Jeremy: Packer Week

Some thoughts about being a Vikings fan in a world of sports mediocrity:

*There is literally no good natured banter in the office today about tonight's Viking/Packer tilt. Nobody is excited about this game like most years, or even as excited about the first match-up earlier this year. You've got two teams who have performed poorly all year, playing for a the glimmer of hope that a playoff spot might fall into their laps and bragging rights. It's hard to be excited. Actually, it's hard to be excited about much of anything sports-related in this town right now. Every team we claim is either mediocre, or full-on terrible.

*It's always fun to see how Sid is going to react when a local sports figure has been bad-mouthed in this town. Look, I don't think that Brad Johnson deserved to be booed on Sunday. He did not play poorly, but don't get me wrong, he certainly did not play well enough to win. Sid takes things a bit far in his defense of Johnson today.
"Johnson owns a Super Bowl ring, and when he retires he will go down in history as being one of the better quarterbacks to ever play in the league."
Two problems with that statement.
#1, what constitutes calling Johnson "one of the better quarterback to ever play in the league"? Better than what? And what makes him better? The fact that he's been a starter?
#2, the fact that Johnson has a Super Bowl ring does not make him immune to booing.

*I'm with Jeff, the Tarvaris Jackson era needed to start. I think everyone was ready to have the Brad Johnson experiment come to an end. At this point Brad Johnson is like an old, lucky pair of boxers: they're beat-up, there's a hole here and there, they've lost some elasticity, but you just can't bring yourself to let go of them. But one day you realize a new hole, one that might cause you to get your wedding-tackle caught in the zipper. Thankful that you haven't already lost your facilities, and certain that it's time to part with your old friend, you move on. Hopefully Tarvaris doesn't end up being like boxer-briefs.

*I was a little surprised last night when I heard Joe "Mr. Fun" Anderson talking on KFAN last night and saying that he believes that if Brad Childress' job isn't in jeopardy heading into the final two games, he believes it should be. I don't understand this. Mike Tice fell into a 9-7 record last year by beating a host of bad teams. The fact that Brad Childress is going to finish with a record below Tice's means nothing. He's a first year head coach whose quarterback is unable to create anything on his own in the way of offense. Chilly deserves at least another year to show that he is able to build upon what he has started.