MAGIC RUNS OUT

GIANTS 31

VIKINGS 24

It doesn't seem fair.

The 2022 Minnesota Vikings were about as fun a team as I have ever seen. This season contained so many incredible wins and moments and performances. It's why I keep coming back year after year, because maybe you'll get this kind of season. They don't get this good that often. 

And it's over. Without a playoff win. Because we just let the ordinary New York Giants come into US Bank Stadium and end our season. 

The crowd at the purple palace was absolutely electric at the start of this game. John Randle came out and did a hype intro. We were fucking READY. 

The Vikings took the ball first, and drove 75 yards to a touchdown. At first it was a short TD pass to Justin Jefferson, but replay showed him just short. So Kirk got to sneak it in.

Would this bottom feeding Vikings defense, weirdly hyped up by Ed Donatell all week, do their part and show up? 

We got an early, definitive answer. And it was an emphatic no. The Giants even got a holding call on their opening play, yet still needed just 5 plays to go 85 yards and tie the game. 

We punt on our next series, after we run a stupid fake reverse by JJ with a throw TO Cousins. And our defense lets the Giants go 81 yards on 4 plays to take the lead.

9 plays, 166 yards. 2 drives. Disgraceful. Wide open receivers. Gaping holes for Saquon Barkley. Nobody spying Daniel Jones. He had over 70 yards on the ground by halftime. 

This quickly it was obvious that our offense was going to have to be damn near perfect to have a chance. But our next series ended quickly after Irv Smith dropped a 1st down. 

The Giants then drained over 11 minutes off the clock, almost the entire 2nd quarter, and went almost the distance again. Mercifully we held them to a short field goal. 

We got back in the game on the next drive. We got a huge 3rd down Kirk to Hockenson play to spark us. The drive ended with a KJ Osborn touchdown. And so we hit the break down just 3. Could have been a whole lot worse. 

It did get worse after halftime though. Any hope that we would see some momentum carry over ended fast, as we gave up another embarrassingly fast TD drive. 6 plays 75 yards, down 10 again. 

But again Kirk dragged this team back. He drove them 75 yards, hitting a couple big passes to Hock and Thielen, before finding Irv for the TD. 

Danielle Hunter broke through for a 3rd down sack on Daniel Jones. Kris Boyd saved our ass when Jalen Reagor muffed the punt. Kirk got us driving again, and we were into the 4th quarter. Our quarter. 

But the 4th quarter magic was not to be. Cook got tripped up in open field on a play that was a likely touchdown. Hockenson was tackled just shy of the first down marker, and we ran a Kirk sneak on 4th and 1, but it was wiped away by the tiniest of a false start on Christian Darrisaw. So we had to settle for a Greg Joseph field goal and a tie game.

And our defense just let them go right back down the field. Nothing was more telling of the state of our defense than when the Giants had 4th and 1 inside the 10. They could have just kicked the short field goal to take the lead, but Brian Daboll went for it. And why not? He knew we couldn't stop them. And we didn't. And Barkley got in a couple plays later to make it 31-24. 

Still wasn't insurmountable. We have faced way longer odds this year. But the magic was gone. Our response drive was a 3 and out, with 2 neutered screens and an incompletion.

The Giants worked the clock, and would have never even given the ball back, but Darius Slayton dropped a wide open crossing throw on 3rd down that would have iced the game. 

We had one last chance to save the season now. One last drive to keep this magic ride going. 

We got a roughing the passer call, and a Kirk-Hockenson 1st down. Then it all went bad. We tried a low percentage deep shot to Thielen that fell incomplete, then a snuffed screen to Cook. After the 2 minute warning, a pass to Osborn didn't connect, so now it was literally season on the line. 4th and 8. And under a heavy rush, Kirk dumped it to Hockenson, who had no shot. He was tackled well short of the first and that was it. Season over. 

The Vikings had spent all season working 4th quarter magic, and winning one score games. And ended by playing maybe their worst 4th quarter all year, and losing by one score. Fate is the cruelest bitch.

It wrecks me that this is how it all ended. Realistically I didn't think the Vikings would have gone to San Francisco next week and won anyway, and this was nowhere near a championship caliber defense, so this was not going to be the year. But this was such a great season and a fun team. They deserved the reward of at least this one playoff win. 

Instead, cruelly, this game only served to embolden the disrespect and the hate this team illogical got all year. All the idiots who called the Vikings frauds all year get to feel validation. All the Kirk haters flood back out of their sewers. The narrative of this season will now always be that the Vikings weren't any good and that Kirk choked and lost a playoff game. 

It's sickening.

This loss will be hard to get over for a while.

But amidst all the pain, there are the memories of one of the funnest, craziest Vikings seasons of all time. It's an all timer. I think it in unquestionably my favorite Vikings season ever that didn't include a playoff win. 

You remember the wins of the great seasons. From the opener against the Packers to the Bills epic to the historic comeback on the Colts and to all those close wins and comebacks in between, there are so many games etched forever into my memory from this year. It was an amazing ride.

Thank you, Minnesota Vikings, and I can't wait to see where this new regime takes us in the future.