Brett Favre's average per rush this season is 0.8 yards, well below his career average of 3.5. John Biever/Sports Illustrated

It was a rather stunning pronouncement to make, and it nearly slid by me while I was watching the Green Bay-Detroit Thanksgiving Day game because I was messing with my charts or something. Cris Collinsworth, one of the analysts on Fox's No.1 team, said that the Lions' defensive coordinator, Kurt Schottenheimer, had told him that "we want to get the ball into No.4's hands."

Now this is Brett Favre we're talking about, a future Hall of Fame quarterback, and even if an opposing defensive coach might think his skills are declining, it's the kind of thing he wouldn't usually spread around. But it didn't sound the least bit arrogant to me. It sounded logical. The Green Bay offense had become a storming, thrashing ground attack featuring not one but three effective runners. Favre merely had become an adjunct to it.

All you had to do was look at the numbers the Packers put up in the three games preceding the Detroit contest -- 241 yards on the ground to Favre's 14 completions for 109 yards in the loss to the Eagles; 190 rushing yards to Favre's 92 on 13 completions in the win over the Bucs; and in the victory over San Francisco the lopsided figures read 48 rushes for 243 yards compared to Favre's meager 10 of 15 completions for 138 yards. OK, you might lay it off on his injured thumb, but in just about every game during this period, and I saw all of them, every time he uncorked one of his sizzlers, whether it found its mark or not, the TV announcer would say, "You think there's something wrong with his thumb? Well, I guess that answers that question."

Schottenheimer, it turns out, was right. The Lions' front seven looked as if they were playing in a different gear than the guys trying to block them as they crashed the Packers' front and cut off the running game before it got started -- and, yes, forced the Pack to put the ball in Favre's hands. Those hands served up three interceptions and dropped the ball another time, which set up a field goal. A terrible game for the QB.

What still bugged me, though, was the fact that Schottenheimer had gone public with something that is painfully obvious. If he had been saying, "Well, their running game is terrific now, so we've got to get them out of that mode," that would have been one thing. But even if people thought thought it, I've never heard it said so bluntly. I mean, in John Elway's later years the Broncos were basically built around the running of Terrell Davis, but I never heard anyone who had to face them say that he wanted to put the ball in Elway's hands. When the old Steelers offense was keyed to the run, there was a Hall of Fame quarterback named Bradshaw who could turn the lights out quickly if the ground game was stopped.

So I put through a call to Schottenheimer, hoping he would elaborate on the information he'd given the Fox TV people, but the enormity of what he had said must have taken hold because he was very careful with me.

"By no stretch of the imagination did I want it to sound like I had no respect for Favre," he said. "I was just pointing out that if we let them run on us, we would have no chance."

But the words once spoken had been stronger than the denial. Put the ball in No. 4's hands. All those friendly interviews with Favre you see nowadays dwell on the fun he's having out there, a theme John Madden whips to death at every opportunity, or the deeply felt, "Will you be back next year, Brett?" Of course he will. Where's he going to go? But it's always asked with due solemnity. What is not asked are questions about his declining skills, and his ball protection -- which is awful -- and the fact that he seldom brings his team back at the end anymore.

There have been no last-minute victories this season. But there were four losses in which a victory was possible. Favre failed to bring the Packers back at the end of the Arizona game. Green Bay lost to the Chiefs in overtime, but that one really can't be laid on Favre's doorstep because Ahman Green fumbled when the team was moving. In the Philly game the ball slipped out of Favre's hands and was lost in the last few seconds, the third time he had fumbled, which was credited to the slick tape covering his thumb. There were no excuses in the Detroit game, though. He threw his third interception when a blitzing linebacker bore down on him. It was a terrible pass, a pop fly that was up for grabs. It ended the Packers' chances.

You can always tell how a quarterback is aging by the way he faces the rush. With time to throw, even the most ancient can step up in the pocket and deliver the ball with perfect form and accuracy. But when the ability to dodge and dart is on the decline, and the rush arrives, there is that awkward, Ichabod Crane-type of moment when everything looks askew and you know the QB isn't going to get away from anybody and you just hope he doesn't get hurt. I've seen those kinds of moments with Favre this season. At one time he was one of the niftier escape artists.

I don't know what kind of coaching he's getting. You've seen the situation in which a passer has been given time, and he steps forward and looks toward the middle of the field and you just know that a completion of 15-18 yards will follow. With Favre you can't be sure. It might come out of his hand high and hard, a rising fastball over the backstop. I wonder if they're really working on his fundamentals, or if that would show a lack of respect for someone of his stature. Don't forget that the Packers' quarterback coach, Darrell Bevell, is a year younger than Favre.

