Hey, all. . .back from that wonderful exercise I was on starting Thursday morning. After a couple of days of constantly switching from MOPP 2 to MOPP 4 and back again and carrying around an extra 40 pounds of gear, I can simply say this:
Holy crap, am I tired.
But, naturally, I thought I'd wander around the interwebs and see what I could find about the Vikings from the past couple of days, and discovered this:
Two north metro lawmakers want to sell the Metrodome to the Vikings for $1 instead of building a new stadium in Arden Hills.
Sen. John Marty (DFL-District 54) and Rep. Linda Runbeck (R-District 53A) introduced a bill Oct. 21 to give the state-owned Metrodome to the Minnesota Vikings - if the team stays at the dome for at least 25 years and pays all operating costs. The team also would have to pay property taxes.
See, here's the thing.
The Metrodome is not anywhere near being a viable NFL stadium any longer. It's not. It's not close. It simply lacks the main revenue-generating mechanisms that many NFL stadiums have, and will make it tougher for the Vikings to be competitive if they were to remain there going forward. Oh, and the minor fact that the Vikings pretty much pay all of the operating costs for the facility now. . .if there's no Vikings football at the Metrodome, there's no Metrodome, and Minneapolis realizes this.
Seriously, Detroit managed to get a little less than $600,000 for the Silverdome, and that was a place that Viking fans could look at and confidently say, "Wow, that place is a real pile of crap."
This basically reminds me of one of those moments on The Price is Right where the first three people go too high on whatever item is currently up for bids, and the fourth person looks out at the crowd for a second, turns around and yells, "One dollar, Bob!" (And yes, I know that Drew Carey is now the host of TPiR. . .as much as I like Drew Carey, it ain't his show.) The last person then looks as though they're awfully proud of themselves, and all but starts making their way onto the stage to play the next pricing game.
But then, in this case, rather than the person that bid $1 automatically getting the prize, Bob looks at them all and says, "I'm sorry, but you have all overbid."
The Vikings have decided that $1 is too much to pay for the Metrodome, because they're simply not interested in remaining there any longer.
Do you blame them?