Hats Off To You: A Eulogy to the 2010 Vikings' Season

Metrodome Collapses Under Weight of a Lost Season

by Jon Gill, Vikings Fan in Mourning.

The Blizzard of 2010 was not a snowstorm.  It was a metaphor.  The first flakes began to fall at the end of the 2009 season, in New Orleans of all places.  Just like 1998, our season of high hopes came to a heart-piercing end in overtime in the NFC Championship. 

From 12-men-in-the-huddle to a third season in a row ending with a Favre interception, some of us could see it coming but denied what we saw on the radar.  How many times has a team fallen short at the Conference Championship and come back to win it all the next year? (that's rhetorical—look it up yourself). 

The offseason had two more flakes, in the form of the annual Brett Favre silence, and yet another rejection/pigeonholing of a Vikings' Stadium proposal.  Most of us thought Brett would be back, so we didn't go to the store to stock up for the coming storm.  We don't panic any easier than we get excited here in the "Great Purple North."

When camp started, we started to see a few more flakes—Percy's migraines worse than ever, Sidney's surgery costing him at least 8-10 games and a Baskett-full of no-name, relatively inept replacement WRs. 

As all this was going on, three players had to fly down to kidnap "Father Time" for one last shot.  A bit reluctantly, and for a few extra semolians, he agrees to sacrifice his body one more time on our/his behalf.  With plenty of questions still unanswered, we coasted from camp back down to where the snow began. 

That's where the snow really started to hit us in the face.

After a tough loss to the Saints, in a game where they DID outplay us (unlike the last time, we'd say), the snow was just a small inconvenience.  What's an inch to Minnesotans? 

Then another warm-weather front came to OUR house and straight-up froze our assets.  The loss to Miami that dropped us to 0-2 was the first sign that this wasn't just an ordinary, Minnesota-pessimistic snowstorm. No, this could get much, much worse. 

Then, Minnesota found a ray of sunshine in Week 4: the great Randy Moss was suddenly back in Purple!  Of course, like any blizzard, a new cold front was colliding with this warm one: "Sterger-gate".  The as-of-yet-not-fully-substantiated allegations of Favre's misconduct two years earlier threw a quick cloudburst of pain onto the hopeful return of No. 84. 

Even the Moss warm front turned cold quickly.  While his return to the Vikings was highly touted and mildly profitable on the field, what was once a break in the clouds quickly closed and poured acid rain on the masses, blowing quickly through town like a 50-mph gust of arctic chill, leaving us both scalded and numb.

Of course, for all of us, it was the losses that hurt the most. Games that we were favored to win, could have won, should have won, almost won—not even one victory of which to be proud.  We trudged through the blinding blizzard that was 3-6, on our way to Lambeau for a grudge match.  Apparently, we got lost in the snow on the way, because we never showed up.

After the most embarrassing loss of the year (and recent memory) to a team that we HATE to lose to (since all our Cheesehead friends in the cities act very un-friend-like afterwards), the bus driver finally found himself thrown under it: Brad Childress was fired, to the delight and/or apathy of Vikings nation. 

This may have been the end of the storm, but there was still lots of shoveling to be done.  While two encouraging wins over bad teams helped boost our spirits, shoveling three feet of snow and three months of turmoil eventually took its toll.  We caved in under the pressure of Super Bowl hopes. We finally deflated on a national stage, as our warm bubble haven was ripped open, and the buildup of a season of icy expectations spilled onto our last refuge. 

Our shredded dignity flapping in the wind, we had to face the fact that this year, 2010, had reached its bitterly cold end, in the most horrifying and unbelievable ways. 

With no roof over our heads, no bubble to hide ourselves, we now let the blowing snow bury the 2010 season.  We look up at the blue sky for the first time, and believe that while 2010 has hit the floor, there is no ceiling to our future.