Favre Joins Jets in Cleveland

CLEVELAND--Brett Favre has thrown his first passes for the New York Jets.

Sort of.

Favre is here with the Jets for their preseason opener tonight against the Browns. He's not in uniform, and Kellen Clemens started the game for the Jets. But the game had a one-hour delay during the first quarter because of a storm, and when the teams returned to the field Favre made some throws on the sideline.

Favre arrived in town this evening and met with Jets Coach Eric Mangini after getting to the stadium. He participated in a pregame news conference in which he said mostly conciliatory things about the Green Bay Packers. He said it was time to put the drama and combativeness of the offseason, and especially of the last few weeks, in the past.

"The last 24 hours have been crazy," Favre said. "The last two or three weeks, this whole offseason, have been bizarre, whatever you want to call it. But it is what it is. I'm a member of the Jets. I'm excited about the opportunity."

Favre said he's eager to get going but acknowledged it's not a certainty that he'll be able to play as well for the Jets this season as he did last season in Green Bay.

"I hope I play at the level I've always played at," he said. "There's no guarantees.... [It's] the game of football, and anything can happen."

The Jets made official what they'd said late Thursday night they would do, and released quarterback Chad Pennington.

"It is a bittersweet moment," General Manager Mike Tannenbaum said. "I have all the respect in the world for Chad."

The Jets, incidentally, are saying they've received no commitment by Favre to play beyond this season.

Tannenbaum said in a conference call early this morning, just after completing the trade with the Packers for Favre: "We're going into this and we're just going to take things one year at a time. We're excited to have Brett on the team for this year."

By Mark Maske |  August 7, 2008; 9:47 PM ET  | Category:  Jets
Previous: Favre's No. 4 Still Will Be Retired by Packers... Sometime | Next: Pennington Chase Under Way

The comments to this entry are closed.