MVN - Most Valuable Network

Vikings Notes

Kevin Seifert has an interesting comment about last week’s game:

As it turned out, Peterson made NFL history in front of a stadium that was less than half full. This is not to say that fans have an obligation to stay and support the team until the end, especially the way this season has gone – or that they’re bad fans by not sticking around to see Peterson through his record-setting day. I guess I just assume that if you care enough to pay an average of $70 per ticket during a disappointing season, you would want to stay and enjoy something like that.

I was wondering about that myself. I know downtown traffic is horrible, but seeing Adrian reach the 296-yard mark would have, of course, easily been worth the extra time in traffic.

I’d guess that the crowd probably wasn’t well-informed about his stats- maybe there weren’t enough updates on his rushing yards on the Jumbotron? Perhaps someone who was actually at the game could enlighten me on why so many people left early, because I found it very odd that Adrian broke the record in front of a tiny crowd.

Ticket sales update for the Oakland game:

Steve LaCroix, the Vikings’ vice president of sales and marketing, said Tuesday that about 5,000 tickets still remain for the team’s next home game on Nov. 18 against Oakland.

“Everybody thinks it had to be going crazy on the ticket sales front [after Peterson set the NFL single-game rushing record Sunday] and there hasn’t been that type of reaction,” LaCroix said this afternoon. “We haven’t moved the dial a whole lot from when we last reported on the available tickets.”

Man, I find that news to be pretty surprising. One of the things that a team must have to sell tickets is the ever-valuable watercooler talk- if there’s a local buzz for your team, ticket sales will likely be strong. And if Adrian Peterson’s 296 yards won’t create enough of a buzz to get people to buy some tickets, then I honestly don’t know what will (well, having a legit chance at a playoff spot would help matters, but you get my point).

A win at Lambeau would pretty much guarantee a sell out, but if the Vikings head into week 11 with a 3-6 mark, we could actually be in serious danger of a blackout. And that’d be a shame- a team with AD just shouldn’t have blackouts. People shouldn’t be passing up opportunities to watch this guy play.

Elsewhere, word is that T-Jack will get the start this week if he’s healthy enough to play. This is an issue I’ve struggled with…I believe that Bollinger gives us the better chance to win, but we need to have an opportunity to evaluate T-Jack before the season’s over.

For the long-term benefit of this team, I guess I’d lean toward starting Jackson…regardless, though, Tarvaris is listed as questionable for this Sunday, so Brooks might be starting by default.

Here’s a great Adrian Peterson story, courtesy of Rube Chat:

[Chris] Hawkey was having breakfast at Perkins and he said there were 2 Vikings players there. He said 2 tables dined and dashed, right after that, the unnamed Vikings player was being a jerk to the waitress because she had gotten side tracked by the tables running out on their bill and forgot something for their table. The other Viking, Hawkey couldn’t tell who he was because he was wearing a hat, then got up went over to the server, apologized for the jerk, paid for both of the table’s that ran out, then gave the waitress another $20 tip and a hug. He then left.

The waitress nor Hawkey knew who the player was. The next morning Hawkey was at the same Perkins and asked the waitress if she ever figured out who that Viking was. She said he had forgotten his cell phone in the restaurant and came back in to get it after Hawkey left. You guessed it, the guy was Adrian Peterson.

Really, can anyone come up with a reason not to be a huge fan of this guy? Not only has he quickly become one of the most dangerous running backs in the NFL, but he’s apparently a total class act off the field, as well.

Of course, I want to know who the jerk was. And that brings up the question of likely people that Adrian would be hanging out with away from the field. Obviously, this is all speculative, but my guess is Chester Taylor…I’d bet that he and Adrian might go out to eat together once in a while. Anyone else have a take?

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 7th, 2007 at 9:15 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.