If anyone knows what it’s like to be a loyal fan of the Purple, it’s the readers of SKÖLIOSIS — your weekly reminder that being a Vikings fan is bad for your health.

Yep, on the second day of Christmas, my true love gave to me, two feeble shoves and a heartbreaker in Cincinnati. Not exactly the Christmas Story we were looking for was it? Especially considering that a year ago this very week, we Vikings fans were treated to “the Comeback.” An epic 39-36 overtime victory over the Indianapolis Colts, that included a 33-point comeback and a playoff clinch.

But the universe has a way of rebalancing itself doesn’t it? Making sure there is a yin for every yang. So, of course, this year it course corrected, and us Vikings fans found ourselves on the other end of a fourth quarter comeback and overtime loss. The kind of loss that feels like we drew the short straw for Secret Santa at the NFL office Christmas party and got gifted the pink bunny suit gut punch loss. The fourth quarter comeback followed by OT loss is the white elephant gift that absolutely no one wants, so it gets regifted and passed around the league to one unsuspecting victim after another. This year we got the pink bunny suit re-gifted right back to us from Cincinnati after giving it to the Indianapolis Colts a year ago.

Let’s just hope we get permission from our old man to take this thing off as soon as possible.

You’ll Shoot Your Eye Out!

Yeah, sometimes being a Viking fan feels a lot like Ralphie Parker’s quest in the 1983 Christmas Classic: A Christmas Story. A seemingly doomed pursuit for a Red Rider BB Gun SuperBowl that we are continually denied from, perhaps because we’ll shoot our eye out with it? Maybe its just too much for us frag-i-le (must be French) Minnesotans to handle such success. It’s unclear why the football Gods have decided we are not worthy of a championship season. But it is clear we are stuck on a Naughty List somewhere we simply cannot get off of. What could it be? Where did we go wrong?

Let’s count the ways, A Christmas Story style.

“It's a Clinker!” - Defensive Implosion

Ralfie’s dad, old Man Parker, was said to be one of the most feared furnace fighters in all of Northern Indiana. Brian Flores has so far played a similar role on this year’s Viking team by orchestrating a defense that likes to bring the heat.

With the highest blitz rate in the NFL, the Vikings defense had been the stingiest since week 5 of the NFL in points allowed per game. They had only given up one touchdown to opposing offenses since week 10! That included just one against the Broncos, zero against the Bears, zero against a bye week (nice!), and zero against the Raiders. That zero against the Raiders in Sin City proving to be Coach Flores Magnum Opus as it came with a complete shutout that was made even more impressive as the Raiders would go on to put up 63 points via a nine touchdown outburst against the Chargers only 4 days later.

With Flores’ defense flourishing in the Sin City, one could only hope they would even further flourish in a Sin City with twice the “sins” in Cin-cin-atti. And for 3 quarters it seemed to be playing out exactly that way with his unit holding the Bengals to only 3 points going into the 4th quarter. But about midway through the 3rd quarter, something went amiss, and the furnace started to gurgle, and clink and clunk, with smoke emanating out of the vents and we knew we had finally pushed this furnace defense that had been keeping us warm during this offensive cold spell, a little too far. Perhaps even harbingered by a defensive celebration after a Jake Browning interception that saw our defense seem to celebrate via a “bomb explosion”??? WTF. While it’s unclear what the celebration was exactly, with defensive back Akayleb Evans tossing the intercepted ball in the air and all the players scrambling to get away before it hit the ground presumably exploding and toppling all the players over as it did. Was that the beginning of the end of our stellar defensive run? Did the defense know they were about to implode? Was karma at play? All we know is we didn’t particularly like it. Where as the Keg Stand celebration was fun and playful and positive, this one was dark and unsettling.

Scott Farkas-ed

After those 3 shutout quarters and a 17-3 lead in hand, things should have been feeling pretty good. We were trudging along home in the snow peacefully when suddenly we took a snowball to the face, knocking off our glasses. Realizing Jake Browning was suddenly channeling his inner Scott Farkas, ambushing our defense and bullying them in the fourth quarter while mounting a 3 touchdown comeback to tie the game at 24-24 all and send the game into OT.

