Transcript of general manager Mike Tannenbaum’s conference call with the media after the Jets acquisition of QB Brett Favre:<\/p>\n
Opening Statements<\/strong><\/p>\n Thank you for everyone\u2019s patience and to be available at this rare time. It\u2019s just how things unfolded here. We acquired Brett Favre from Green Bay. He will be a member of the team. I had a quick conversation with Brett. It was a good conversation. We\u2019re excited about it and we\u2019re glad he is on the team. We\u2019ll have more transactions to announce as it affects Chad (Pennington) and Chad\u2019s situation. I\u2019ll have more comments about that tomorrow. We just felt like this was an opportunity for us to go get someone of Brett\u2019s stature and what he\u2019s accomplished. Woody [Johnson], Eric [Mangini] and I felt that it was in the best interest of the team.<\/p>\n When the opportunity presented itself, we felt it was the right move for us to make and we went ahead and did it. On specific concerns Favre may have had on the move to New York\u2026<\/strong> On if Pennington is involved in a trade\u2026<\/strong> On his exact words taking it one year at a time on the commitment he gave\u2026<\/strong> On the first time he spoke to him directly\u2026<\/strong> Yesterday\u2026<\/strong> On if there was a presentation made where he had to try and sell Favre on the benefits on trying to come to the Jets\u2026<\/strong> On how this has played out through the past days\u2026<\/strong> On if there was a time when you thought the deal was dead\u2026<\/strong> Transcript of general manager Mike Tannenbaum’s conference call with the media after the Jets acquisition of QB Brett Favre: Opening Statements Thank you for everyone\u2019s patience and to be available at this rare time. It\u2019s just how things unfolded here. We acquired Brett Favre from Green Bay. He will be a member of the team. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[213],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1430","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-jet-news"},"acf":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/peLffi-n4","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1430","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1430"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1430\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1430"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1430"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1430"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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\nOn if the Jets are concerned with QB Brett Favre\u2019s commitment to the team\u2026<\/strong>
\nWe had discussions with him (Favre) and his agent Bus Cook. We would like to thank him (Cook) for all of his help. We\u2019re going into this and we\u2019re just going to take things one year at a time. We\u2019re excited to have Brett on the team for this year. We felt like it was an opportunity that presented itself. I was looking back the other day and going back a few years to 1998 \u2014 Vinny Testaverde was on the streets for 22 days before we actually signed him. This was just a situation that we were monitoring and then when we felt like there was an opportunity. We thought it was the right thing for us to do, to go after Brett. We felt like he could help us at the quarterback position. We looked at the situation and where we were and what we thought he could do for us. We went ahead and made the trade.
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\nOn what the Jets said to Favre to ease his mind on the move to New York\u2026<\/strong>
\nWe\u2019ve had multiple discussions with Brett, his representative, Bus Cook, and his family. Organizationally we talked to him and had a number of conversations. We\u2019re already at the start of training camp and there were obviously some concerns. We had multiple conversations, but we got to a spot where we felt comfortable with things. We talked through the issues and realized that we would be heading into this together. We\u2019re excited that he\u2019s here. It did take a lot of good communication. I really appreciate the effort a lot of people in our building did to help to get this done. I really appreciate Bus and Brett listening and discussing things and just keep talking things through.<\/p>\n
\nHe\u2019s coming to a new city. He\u2019s been in one system for 16 years. There aren\u2019t a lot of connections with Brett and our coaching staff, but we were able to talk through moving to the northeast and all those other issues. We feel really good about it and we\u2019re excited that he\u2019s with us.
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\nOn if this is the end of the era for Chad Pennington\u2026<\/strong>
\nIt\u2019s a bittersweet moment for us. I have not had the opportunity to talk to Chad as of this call. I know Eric has and I just have all the respect in the world for Chad as a person and a player. We have accomplished a lot great things with Chad including winning playoff games, which is very hard to do, and he gave his heart and sole to this organization for a long, long time. I really appreciate everything he has done. Like I said, we will have more to say about that tomorrow just with the way transactions are processed where we have a little bit more work to do with the league before four o\u2019clock tomorrow. We are not completely done with the other things we have to do with the league, but just from a personal and professional standpoint I have all the respect in the world for Chad. Like I said, we will have more to say in a few hours on that.
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\nOn confirming Pennington will no longer be with the team\u2026<\/strong>
\nYes, unless something unforeseen happens. That looks like where we are going but again I have not had that conversation Chad. Eric has had that conversation, so that\u2019s really where we are.<\/p>\n
\nNo, no he is not. I appreciate your (clarification). It\u2019s a separate transaction, but we will have a separate transaction involving Pennington before 4 o\u2019clock tomorrow. We are not quite there yet.<\/p>\n
\nAgain, I would keep our conversations private on that except to say that we are taking things season-by-season. We are really happy to have him for the season and we will move forward from there.<\/p>\n
\nI don\u2019t know exactly but it was pretty recent.<\/p>\n
\nI am not sure exactly but something like that.<\/p>\n
\nWell, I wouldn\u2019t say presentation. I think it was just more communication. I did have some conversations with his agent, very minor ones. Again going back to the Vinny Testaverde situation \u2014 Testaverde was on the streets for a long time and then it was just a situation that presented itself and in the last 24 hours things changed. I am just fortunate to work with a lot of great and talented people in this building that help put this together and they did a great job. We did have an opportunity to talk to Favre recently and talk through the challenges collectively we would have, and we got to a spot to where we were all comfortable.<\/p>\n
\nI have probably read most of what you have read as well. I am not sure all of it is completely accurate or not, but again we again were monitoring the situation for lack of a better word. When the opportunity presented itself, I just felt like it\u2019s something we had to take a real long look at. My gut feeling, for a long time, I just didn\u2019t think was going to come to fruition. Then it really heated up recently. I just think organizationally the only part of the process we control is preparation and we had a lot of great preparation, so if and when that opportunity presented itself we were ready to roll. When it did, we moved quick.<\/p>\n
\nReally we had a cursory monitoring situation going on for a number of days. Very akin to 1998, it was June of \u201998. I remember coach Bill Parcells saying we’ll reach out to Mike Azzarelli and don\u2019t tell anybody. I did that and then it went away for a week or two, and then kind of rekindled and we ust kind of put an oar in the water. Then things finally just heated up real quick in here at the end, but again it\u2019s because of a lot of great talented people I work with that we were prepared so we could move quickly.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"