Walk into the Vikings media center in their Eagan practice facility and you’re met with a life-sized reminder of the Miracle: Stefon Diggs’ hands outstretched, eyes wide, seconds before tossing his helmet to the side in a perfect game-winning mic drop.
Fans are reminded of the 2017 playoff victory over the Saints every home game as the Vikings blare their pregame montage.
Players and coaches were interviewed about Diggs’ catch, and the game as a whole, when the NFL recapped its Top 100 Plays and Top 100 Games in NFL history.
But the statute of limitations may have run out on the Vikings’ window to relish their historic moment.
Some might say the window ran out once Minnesota slipped up the following week against the Philadelphia Eagles, a sobering plunge back to reality that disproved any team-of-destiny narratives. They allowed 38 straight points that day, a defeat which preceded a change at offensive coordinator, a big move at quarterback and an underwhelming 2018 that felt strange for numerous reasons — almost as if the VIkings were paying a tax after cashing in the Miracle.
The Vikings have gotten more and more reluctant over time to discuss the play that now lives on through the team’s Vikings Museum in perpetuity. To them, it’s history that can only serve to hold them back as they attempt to beat the Saints again in a much tougher environment.
The hero’s perspective
When Diggs caught the pass from Case Keenum and raced down the sideline for a 61-yard walkoff score, he cemented his place in Minnesota sports lore and turned into a local celebrity. He did myriad interviews. He appeared in commercials. He began negotiations on a $72 million contract extension that he would sign in late July of that year.
But fame can be exhausting. On May 23, 2018, he confessed he was “over it at this point.” When the Vikings prepared to face the Saints in the 2018 regular season, Diggs declined interview requests. He says he’s often met on the street by excited fans, and while he admits that the Minneapolis Miracle was a “blessing,” its ripple effects are a mixed bag.
“Kinda take the good with the bad with most things,” Diggs said Wednesday.
There may not be many more nuggets to wring from the Minneapolis Miracle story. The play call was “Buffalo Right, Seven Heaven.” As legend goes, Case Keenum told the huddle he was going to “give somebody a chance.” Diggs took a mental picture of the secondary before catching the ball, and when safety Marcus Williams whiffed on the tackle, he knew he had a path to the end zone.
Diggs said he threw his helmet because he knew the game was over. His good friend Cayleb Jones got to him first and dropped Jarius Wright’s hat in the end zone (to Wright’s tongue-in-cheek chagrin). The dogpile was so intense that Diggs said he nearly passed out.
There was Everson Griffen’s incredulous reaction on the sideline. Keenum led the Skol Chant. Paul Allen went crazy in the radio booth.
In Diggs’ eyes, the story has been told so many times, in so many different ways and from so many perspectives, another regurgitation feels like a chore.
“Outside of the building, it’s really more of a like a fan thing,” Diggs said. “But right now I’m focused on this week.”
‘Underestimated’
Mike Zimmer is rarely characterized as “warm and fuzzy.”
A reporter asked him this week if memories of the miracle give him “warm and fuzzy” feelings.
His response was classic Zimmer.
“Come on, man,” Zimmer lamented. “We’re concentrating on the Saints this week. We don’t care about three years ago or whatever it was.”
The play is so far from Zimmer’s mind he’s added a year on to the time that’s passed since it happened. But even before last year’s Week 8 meeting with the Saints, Zimmer was already weary of the narrative.
“I think I’ve gone through this a hundred times,” he said, when asked about Diggs’ touchdown, “but I think I was trying to tell him to get out of bounds, honestly.”
Oddly, Zimmer’s reaction to the score was never captured, at least on footage that’s readily accessible. He recalled afterward that “some guys jumped on me.” But his mood at the postgame press conference that day in January 2018 was as close to warm and fuzzy as Zimmer’s gotten. Smiles, jokes, fist pumps. He asked if somebody could get him a beer and mimicked Skol Chants with the fans looking in on the press conference through a window.
But it’s also possible Zimmer regrets feeding into the hype that may have contributed to the Vikings’ downfall the following week.
“In retrospect looking at, maybe I underestimated the emotional win the week before,” Zimmer said on the radio at the 2018 combine. “Honestly, practice wasn’t real good on Wednesday that week. Thursday practice was so-so.”
Stats also circulated that six previous teams had won in the playoffs via walkoff touchdowns, and all six had lost the following week by an average of over 20 points per game.
“I don’t know what I would have done different,” Zimmer said, “but I would have addressed it.”
‘That can’t help us’
The person most willing to delve into the Minneapolis Miracle was the losing coach. Sean Payton gave an 85-second answer about the game this week, but primarily to emphasize how far it is from the Saints’ mind.
“We’re already in a game that means so much,” Payton said on a conference call. “I know there’ll be highlights of it and clips of it, but I don’t think it’s even a topic that’ll be talked about.”
As Payton also points out, a lot of the tension between the teams has been diffused by a regular season and preseason meeting over the last two seasons.
The Saints haven’t been holding a grudge for the last 24 months, and in fact, they may have a new playoff nemesis after losing to the Los Angeles Rams in overtime in last year’s NFC Championship Game.
If the Vikings can knock off the Saints on Sunday from their underdog position, it’s guaranteed to be an emotional win, but it will only be the first of three road wins needed to reach the Super Bowl. No. 1 seed San Francisco awaits the Vikings on Saturday if they pull it off.
The Vikings can’t rely on a miracle to win three games from the underdog seat. To knock off the Saints and any future opponents they’ll simply need to be the better team. Any hope of channeling whatever celestial force that helped Diggs two years ago may be fruitless.
Dalvin Cook, who didn’t participate in the miracle game, might’ve said it best when asked if he’s motivated by seeing replays and pictures of Diggs’ catch.
“That can’t help us this game” he said. “We know what’s at stake. We know. We know. We wake up fired up. We know. We know what’s at stake. It’s playoff football. We’ve got to go. If that can’t get you going, I don’t think a picture can do it.”
