Brett Favre reacts after his dramatic fourth-down pass beat the Vikings.

Neither did Corey Bradford, who caught the pass.

Favre?

"I'm not sure I called anything," he said.

That is the essence of Brett Favre, who is to the NFL in 1999 what John Elway was for 16 seasons until he retired last spring. That is, when a game is on the line, chances are that Favre will win it -- Green Bay's other victory this season came on a game-winning TD pass by Favre with 11 seconds remaining.

Anyone want to bet that the next time the clock will read 00:13?

Here's the bottom line on the Packers' 23-20 victory over the Vikings: for the first 58 minutes and four seconds, there was one offensive touchdown scored, and that was by the Vikings after Green Bay twice prolonged a drive with penalties. Green Bay's only touchdown came on rookie Antuan Edwards' 26-yard interception return.

But with 1:56 left, Randall Cunningham found Randy Moss with a 10-yard TD pass to give the Vikings a 20-16 lead. Moss looked like a money player, too -- until then, he had one catch for three yards.

Was it, a Vikings official in the press box wondered, a little too early?

Yes, it was.

In a 28-24 victory over the Raiders in the opening week, the Packers got the ball trailing 24-21 on their own 18 with 1:52 left. That was relatively easy -- all they needed was a field goal to tie. Favre got them a touchdown.

This time, they got it on their own 23 with 1:51 left. And it was a lot hairier.

One problem was clock management -- the Pack had to burn two timeouts, and the Vikings managed to keep them in bounds on a couple of their completions. So now it was fourth-and-1½ at the Minnesota 23, and the clock was counting down toward 20 seconds.

The Packers lined up. "I don't remember that," Favre said. "I wasn't looking for the touchdown. I was just trying to get the first down and then maybe spike it so we could get in another play."

Instinct took over, as it does when Favre or Elway is the quarterback.

He looked right toward Bill Schroeder, and one of the safeties moved in his direction. Antonio Freeman had his customary double coverage.

Then, he saw Bradford streaking by Jimmy Hitchcock, who was playing him to the outside. Favre released the ball, then turned around and started running in the opposite direction. The roar of the crowd told him what happened.

Then, exhausted, he lay down on the bench, surrounded by teammates and trainers trying to cool him down with towels.

Half an hour later, Favre treated all this like it was routine.

It is, for him, and for maybe a dozen other quarterbacks in NFL history, the most recent of them Elway, without whom Denver is 0-3.

Elway had 47 fourth-quarter game-winning or tying drives in his 16 seasons. This is only No. 12 for Favre, who is in his ninth.

But the reason for that is simple.

When Favre began, the Packers weren't good enough to be in a lot of games late.

More recently, in their division championships and Super Bowl seasons, they've usually been far enough ahead that there's not need for them.

But these are not your Super Bowl Packers -- too many parts of that puzzle are missing, the most recent tight end Mark Chmura, who is out for the season and perhaps his career with a neck injury. So the difference in a division race as well as the playoffs can be a quarterback like Favre, who can win a game by himself.

"There's no such thing as domination anymore," Favre said. "There are no more 38-7 games. Every game can come down to the wire, and you just have to get lucky to win."

Don't tell that to Favre's coaches or teammates.

"That was awesome," said Rhodes, whose last years in Philadelphia were spent with the likes of Rodney Peete, Bobby Hoying and Koy Detmer. "I haven't been around that in a long time."

A long time means since he was an assistant in Green Bay with a young Favre, and in San Francisco with Joe Montana and Steve Young.

Rhodes has been around.

To Bradford, the 23-year-old second-year man the Packers hope can eventually become another Robert Brooks, the whole experience was too awesome to describe.

"I was in a dream, and I figured some time I would wake up," he said. "When I did, it was in the end zone."

With Favre as your quarterback, that's where you often wake up.