Finally! He's gone!
Beginning with his third season as a starting quarterback, Brett Favre's Green Bay Packers defeated the Bears 18 times in 20 games from 1994-2003, and he was 22-10 lifetime in the NFL's most storied rivalry.
So, in many ways, Favre's Tuesday retirement is a good thing for the Bears -- almost too good to be true.
"I think this announcement comes about 17 years too late, and I don't know if I will completely believe it until Green Bay opens the season without No. 4 lining up under center," Bears coach Lovie Smith said. "In all seriousness, no one has given more to our game than Brett Favre."
The Bears-Packers rivalry won't be the same without Favre, even though it became terribly one-sided in his heyday. Win or lose, it always was a challenge for the Bears to contain Favre, who threw 53 TD passes against them while completing 62 percent of his passes for 7,660 yards.
"Even though you hate to play against him, it's bittersweet because you love the fact that you can say that you've played against this guy," defensive end Adewale Ogunleye said. "But I'm not saying I want him to come back because last year he still played at a phenomenal level."
Even before taking over as Bears head coach in 2004, Smith had plenty of experience coaching against Favre, including three years as St. Louis Rams defensive coordinator before he came to Chicago and five years as Tampa Bay Bucs linebackers coach before that.
"I have spent the better part of my NFL coaching career working on game plans to beat him," Smith said. "There is no player I respect more. He is one of the all-time greats to ever play in the NFL. He was a tremendous leader and the ultimate competitor on Sundays."
Smith's players also hold Favre in high regard, even though they got the better of him recently, intercepting him 13 times in their last six meetings while he threw just 2 touchdown passes.
"I have a lot of respect for the guy," linebacker Hunter Hillenmeyer said. "The guy is a first-ballot Hall of Famer. The list of great things he's done goes on and on. It makes it that much more fun to play against him."
The challenge of playing against Favre twice a year is something a lot of Bears will miss, but it's something they'll probably talk about for a long time.
"I can tell my kids that I played against Brett Favre; that I've beaten Brett Favre," Ogunleye said last season. "You never know what you're going to get out of him. He's just a general; he's a leader. I like the way he operates on the field."
Favre's retirement came as a surprise to many, considering that he enjoyed one of the most productive seasons of his 17-year career in 2007.
He completed a personal-best 66.5 percent of his passes, tied for second in the NFC with 28 TD passes and finished second with a 95.7 passer rating, his third-best mark ever. His 442 career touchdown passes, 61,655 passing yards and 253 consecutive starts are NFL records for a quarterback.
"You have to take your hat off to him," said Smith, who as the Bears' coach was victorious in six of his eight meetings with Favre. "He's done about everything that you can do in the National Football League."
The Bears defeated Favre and the Packers in both 2007 meetings, and the NFL's only three-time MVP was picked off four times, while throwing just 1 TD pass. But he played well enough against the rest of the league to be voted to his ninth Pro Bowl.
"To me, he's like the godfather of the league," Bears defensive tackle Tommie Harris said last season. "He knows all the little things to do, all the secrets. It's all second nature to him. It's like breathing."