Winning Does Wonders for Viking Locker Room

A joke making the rounds recently ends with Minnesota’s Mike Tice being honored as “Comeback Coach of the Year.” Because the NFL award is actually for “Coach of the Year,” the joke only works if you know what Tice and the Vikings are coming back from.

Steve Tallen, the prosecutor for the Lake Minnetonka Conservation District, wasn’t laughing Thursday when he charged four members of Tice’s football team with three counts each of disorderly, lewd or lascivious conduct during the players’ infamous “Love Boat” ride on Lake Minnetonka in early October.

If convicted, the players could spend up to 90 days in jail on each count. Nothing funny about that.

Fortunately, Daunte Culpepper, Bryant McKinnie, Fred Smoot and Moe Williams can afford pricey lawyers and they’ll get their day in court. But it’s worth remembering that those players -- and just about everyone else connected to the franchise -- have already been found guilty in the court of public opinion.

They’ve already served the better part of two months as the butt of a national joke. A few of them just finished paying off credit-card bills that would make even an Enron accountant flinch.

So it didn’t seem unreasonable when Tice called on the media and the rest of the scolds to hold their fire for the time being.

“According to NFL rules and union contracts, there is a large difference between allegations and charges and convictions,” he said. “So until at any point there is a conviction of some type, if there is, I have no action to take and nothing to say.”

Even as the words left Tice’s mouth, he knew they were useless. That’s why he threatened a few moments later to quit talking altogether if one more “Love Boat” question surfaced.

The Vikings were 1-3 and enjoying a bye week when reports of the cruise hit the papers and blindsided Tice. They returned to work Oct. 16, just in time to get beaten 28-3 by the Chicago Bears. They were about to slide to 2-5 when Culpepper’s knee ligaments were fricasseed in mid-game against the Carolina Panthers.

Tice helped carry his quarterback off the field that day. He probably thought about continuing on into the tunnel and then making a run for it. Instead, he came back. The Vikings have gone 6-0 since and can see the playoffs from where they stand.

Winning is, and always will be, a happy confluence of talent, timing, resources and luck, and all of them played a role in Minnesota’s stunning comeback. They got a gift from the schedule-makers, drawing Detroit (twice), Cleveland, Green Bay and St. Louis, in addition to the New York Giants. The defense stepped up. With Brad Johnson subbing for Culpepper at quarterback, the Vikings offense switched from high risk to high efficiency.

It’s rarely been pretty, but winning did wonders for everyone’s nerves and lightened up the mood in the locker room.

Owner Zygi Wilf has had plenty to say about every other aspect of the story. He’s apologized to fans, the league and went hat in hand to state lawmakers, hoping to keep plans for a new Vikings stadium on the drawing board. He blistered the players, instituted a code of conduct and bolstered the baby-sitting department by hiring a former FBI agent as the team’s security director.

Yet Wilf has been absolutely mum on the subject of Tice’s future.

The coach had quite a reputation for running a loose ship before Wilf took command: See Moss, Randy; ticket-selling scandal, Super Bowl; and “Whizzinator,” Onterrio Smith.

Still, Tice lost his football team once -- the day the “Love Boat” story broke -- and if he doesn’t lose it again, Wilf should think seriously about giving him an extension for at least one more season. Who knows how good Tice might be as a coach if he didn’t have to spend most of his time playing the role of parent.

True, he won’t challenge coaches like Tony Dungy of Indianapolis, Marvin Lewis of Cincinnati or Lovie Smith of Chicago for the NFL’s annual honor.

But if Tice finds a way to keep the Vikings afloat deep into the playoffs, the league might want to think about ordering a duplicate trophy and have somebody engrave “Comeback” right next to “Coach of the Year.”