The Minnesota Vikings had just finished their dissection of Cincinnati’s stingy defense when coach Brad Childress was asked for his assessment of Brett Favre’s performance.

“I thought he did a nice job,” Childress said after the 30-10 victory over the Bengals. “Had this been 13 weeks earlier, you would say he is a game manager.”

That was Childress’s playful jab at the people — analysts, fans or even other NFL teams — who figured Favre would be focusing on short, safe throws and mostly moving out of the way while Adrian Peterson sped through the line this season. For a 40-year-old who just had surgery on his throwing arm joining a team that prefers a run-first approach, that was a reasonable assumption.

Favre sure started that way, attempting only 21 passes in the opening win over Cleveland while Peterson plowed through the defense for 180 yards and three touchdowns, both season highs for him.

By the third week, though, Favre was already airing it out. He had to when the Vikings fell behind San Francisco and faced an 80-yard drive with 89 seconds left. They needed a laser-like, out-of-the-pocket throw by their ageless quarterback into the end zone from 32 yards in the final seconds to cap the winning march.

Favre attempted 46 passes in that game and hit 50 a month later in the team’s first loss, at Pittsburgh. When Chicago refused to give Peterson any room on Thanksgiving weekend, Favre threw 48 times. In defeat at Arizona, clearly the worst game by both him and the Vikings this year, he had 45 attempts. Totaling 12 touchdowns without a turnover, Favre fueled four November victories while Peterson had trouble finding space.

The crux of the situation is this: With 27 touchdown passes and the NFL’s lowest interception percentage among quarterbacks with the proper amount of attempts, Favre has zinged the ball up and down the field better and more often than almost any observer could have predicted.