In 2009, the Minnesota Vikings made a deal with the devil...
In 2010, the payment came due...
I think that one can categorize the '10 Vikings into four sections:
Part One: The Anticipation
In all honesty, I hadn't been that excited about a Vikings season opener in a long, long time (perhaps forever). However, it was clear from the beginning that things just weren't quite right. A loss to Miami the next week only deepened the lingering feeling of unease.
Part Two: One Clap
With the season teetering on the brink, the Vikes decided to shake things up and bring in an old "frenemy" (yeah, that's right, I can speak "teen girl" when I want to)...
While the move generated a lot of excitement in Vikingland, it pretty much failed miserably (especially when Moss made a complete ass of himself to a MN caterer). Moss basically came in, vultured Favre's 500th career TD, and then was released almost as quickly as he appeared (with a 2011 draft pick gone with him).
Part Three: The Collapse
The teeter-totter finally upends with blowout losses against the Bears and Packers, leading to the firing of Brad Childress...
The Dome collapse itself just added another layer to the metaphor...
Part Four: The Slow Bleed
New head coach (Leslie Frazier), new QB (Joe Webb), same old general disappointment. By the end of it all, I was almost glad that the slow bleed was over.
2010 was certainly the strangest Vikings season I can ever remember watching (2001 comes close, but that's its own blog post). Perhaps it just goes to show, in a cosmic sort of way, that if you do dealings with the devil and don't reap immediate dividends, the price ALWAYS comes due...with interest.