In a debate about whether this state's professional football team should take a flier on a certain high-risk, yet highly talented player, just tell the skeptic he's straight rash, homies.
Media and some fans alike are, in some strictly sporting sense, going randy over Randy.
It's a quite different situation from a couple years ago, when Moss performed perhaps the most lurid public pantomime Wisconsin has ever seen at Lambeau Field.
But it really is time to let bygones be bygones. Randy Moss is open for the taking, and the Packers need to pursue this option for all its worth.
Reportedly, he's persona non grata in Oakland. At the recent NFL combine, Raiders' executives were saying he was not expected back in the Bay Area, for predictable reasons â_ he's taking plays off, conducting himself in manner detrimental to the team and not keeping himself in the greatest shape.
That's far from saying that he can't take off on a respectable team with a Hall of Fame quarterback, in another bay area.
If the organization in Green Bay wants to get anything out of the final years of the Brett Favre era, it will do precisely what the team's elder statesman has expressed interest to his agent in: making a pitch for Moss.
Tempestuous, immature, wayward, inconsistent â_"" all describe him. Yet he would fill the conspicuously open spot where the playmaker goes on this team and give Favre a sorely needed second throwing option.
The NFL's trading season opens today, and it would only be appropriate for general manager Ted Thompson to put Oakland owner Al Davis on speed dial. One circulating rumor has Green Bay offering Aaron Rogers, but that won't fly. With the first pick in the draft, and Oakland all but starting over, they probably have eyes for JaMarcus Russell.
The best bet is for Thompson to offer a third-round draft pick, or even a second-rounder if it's the dealbreaker. He's operating with a grand sense of leverage because there's virtually no chance that a black and silver jersey is given to Moss next season.
Any deal would also be conditioned on the wideout negotiating a restructured contract. As it stands now, his contract, which owes him $9.75 million in 2007 and $11.25 million in 2008, would be too onerous for the Packers.
Whatever the investment, Green Bay would lay claim to an all-pro player who has shown the team firsthand how he can influence events over the course of a game. On offense, the closest player the Packers have fitting that description â_"" excluding Favre, who can only do so much â_"" is Donald Driver, who exceeds Moss in heart, but not ability.
Packers fans best remember him for an infamous stunt he pulled in the playoffs in early 2005. After scoring a decisive touchdown at Lambeau, he feigned pulling down his pants and mooning the crowd. That drew a $10,000 fine from the NFL, and his widely publicized response to a reporter that rich people paid not with checks, but with ""straight cash, homie.""
How he would pay dividends to the Packers? It's a question worth answering.
