It has been a strange week for Team Wobegon.
The head coach barely slept, drove home late one night, decided that eating occasionally might be wise, ordered two fast-food burgers and later realized they only gave him one. Bud Grant would have gone back through the drive-through with a shotgun.
The quarterback got called "scared'' by an opponent, then later said the opponent was an old friend with whom he exchanged jerseys after the game.
The star running back complained that he only got eight carries in a 31-point loss. All four of the team's safeties were hurt, and its three best defensive players, and the NFL forced this tattered bunch to fly to Arizona three days after that 31-point loss, and not for sun and fun, or rest and rehab, but to play one of the league's most complete and best-coached teams.
One week after the Vikings won to reach 8-3 and become one of the more promising teams in the NFL, a 38-7 loss at home to Seattle cast everything they have accomplished into doubt. It's as if the Vikings ship outside the new stadium should be replaced with a life raft.
Things figure to get worse on Thursday night. The Cardinals are 10-2, healthy and home, so the Vikings are facing the possibility of their first two-game losing streak of the season and the endangerment of a playoff spot that had become assumed.
It's time like these that cause overreaction. Here's the right way to react to three key issues:
1. Losing to Arizona won't be disastrous, unless injuries mount.
If the Vikings lose tonight, they'll be 8-5 with two winnable home game between now and their season finale at Lambeau Field. That's about where any optimistic realist would have projected them to be before the season began. They still can reach 10 victories and make the playoffs for only the second time since 2009, and they might be better off finishing second in the division if that means a chance to play against the NFC East champion instead of Seattle.