Childress and Favre make up following spat

EDEN PRAIRIE, Minn. (AP) — Brett Favre and Brad Childress enjoyed quite the honeymoon in their first three months together in Minnesota.

The coach coaxed the quarterback out of retirement to play for the Vikings, picking the 40-year-old up from the airport and personally chauffeuring him to team headquarters to sign a contract in August.

Favre responded with some of the best football of his life to help the Vikings to a 10-1 start, piling up touchdowns and victories that helped Childress secure a long-term contract extension.

A day after their first public spat, Childress said he was only thinking about Favre’s safety against a ferocious Carolina pass rush when he considered pulling him from the game Sunday night with a one-point lead in the third quarter.

“I’m watching, and I said, ‘Hey, you know what? I’m thinking about taking you out of the game here,” Childress said on Monday. “I mean, you’re getting your rear end kicked.’ Through not a lot of fault of his own.”

After their second alarming performance on national television in three weeks led to a 26-7 loss to the lowly Panthers, Favre was asked about an animated exchange he had in the third quarter with Childress with the Vikings clinging to a 7-6 lead.

“Yeah, there was a heated discussion, I guess you would call it,” Favre said after the game. “We were up 7-6 at the time. No secret, I was getting hit a little bit. I felt the pressure on a lot of plays. We had seven points. So I think everyone in the building was like, ‘They’re not moving the ball, they’re not getting points.’ Brad wanted to go in a different direction and I wanted to stay in the game.”

Favre remained in the game and finished 17 of 27 for 224 yards with no touchdowns and an interception as the Vikings missed a chance to put some pressure on New Orleans for the top seed in the NFC.

Childress said he didn’t consider it a “heated discussion,” but rather “a stream of consciousness” that Favre did not take well in the heat of the moment.