Favre Taken Out of His Comfort Zone

No matter how good they are, the Green Bay Packers just can’t seem to play well in the Metrodome.

Brett Favre threw for only 169 yards against Minnesota’s poor pass defense a week after shredding one of the NFL’s top defenses, while counterpart Daunte Culpepper threw for one score and ran for another in the Vikings’ 35-13 victory Sunday.

It was the Packers’ worst regular-season loss in eight years.

“We’ll find out if we’re as good as we think we are,” Favre said. “If we play like today, we’ll be home for the playoffs.”

Minnesota (3-3), which entered the game ranked 29th in the league against the pass, won for the eighth time in its last 10 home games against Green Bay (4-2).

Favre completed 21 of 35 passes with two touchdowns and an interception. Most of the yards, though, came in the fourth quarter with Green Bay far behind. It was strikingly different from his performance last week in a 31-23 victory over visiting Baltimore, when Favre went 27 of 34 for 337 yards with three touchdowns.

Culpepper was 18 for 27 for 184 yards passing and ran nine times for 70 yards. The rushing touchdown was his fifth of the season. Doug Chapman, subbing for the injured Michael Bennett, had the best game this year by a Viking running back--90 yards in 22 carries.

The Packers, even with the help of two first-quarter fumbles by the Vikings, were terrible in the first half. Ahman Green had four yards in eight carries.

Favre and Green were frustrated by a bigger Viking defensive line that included the recently acquired Stalin Colinet at end and Fred Robbins playing most of the snaps at nose tackle.

Favre, in the shotgun much of the half, twice had to retrieve errant snaps deep in his backfield.

“He wasn’t comfortable,” Viking defensive end Lance Johnstone said. “He made some bad decisions.”

Backpedaling in his own end zone late in the first quarter, Favre threw the ball directly to Kailee Wong, who returned the interception 27 yards for his first career touchdown and a 14-0 Viking lead.

Gary Anderson kicked two field goals in the final four minutes of the half to give the Vikings a 20-0 halftime lead.

After nearly blowing a 31-6 lead in last week’s win over Detroit, the Vikings put the game away with a 14-play, 73-yard drive that took 9:34 off the clock. Jim Kleinsasser muscled his way into the end zone from two yards out to make it 35-7.

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Doomsday at the ‘Dome

Brett Favre’s record at the Metrodome dropped to 2-8 with Sunday’s loss:

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Date Att. Comp. Yds. Pct. TDs Int. Score Sunday 35 21 169 60.0 2 1 L, 35-13 12/17/00 38 26 290 68.4 3 0 W, 33-28 12/20/99 39 22 229 56.4 0 2 L, 24-20 11/22/98 39 31 303 79.5 2 1 L, 28-14 12/01/97 29 15 196 51.7 1 0 W, 27-11 09/22/96 27 14 198 51.9 2 1 L, 30-21 11/05/95 30 17 177 56.7 0 2 L, 27-24 10/20/94 10 6 32 60.0 0 1 L, 13-10 09/26/93 31 20 150 64.5 0 2 L, 15-13 12/27/92 35 23 187 65.7 0 3 L, 27-7

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