Like other Green Bay Packers in the Pro Football Hall of Fame, kicker Jan Stenerud will be watching Brett Favre’s return to Lambeau Field on Sunday with great interest.

However, there’s one thing that separates him from the rest of his Packers brethren. Stenerud is the only member of the Hall of Fame that has played for both Green Bay and the Minnesota Vikings.

So when Brett Favre is announced to the Lambeau Field congregation in two days, will Stenerud cheer for the NFL’s lightning rod?

“Yes I will,” said Stenerud. “I am for Brett Favre as a professional football player. I am proud of him for what he’s accomplished.”

Stenerud’s allegiance doesn’t necessarily lie with either the Packers or the Vikings, however. He began his career with the Kansas City Chiefs and was a member of their Super Bowl IV winning team, which had a profound impact upon him and his young career at the time. He’s enshrined in Canton, Ohio as a member of the Chiefs.

Even so, he has fond memories from his time spent in both Green Bay and Minneapolis. As a native of Norway, the large Scandinavian population in Minnesota immediately took to the kicker and the fact that he was a “Viking.”  Yet Stenerud also has nothing but good things to say about the fans of the green and gold as well.

“I tell people if they played in the NFL for a long time, and they haven’t played in Green Bay, they missed out on quite an experience,” said Stenerud. “When you hear the term ‘die hard Packer fan,’ you’ve just got to experience it.”

Favre could be next in line to join Stenerud in the Hall of Fame as athletes that have played for both the Packers and the Vikings, but the situation in which they jumped to Minnesota was vastly different.

“I don’t know if I jumped,” explains Stenerud. “I was traded.”

Both players went from playing with the Packers first to suiting up for the Vikings second. But the term “traitor” doesn’t seem to apply to Stenerud in the same way as some might say it aptly describes his quarterbacking counterpart.

Whereas Favre willingly signed with the Vikings, Stenerud had no choice in the matter. Once head coach Bart Starr was fired and Forrest Gregg was hired, the Packers traded the native Norwegian sight unseen by the new coach.

In any case, the mixed reaction Favre is sure to get on Sunday surely won’t compare with the experience Stenerud received his inaugural time playing against the Packers while wearing purple, at least in terms of magnitude.

“The first time I played the Packers (as a member of the Vikings), we played in Milwaukee,” describes Stenerud. “It wasn’t the same as playing in Lambeau. People were nice to me, but the situation was quite different.”

Stenerud will be reuniting with his former coach, Bart Starr, and ex-Vikings safety Paul Krause on Sunday to before the game to serve on a panel discussing the class of 2010 prospects as part of “The Van Heusen Pro Fotball Fall of Fame Fan’s choice Tour” to give fans a voice on the potential inductees.
But once the panel discussion is over and the game begins, Stenerud will stand up and clap his hands for Favre, not necessarily as a member of the Packers or the Vikings, but as a fan of an NFL player that has accomplished so much.