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Mike Modano facing a Brett Favre decision

Image (1) Modo5-thumb-200x300-9755.jpg for post 1052

While he’s certainly not the NFL superstar that Brett Favre was at the time, Mike Modano could certainly start to draw some comparisons to the this summer to the quarterback. Just a week after the NHL regular season ended, Modano is already answering questions about his decision on retirement and if anything, he’s even more undecided that he was while skating around Minnesota ice with a North Stars jersey on his back.

Talking to reporters on Sunday at Texas Motor Speedway, Modano had this to say about his decision for this summer.

“It’s really hard, I’m really kind of on the fence right now,” he said. “It’s tough. And then you watch some of the playoffs, watch some of those games and it’s like those are the things that you miss.”

Not helping matters is how the Dallas Stars finished their season, missing the playoffs for the second straight year. For a player with as much pride as Modano, this cannot sit well.

“That’s the hard part. You leave on a real bad taste in your mouth about how we played,” Modano said. “That too is a real motivating factor because you hate to end on that type of note. You like to go in the playoffs, make a good run and have some excitement. ... But then you have a type of run like that and you’re like, ‘Hey, let’s do it again next year.’”

So of course, the comparisons to Brett Favre commence and what’s amazing (although not surprising) is how Modano certainly acknowledges how the situations are very similar. “He still feels he can throw and obviously he can,” Modano said. “So I can see why we at this time get real wishy-washy about what we’re going to do.”

Modano has not had injury issues in the later years of his career and while he’s far from the offensive sniper he had been in the 1990’s, he’s still a very capable two-way player with above average speed and an incredibly accurate slapshot. So he likely feels, and I agree, that he has something to add to an NHL team. The Capitals thought so; they were willing to trade for him at the deadline.

Still, Modano has a chance to go out relatively on top. The final two games of the season were incredibly emotional for Modano and the Stars fans and there is no way that another moment like what we witnessed two weeks ago will ever be recreated. Modano can come back, but he runs the risk of being forced into retirement due to injury or another disappointing year.

And the decision may not be entirely up to him. He’s not under contract for next year, and the the Stars have yet to decide on whether to give a contract offer to Modano. The Stars are looking to go younger and have a limited budget to do so. If the Stars decide to move on without Modano, and with the franchise player aiming to become part owner, I doubt he’ll head to another team.