Patrick Reusse: Today's Vikings have nothing on the '69 squad

There were Vikings fans in their early 40s and younger still walking around in full pout more than a week after the overtime loss to New Orleans in the NFC Championship Game. Many suggested that they hadn't felt this bad for this long over a result since the loss to Atlanta in a similar circumstance in January 1999.

The failure in the Superdome came as Purple loyalists anticipated the moment that would declare their hard-edged quarterback to be a hero for the ages. The failure in the Metrodome came on a Sunday that started with no horn-wearing devotee having considered the possibility of defeat.

These fans are offspring of Flower Children, and Generation Xers, and Millennials, and we that came before merely smirk at the naiveté of these short-timers in VikesWorld.

Forty years ago, when even the oldest of these pathetic whiners still needed diapers changed, the Vikings suffered a failure that caused greater agony for believers in a hard-edged quarterback, and also caused the populace from Winona to Warroad to wander zombie-like for weeks.

The occasion was the fourth Super Bowl -- played in New Orleans' Tulane Stadium on Jan. 11, 1970. The opponents were the Kansas City Chiefs, the final champions of the American Football League.

The AFL had surprised fans of American football with the New York Jets' victory over the Baltimore Colts in the third Super Bowl.

This mattered not a year later. Joe Kapp was the trigger for a Vikings offense that could be either explosive or time-consuming, and the front four of Page, Eller, Marshall and Larsen led a defense that was beyond fierce.

The Chiefs had obvious talent, yet there was no way a team from the AFL -- from the lesser league -- could deal with this defense. The official betting line was Vikings by 12 at kickoff, and it was higher here among gentlemen taking bets on pay phones.

Either way, 12 points or 14, we figured a wager on the Vikings was stealing candy from a toddler.

Ron Hein was 21 and working for Onan Corp. in Minneapolis. Lee Walter was a colleague. They knew that Forrest Tagg, an Onan truck driver, had a single-engine Cessna.

"We gave Forrest our idea, and he went for it: If we could get everyone tickets, he would fly us down there," Hein said. "We put an ad in the newspaper, and that's how we found Wally."

Wally Kalscheuer was a Vikings season-ticket holder with access to four tickets, for the kingly sum of $15 apiece. The foursome flew to Jackson, Miss., on Saturday and ran into thick fog. They rented a car and drove to New Orleans on Sunday morning, joined 80,000 people in the worn stadium and waited for the Vikings' domination to ensue.

Bob Lundegaard, on the scene to write the news-side color for the Minneapolis Morning Tribune, described it thusly: "In an ominous sign of what was in store for the Vikings, [the balloon] skittered and bounced toward a corner of the end zone like an onside kick, pushed through a wall of shrubbery and piled into some terrified Sugar Bowl princesses as it spouted flames."

There was a pregame photo in Monday's Tribune that showed Hein, Kalscheuer and Lee Walter holding their tickets and smiling. The smiles disappeared as the Chiefs took a 16-0 halftime lead.

"We kept saying, 'Where's the team we watched all year?'" Hein said.

The second half offered no answer. The final was 23-7. Hein and friends left solemnly, drove back to Jackson and flew home.

Bourbon Street? "Never got there," Hein said. "Nothing to celebrate."

"We had so many chances to win that game," Hein said. "What's new?"

What's new? Doesn't Ron Hein see The Favre Game as a devastating milepost for Vikings fandom?

"Not compared to that first Super Bowl," he said. "We knew we were going to crush the Chiefs. That was a given."