Image courtesy of Vikings.com
Long before ESPN predicted a Minnesota Vikings-Indianapolis Colts Super Bowl next season, a rogue Youtube user uploaded a unique, ranting revelation — the Colts would defeat the Vikings in Super Bowl 51.
That obviously didn’t happen, as the New England Patriots mounted the greatest comeback in Super Bowl history to beat the Atlanta Falcons last Sunday. The Colts and the Vikings, meanwhile, watched from home, dreaming of future Super Bowl victories.
Using an ancient numerical system and extreme deductive analysis, the Youtube user made another claim in his video — the Vikings would avenge their nonexistent Super Bowl 51 loss by defeating the Colts two years later in Super Bowl 53.
Crazy, I know, but fans of Minnesota’s snakebitten franchise are desperate for any positive speculation. I, for one, don’t believe anything in the video, but I was surprised to see ESPN’s coincidental prediction of a Vikings-Colts Super Bowl this coming season.
If the Vikings were to return to the NFL’s grandest stage in 2017, they’d be the first team ever to play a Super Bowl in their home stadium. While two franchises have played the game in their home market, no team has ever hosted the Super Bowl; the Texans fell short of Super Bowl 51 with a loss to the Patriots in the Divisional Round.
Ask most fans, and they’d tell you the Vikings have a shot to make history. Ask the Vikings Territory team, and they’ll give you a broad range of answers. Without further ado, here are Adam, Sam, and BJ’s thoughts on the following question:
I’ll never bet against my team, but only a real gambler would bet on them…they never do what we expect. With that being said, it’d be sweet as all get out for the Vikings to finally get to the Super Bowl again, regardless of the venue. I’ll reserve actual judgment on the roster until free agency, the NFL Draft, and the injury news is more concrete than its current state.
Call me what you like, but I’d settle for the Vikings just making damned sure that Green Bay doesn’t get a chance to get Aaron Rodgers another ring in our house.
No, of course, they won’t.
They’ll go 12-4 and get a first round bye, then blow a 17-point lead to the Redskins in the Divisional Round. Sam Bradford will leave the game in the second half with a fractured forearm, and Adrian Peterson—still on the team—will have four fumbles, all contributing to the collapse. Washington will go on to play the Patriots in the Super Bowl, losing 63-3 and sending masses of fans out into the cold Minneapolis streets well before the game concludes.
Record snowfall will paralyze downtown and the surrounding areas, causing tens of thousands of missed flights and giving the national media an open door to smugly crack wise about Minnesota weather. Both Sean Daley of Atmosphere and Bob Dylan will tragically pass away within a week of the game, and winter will extend into June.
I’m okay, I promise. I just need some time.
Austin Belisle, being the outstanding sports critical thinker that he is, came up with one heck of a question this week, folks. Not only did he draw on emotions from both the past and present, but he left each one of us “humble” Vikings Territory contributors cold (currently a chilly -3 with 17 mph winds in beautiful Bismarck, N.D.), alone and tasked with carving out a “brief” answer to this raging hellfire of an open-ended offseason question.
Honestly, there is no right way to respond to this — and that, in essence, is what makes Question of the Week an enjoyable experience. If I respond by stating a firm belief that the Vikings will compete in the Super Bowl …at U.S. Bank Stadium…one year from now … — thus silencing every *fire* take from Patrick Reusse and/or Jim Souhan over the past 8 months or so — it is an absolute, carve it in stone with a machete and relay it to the public as canon, certainty that our favorite football team will finish with a Top-5 pick in the 2018 draft.
That’s just how being a Vikings fan works — you know it, I know it; hell, even diehard Green Bay Packer fans will readily admit that Minnesota, as a broad sports market, has even worse luck than Wile E. Coyote.
So, no, Austin, I will not fall into this trap you masterfully laid upon my three-legged desk. The Vikings will not only fail to become the first team in NFL history to play a home Super Bowl, but they will also find a way to dramatize it beyond mensa-level human comprehension.
The final Act in this William Shakespeare of a tragedy will resolve with something to the effect of Jay Cutler, (now) leading Bruce Arians’ offense in Arizona following some unprecedented Ryan Pace draft-day swindling, quarterbacking a 98-yard, 42-second drive to edge out Mike Zimmer and Co. 10-7 in an NFC Championship game. The reincarnated BJ Reidell, writing about a still Super Bowl-less Vikings team suffering through an injury-ridden 2119 campaign, will convey an article via some neuron-activated microchip-styled Journalism for the timeless Vikings Territory entitled, “2018 NFC Championship: Another Soul-Crushing Defeat or Sportswriter-inflated NFL Myth?”
And the best part about all this nonsense — you, the Vikings fan who has witnessed the greatest of NFL horrors, cannot tell me this scenario won’t play out without that sinking, “What if…?” feeling we all know too well.