Darren Boyle's Weekly Words of Wisdom

First of all, merry christmas to everyone although it is a day or two late. I got a new laptop from my wife and now it is set up in my "man cave" a.k.a. our basement and now I wont have to battle for computer time and I can be a blogging machine. If you listen to our sportscasts on the internet, have you checked out our new live chat feature? Do you like it? I would like to get the imput from you our listeners so we can continue to improve our coverage. We have had alot of games on our early schedule and have seen some surprises. I felt that Lyman's boys bb team lost alot to graduation last season but appear to be a young, but very quick team that will have some bumps early but should be ok by the time it matters. Millers boys team has alot of letterwinners back and look very good, and White River's boys made a splash early this year by winning the LNI. From what I have seen on the girls side, Miller looks to be in good shape. It's not every girls team that has 6 players 5'11" on their roster. Its way too early to start talking favorites though and we will have a good double header for you this Tuesday as Miller goes to Todd County. Tipoff @ 5:00 on KPLO. On the Vikings front, I was much maligned earlier in the year about my reluctance to drink the purple kool-aid when VSK came on board. And honestly, it was pretty hard to make fun of a team that was 10-1 at one point. But now after the Vikes have lost two of the last three we see some chinks in their armor. It think now most would agree that VSK would have played for the Vikings whoever was the coach just to get back at the Packers for running him off, so we can forget the whole long lost friend deal with VSK and Childress. And now that the Vikes beat the Pack not once but twice this year, VSK seems to have lost some interest in whats going on. There was a play during the second half of the Cardinals game where VSK got thrown down and sacked, on the following play he threw an intercepion. he left the field with a look like he would have rather been anywhere else. Childress on the other hand got his contract extension when the Vikings were on their roll and now wants to do things his way or else. That's why the power struggle between VSK and Childress reached the boiling point last Sunday @ Carolina. VSK called a few too many audibles and Childress was going to bench him. Farve airs out most of his dirty laundry through the media so now its all public. I would also expect that the way AP has performed lately and the way the Minnesota Matadors a.k.a the offensive line, has blocked lately there is some bickering in the lockeroom as well. And thats just the problems with the offense. The defense was getting tons of praise around the league for getting after the QB six weeks ago, now they are constantly being victims of screens and misdirection plays mostly run at the side of Jared Allen. A first round bye isnt a sure deal, if they lose to the Bears Monday night, they finish the season with a must win game against the Giants. The Giants will need to win to get into the playoffs, so it is possible the Vikes could be on a three game losing streak coming in the the playoffs without the bye week. So in the end who is to blame for all this? Farve??? Not hardly. The real Viking Season Killer is Brad Childress. If he was half the "genius" he was made out to be do you think the Eagles would have let him get away? When Childress left Philadelphia to come to Minnesota, Andy Reid was on the hot seat remember? No way would the Eagles have let him go to another team in the NFC. Whats going to happen over the next few weeks? Who is going to step up and motivate this team to turn things around? If the Childress era has showed us anything, we as Viking fans are screwed.