Here we are. The beginning of July. Many have tried predicting when Favre will officially become a Viking, with some even pinpointing the end of this week and most picking anywhere between now and around the middle of the month.
As Tom Curran points out, there are a couple factors dictating when it could happen:
- Chilly's daughter is getting married on Saturday, July 11th -- so you can rule out the end of next week, at the very least. Incidentally, that's the day I'm returning from some traveling (I'll be disappearing from here for the next week), and it would be truly flattering if they held off on an announcement until I got back to a computer. Chilly might obviously want to delay making the Favre acquisition official until the family stuff is out of the way.
- Monday, July 20th is the day single game tickets go on sale. It's easy to see how that could impact the timing of an announcement, as demand for tickets will skyrocket once Favre is officially a Viking.
With those factors taken into consideration, it's prediction time. Here's the question: On which date will Brett Favre officially become a Viking? My prediction: Friday, July 17th. It generates buzz at the right moment for the Vikings, but the circus will have a couple weeks to calm down before the team heads to Mankato.
And besides, any announcement that comes on a Friday will generate less of a media circus than an announcement made earlier in the work week, and I have little doubt the team will try to walk the tightrope between generating buzz to sell jerseys and tickets while avoiding a complete media free-for-all in Winter Park.
Make no mistake about it: If you want Vikings tickets, and the announcement of Favre joining the team is placed close to the 20th, you're gonna need to act fast to score some seats. And I mean fast.
Folks who were predicting July 3rd for the announcement (*cough* Mike Florio *cough*) will probably end up being off by a couple weeks. As much as I'd like Favregeddon to conclude ASAP, it just doesn't make sense from a business standpoint to make an announcement so far in advance of tickets going on sale. But hey, we've made it this far and, for the most part, kept our sanity intact. If it's gonna take another week or two, that's just fine with me.