NFL

FAVRE JOINING UP WITH GANG GREEN

CLEVELAND – The Jets, making their boldest personnel move in team history, last night acquired Brett Favre in a blockbuster trade with the Packers.

It’s a move that completely alters the face of the Jets franchise and immediately has a chance to make the 2008 season something special. The move gives the Jets their most iconic player since the days of Joe Namath.

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The compensation to the Packers is believed to be a conditional 2009 third or fourth-round draft pick that could become a first- or second-round pick depending on Favre’s performance and the team’s success.

The acquisition of Favre, who is scheduled to make $12.7 million this season, means the end of the Chad Pennington era.

Pennington, who’s due to make $6 million in 2008, is the odd man out as the Jets clear salary cap space, leaving Kellen Clemens as Favre’s backup.

Jets’ GM Mike Tannenbaum last night confirmed that Pennington will no longer be a Jet by the end of the business day today. Pennington is not part of the compensation to the Packers, but he will be released or traded.

Speaking of Pennington, Tannenbaum called this “a bittersweet moment for us,” adding, “We’ve accomplished a lot of great things with Chad. He gave his heart and soul to this organization and I really appreciate everything he’s done.”

Making this transaction even more fascinating is how it came together so quickly in the last couple of days.

The Jets didn’t even speak to Favre until Tuesday and Tannenbaum even conceded his “gut” feeling was that the deal would never “come to fruition.”

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“I never thought it was alive,” Tannenbaum said. “We had a cursory monitoring situation going on for a number of days. We put an oar in the water and things heated up really quickly.”

Interestingly, Tannenbaum said the Jets are taking things with the wishy-washy Favre “one year at a time,” indicating that the team has not gotten any commitment from Favre beyond 2008.

“We’re going into this just taking things season by season,” he said. “We’re really happy to have him for this season and we’ll move forward from there.”

Jets owner Woody Johnson said, “I am looking forward to seeing Brett Favre in a New York Jets uniform. He represents a significant addition to this franchise, and reflects our commitment to putting the best possible product on the field.”

The Jets’ stunning acquisition of Favre makes them matter again on the New York football landscape, where the Giants have always owned the city – particularly now as defending Super Bowl champions.

The Jets spent more than $140 million in the offseason on new talent to bolster a team that went 4-12 in 2007. Among the offseason work the Jets did was revamp the offensive line with the signings of LG Alan Faneca and RT Damien Woody.

Those signings surely were attractive to Favre.

So, too, was a conversation he had with coach Eric Mangini on Tuesday night during which Mangini gave Favre the hard sell on why coming to New York was the move for him to make.

Mangini told Favre of the team’s new state-of-the-art practice facility that the Jets will move into in September. He informed him of the attractive rural places to live in New Jersey near the team’s Florham Park (N.J.) facility. He, too, emphasized the fact that playing in New York could be a huge marketing and promotional opportunity for him.

The Jets, too, would love to think the addition of Favre will soften the blow to season ticket holders who will have to pay those personal-seat licenses in the new stadium that will open in 2010.

No. 4 jerseys in Jets’ green should become a hot item. They already were on sale on the team’s Web site as of late last night.

For days, there had been rampant speculation that the Buccaneers would be the landing place for Favre since he knows Tampa Bay coach Jon Gruden and because the Bucs use the west-coast offense. But the Jets were more aggressive.

Favre, 39 on Oct. 10, is coming off one of his best seasons in 2007, throwing for 4,155 passing yards, 28 TDs, 15 INTs and career-highs in both completion percentage (66.5 percent) and yards per attempt (7.8).

He led the Packers to a 13-3 record and to the NFC Championship Game, where they were suffered a 23-20 overtime loss to the Giants.

This is a compelling full-circle story since the Jets, back in 1991, were about to draft Favre when the Falcons swooped in and picked him right before the Jets’ pick.

mark.cannizzaro@nypost.com