Adding together their regular-season and postseason games — games that have thrilled us and tortured us and sewed stitches into Minnesota's fabric for 62 seasons — the Vikings played Game No. 1,000 Saturday with a game that did all of those and more.
We charted all 1,000 Minnesota Vikings games ever played. Here's a portrait of that joy and pain
The Vikings played their 1,000th game Saturday. From Fran Tarkenton to Bud Grant to Tommy Kramer to Randy Moss to Justin Jefferson — and yes, four fruitless Super Bowls — this is a remarkable history.
December 17, 2022 at 11:17PM
Over the course of each decade, we tracked the team's wins and losses into a running total of games above or below a .500 record, including both regular season and playoff games. Wins gained a point, losses dropped one, and ties, more common in the 1960s than today, did neither. When the line drops below zero, it indicates a losing record, but above zero means they were winning more that decade.
After their historic 1,000th matchup, the Vikings have won more games than they've lost — 535 wins, 454 losses and 11 ties. From the opener in 1961, to frozen games in numbing windchills, to toasty ones under an inflatable roof, to four Super Bowls, with 949 regular-season games and 51 more in the postseason, a miracle or two, a missed kick or three, here's a grand in games.
Editor's note: The NFL held a third-place game from 1961 to '69, which the Vikings participated in at the conclusion of the 1968 season, but these games, known as the "Playoff Bowl," are recorded as exhibition games, like preseason games, and not included in our count.
Data source: Star Tribune analysis of FiveThirtyEight NFL data
Mike Conley was in Minneapolis, where he sounded the Gjallarhorn at the Vikings game, on Sunday during the robbery.
