It was somewhere around Barstow, Hunter S. Thompson wrote in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, that the drugs began to take hold. Rolling Stone first printed Fear and Loathing in its magazine. Random House published it as a book a year later in 1972, and Paramount turned it into a stoner road trip comedy in 1998. “The possibility of physical and mental collapse is now very real,” Thompson wrote. “No sympathy for the Devil, keep that in mind. Buy the ticket, take the ride.”
On Sunday, thousands of Minnesota Vikings fans paid premium rates for Delta flights to Vegas to pack Allegiant Stadium full of purple. Week 14 felt like a home game, to the extent a contest played 1,600 miles away from U.S. Bank Stadium can feel that way. Whether you were in Sin City or on your couch, you probably stuck with this one. Still, Minnesota’s 3-0 win over the Las Vegas Raiders could cause anyone to collapse physically or mentally.
But you buy the ticket; you take the ride.
Thompson was a football fan. “I am a football addict, and I am not alone in this country,” he wrote in an ESPN column. “We are legion, and we must have football.” He titled his 2005 suicide note “Football Season Is Over.” Still, he probably wouldn’t have sat through this one if he were still with us. Legions of football fans skipped out on it. Fox’s play-by-play man, Kevin Kugler, jokingly asked Charissa Thompson if she was updating other broadcast teams on the Vikings-Raiders score. Thompson didn’t reply. She didn’t need to.
Unless you were pot-committed on your Vegas trip or have a certified Vikings addiction, you weren’t watching this one. Greg Joseph missed a 49-yard field goal late in the second quarter, and Minnesota and Las Vegas played to a 0-0 tie until he split the uprights on a 36-yarder after the two-minute warning to put the Vikings ahead for good. You have to go back to 1971 to find the last time Minnesota went scoreless through three quarters. They beat the Green Bay Packers 3-0 that year.
That was also the year that Rolling Stone first published Fear and Loathing.
Joshua Dobbs was 10/23 for 63 yards before Kevin O’Connell replaced him with Nick Mullens in the fourth quarter. Mullens finished 9/13 for 83 yards and set Joseph up with the game-winning field goal. Justin Jefferson made two catches for 27 yards before suffering a chest injury that landed him in the hospital. Minnesota’s leading rusher, Alexander Mattison, left with an ankle injury in the third quarter. Brian O’Neill suffered an ankle injury in the second. It will be an especially short week before they play in Cincinnati on Saturday.
Minnesota’s defense held up its end of the bargain, limiting Davante Adams to 53 yards and Josh Jacobs to 34. The Vikings recorded their second shutout in the last 30 years. They limited the Denver Broncos to 21 points and the Chicago Bears to 12 in Minnesota’s most recent losses, and they haven’t given up a touchdown since Courtland Sutton’s end-zone reception in Denver – over 121 minutes of game time. Josh Metellus forced his fourth fumble of the season, halting a promising Raiders drive in the third quarter. Ivan Pace Jr. finished the game with 13 tackles, a sack, and the game-sealing interception.
But defense alone can’t win the Vikings enough games to stave off Green Bay and the rest of the NFL’s middle class. Minnesota will have to find a way to generate offense to take a winnable game in Cincinnati, take advantage of two games against the Detroit Lions, who lost to the Chicago Bears this week, and beat the Packers at home. The Vikings can still defend their NFC North title and qualify for the playoffs. But they’ll have to do so without Jefferson, O’Neill, and Mattison. Kirk Cousins isn’t walking out of the tunnel anytime soon.
The Vikings will have to decide if they will start Dobbs or Mullens in Cincinnati, where they’ll face old friend Jake Browning. Dobbs is undoubtedly more fun, but Mullens was the steady hand in Vegas. Both quarterbacks are gamblers, so Minnesota has no safe option. However, Mullens has better mastery of the offense because he was in training camp with the Vikings and has been Cousins’ understudy. He may have to perform with a shorthanded offensive line and a depleted receiver corps.
Such is life for the Vikings this year. They started 0-3 but decided to go for it, trading for Cam Akers and Dalton Risner. They recovered and were 4-4 when Cousins suffered his Achilles injury at Lambeau. Dobbs allowed them to enter the bye 6-6, but it might be Mullens’ time to command the ship. Minnesota is pot-committed now. They’re on the edge of the desert, somewhere near Barstow, and have to see their journey through. “If it occasionally gets a little heavier than what you had in mind,” Thompson wrote in Fear and Loathing. “Maybe chalk it up to forced consciousness expansion: Tune in, freak out, get beaten.”
We all bought the ticket. The Vikings will continue to take us on a ride. There’s no turning back now.
