Sports Radio Interviews

Brad Childress On Favre: “He can still gun it when he needs to gun it and can still throw the football down the field when he wants to throw it down the field.”

After Sunday’s action, there are now just five undefeated teams in the National Football League. One of those five teams, the Minnesota Vikings, will square off against divisional foe Green Bay on Monday Night Football with first place in the NFC North at stake. The big storyline of course is Brett Favre playing against his former team the Packers. Favre insists that he doesn’t have revenge on his mind, but knowing what we do about Favre and his flair for the dramatic – not to mention his propensity for flip-flopping – it’s hard to believe that he won’t be trying extra hard to deliver against his former team.  But no matter what the Monday Night Football crew says about Favre – and no doubt he will be the center of attention – this game is bigger than Favre and his remarkable story. It’s an early season game to keep pace in the NFC North featuring two teams that have looked very good for the better part of three weeks, but have also shown they’ve got plenty of work left to do if they hope to accomplish more than just contending for a playoff berth. Vikings head coach knows that, and he said as much when he joined NFL Now with Mike Francesca on WFAN in New York.

On how a win like last week’s can really energize a team:

“Well it does. We just got off the practice field, you need to make sure you package that energy and hold on to it until Monday. And that’s always the grind through Sundays because everybody else plays, and then sitting around on Monday, but you know you want to hold on to that energy.”

On how his team has kept its head and focused during this exciting week leading up to the game:

“Well you know, we’ve got a pretty good bunch of veteran guys. And as Brett has said, it’s not as if he hasn’t played against other coaches before, whether it’s Mariucci or Holmgren or against Andy before, so he’s kind of been to that movie before, albeit not that team. So he’ll recognize some of the faces but he’s got a pretty even keel about him.”

On how Favre’s playing and if he has tried to keep some of his gun-slinger mentality under control:

“Yeah you know, I don’t want to coach any of that out of him. I like the way he competes. I think he’s been great with the ball so far. We could probably take the wraps off that game manager adjective that we didn’t want to say in the first two or three games. He can still gun it when he needs to gun it and can still throw the football down the field when he wants to throw it down the field. But I think he’s playing very well within the system right now.”

Listen here to Childress on WFAN in New York

Tags: Brad Childress, Brett Favre plays Packers for first time, Monday Night Football, Vikings vs. Packers