But Is Jake Browning Scott Farkas, or have the Minnesota Vikings been Scott Farkas all along? Turns out Jake Browning was on the Minnesota Vikings once upon a time, serving on our practice squad for a couple years before being unceremoniously cut from the Vikings more or less via a Dear John notification delivered through his agent. Something he was clearly still harboring resentment for evidenced by him yelling into the cameras at the end of the game something to the effect of “SHOULD HAVE NEVER F’ing CUT ME”!! as he delivered the Bengals to victory and a Ralphie style beat down on our bloody faces.

Incidentally A Christmas Story takes place in Indiana, the home state victim of last year’s week 15 comeback win over their hometown Colts. But the movie was actually FILMED in Ohio, the home state of the Bengals. So, perhaps this beating was us justing getting the Scott Farkas revenge with A Christmas Story beat down we deserved.

Mush Push – All Legs and No @SS.

When it’s all said done, most likely the biggest thing Vikings fans are going to remember about Saturdays game was our not one but two failed Tush Pushes. A play that the NFL is considering banning, because it is too hard to stop, but our Vikings seem intent on proving otherwise. Of course, it is not clear if Kevin O’Connell quite understands how the Tush Push is supposed to work exactly. It’s been a play made famous by the Philadelphia Eagles who will put some of their largest men behind the QB to ram into their tush from behind and help push them and the pile forward, over the line to gain. But apparently Kevin O’Connell doesn’t listen to Sir Mix-A-Lot, or likes to roll around in a Honda, playin’ workout tapes by Fonda, and doesn’t realize that Fonda ain’t got a motor in the back of her Honda, cause he doesn’t seem to quite understand that a bigger TUSH is the key to a successful PUSH. Nope, his version of the Tush Push might as well be like the Christmas tree leg lamp version, which is all leg with no ass, and ended up broken on the floor. As O’Connell somehow drew up a version that had perhaps one of the smallest guys on our team, Brandon Powell, lined up behind Nick Mullens to help with the pushing.

What was most egregious about this was the overthinking of it. Despite having Ty Chandler who looked like the second coming of Scottie Graham bowling-balling his way through Bengal defenders for 4 quarters and producing our first 100 yard rushing since mid season last year, O’Connell decided instead to run two anemic versions of the Tush Push.

Point being, we’re not sure what kind of decoder ring Coach KO is using to figure out his play calling lately, but we have a hunch that the message should definitely include a “drink more Ovaltine” so we can beef up some tushes.

Son of B**TCHES!! BENGALES!!

While Saturday’s loss ultimately felt a little like having the Bumpas dogs ruining our Christmas dinner, there were some positives to enjoy.

Nick Mullens was exciting to watch, in perhaps the same way that watching people play Jenga on a boat is exciting to watch. You have no idea what’s gonna happen, but you know it’s going to topple soon. In particular:

His throw away attempt interception into the lap of a defensive tackle sitting on the ground.
The back footed ill-advised heave throw that Jordan Addison was able to finger tip grab for a TD run.
The scramble on 1st and goal on the one yard line that begged him to just be smart and throw the ball away if nothing is there, only to see him scramble and toss the ball for a TD into triple coverage.

Yes, there’s always excitement with good ole’ Saint Nick! It’s no wonder his son was channeling Ralphie on the sidelines with headphones and an iPAD to distract him. For him more screen time stimulation may actually be less stimulating than watching the frenetic-ness of his dad running an offense.

As forementioned, Ty Chandler going for over 150 all purpose yards including 132 Rushing yards was also highly encouraging. Imagine having an effective running game again! Add onto all that Jordan Addison going over 100 yards and 2 TDS with a healthy Justin Jefferson back and perhaps our Purple can help Stella get her groove back for one final playoff push.

I guess what we’re saying is that our Christmas wish should just be for a healthy offense clicking at the same time as Flores finally tuned furnace of a defense back to pitching shutouts again. Maybe then there could be a Red Rider BB Gun Super Bowl hiding behind the tree for Vikings fans someday yet after all. Wouldn’t that be a Christmas miracle!