking about, everything. Apparently, Wrangler jeans' favorite spokesperson can also hold a grudge. Via the New York Daily News' Gary Myers:

Columnist John McClain of the Houston Chronicle is reporting that free agent QB Quinn Gray is about to sign a one year deal with the Houston Texans. UPDATE: Signing is official.

He chose to come to the Texans, canceling other free agent trips, to be signed as a #3 behind #2 QB Sage Rosenfels? GM Rick Smith claims the Texans would like to carry three veteran quarterbacks to start the year, even though the Texans haven't done that while coach Gary Kubiak has been running things.

Of course, nobody with a brain thinks that this is the end of the story. Clearly, the Texans are giving themselves the flexibility to trade Sage Rosenfels for some draft considerations. Most sentient football observers would think this is a sensible thing to do, but Richard Justice at the Chronicle claims that:

The Texans cannot and must not trade Sage Rosenfels. It's not even a close call.
...
Weakening the most important position on the field to strengthen another makes no sense. And there's no one available that's even close to being as good as Rosenfels.

Then he proceeds to say a bunch of blather that has no relevance to whether you should trade Rosenfels away if you get good value for him. Well, I suppose I'm glad that Richard Justice isn't running the Texans as actually it is a close call.