Vikings lose; Free at last

Yes that's right, I am finally free from the ever encompassing fear that Brett (sith lord) Favre might actually lead my arch nemesis, the Minnesota Vikings, to the Superbowl or worse yet a Superbowl victory. If you happened to be lost in the wilderness or trapped in some sort of avalanche, then you may have missed the Vikings losing in epic viking-fashion to the New Orleans Saints in the NFC title game, and therefore--regardless of what any denying Vikings fan might tell you--rendering their season a failure and accordingly setting the stage for an undoubtedly tumultuous off-season to come, sure to be ripe with unanswered questions for an aging team that may have blown its best shot at a title for years to come.
If you did miss the game, then you should know that the vikings out-gained the Saints by a whopping 200 plus yards, only to loose in overtime in heart-breaking fashion on a 40 yard Garret Hartley field goal. What stings even worse than the close defeat in such an important setting, was that the vikings star players were largely responsible for the loss. While Adrian (fumble mcgoo) Peterson fumbled the ball thrice himself (however only once recovered by the opposing team), the blindly revered Favre was the true goat of the evening--and accomplished this in true Favre-fashion. With the game tied at 28, the vikings had the ball in field goal range on the saints 33 yard line and faced a third down and ten with approximately :18 seconds remaining. Because of an extremely stupid illegal substitution penalty, the vikings were pushed back five yards, and now presumably had to throw the ball, resulting in one of the all-time dumbest decisions that will forever haunt vikings fans and redeem those of the packers. Rolling out to his right, Brett Favre had an easily enough room to run safely into field goal range, but instead inexplicably heaved an ill-advised through across his body to the middle of the field and ultimately into the hands of a saints defender, sufficiently pushing the game into overtime, and finally defeat.
Now, those delirious supporters and defenders of Favre will fervently point out that the vikings lost the game after the errand interception and because of it, but anyone who has watched Favre play for the last 17 years (so mostly packers fan) are more than accustomed to these horrendous mistakes in crucial points of playoff games, and well know the resulting momentum of such passes almost all ways leads to defeat. In fact it's difficult to remember the last close playoff game Brett Favre played that wasn't decided in large part to one of his late mistakes. Favre threw away the NFC championship against the Giants in overtime in 2007, and made a similar mistake just years before in the divisional round against the Eagles. Well they did defeat the Seattle Seahawks in overtime, but that was due to a defensive touchdown, and not Favre's heroics. While many continue to mistakenly tout Favre as a clutch game-winning quarterback, his playoff record more than disproves this notion, and now Favre has left yet another team in the limbo of his incessant off-season flip-flopping and diva-dom.
After 17 weeks of over-rated hype, the vikings yet again enter the off-season with a sour taste in their mouth, and this was evident in their post-game comments, lamenting the refs and discrediting their opponents. Although their was one admittedly, likely wrong, pass-interference call against the vikings in overtime (this was also on first down, so the significance of this penalty was surely not to grave), for the most of the game the refs called it pretty evenly, even giving Favre the benefit of the doubt on a couple of roughing penalties and missing an obvious offensive pass interference on Sidney Rice that effectively halted the defensive back from an interception. Vikings outside linebacker even went as far as question Reggie Bush's conclusive touchdown run (one of the more obvious calls in the game) saying, "I'll have to see that replay again," Leber said. "That's another one I don't really agree with. I thought TJ did a good job getting the guy out of bounds, but we'll deal with it."
Although I had my doubts I am assuredly relieved and happy to be a packers fan in light of the Vikings devastating loss and congruent whinny-ness. While the vikings have questions to answer at the quarterback and running back positions, as both Favre and Peterson remain relative enigmas in their own right, the Packers have a young pro-bowl quarterback to anchor their young and talented nucleus for years (and undoubtedly division titles) to come. Whew, that was a close one.

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