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Folks tend to forget football players are people, too.

That's why it's interesting watching the contrasting seasons of Drew Brees in San Diego and Matt Hasselbeck in Seattle. Both are quarterbacks in the final year of their contract. Brees entered the Chargers' season with his career at a crossroads. Hasselbeck entered the Seahawks' season with nothing but optimism.

However, roles have switched. Brees has been every bit the Pro Bowl quarterback Hasselbeck was last season, and Hasselbeck is struggling mightily. While Brees was considered to be an inaccurate quarterback last season, his stats have since improved. He's gone from completing 57.6 percent of his passes to 64.7. His touchdown to interception ratio rose from 11-15 to 21-4. His quarterback rating soared from 67.5 to 103.1.

Hasselbeck's season has been the opposite. He's gone from a 61 percent thrower to 55.6. After throwing 26 touchdowns and having 15 interceptions last season, Hasselbeck has 15 touchdown passes and 11 interceptions this year. His quarterback rating fell from 88.8 to 78.4.

Much of the explanation could be linked to how players react in the final year of their contracts. Brees has excelled in San Diego despite the belief that he did not have a long-term future with the club. Hasselbeck, thought to be the team's long-term answer at quarterback, hasn't fared as well.

That's where the people part of being a football player comes in. Football is a macho sport. Its core is based on physical and emotional toughness. Because players perform on the field wearing a helmet and appear faceless, outsiders tend to assume they'll all handle the circumstances in the same way.

They don't. And there isn't anything wrong with that. Football is not like baseball in the sense of the guarantees of the sport. Baseball players in the final years of contracts can be fearless. The threats of career-ending injuries aren't as severe in baseball. Big seasons translate into big contracts. The Red Sox won a World Series with a bunch of players having career seasons in the final year of their contracts.

The NFL is different. The nature of the sport is year-to-year. Guaranteed contracts are rare. In fact, the only guarantees a player usually negotiates is the signing bonus or an option bonus, and sometimes, the player has to sweat through the first year of the contract to collect the second-year option bonus.

Injuries can end careers quickly, too. Because general managers have to have a businesslike attitude in dealing with contracts, players have to have the same mentality, which is tough.

Hasselbeck is the leader of a Seahawks offense that ranked in the top seven overall the previous two years. Despite this year's struggles through a disappointing 6-6 season, the Seahawks are eighth. Hasselbeck is a noted leader in the locker room and makes sure a majority players work out at the team facility to promote comradery. Plus, he's good. His brain is sharp in making reads. He understands defenses and can make impromptu plays. He's mobile. His arm strength is good.

Seahawks ownership, however, only did lip service to getting a long-term contract completed for Hasselbeck. For a while, he was pretty much willing to sign for around $7.5 million to $8 million a year. The Seahawks thought they were nearing a deal until Chad Pennington of the Jets reached a seven-year, $64.2 million contract extension this summer.

By the way, those who knew Pennington knew he would be negatively affected by having to deal with the uncertainty of going through a contract year. In fact, his agent, Tom Condon, had a hard time getting Pennington to think about doing the extension because he was trying to just focus on the preseason and training camp. Now that the quarterback has financial security, Pennington and the Jets are having a 9-3 season, and there are no questions.

Hasselbeck, on the other hand, has been a mess and part of it has to be because of the contract. When the leader of an offense isn't sure about his long-term future with the team, it's tough to completely concentrate. Long-term financial security is at stake. He's a family man and it's hard to lead a team when the player wonders where he stands.

But again, not everyone handles the situation the same. Shaun Alexander, the Seahawks' featured back, has had a career year with 1,273 yards. Left tackle Walter Jones has been handling one-year franchise contract deals by responding with Pro Bowl seasons. But for every Alexander and Jones, there are the Chris Hovans and Kendrell Bells of the NFL world.

Hovan looked at playing the last year of his Vikings contract as a bad sign. He's struggled all season and now finds himself on the inactive list because of his poor play. Bell, the Steelers' playmaking inside linebacker, worried about a groin injury that turned out to be a sports hernia. Knowing he risked re-injury by rushing back too soon, Bell took the stand of not playing until he was totally healthy, a long process that probably triggered the end of his Steelers days. As it turned out, Bell came back and still re-injured the hernia.

This brings us to Brees. Few have handled a bad situation as well as Brees. The Chargers couldn't wait to run him out of San Diego after last season. They drafted Philip Rivers and had the rookie not held out a week longer than he should in camp, Brees would be a backup this season or maybe playing for another team.

Brees never doubted himself. He blocked out the criticism. He blocked out the Rivers scenario. His competition was more internal than external. He competed against himself to improve

"I had to be patient," Brees said. "We couldn't win the Super Bowl last February. I didn't listen to all the stuff swimming around about another quarterback. It's one of those things where I took everything serious."

Brees reflected on his entire career during this offseason. He remembered in high school suffering a knee injury that required six months of rehab. That injury temporarily halted phone calls from recruiters. He bounced back and ended up at Purdue.

	Drew Brees Quarterback San Diego Chargers Profile
	2004 SEASON STATISTICS Att Comp PaTD RuTD Int Rat 340 220 21 2 4 103.1

Brees remembered a two-interception game at Purdue which resulted in a loss and the feeling that the world was against him. He also reflected on getting pulled when he was having a bad game against the Bears last year.

"I knew he was coming over to tell me he was putting Doug Flutie in," Brees said. "In the past, I would fight it until the end trying to tell him to keep me in there. I just looked at him straight in the eye and said, 'I understand.' I felt a little helpless. I felt I was doing everything I could and it wasn't working."

That was the low point of Brees' NFL career, but he looks at the experience as growth.

"It seems like this has happened to me at every level of my football career," Brees said. "Something bad has to happen, and you have to fight through it. If you are sitting on top, sitting through it and having gone through it, it makes you stronger as a player and a person."

Brees doesn't know whether he will be a Charger next year. The Chargers could give him the one-year franchise tag or let him hit free agency. Either is fine with him although he would lean toward staying because of the bonds developed with his teammates.

The Chargers quarterback was open and emotional after beating the Broncos last week.

"I learned you can't look too far ahead," Brees said. "It's just like this offseason. I took it one day at a time. I never knew which day was going to be my last. There were talks of me being traded and everything else in the offseason. You didn't know. You can't worry about any of that stuff. Before you know it, here you are."

Figure Brees to be emotionally drained after this season. He survived the pressure-cooker of being in a one-year situation and set himself up well for the future. It doesn't always work out that way in NFL, the Not For Long league.

John Clayton is a senior writer for ESPN.com.