As NFL Nation nurses its collective Brett Favre hangover, a certain reality returns to remind one and all of the transient nature of sports. Not only are things sure to change, but they also can change dramatically.
If Brett Favre was Lou Gehrig to Don Majkowski's Wally Pipp, then Aaron Rodgers is Babe Dahlgren.
Dahlgren was the player who had the awkward obligation of stepping in at first base when illness forced Gehrig from the New York Yankees' lineup in spring 1939.
Filling in for legends is always uncomfortable business. And for every time a Mickey Mantle trots out to replace a Joe DiMaggio in center field, you have scores more instances where a Lou Gehrig is replaced by a Babe Dahlgren. Dahlgren had more than 1,000 hits and a .261 batting average in 12 major league seasons, but let's face it: If he's remembered at all, it's for his name on a lineup card in May 1939.
As part of Favre's departure, the conventional wisdom has been that the Green Bay Packers will be OK, based on Rodgers' pedigree as a first-round draft pick and a pretty good performance against the Dallas Cowboys in a Thursday night game in November in relief of Favre. But really, the Packers might be lucky if Rodgers even turns out to be as dependable as Dahlgren. The replacement first baseman sure wasn't a star, but he was usually fit for duty after replacing Gehrig for the Yankees.
In contrast, Rodgers, despite being shielded from the NFL's fury for most of his three seasons, has already had two injuries that would have forced him to miss starts. In a cameo appearance against the New England Patriots in 2006, he suffered a broken foot that put him on injured reserve. Then last year, after relieving Favre in that game against the Cowboys, he injured a hamstring that forced him to be inactive in the weeks immediately after the Dallas loss.
It might not be fair to call the guy fragile yet, but you do have to wonder.
So if Rodgers' luck doesn't get a whole lot better, who's the next man up?
The name is Craig Nall.
Originally a fifth-round pick of Green Bay in 2002, Nall has wandered from the Scottish Claymores of the defunct NFL Europa to the Buffalo Bills and Houston Texans before he wound up back with the Packers. The good news is he has thrown five touchdown passes during his itinerant NFL career; the more sobering footnote is that four of them were in 2004 mop-up duty.
Maybe Rodgers will play the next 10 seasons with distinction and without incident, but, well, his history suggests otherwise. And so that's how life can be in sports. For the moment, if Rodgers slips on a banana peel, you go from Brett Favre to Craig Nall.
Just ... like ... that.
bill.ordine@baltsun.com