I saw something in Green Bay's game against the Eagles that puzzled me. The Pack took a four-point lead on Green's 45-yard run with about seven minutes left. Philly drove and was stopped. Green Bay had the ball on its own 32 with four-and-a-half minutes to go. The Pack could have driven a dagger into Philly's heart. I mean, a quarterback who's supposed to be an all-timer is running the show. Put 'em away. End the game. Instead, Green Bay ran the ball twice for five yards and then Favre threw a zero-yardage checkdown to his fullback. Punt, Philly drives for a TD, Favre fumbles at the end, ballgame's over.

If the guy's still got it, why is the coaching staff choking him off? I know one thing: he's never thrown this short in his life. There was a five-year stretch under Mike Holmgren, and then Ray Rhodes, with the two Super Bowl seasons included, during which Favre averaged 12 yards per completion every year, making him one of the longer throwers in the league. This year his average is 10.3 yards, well below the norm for NFL passers and the lowest mark of his career. Maybe the thumb has something to do with it, but maybe Mike Sherman and his staff just feel that they want to play it tight and avoid screwups. Of course the Lions wanted to put the ball into Favre's hands. They're not the same hands we remember.

New England's Weis guy

I'll give you the reverse side of the coin. Patriots-Colts last Sunday. New England goes up, 31-10. Then, with 6:12 left in the third quarter Peyton Manning throws an interception that comes back to the Colts' 32. At this point Manning looks whipped. He pounds the ground. His head sags. The game seems over. It should be routine for New England. Run some clock, either kick the field goal to go up by 24, or punt the Colts deep and give Manning the whole field to travel.

Charlie Weis, the Patriots' offensive coordinator, has Tom Brady throwing. Two straight, the second a bad one that gets picked off. Indy drives for the TD. They're down by 14, with the whole fourth quarter and part of the third still left. The Indianapolis crowd wakes up. Next series, Brady is firing again, three in a row, and the third one gets intercepted on the Patriots' 26. One play later Manning hits Marvin Harrison for the score and Indy's down by seven. The Patriots have thrown five straight times when they should have been working the clock, at least part of the time. Their defense is tiring fast.

Let's fast-forward to a little more than three minutes left in the game. Indy has scored one touchdown, on a long drive, and kicked a field goal. New England has registered a TD set up by Bethel Johnson's long kickoff return. Pats are up 38-34. It's their ball on their own 33. Their defense is exhausted. It needs some bench time. Weis has Brady throwing, only Brady is not the same guy who started the game on a hot streak, who got his team well ahead early. His body language registers defeat. Brady is a young, gung-ho guy with a real bounce to him, but now he's noticeably sagging. His setup, his steps, all his fundamentals have gone to hell.

But Weis is a coordinator who likes to do the unusual. He is desperate to get a head-coaching job, and you don't convince people you're a genius by running the ball, by sticking with the conventional. Brady overthrows Deion Branch on a little slant pattern on first down. His second throw is to Branch again, a shoot pattern to the sideline that goes backward and past the receiver. It's a live ball. The Colts could have recovered. Instead the ball goes out of bounds. Things are coming apart. Brady is a basket case. The Patriot defense is on the bench, exhausted, their heads drooping. They need some time. What they get is Brady's third incomplete. This one hits Indy linebacker David Thornton in the hands and he drops the interception.

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Following a short punt from Mike Walter, Indy is poised to go in and win the game against a worn-out defense after New England's offense took no more than 30 seconds off the clock. Well, we know what happened. The Colts did not score for a fifth time in the half because Manning is not a machine, he's a human being, and because the Patriots defense somehow got itself together enough to come up with a goal-line stand.

Weis had run as unsound a show as I've ever seen at the end of a game, practically ruining his quarterback, wearing out his team's defense, coming an ace away from blowing an important contest. I'm surprised that Bill Belichick didn't step in and cut off all the nonsense, but Belichick labored as an assistant for many years and I guess he feels strongly about interfering with his aides during the course of a game.

Not everybody saw this as I did, though. On Monday night, during the ESPN pregame show, Ron Jaworski described Weis as a near-genius, one of the most imaginative and innovative game planners in the business. He mentioned what a great head coach he'd make. Well, Charlie's sure working on it ... at the expense of everyone around him.

Sports Illustrated senior writer Paul Zimmerman covers the NFL for the magazine and SI.com. His Power Rankings, "Inside Football" column and Mailbag appear weekly on SI.com.