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Spreading the Word Is No Secret in the N.F.L.

By JUDY BATTISTA In the N.F.L.'s version of phone-a-friend, the calls start on Monday, coach to coach, player to player, trolling for the subtleties of a game plan -- a code word here, a tendency there -- that only a trusted colleague would share. It is the sort of conversation Brett Favre had with the former Detroit Lions president Matt Millen a few weeks ago, one that began with hunting talk, only to turn -- as Favre suspected it would -- into a fishing expedition for information about his old team. Favre's chat with Millen, depending on which version one believes, might have been brief and cursory or lengthy and detailed. But more than anything, it was entirely common and wholly within the rules. The controversy in which Favre found himself last week -- had he turned on the Green Bay Packers by telling Millen what he remembered about how they had attacked the Lions in previous games? -- was met largely with a shrug from around the N.F.L. But it pulled back the curtain on a widely practiced slice of the football culture that does not just accept the casual trading of information, but encourages it. "Every team that you play against, your friends who play for other teams are like: 'Hey, tell me about this. Tell me about that. This defense, how does it run its scheme? Do they tip it?' " Washington Redskins running back Shaun Alexander said. "That's what happens. It's like advance scouting. You do the best scouting through your friends." It may seem incongruous that in the most paranoid of sports, where coaches cover their mouths to thwart those trying to lip-read their plays and security personnel sweep hotel rooms to check for an opponent's forgotten playbook, sharing of trade secrets is embraced. What set Favre's chat apart is that he did not tell his new team, the Jets, inside information about the Packers -- that is practically a daily occurrence in the N.F.L. -- but instead told a division rival of the Packers, giving the exchange a whiff of betrayal by the quarterback scorned. But the N.F.L. is an exclusive fraternity, and even if there were an outcry to stop sharing -- there is not -- it would take a ban on conversations between close friends to halt the practice.

Full post as published by The Trade Secrets Vault on October 25, 2008 (boomark / email).