Bill Simmons of ESPN wrote a column about the "most tortured" sports teams, and the Vikings came in at #2. Here's what he wrote about them:
2. Minnesota Vikings
Last Title: Never.
Last Truly Devastating Defeat: This past Sunday.
Rock Bottom: Hard to top four Super Bowl losses in eight years. (Although we just topped it with the Bills, so I guess it's not THAT hard.) But since there were so many rock bottoms, let's go with the first one: Super Bowl IV, when the Vikes were favored by 12 and ended up losing by 16 to the Chiefs. Before the game, a Vikings mascot tried to take off in a hot air balloon, failed and nearly crashed into the stands. Don't believe me? Go to the 20-second mark of this clip. It's like a deleted scene from a Christopher Guest movie. Not a good omen for the Vikes and big games. Call it a retroactive rock bottom.
Additional Thoughts: As Geoff said on my podcast, "If there's any upside [from Sunday's loss], it's that no city will be willing to lure the Vikings away." I bumped them ahead of Buffalo only because of their unparalleled streak: Every 10 years or so, they rip the intestines out of their fans. Happened in 1975 (the Hail Mary), 1988 (Darren Nelson), 1998 (Gary Anderson) and 2009 (12 men). ... By the way, none of those were the four lost Super Bowls. Not even the Red Sox annihilated their fans at such a consistently efficient pace.
And here's the link to the article. It's a pretty good list, although I think the Lions should've made it:
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/100129&sportCat=nfl