Vikings in L.A.? It’d Be a Steal

I woke up Sunday, watched the NFL games and finally realized what Los Angeles needs to do. Why hadn’t I thought of this before? It is so simple, so obvious.

We steal the Minnesota Vikings.

It worked once--we snatched the Lakers away from Minneapolis--and it can work again.

You think I’m kidding?

I am perfectly serious.

The Vikings are for sale. They need a good home.

L.A. needs a team. We don’t know if the NFL will give us one. So come on, let’s take one.

Don’t cry for Minnesota. The title of Coach Dennis Green’s new book is, “No Room for Crybabies.” He’s right. There is none.

Oakland and St. Louis didn’t cry for us, when they stole our teams.

And we wouldn’t even have had the Raiders and Rams, if we hadn’t stolen them from Oakland and Cleveland in the first place.

L.A. is a born thief.

We even stole the Clippers from San Diego, although that was more like petty larceny.

If we are going to steal teams, why not steal from the best?

Minnesota is a strong organization. The Vikings have been to several Super Bowls. They seldom have a losing record. Their record this season is 7-2, even though I can’t name five Viking players.

I keep hearing how L.A. wants an expansion team because we don’t want to get stuck with some perennial loser, such as the Seahawks or Cardinals.

Repeatedly, I have argued that these same perennial losers tend to turn things around, eventually.

Nobody here wanted Tampa Bay. I would love to have Tampa Bay’s team here today.

The Buccaneers have won more games--six--than the Raiders and Rams have combined.

Well, OK.

You don’t want a loser?

Minnesota is not a loser. The Vikings have been good for as long as I can remember. They were a good team even before Fran Tarkenton began selling every new product in America on TV infomercials.

Evidently, the Vikings--like the Twins--do not wish to play at the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome any more.

I don’t know if this has to do with a lease, with luxury boxes, or with the fact that footballs and baseballs should not bounce 100 feet in the air off a carpet made of Flubber.

Whatever the reason, the Vikings have hoped that the taxpayers of Minnesota would help them build a new stadium. I am pretty sure that the taxpayers of Minnesota--most of them grumpy old men and grumpy old women--told the Vikes to take a hike.

With hockey long gone, Minnesota’s only pro sports in the 21st century will be pro basketball and ice fishing.

Rumor has it, the Twins will move to the tri-city area of Greensboro, High Point and Winston-Salem, N.C., where they probably should call themselves the Triplets.

But what about the Vikings?

In his controversial new book, Green, the coach, demands that the Vikings sell a piece of the team to him. I believe Denny is trying to become a new kind of hyphenate, owner-coach.

(Jerry Jones has similar aspirations in Dallas, and after seeing what Barry Switzer has done, I wouldn’t put it past Jerry to become owner-coach.)

I think Minnesota’s owners have other plans.

A town like Los Angeles, with a lot of money and a stadium to fill, should have its people call Minnesota’s people. Let them know our town is interested. Get our foot in the door.

If L.A. is anxious about the NFL’s ignoring us in the 1999 expansion, this is our chance to gain a little leverage. Instead of begging for a team, we seize one.

That way, the New Coliseum can deal with Minnesota directly.

Voila, the L.A. Vikings.

I don’t know if a team called the Vikings could function in warm weather, but we don’t have many lakes here, either.

No matter how you feel about expansion team versus existing team, I only know one thing: You can’t play football without a team.

Let’s get in the league, any way we can.

We would be doing Minnesota a favor, taking in the cold and homeless.