How to be keep being a Vikings fan after something like
that happens
I got rug burn yesterday when Blair Walsh missed a chip shot for the Vikings--THE chip shot—to beat Seattle. The kick sailed wide left and I dropped to the floor like I’d been shot, scuffing my forearm on the carpeting. I think I screamed out "NO," although I may not have even made it to the “o” part of the word. Just NNNNNNN! and I was down. For a while. I made no sound at all. My wife was playing with the kids nearby and did her best to distract them from the fact the fact that Daddy was dead over in the next room.
Pay no mind to the deceased idiot. It was probably really awkward for them.
This, of course, is the fate I deserve. Not only am I a lousy person who gleefully revels in the misfortune of other teams and routinely incurs the wrath of entire states (
Sorry, Maine), but this is what I get for expecting anything ELSE from the idiot team I cheer for. This is what they do, no? I remember watching them blow the NFC title game to New Orleans back in 2010, and I remember that game not hitting me as hard as this one did because Brad Childress was the coach, and Brett Favre was the quarterback, and Fate will come for you if that’s the case. Also, the team committed several GLARING fukk-ups in that game (settling for a long field goal, getting flagged for too many men on the field) before committing the final, crowning fukk-up (Brett Favre throwing a back-breaking interception that only Brett Favre would throw). All of that felt natural and correct. You could see it coming miles away.
But this was different. With the notable exception of Adrian Peterson, this Vikings outfit is a likable team that has been built to last for years, instead of a team jury-rigged for one final run on behalf of a mercenary veteran quarterback. They play brilliant defense. They never miss a tackle. Their head coach is easily the best head coach the Vikings have had in my lifetime. The quarterback never misses, provided he has time to throw (rarely the case but still). AND IT WAS COLD. Look at all those fans who braved the cold for that team yesterday. They wouldn’t have done that for Mike Tice!
This is a team made for bigger things down the road: maybe next year, or maybe the year after that. But then they started to WIN. They harassed Russell Wilson and made the Seahawks miserable for the better part of three hours. And even when Vikings things started to happen—Peterson fumbling like an a$$hole (which he ALWAYS does in important games), Wilson summoning his magic Jesus powers to salvage a play that deserved a Brian Hoyer ending--they kept their shyt together and drove the length of the field, doing what the Vikings never do: coming through. And so, just before Walsh got ready to kick that ball, it was easy—against all common sense--to think:
Maybe it’s different this time.
That’s where sports crushes you. And I should have known. Rooting for the Vikings doesn’t give me any kind of special pass for self-pity because there are so many other miserable franchises out there. We are just one of a great many have-nots: Detroit, Buffalo, Cleveland, Cincinnati (poor, poor Cincinnati), San Diego, Philadelphia, Houston, Arizona (good luck, men), the Jets… In the NFL, misery is the NORM. Right after the game, I found any number of other fans ready to shake some sense into me and scream, “Why did you believe?! YOU IDIOT!” And they were right. I never should have believed.
But then again… things DO change, don’t they? I bet Saints fans were just as fatalistic every year right up until they won the Super Bowl. And against Peyton Manning, no less! Look back through the history of sports and you will find the glories of the formerly woebegone: the Saints, the Boston Red Sox, the New England Patriots, the Chicago White Sox, the Golden State Warriors, THE SEAHAWKS, and on and on it goes. The cold, hard math suggests that, if you live forever, your supposedly snakebitten team will eventually get its turn. One day, some collection of players with FABULOUS chemistry will look at your team’s history and say WELL SCREW ALL THAT and then go out and win it all for you, because the past haunts the people watching the game much more than its haunts those playing it.
You just have to live long enough to see that special, mathematically inevitable team come around.
I’m 39 years old, which puts me just past halftime of my life expectancy. I only have a few decades left to see if the Vikings can pull this off, and it’s enormously discouraging to see a promising young team get into the playoffs only to have the Vikings get their Vikingness all over them, perhaps ruining them forever. I may die without seeing them win it all. I probably will. Again, it’s what I deserve.
But it’s worth it to believe. It’s worth seeing other teams throw off the yoke of history and then think to yourself, “Hey! Maybe my a$$hole team can do that, too!” Because it can happen, and I want to live in a world where things can change in the face of seemingly overwhelming evidence to the contrary. I want to be suckered in. I want my team to tempt me with the promise of salvation. And if they fukk me over again—and they will!—well, I’ll have to deal with it. That’s my problem. I will be fully accountable for all future rug burns. But I’ll keep taking the bait anyway. Because I’ve SEEN fortunes change and the faith means something to me even if it never tangibly pays off.
Although it could. If we just get a few more offensive linemen, and Wilson gets busted with hookers, and Teddy becomes a passing god, it could happen! YOU’LL SEE! ONE LUCKY BREAK AND THEY COULD WIN FIVE TITLES IN A ROW! IT’S NOT INSANE! YOU’LL ALL BE PROVEN WRONG AND THEN I’LL BE KING OF NACHOS! It’s not just a dream. I’m not just crazy. One day, my friends. One day, a long time from now, something will change.
One day…
are you even a man?
or 
face. Those Super Bowl winners are rare company to be in and our team has the foundation to be in that conversation.
