http://mmqb.si.com/2015/07/15/brett-...r-retired-nfl/

King with a lot of insight on the summer of 2008, among them that Favre wanted to play for the Bears

A couple of months later I was washing my dog in my New Jersey driveway (true story) when my cell rang. It was Favre. I put down the soap and hose and talked to him. He said he was having second thoughts. Lots of them. He said he still wanted to play. He said he was thinking of asking for his release so he could play somewhere else. Chicago or Minnesota, maybe.
On the Saturday before the Packers were due at training camp, I visited Favre at his home outside Hattiesburg, Miss. He and wife Deanna were there, and agent Bus Cook. We went to dinner with some relatives, then back to the house on his 465-acre spread. That day, Thompson asked Favre for a list of teams he’d agree to be traded to. Favre wouldn’t give him one. If Favre couldn’t go to Minnesota or Chicago, his preference was to force Thompson’s hand, and come back to play quarterback for the Packers.
But Favre wanted to play for the Vikings, or possibly the Bears. Both needed passers. Next option: the Packers.

Two or three times that night, well into the evening, I told him Thompson wouldn’t bend. The GM would get killed in Wisconsin if he handed Brett Favre to an archrival. Favre knew, but he had trouble accepting.

“Ted told me, ‘Aaron’s our starter,’ ” Favre said at one point. “I asked if I could compete for the job. He said, ‘That is not an option.’ He said, ‘Coming up there obviously is not good. Things have changed. We’ve moved on.’ He basically said, ‘You’re not going to play here.’ ”

I flew to Green Bay the next day. Thompson reiterated there’d be no release. Favre, that night, texted me thusly: “Tell Ted to release me.” I don’t recall what I said, but it was something like, Not happening.