A week ago, if I had found myself playing the macabre party game “Dead or Alive,” and Fran Tarkenton’s name had come up, I would have been stumped.

I certainly wouldn’t have thought that the former Minnesota Vikings quarterback and co-host of That’s Incredible was definitely dead, but Frantic Fran hasn’t exactly been making many headlines lately.

Well, Scramblin’ Fran, 69, is alive. And angry. At Brett Favre.

Sir Frances told a radio station last week that he would like to see No. 4 play for his former team this upcoming season. But not so the former Packer could lead the Purple to its first-ever Super Bowl title.

“I kind of hope it happens, so he can fail,” Tarkenton said.

Tarkenton went on to call Favre “despicable” for how he has conducted himself since his initial retirement in March 2008, and he summed up Favre’s last season by stating “He goes to New York and bombs” (which is only true if you ignore Favre’s first 11 games, during which he led the Jets to an 8-3 record).

Now, I have tons of respect for Sir Francis. Not only for his stellar playing career, but for something a bit more arcane: in 1977, Tarkenton was the very first athlete to host Saturday Night Live (Minnesota natives Al Franken and Tom Davis lobbied hard for him) and for my money, Fran the Man was more natural on-camera and funnier than any of the countless athletes that have hosted since then. 

(For anyone who believes that SNL is edgier now than it was 30 years ago, I urge you to rent or download Tarkenton’s fine episode. Sketches such as the “Anabolic Steroids Cereal” commercial parody and the “Black Perspective” debate on African-American quarterbacks would never get on the air today.)

But Francis’ decision to give a rare public interview on Brett Favre sounds to me like nothing but sour grapes.

Why would Tarkenton be bitter toward Favre? Well, when Tarkenton retired in 1978, he held the following NFL records: pass attempts, completions, yardage, touchdowns, rushing yards by a quarterback, and wins by a starting quarterback. Now, with the exception of rushing yards (that record is owned by Randall Cunningham, who oddly enough also played with Minnesota), all of those records are held by Favre.

And despite Tarkenton’s Hall of Fame career, he (like poor Jim Kelly) is unjustly remembered as someone who, despite numerous opportunities, could not win a Super Bowl. Tarkenton played lousy in all three of his bids for the Vince Lombardi Trophy, notching an unenviable 0-3 Super Bowl record. .

So although it seems like a long shot, I think Francis is a little perturbed at the mere thought that the guy who now holds nearly all of the records he once held could possibly lead the team that he once led for 13 seasons to something that he could not—a Super Bowl victory.

Do I agree with Tarkenton that by his actions over the past 16 months Favre has sullied his career with the Packers? No question. But as the Vikings’ greatest living ex-player, Tarkenton has hardly outclassed Favre by going on record as saying he hopes his former team makes a move that will cause it to “fail.”

Bud Grant would never say such a thing. Ever if he were alive. 

Wait a minute . . .

 

My six-year-old son changes his obsessions more often than my father changes his underwear (which frankly isn’t nearly as often as the family would like). Just in the last few months, my son has gone from Yogi Bear to Scooby-Doo to SpongeBob to Charlie Brown.

The downside of this fickleness is that he is constantly asking for new toys, video games, and movies to match his new interests. The upside is that my wife and I never get too tired of any one character or show, and often he moves on faster than I want him too—hey, that SpongeBob is funny stuff.

Unfortunately, the new obsessions—Pokemon and Super Mario Bros.—are not nearly as entertaining as Mr. Square Pants. And to make matters worse, he’s not just into Super Mario Bros. the video game, but the early-’90s TV show, which of course is available on DVD. (Hey, not much isn’t.) 

Anyway, the other day he was watching an episode of Super Mario Bros., and I was flabbergasted to discover it was about Milli Vanilli, the disgraced pop duo whose career ended when it was discovered they did not actually sing on the multi-platinum album Girl You Know It’s True.

As my brain took a vacation from Mario and Luigi to reminisce about Milli Vanilli, I found myself suddenly thinking about the “retired” Brett Favre.

When Favre announced his second retirement in February, I was pleased and relieved. After his year with the New York Jets had come to a miserable end, I felt it was clear that Favre’s time had come and gone.

I was similarly pleased and relieved when the cover was blown off of Milli Vanilli’s vocal deceptions. Milli Vanilli’s time couldn’t come and go fast enough.

But then the highlight of the Milli Vanilli scandal happened: The bizarre press conference when the duo tried in vain to prove that they really could sing. They proved in about 1.5 seconds at that press conference that they couldn’t.

But the conference itself was a spectacle of which I wanted more of. Surely nowadays Vh1 would sign the two to a reality show, elongating the duo’s 15 minutes of fame, but in the early 1990s, it was harder to be famous without having actual talent, and Milli Vanilli was done for good.

Now comparing Brett Favre’s career to Milli Vanilli’s is like comparing my journalistic career to Woodward and Bermstein’s: It’s insulting and ridiculous.

But now that the story of Brett Favre coming out of retirement—again—to join the Minnesota Vikings is getting hotter, it’s clear to me that, like my unexplainable morbid fascination to see Milli Vanilli try to go legit, I have an unexplainable morbid fascination to see Brett Favre play for the Vikings.

