Tuesday, November 24, 1998

Nine years later, Vikings outrun Herschel legacy

By Rick Gosselin

The Dallas Morning News

(KRT)

Red McCombs is a novice in NFL ownership circles. He spent 25 years in the NBA, so he knows basketball. But you can count his football experience in months.

"If I live to be 110, I would never know as much about football as Jerry Jones," McCombs said. "I'm just not that much of a student of football."

But here are a few words of advice to Jones: Don't bother calling McCombs with any Herschel Walker-type trade offers. No rookie owner would dare make such a deal especially a rookie owner with the Minnesota Vikings.

McCombs wasn't with the Vikings in 1989 when the Cowboys engineered the trade of the century make that the heist of the century when they sent Walker to Minnesota for what turned out to be seven high draft picks and five starting-caliber players.

That haul provided the foundation for a three-Super Bowl spree by the Cowboys in the 1990s. When Jimmy Johnson was through wheeling and dealing from his vault of picks, the Cowboys had added Emmitt Smith, Darren Woodson, Kevin Smith and Russell Maryland to the roster.

Back then, McCombs loved the deal. He lived in San Antonio still does and, like most Texans, considered the Cowboys his NFL team of choice. McCombs was all for any trade that made the Cowboys a better football team. But as the owner of another pro team in another sport, the deal made him scratch his head.

"It didn't make any sense," McCombs said. "The Vikings weren't even on my radar screen then. But I'm looking at that trade and thinking, 'How do you give away your team? How do you give away your future?'

"Once you get in that hole, how do you get out?"

The NFL still can't answer that question. But the NFL now can answer the related question: How long does it take a team to recover from the worst trade in NFL history?

Nine years.

And McCombs is the beneficiary. He bought the Vikings last summer, and they have matched the best start in franchise history at 10-1. Nine years after the Walker deal, the Vikings finally are where trade architect Mike Lynn thought they'd be: the team to beat in the NFC.

The Vikings haven't beaten the Cowboys since the Walker trade, going 0-3 in the 1990s. But the Vikes are favored on Thanksgiving when they visit Texas Stadium. Clearly, Minnesota can finally exorcise the ghost of Herschel Walker with a holiday victory in Dallas.

Walker didn't push the Vikings over the top as Lynn had hoped. Minnesota did win the division in 1989, but sank to last place in the NFC Central in 1990. The Vikings hired Dennis Green as coach in 1992 and stormed to another division title.

But that three-year hole in their drafts haunted the Vikings. With no first- or second-round picks from 1990-92, Minnesota was unable to fortify the roster with any difference-makers. Free agency hadn't arrived in the NFL yet, so the Vikings were handcuffed as their talent supply dwindled. That doomed Minnesota to status as a playoff contender, but not a Super Bowl contender, in the 1990s.

The Vikings began drafting in the first round again in 1993 and have since added running back Robert Smith, offensive tackles Todd Steussie and Korey Stringer, defensive linemen Derrick Alexander and Duane Clemons, linebacker Dwayne Rudd and wide receiver Randy Moss with those premium picks.

There have been no misses in the first round by the Vikings, an incredible display of drafting. Now all those picks have matured as NFL players, just as they did in Dallas. All start and all have played major roles in Minnesota's marvelous debut season under McCombs.

So the new owner isn't in the market for any trades.

"In basketball, it's a lot easier," McCombs said. "You can take one guy and make a whale of a difference. You can take two guys and arguably create a championship team. But in football, in my opinion, you're talking about seven to nine guys. That's kind of hard to come by."

McCombs might have those seven to nine players on his roster right now. Minnesotans have waited a long time for a team like this. They've waited a long time to get over Herschel Walker.

(c) 1998, The Dallas Morning News.

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