That Green Bay’s Brett Favre almost pulled a comeback out of his hat amidst a 5 INT day with a botched fake-spike ala Marino finale either says something about his being a gutsy gamer, one of the all-time greats, guh-guh-guh-guh-guh….or perhaps the reality is that sans Ahmad Green, the ’05 Pack really suck and Favre ought retire. From the Cincinatti Enquirer’s Paul Daughtery.

The Bengals beat Green Bay on Sunday because Favre™s skills and Favre™s supporting cast are no longer a perfect match for his forever-brash mentality.

Credit Cincinnati™s ball-aware linebackers and secondary. Rookie Odell Thurman swiped two passes. Deltha O™Neal took two more. Props to the entire defense, which, as offensive tackle Willie Anderson noted, œplayed their tails off today.

Favre helped. His appearance at Paul Brown Stadium was equal parts swan song and swan dive. The quarterback who never knows when to say when tried to make some impossible throws. All it cost him was five interceptions, including four in four possessions. In a 21-14 game, that was the difference.

Either that, or it was the fan who ran across the field with 28 seconds left, swiped the ball from an astonished Favre™s hand, and sprinted some 60 yards to the opposite 15-yard line. Cops stopped him there and buried him in a pile. If you get in the red zone, you have to score. Everybody knows that.

In the closing moments, helped by a ridiculous pass interference call, Favre moved the Packers from his 5-yard line to the Cincinnati 28, with no timeouts remaining. As bad as Favre had been to that point, he appeared poised to be Superman once more.

The Bengals have been good at beating the teams they™re supposed to beat. As coach Marvin Lewis put it, œWe™ve taken care of business when we had to.

They did it again Sunday, beating the overmatched and undermanned Favres, who live and (mostly) die on Favre™s audacity.

He™s still fun to watch, though. Then again, so was the fan on the field.

œThe 12th man, Robinson called him, jokingly. œIt takes that kind of effort to win.

Added Chad Johnson: œI might streak next week.