Do I believe Brett Favre will launch yet another comeback to play for one of the Packers’ two biggest rivals? Six weeks ago I would have laughed at the notion. But six weeks ago I would have laughed at the notion of David Letterman getting married.

This we know: A year ago Favre wanted to play for Minnesota. Ted Thompson made sure that couldn’t happen. Ted Thompson can no longer prevent that from happening. Brett Favre hates Ted Thompson. Brett Favre is a massive competitor. Brett Favre also has a massive ego. 

Like a child who sneaks off to get a pre-dinner cookie after being told no, Favre would presumably love to sneak off and play for Minnesota now that Ted Thompson can no longer tell him no.

But I don’t believe that the chance to continue his personal battle with Thompson would be enough for Favre. But I do believe that the chance to end his career on a more positive note would be.

Favre’s last five weeks in 2008 were his worst stretch since the Packers’ awful 4-12 2005 campaign and were perhaps worse than that: Unlike in Green Bay, where Mike Sherman was the scapegoat for losing, Favre was the scapegoat in New York. 

The Jet teammates that Favre supposedly distanced himself from were publicly calling for his benching, a type of outcry that was unheard of in Green Bay, where, despite occasional setbacks, Favre was seen (along with Mike Holmgren) as the savior of a franchise that had been long dormant before his arrival.

Could Favre save the Vikings? Yes, at least for one season.

Favre could make a playmaker out of first round draft pick Percy Harvin (although the wide receiver’s NFL career is off to a bad start, as he was hospitalized less than a week after the draft for dehydration and a virus), and apart from shaky special teams play, the Vikings don’t really have any glaring holes outside of quarterback.

Vikings head coach Brad Childress may bear an uncanny resemblance to Mr. Noodle’s brother Mr. Noodle from Elmo’s World, but Childress is undoubtedly smarter than the wide-eyed dimwit who lives to perform simple tasks at the behest of a goldfish.

He knows that stubbornly sticking with the consistently disappointing Tarvaris Jackson and career backups like Gus Frerotte or new recruit Sage Rosenfels will eventually cost him his job.

Childress knows that Favre would, rightly or wrongly, bring immediate Super Bowl talk to the Twin Cities and, again at least for a season, end the ticket-selling problems the Vikings started to have last year, problems that admittedly could be blamed on the economy as much as on the team’s inept quarterback play.

Childress admitted at the Vikings’ rookie minicamp that the team would talk about pursuing Favre. “We talk about everything,” Childress said, insinuating that the conversations in Eden Prairie could also include what the heck is happening on Lost, whatever happened to the McDLT, and Miley Cyrus’s Twitter page.

Undoubtedly one of the major negatives for Childress in bringing Favre on—if Favre was indeed open to the possibility—would be the baggage that such a signing would bring.

Childress isn’t real good with the media, and Favre in purple would be the state’s biggest sports story since the Twins won the World Series in 1991, which happened just a few months before Favre was traded from the Atlanta Falcons to the Packers.

Look, I said my desire to see Favre play for the Vikings was an “unexplainable morbid curiosity.” But I’ll try to explain it anyway: To use Mike McCarthy’s and Ted Thompson’s words, the Packers have “moved on” with Aaron Rodgers. 

Statistically, Rodgers had a much better 2008 season than Favre, and while I’m not prepared to say that the team did the right thing in not welcoming Favre back with open arms, no one can now inarguably claim that the team made a major mistake by not doing so.  

Favre did not lead the Jets to the Super Bowl or even the playoffs, and Rodgers’s failings to do the same with the Packers last year more often than not had more to do with the bad situations his defense continually put him in than any poor play on his part. 

In short, Rodgers has proven himself worthy of the faith his bosses had in him and the Packers—and by extension, their fans—should no longer feel threatened by what Favre might bring to another NFL team, even one in their own division.

Could Favre be detrimental to the Vikings? Certainly. As he did in New York, Favre could alienate his purple teammates, anger his coach, downplay an injury that causes him to play poorly, and hinder the team’s long-term growth by delaying the development of a young quarterback. (Although Jackson’s had ample opportunity to indicate growth and he has not done so.)

Therefore, I don’t believe Favre playing for Minnesota negatively impacts the Packers while I also think his chances of screwing up the Vikings—especially in the bigger, development of players at the team’s most important position, picture—are nearly equally as great as his chances are for improving them.

I said earlier that if the Milli Vanilli scandal broke today, the duo would have their own reality show as they attempted their comeback. Favre in purple would be an equally bizarre reality show that would fascinate Packer Nation and Purple Pride alike, with the Vikings having much more to lose in the experiment than the Packers.

Brett, you keep trying to get out, but something, even the hated occupants of the NFL’s worst monstrosity of a stadium, keeps pulling you back in. If you want to heed the call of the Viking horn, go right ahead. You have my blessing.

I’m a much better father than I am a husband. Although I believe that on many levels the roles are intertwined, my kids are the major benefactors of whatever generosity and kindness I can manage to scrounge together.

