NFL Network Host Drunk on Purple Kool-Aid and Vikings Nostalgia

By    |  
Updated:
Follow Us
Minnesota Vikings
Credit: Brad Rempel-Imagn Images

The NFL regular season kicks off on Thursday night and it’s the Dallas Cowboys playing the Super Bowl Champion Philadelphia Eagles. Minnesota wraps up the first week on Monday Night Football against the Chicago Bears at Soldier Field.

This season is one of significant expectations for Kevin O’Connell’s squad. Last year they won 14 games but were bounced in the first round of the playoffs by the Los Angeles Rams.

Jamie Erdahl
Credit: Kirby Lee-Imagn Images

There’s a level of uncertainty due to the nature of breaking in a new quarterback. That doesn’t mean the roster isn’t a better sum of parts. That has NFL Network’s Jamie Erdahl giddy.

Jamie Erdahl ready to plan the Minnesota Vikings parade

Host of Good Morning Football on NFL Network, Jamie Erdahl is one of us. The Minnesota native has lived the Minnesota Vikings heartbreak, and came back last season to sound the Gjallarhorn. Now she’s sounding the alarm and planning the parade.

“What if I think the Broncos and the Vikings will be playing in the Super Bowl in mid-February of 2026? After a 2025 regular season where you will see the Denver Broncos as your AFC Champions, and the Minnesota Vikings as your NFC Champions? Elway, Cunningham? Great! I think Nix and McCarthy is a better story…I’m not sorry that I have the Vikings winning the NFC North and the NFC. I’m not sorry that the Broncos are going to be the AFC Champions…Minnesota, an equally soul-stealing defense will pound quarterbacks this year. The best wide receiver in the game, and that quarterback’s twinkle? That’s the scariest answer in football. It’s the, ‘we don’t know,’ ‘we haven’t seen him.’

To that I say, we are the sum of the people that you surround yourself with. If I’m J.J. McCarthy, I’ve got Kevin O’Connell. I got Justin Jefferson. Adam Thielen now, Aaron Jones. I have an O-line that’s been invested in, and a Brian Flores defense. That is a great group of people to surround myself with. That’s the dream…The Minnesota Vikings, in their fifth Super Bowl appearance, will finally, for the first time in the history of the organization, win a Lombardi Trophy.”

Jamie Erdahl – Good Morning Football

If you can listen to that impassioned speech by Erdahl, see her removed the jacket to reveal a “9” McCarthy jersey, and not be ready to run through a wall with tears streaming down your face, I’m not sure how to help you.

The Minnesota Vikings have seemingly been there. From that fateful kick in 1998, to wide left, or wide right. After Brett Favre found Greg Lewis in the back of the end zone. Watching Favre take body shots against the now Broncos head coach Sean Payton’s New Orleans Saints. The Minneapolis Miracle. Darnold’s dream season. All of that hurt leads to this.

Related: QB Expert Would Take JJ McCarthy Over Everyone

It has been 50 years since the Minnesota Vikings last played in a Super Bowl. It seems now, with this team, it’s as good of a time as ever to win the next one you get to.

MN Vikings Super Bowl is not far-fetched

Of course Erdahl’s prediction is ripe with homerism, but that’s the beauty of sports. Each new season hope springs eternal. Her belief that the Vikings can not only with the North, but take the conference as well is not misguided.

Laid out eloquently as a perfect sum of the parts, this roster is capable of achieving greatness at the peak. Doing so with McCarthy in his first year under center would be an incredible way to shush the doubters, and usher in a new era of Minnesota football where the roster can be built from the inside out.

This moment, when the ball is snapped on Monday night, will have been more than a year in the making. We’ll finally see what McCarthy is capable of, and he could torch the expectations in one fell swoop.

Related: O’Connell Gives Major Update on Key Vikings Starters

The season is long, and it is grueling. If it can end without heartbreak, just once, this rallying cry might be the perfect one to come back to.

Mentioned in this article:

More About:
0What do you think?Post a comment.