That plan changed, however, after the Niners blitzed Favre and flattened him.  The sight of the 40-year-old Brett getting taken down by a fired-up San Francisco defense was all it took to convince Brad Childress to give his Hall-of-Fame QB the rest of the night off, and feed Tarvaris Jackson to the wolves instead.

Ah the life of a backup quarterback.

So, Favre ended up playing only 4 plays instead of 10.  But that was only one of several interesting personnel decisions made by Chilly before and in the early stages of the game.

Perhaps the most intriguing of these was the decision to play Anthony Herrera at center and rookie Chris DeGeare at right guard for a time.  DeGeare took advantage of his reps with the first team by making a nice pulling block on Patrick Willis to spring Adrian Peterson for a gain.

He then reminded everyone of his rookie status by getting called for holding.

Another move with possibly interesting implications was the decision to start Jamarca Sanford in place of Tyrell Johnson.  Those two had been splitting time almost equally throughout camp and the early presason, but it’s possible that Sanford’s start indicates that he has now moved ahead of Johnson in their battle.

Perhaps the most encouraging story of the night was the play of E.J. Henderson, who saw his first action since breaking his leg last December, and was all over the field making plays.  Unfortunately, E.J. also flashed some poor coverage on that same series.

It’s a work-in-progress.

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