So when the timing hit for my wife to be invited to a party on Saturday afternoon on the same weekend that my parents would be in town to watch our kids, there was really no way out for me.

I had to put on my husband pants and accompany my wife to the party. Only it wasn’t really a party. It was a co-ed baby shower, the social equivalent for most males to getting their scrotum caught in a paper shredder.

Right in the middle of the opening day of the NFL Draft, which is, after MLB’s opening day, the best sports day of the spring.

But I reasoned that I wouldn’t be the only male at the party more interested in following the NFL draft than in playing “name the baby animal.”

I figured that the host of the party, whom I admittedly didn’t know well, would greet all men at the door with an “I’m sorry, this was the only day that we could do this” pat on the back, a barley pop, and directions to a widescreen HDTV tuned to ESPN.

I was wrong. I didn’t hear the draft mentioned once. There was no TV tuned to ESPN or NFL Network or anything else. (I found out towards the end of the party that the hosts don’t have cable or satellite and the only television I saw was one that most self-respecting TV lovers like myself would confine to a bathroom, garage, or shed.) There was no barley pops; only a lukewarm 2-liter of Coke.

I quickly accepted my fate and resisted the urge to get draft updates via the iPhone that my wife kept in her front jeans pocket so as to avoid an argument later.

(That strategy didn’t work—I still had the argument, for reasons too convoluted to get into here.) 

So I missed live coverage of the 2009 NFL Draft. But if I were superstitious, I would make it a point to miss it every year. Because the Green Bay Packers avoided the head-scratching moves of the last two drafts and actually had a stellar opening day.

GM Ted Thompson successfully fought his tendency to draft the so-called “best player available” and went with Boston College nose tackle B.J. Raji instead of Texas Tech standout wide receiver Michael Crabtree, who was then immediately snapped up by the San Francisco 49ers with the very next pick.

While Crabtree should fulfill 49ers head coach Mike Singletary’s oft-repeated cry for “winners,” Raji, at 6′ 11″ and 323 pounds, should fulfill the Packers’ need for run stoppers (105 tackles at BC) in Dom Capers’s new 3-4 scheme.

Raji has also proven to be an effective pass rusher, with 12.5 sacks in his college career, eight of those coming in 2008 alone.

Thompson then did something even more out-of-character: he traded up to get USC linebacker Clay Matthews in the second round with the 26th overall pick.

It was the first time since 1993 the Packers had two first-round picks and the first time in five years that Thompson has not traded down to get more picks. While there are some concerns that Matthews lacks experience—he started only 10 games in his USC career—Matthews was a key piece in the nation’s best scoring defense (9.0 points per game) in 2008.

And Matthews, the son of former NFL linebacker Clay Matthews Jr. and nephew of Hall of Fame offensive lineman Bruce Matthews, has football in his blood. Like Raji, Matthews could see significant playing time in his rookie season.

So who is this “Ted Thompson impersonator,” as Wisconsin State Journal columnist Tom Oates so accurately labeled him after Saturday’s sensible need-based picks?

Well, it’s pretty simple—he’s a man who, perhaps for the first time, realizes that he is in charge of a team that has real problems, and not a team that can sleepwalk its way to the top of the improving NFC North.

When told that his Saturday picks were not met with boos by fans attending the draft party at Lambeau Field, Thompson joked that Packer Nation was getting “soft.” No, Ted, you’re getting smart. You’ve taken a lot of blame lately for questionable decisions. Feel free to take credit for what appears to be two very sound draft picks.

Whereas the Packers had the most solid first day of any NFC North team, they clearly did not make the biggest splash in the division.

The Bears, by virtue of the Jay Cutler trade, and the Lions, by virtue of having the first overall pick, made sure of that.

But it is a much surer bet that—assuming they sign—the Packers will get their money’s worth from Raji and Matthews than the Bears or particularly the Lions will get their money’s worth from their new very expensive franchise quarterbacks.

The Vikings raised many eyebrows by drafting Florida wide receiver Percy Harvin with the 22nd overall pick.

While I join others in questioning Harvin’s maturity level (testing positive for drugs at the NFL combine is beyond stupidity, since players know in advance they will be tested), my main issue with the Vikings’ first-round pick relates to their quarterback situation.

Harvin could well be the finest receiver of this year’s draft class, but if a team doesn’t have a dependable quarterback—and the Vikings don’t—then using a first-round pick on a receiver seems as sound an investment as a high school kid buying a gross of condoms when he has no girlfriend and no prospects.

As long as the Vikings have Tavaris Jackson and Sage Rosenfels as their quarterbacks, they will never see Harvin reach his potential.

It will be interesting to see which if any of the four Badgers drafted will be able to reach their potential in the NFL.

While offensive lineman Kriag Urbik is clearly going to the best team — Pittsburgh — I look for Travis Beckum, if he can stay healthy — to fit in very well with the Giants.

Poor Matt Shaughnessy (Raiders) and DeAndre Levy (Lions), though: Hopefully they can ride out their time with the NFL bottom-feeders and get traded along the line to better teams. Ain’t nobody in the NFL reaching their potential in Oakland and Detroit.