What’s missing from the daily news cycle as the NFL training camps open? The yearly angst about whether Brett Favre will retire or return for another season.

Instead we have been treated to our daily dose of LeBron James ever since he played his final game in the 2010 NBA playoffs.

The King has been the featured daily news hog as a result of his “Decision”, the fallout from it and the ESPN.com article that chronicled his night out in Vegas.

LeBron’s Vegas chronicle pulled by top brass

Brett Favre has been reduced to the size he should have been for the last three years. It’s a story that titillates only once and maybe twice.

For some, the third time is the charm but for news of Brett Favre’s Decision, it is strike three, you’re out. Thank you to all that is holy.

Two years ago we suffered through his retirement, his ugly divorce from Green Bay, a flirtation with their rivals the Minnesota Vikings and his ultimate arrival on the door step of the New York Jets.

Packers finally tell Favre to stay home

Last summer it was the will-he-or-won’t-he sign with the Vikings after a less than triumphant end of season in New York. The daily reports of flights to and from Hattiesburg were spellbinding for some, while others tried to suppress their gag reflexes.

Vikings fans sick of the Favre indecision

The current news on Favre is none. Just the same old photos of him throwing a football to high school students near his home in Mississippi, without it pointing one way or another to his return to the NFL.

He had the necessary surgery he said he wouldn’t undergo if he didn’t intend to return. We’ve been treated to the obligatory orations about him trying to recover enough to help a team again.

Kurt Warner shows Brett Favre how to retire with dignity

What’s new this time, other than the absence of interest in the story, is that his head coach has been honest about it all.

Brad Childress, Vikings head coach said that once Brett leaves home, he’d only need two to three weeks to ready himself to start a new NFL season.

That arrival would have him missing all of training camp and after the pre-season games were already in full swing. Hey, let poor Tavaris Jackson play the meaningless contests, right.

There you have it. Someone who finally gets the drama out of the way and speaks the obvious. The guy doesn’t want to attend training camp. Period.

No one thinks he won’t play again. That is why the silence about his third annual summer drama has been deafening. Been there, done that, more than we ever wanted.

Used with permission of the author.

Paula Duffy is a national sports columnist for Examiner.com and the Huffington Post and regularly comments on sports/legal matters for radio affiliates of ESPN and Fox Sports. She founded the sports information site, Incidental Contact, is the author of a line of audio books designed for sports novices and in her spare time practices law in Los Angeles. 

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