Fran Tarkenton will catch Saturday's NFL playoff games in his theater room with Susan Lucci.
Thought I'd misheard the loquacious Vikings Hall of Famer during a Monday appearance with KFAN's Dan Barreiro — but no. Their talk started out as a post-mortem on the Vikings wild-card game loss to the Seahawks.
When the Barreiro-Tarkenton exchange turned to his social media profile the HOFer averred, "Saturday I'm going to have a good time because my wife's going to handle the camera and I've got Susan Lucci and her husband here watching the game. My wife's cooking. We're going to put that up and post it all during the games this weekend. I had a lot of fun with it today because I was hurting so much, it gave me a chance to vent and talk to Vikings fans wherever they were. When I checked we had 20,000, 28,000-plus viewers of that post we did a couple hours ago. This is the most excited [about] talking I've been since the game. I've been speechless all day long."
Barreiro jumped on that one: "That's not easy for you."
Tarkenton also promised to get Lucci to be on Barreiro's show this Friday or next.
Contrary Coach Grant
How refreshing that Fran Tarkenton does not bite his tongue. He called Bengals cornerback Pacman Jones "a thug" for his latest atrocious behavior during the Steelers loss and also told Dan Barreiro, deep sigh here, that God didn't want the Vikings to beat the Seahawks.
"This stuff happens. They played great. They had beaten the Seahawks and then I think there was divine intervention. This is a little sacrilegious for me," Tarkenton laughed. "God, I think, sometimes decides, 'I think this team should win today.' I don't know why he's picking on the Vikings, but he did."
I thoroughly enjoyed my recent interview with Tarkenton (http://tinyurl.com/j7l8gbj), but seriously doubt that God has time to care who wins sporting events. Moving on to Tarkenton's take on his old coach, Bud Grant, coming out for the coin flip with a golf shirt on when it was below zero.
"Bud," laughed Tarkenton, "is a contrarian. I could see it in his face. He was enjoying himself to the utmost 'cause he's doing something that he thinks the people are going to … say, 'What a tough guy — 88 years old.' That's part of the greatness of Bud. You never know where he's coming from and he's so clever.
"The reason he didn't let us wear all that stuff on the sideline and the heaters and so forth — the other team was all hanging around the heater, losing concentration. I said this to you last week, all the games we played I never remember being cold. However, I didn't play in a 26-below chill factor."
Walsh gets kicked again
Not all schoolkids are trying to patch up Vikings kicker Blair Walsh's ego after he missed that field goal Sunday.
KFAN's Common Man said that when he scolded one of his sons for not picking up after himself, the boy replied: "My Blair." ("My bad" is normally the phrase for taking responsibility for an error.)
Wilson's uncle was a sweetie
Seahawks QB Russell Wilson's uncle left Minnesota happy.
Ben Wilson wasn't so sure Saturday night that the Seahawks were going to defeat the Vikings Sunday.
I met Russell's uncle, who lives in the Washington, D.C., area, at the Atlanta airport where I had missed two flights. I assume the football gods wanted me to notice the man in the No 3. Seahawks jersey who casually told some other Delta passengers, "My nephew is the quarterback of the Seahawks." I informed the elder Wilson that days earlier I tweeted to Seahawks fanatic Ross Mathews: "Premature to say congratulations @helloross? I don't think @Vikings really want any part of your @Seahawks who seem rather hot."
Wilson asked me to watch his luggage while he stepped into the restroom. He bought me a bottle of water. I gave him a package of foot warmers. Oh, and I can confirm, for his wife who he said might not believe it, that he bought food from one of the healthiest airport restaurants.
C.J. can be reached at cj@startribune.com and seen on Fox 9's "Jason Show" and "Buzz."
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