Freeman’s Return Helps Favre Regain Confidence, MVP Form

When wide receiver Antonio Freeman rejoined quarterback Brett Favre in the Green Bay offense last Sunday, Favre, for the first time in a month, performed with the assurance of a most valuable player.

Ten of his 19 pass completions went to Freeman as Green Bay downed Chicago, 28-17.

Only 14 days earlier, Favre had struck bottom, losing at Dallas a week after losing at Kansas City, and, from here to Wisconsin, there were reports that the Packers and their passer had been overrated in October, when they started the season 8-1.

Not so.

What Favre underlined during his brief slump is that no quarterback can do it alone. Injuries had taken out his team’s best two wide receivers, Freeman and Robert Brooks--as well as tight end Mark Chmura--and Favre was narrowly missing on throws to three new targets--three guys running familiar patterns in unfamiliar ways.

And the misses caused Favre to lose confidence.

The same thing had happened to Dallas quarterback Troy Aikman early this season when the Cowboys, minus wide receiver Michael Irvin and tight end Jay Novacek, started 1-3.

Although one thinks of a great NFL quarterback as an automaton, the reality is that he’s one of 11 members of a unit.

It’s not the same as in baseball, where, after losing three Hall of Fame teammates, a great pitcher can still pitch a no-hitter.

Polian’s team: The rise of the Carolina Panthers, who can catch San Francisco for first in the NFL West today if they win at Candlestick Park, has been orchestrated by an able general manager, Bill Polian, whose personnel decisions in Buffalo not long ago helped lift the Bills into four Super Bowls.

Either the Rams or Raiders would still be in Los Angeles now, quite possibly, if either had shown the wisdom to send for Polian when he left Buffalo.

For he is among the few who know what it takes to win in the NFL these days.

The first requirement is tight defense, which can only be played by veterans. Thus, taking advantage of the NFL’s new rules, the Panthers have begun by combining experienced free agents and other imports from established franchises into a strong defensive team.

Also necessary are talented offensive athletes, who in pro ball are rarely recruited other than in the draft. As young men, such athletes can’t do it, of course, but in time they can learn to do it.

So in Carolina, the question, as always in a building situation, is whether the club’s young offensive players are gifted enough. For example, much is riding on the Panthers’ sophomore quarterback, Kerry Collins.

More is riding on Coach Dom Capers, who seems to be a brilliant defensive leader but who, if the Panthers are to win a Super Bowl someday, must also show them that he has a grasp of modern offense.

Surprisingly, Carolina is the only team to have outplayed the 49ers this year. The Panthers, in fact, set the 1996 scoring record against San Francisco with 23 points. In that September game, however, one of the Panthers’ senior citizens, Steve Beuerlein, whom they brought in belatedly as their backup quarterback, had a career day.

On a California field this time, if they’re realistic in Carolina, they’ll expect less.

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NFL sliders: When this season of football comes into perspective a few years hence, it will be realized, no doubt, that more good young quarterbacks were active in 1996 games than some sports fans noticed.

For one, Steve McNair of the Houston Oilers, late of Alcorn State, sidestepped a rush the other day and dispatched a 55-yard pass with less effort than it takes some old pros to throw 25 yards.

As for Ty Detmer, the new Philadelphia quarterback, he has played well and looked good most of the time, win or lose.

Some football people, interested only in the bottom line, hold that that’s impossible. But in late November, as the Eagles went 0-3 against Buffalo, Washington and Arizona, Detmer excelled more often than not, sliding around artistically in the pocket, then throwing accurately.

Of the six playoff favorites in the 15-team NFC, three, Washington, Philadelphia and Carolina, have reached this level with new young quarterbacks, including Gus Frerotte of the Redskins. The others are Detmer and Carolina’s Collins. Conceivably, the NFC’s future belongs to one of them.