Dysfunction in Atlanta

The Falcons' quarterback, Chris Miller, had won just three starts each in 1989 and 1990, yet then-coach Jerry Glanville thought Miller could become successful if surrounded with some weapons. When the 1991 draft rolled around, he had his eye on a receiver and took Mike Pritchard at No. 13 before taking Favre with the sixth pick of the second round. Favre appeared in two games as a rookie, throwing four passes. Two of them were intercepted. Twenty-four years later, Glanville and Herock still can't agree on how the Favre trade went down. What they can agree on: It was the other guy's fault.

Jerry Glanville, Falcons head coach, 1990-93: I liked Favre, but I said I've got to get the wide receiver first, and everyone said, "Then you'll never get Favre." And lo and behold, in the second round, Favre was there, and I wanted him as much as anybody in the second round. I said we had a great draft. We got Favre and Pritchard. Anybody who says I didn't want him is a bold-faced liar. My brother was sitting in the room, my assistant coaches were sitting in the room and they'll all tell you I wanted Favre, but I didn't want him until I got the receiver.

Ken Herock: [Favre] would never play for that coach. When I was drafting, I liked to pick players for the coach, you know, who could work together. And there was animosity built up right away after the pick.

Jerry Glanville: If you look in the encyclopedia under the word "bulls---er" [Herock's] picture is there. That's obviously 100 percent false, but he sort of reminds me, if his lips are moving it's hard to come out with a true statement. He's a cover-your-ass guy. That's who he is. Unfortunately I had no authority to make the trade, and I had no authority to draft him. All of a sudden when this happened, I had all this authority.

Ken Herock: When I picked Favre, [Glanville] didn't want him. And I didn't care because I thought I was picking a great player. During the whole year after I drafted him, it was partly his fault -- Favre was always late for meetings, drinking a lot, didn't even know the scout plays. He couldn't even run the scout team, they were telling me. I'm not there every day, I might be there through Tuesday and then I'd go out [to scout] for a couple of days, and every time I'd come back they'd say, "Oh, you should see what your guy did today." It was always my guy. It wasn't our guy. It was my guy. And I had no defense. I couldn't come back and say, "This is what he can do."

Favre has admitted many times that he was a train wreck as a rookie. He partied, missed meetings and team functions and knew he had fallen into Glanville's doghouse. Meanwhile, Miller turned things around, throwing for more than 3,000 yards and 26 touchdowns in 14 starts. The Falcons went 10-6 and won a wild-card game.

Jerry Glanville: Favre was a young guy in a big city, and I went to all the bars where he went and I asked them to quit giving him drinks. I flew his mom and dad into my office. Does that sound like a guy who didn't like him? I paid to fly in his mom and dad in to help me talk to him. They said nobody cared more about him than me. But was I ever happy with him there? He hadn't grown up yet. But we've all been there. Guess what? If I was that age, I'd probably be the same guy.

June Jones, Falcons offensive coordinator, 1991-93: Favre never got an opportunity because Chris Miller was playing lights out. He was the best player in 1991, and we played really well. [Glanville] wouldn't have played him ahead of Chris Miller, I know that. Chris had a phenomenal year. His numbers in 1991 were incredible and then in '92, his first six games were unbelievable, too, and then he was just running and nobody hit him and he tore his knee up.

Ken Herock: We met at the end of the season to go over personnel, and I've got the head coach and the coordinator telling me he can't play. And I'm thinking, "I've got to be wrong." Everybody on our team is telling me he can't play, I'm not going to say he can. First of all, I didn't think I was wrong. But you have to finally give in. I told the owner, Taylor Smith, I said, "Taylor, there's two guys here who are going to tell you about Favre. I'll tell you what I think and then we'll go on." So they say he can't play. I say, "Well when I drafted him I thought he was going to be a great player. Sometimes things don't work out. I must be wrong." I said I can trade him. And I knew I could trade him. I could sense what was going on during the season and I told Ron Wolf -- we played Green Bay that year down at our place -- I said if you're interested in Favre, and I knew he liked him, you better go look at him in pregame warmups because you won't see him anymore.

Enter Ron Wolf

Four days after team president Bob Harlan hired Wolf as general manager, the Packers played at Atlanta. It was in the press box at Fulton County Stadium on Dec. 1, 1991, when Wolf first informed Harlan of his plans for Favre.

Bob Harlan, Green Bay Packers CEO, 1989-2007: The week we hired Ron, he still had some scouting responsibilities with the Jets. We hired him in midweek, and he said he was going to meet us in Atlanta and then come back to Green Bay with the team. So I'm sitting in the press box on Sunday morning before the game and he comes up, puts his briefcase down next to me and says, "I'm going to go look at Atlanta's backup quarterback in warmups. If his arm is still as strong as it was coming out of college, we're going to make a trade for him." And then he walks away. So the first thing I did was take the flip card and turn it over to see who Atlanta's backup quarterback was. And I thought his name was Fav-RAY.

Mike Reinfeldt, Packers CFO, 1991-2003: Ron had gotten word that if he wanted to see Favre at all, he needed to get down on the field early. But the Green Bay media cornered Ron near the elevator coming out of the press box and they grilled him with a lot of questions. Ron couldn't break away, and by the time he made it onto the field, he was too late. He never got his exclusive look at Brett Favre.

Ron Wolf, Packers general manager, 1992-2000: I never did [see him throw before the game]. But I didn't need to. The thing I find so hard that people don't understand is this was a guy I personally rated the best player in the draft in 1991. So it's the next year. Actually it's still 1991. To have an opportunity to get a player of that caliber, in my opinion, a person's just lucky. I went back and looked at him [on film], but every time I saw him play, I saw him play well.

Brett Favre: Thank goodness he didn't look at my waistline and say, "I'm not going after this guy."

Ken Herock: You should've seen the guy. If you would've seen what he was doing, you'd say you'd be lucky to get a seventh-round pick for him. Nobody else wanted him but Ron. I told him, "I'm not parting with Favre without a first-round pick."

Bob Harlan: Ron comes back within a half hour and all he told me is we're going to make a trade for Brett Favre [and asked], "Are you OK with that?" I said, "Ron, when I hired you, I told you it was your team to run, and I promised you no interference from the board or the executive committee."

Committee Interference

At the time, the Packers' executive committee met every Tuesday, and two days after the game in Atlanta, Wolf found himself in front of the members explaining his plans. Little did he anticipate, there were some skeptics on the committee.

Ron Wolf: I told Bob that I'd have to give up our No. 1 [draft pick]. Not only did I tell Bob that, but Bob told me when we go back [to Green Bay], we have an executive committee meeting on Tuesday and [we'll] just talk it over with them.

Bob Harlan: There was some concern about giving up a No. 1 draft choice for a third-string quarterback who doesn't play. But the way I felt, I knew I could never even hire Ron without giving him that control. Because you know he interviewed here before [in 1987], and I knew what he didn't like about the situation then, and I knew I would never get him if I didn't promise him full control and absolutely no interference from the board of directors because he was concerned about it. Like I told him, I'm not going to interfere with the first decision you want to make.

Ron Wolf: I came in, made my pitch, told them why we're doing it and what I thought he'd do and what I thought he'd mean to the franchise. But I wasn't aware of [any opposition].

Don Harden, executive committee member, 1985-2005: Bob was absolutely right; we should not have interfered. I was never a naysayer, but I think there were some. But we needed to win, I knew that. If Ron and Mike liked him, and if those guys were for him, that was good enough for me.