Favre hears boos everywhere he turns in first visit back to Lambeau

Brett Favre was roundly booed in his Lambeau return. Rich Gabrielson/Icon SMI

GREEN BAY, Wis. (AP) -- Tom Fields had pretty much every piece of Brett Favre memorabilia there is, and he and his buddies had already planned their road trip for whenever the quarterback is enshrined in the Hall of Fame.

Then Favre signed with the Minnesota Vikings, the Green Bay Packers' fiercest, most hated rival.

"That was just a dagger in the heart," said Fields, whose Favre jersey now has "JUDAS" on the back and big red slashes through the 4s. "I'll be booing him as loud as I can."

A day once unfathomable to Green Bay fans finally arrived Sunday, when Favre returned to Lambeau Field as a Viking.

A plane trailing a "Retire 4 Good" banner circled Lambeau in the hours before the game, and Favre was greeted with a long, loud chorus of boos when he jogged out for the game, the last of the Vikings to take the field. Visiting players aren't introduced at Lambeau, but the jeers and whistles from the crowd of 71,213 -- a regular-season record -- continued anytime Favre got close to the ball.

But if the rude reception rattled him, he didn't show it, looking as if he was playing any other road game.

Favre was cool and efficient, going 11 of 15 for 97 yards and a score in the first half as the Vikings took a 17-3 lead. Favre threw his first touchdown pass as a visitor early in the second quarter, thrusting his hands in the air and grinning after hitting Visanthe Shiancoe for the 12-yard score.

Adrian Peterson rushed up to Favre and gave him a big hug while much of Lambeau sat in silence.

Wisconsin has a bond with the Packers unlike anything else in pro sports, and for 16 years Favre was beloved by the entire state. It wasn't just that he rejuvenated the storied franchise, bringing the Lombardi Trophy back to Titletown after the team wallowed through two decades of mediocrity -- or worse. Or that he turned Cheesehead, a derogatory nickname favored by residents of neighboring states, into a term of endearment and pride.

To Wisconsinites, Favre was family.

He liked to hunt and, in the early years at least, drink a beer or two. He preferred jeans and flannel shirts to suits. And game after game, year after year, no matter what personal crisis he faced, he did his job.

"He was one of us," Sedar said. "You just felt like he'd come and sit around at your house."

Which is what makes the split so messy and gut-wrenching. There were shirts calling him everything from "Traitor" to "Judas" to "Drama Queen." One fan carried a poster with "True Legends Don't Wear Purple," and someone hung a "Welcome Back to Lambeau Field ... B-R-E-N-T" sign behind the Vikings bench.

"It's like going into church on Sunday and the priest says, `Everybody go home, Jesus has now sided with the devil,"' Fields said.

But one look at some fans' outfits told of the conflicting emotions.

Some paired Favre's Vikings jersey with a Packers jacket and cap, while others wore half Minnesota-half Green Bay jerseys. Others simply wore their old Green Bay No. 4s. A smaller sign near the Vikings bench said, "Thanks 4 the Memories," and another proclaimed Lambeau "Brett's Field."

"I'm having mixed emotions," admitted Robert Barranco, who wore a green Favre jersey while his wife, Martha, had on the newer, Vikings edition. "I'm a diehard Packers fan, but I also want him to do well."

Favre, then 38, retired after the 2007 season in a tearful news conference, only to announce a few months later that he really did still want to play football. The only problem was, the Packers had already given Aaron Rodgers the starting job. An ugly back-and-forth ensued, and Green Bay eventually traded Favre to the Jets.

He retired again after last season and then unretired -- to play for those hated Vikings.

Minnesota was, most fans assume, where Favre wanted to go all along. Though he denies it, most believe he and Packers general manager Ted Thompson didn't see eye to eye, and that was the real reason for his (first) retirement. By going to a division rival, Favre could exact a measure of revenge on Thompson.

In the process, though, he's exacting revenge on the very fans who adored him.

"It might not be so hurtful if he came out and acknowledged it," said Ross Kohlbeck, who was selling green T-shirts with a No. 4 on the front and JUDAS on the back a few blocks from Lambeau. "He just goes about it like it's not a big deal, like it's just football. But it's not. It's bigger than that."

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