In today's installment of "Yep, It's The Off-Season Alright," we get this from Vikings' quarterback Christian Ponder in his correspondence with the man responsible for protecting his blind side, offensive tackle Matt Kalil.

Now, I'll cop to using emoticons and stuff like that when I chat or text or whatever. . .I tend to use a lot of sarcasm (shocking, I know), and the emoticons are a way of making sure the sarcasm gets through okay.

But, if our cornerstone left tackle wants to use smiley faces and what not, I say go with it. After all. . .last year, defensive linemen that lined up against the Vikings looked like this:

Matt Kalil's job is to make them look like this:

In an effort to keep Christian Ponder from looking like this:

As long as he can do that, the man can speak in LOLCats, as far as I'm concerned.

(Pictures above provided by The Smilies.)