Booty has foresight absent a '4' sighting

Vikings quarterback John David Booty has heard the question plenty of times the past month. You know, the one about a certain retired 39-year-old quarterback and their shared jersey number.

"The only thing people ask me is, how much will I sell my jersey number for?" Booty said, laughing. "I try not to pay attention to that stuff because it doesn't do me any good."

Booty's role in the Brett Favre soap opera is understandable considering he's entering his second with the Vikings and, more important, he wears Favre's number -- 4. If Favre comes out of retirement to play for the Vikings, he probably will have to persuade Booty to hand over the No. 4 jersey with a cash incentive.

Booty seems to take the Favre/number speculation in good humor, but he insists he's focused only on his personal improvement and nothing else. He said his understanding of the offense and the demands of the position is "night and day" from his rookie season.

"You know what to expect from practice," Booty said Thursday after an Organized Team Activity workout. "You know what to expect from meetings and the preparation you need every week. Last year every day was brand new. At least now you've gone through it once and have a much better understanding of what to expect."

Booty remains the No. 3 quarterback behind Tarvaris Jackson and Sage Rosenfels, who are competing for the starting job. Vikings coach Brad Childress praised Booty's development when discussing the quarterback competition, saying Booty is "doing some great things in there, some things he couldn't have even thought about doing last year in terms of orchestrating the offense."

"I just think he's seeing things better as opposed to, 'Where am I looking and what is the snap count?'" Childress said last weekend during the mandatory minicamp. "All the mechanical things, all the things you take for granted. So he's able to be more of an anticipatory thrower [and] get the ball out early instead of out late and hard."

Booty said he's far more comfortable with the offense but that he's still learning the nuances of the West Coast system and how to attack different defenses. Childress said that improvement is typical of quarterbacks who are entering their second season.

"The second year you have a little bit better understanding of what's going on," Booty said. "I still have to learn so much at this point, but the way I've improved from last year I couldn't be happier with the way things are."

That includes physical changes he has made this offseason. Childress noted in March that Booty "changed his body around." Listed at 213 pounds last season, Booty said he still weighs about the same but he lowered his body fat through diet and running.

"Just better proportioned," he said. "You wouldn't even notice if you saw me, but it was things that I felt like didn't allow me to play at my best last year in the few preseason games that I played in. I think I could have been in better shape and played better."

Booty, who is getting married in Los Angeles in early July, returned to the Twin Cities a few weeks before the start of the offseason program to work with strength and conditioning coach Tom Kanavy.

"We got in there and got after it," Booty said. "I think there's still a lot more I can do to my body, and I'm going to continue to do that. But I just feel a lot better this year."

Rosenfels came into the NFL at the same time as Booty's older brother, Josh, so he's known their family for nearly a decade. Rosenfels said he believes Booty has a future in the NFL.

"He's got a lot of talent, in my opinion," he said. "He can play in this league for a long time if he just keeps working."

Asked when he believes he'll be ready to compete for a starting job, Booty said he hasn't put a timetable on his career.

"I don't have an answer to that," he said. "My biggest thing is just competing. That's all I can do. I can't control any of that. The only thing I can control is to become the best player I can be."