LOS ANGELES -- The desire is there for Brett Favre to return for another season with the Minnesota Vikings. If he doesn't return, it will be because his surgically repaired ankle won't allow him to, the quarterback said Wednesday night.
"It starts with the ankle," Favre said in an interview with ESPN's Hannah Storm backstage at the ESPY Awards. "I can walk fine, but you don't walk in football."
Favre said that he is still not completely healthy. "I guess at 40 I may never be," he said.
Favre said he thought his recovery from ankle surgery -- this Friday will mark eight weeks since the operation -- would have been quicker.
"I had hoped it would have been a little bit better at this point," he said.
Favre said his hurting ankle affects his entire body.
"When you wake up in the morning and your feet hurt it kind of makes the rest of your body hurt," he said. "And If you've been sacked 700 times that usually adds to it."
Favre said he knows the Vikings are a great team: "I know that now, I knew it last year," he said.
However, if he does return, he wants to make sure the Vikings are getting what they expect.
"I would love to play and be the best I can possibly be," he said. "That's what I'm working toward right now."
Favre had hoped to make a quicker decision on a return this time around, but that didn't happen.
"It's not desire," Favre said.
He said the "goosebumps come right back ... not that they ever left" when watching the highlight of his last-second touchdown pass last season to Greg Lewis, which won the pair of teammates the Best Play Award at the ESPYs.
"But physically, I want to know if I can play and make those type of plays," Favre said. "I don't know if I can ever answer that. At least in my mind that's how I feel where I have to be."
