After videogame of the year, it’s time to reward the Vikings as competitors

Three huge declarations came bounding out of Buffalo priorto the Minnesota Vikings even started their newest celebration airplane flight house, all finding prevalent preliminary arrangement.

The veryfirst, and possibly most apparent, was that the Vikings’ nail-biting, head-scratching, thrill-seeking 33-30 triumph over the Bills was an immediate lock for videogame of the season.

Next was that in moving to 8-1 and downing one of the Super Bowl favorites on their own turf, the Vikings are genuine competitors, a claim loudly and boldly made by head coach Kevin O’Connell in his post-win locker space speech.

The 3rd was that Justin Jefferson’s one-handed grab from the paradises, the one you either pushed rewind on 50 times if enjoying live or haveactually been glued to on your social-media platform of option if not, is a leading competitor for the title of the biggest catch in NFL history.

In the heady minutes that followed a videogame with so lotsof “what the heck” minutes that some genuinely admirable plays endedupbeing a simple footnote, Jefferson, coming off an trip where his 193 getting lawns informed however a portion of the story, had another principle for consideration: That the Vikings are now a group predestined for supreme splendor.

“It was so insane,” Jefferson informed pressreporters. “It felt like it was unbelievable, it felt like a motionpicture. I informed everyone, ‘this is our season.’ This suggests this is our season — to win out and go to the Super Bowl.”

The oddsmakers wear’t always concur, and if we’re being truthful, the public hasactually been painfully sluggish to accept what is now looking us in the face. The Vikings are here, not as a sideshow for a charming interlude, however as a force. In a league where it feels like everybody is within a shade of .500, their just loss hasactually been to the 9-0 Philadelphia Eagles.

They are not ideal; not close to it. But they are definitely, unquestionably, provenly, and truly freaking excitingly, the genuine offer.

They are a group to be reckoned with by any metric, quantifiable or otherwise, that you desire to include to the discussion.

O’Connell’s group is one that can conserve its own skin with plays of difficult grace and athleticism, that can dig deep with the steeliest of nerve, and can — when things fall right — win it all with a wonder when all was really lost.

Their tight margins of triumph — each of their last 7 wins haveactually been by one ownership — were being held versus them in the court of public viewpoint, proof maybe that the record was flimsier than the raw numbers recommended. Maybe we’ve all been looking at it the incorrect method. Perhaps Minnesota’s durability and valiancy and capability to produce significant plays, apparently at a impulse, is what makes it so harmful.

They’re still enjoyable, and they still get loud and jolly on the airplane house, even if Kirk Cousins obviously passed over his bare-chested, chain-wearing event to Patrick Peterson this time. But the Vikings are a thing now.

The approach isn’t complex. On offense, when things get as challenging as they were when falling 17 points behind to Josh Allen’s Bills, Cousins went with the basic treatment of looking for his finest gamers, time and onceagain.

“What we made here today is the last stamp in understanding that we are one of the finest groups in the league,” O’Connell informed his gamers in the locker space, to roars of approval. “Now, we get to show it each and every week.”

Next up are the Dallas Cowboys, 6-3 and smarting from Sunday’s overtime loss to the Green Bay Packers, at house next Sunday.

If we’re being truthful, there is mostlikely a bit of regionality to the prior suspicion about Minnesota. If Jefferson was carryingout these kinds of ridiculous tasks in Los Angeles, or New York, or Chicago, or Dallas, he would be admired as the greatest thing in the history of truly huge things. Name me somebody who you believe is, right of this minute, a muchbetter large receiver, and we’ll mostlikely get into a truly great argument.

Dalvin Cook is a running threat on any play, highlighted by Sunday’s 81-yard rating. The defense is a pack of wolves, searching quarterbacks and hawking for interceptions, like the one Peterson utilized to ice it in overtime versus Buffalo.

And then there is Cousins, the QB numerous love to dislike, at least partially because he’s wacky and his style sense doesn’t truly exist. But he works ceaselessly, has figured out that the finest method to assistance his group is by lowering threat, and doesn’t panic when the minute showsup.

Plus, and this is not to be ignored, he makes the Vikings severe and enjoyable at the exactsame time. Summed up by how, with every triumph, he brings the possibility we might see a repeat of the silliest, funniest, most satisfying three-word triumph celebratory concern recognized to humanity.

You understand you do.

Martin Rogers is a writer for FOX Sports and the author of the FOX Sports Insider newsletter. Follow him on Twitter @MRogersFOX and subscribe to the everyday newsletter.