On Sunday night, the Minnesota Vikings will play their first regular season home game at their billion-dollar stadium in downtown Minneapolis. To celebrate, the team plans a full afternoon of festivities outside the venue and a Super Bowl-style extended halftime show at the game itself, with performances by the Minnesota Orchestra and a tribute to native son Prince. Also, The Mountain That Rides will be there to lead the crowd in an “Icelandic war chant,” which sounds cool and also a bit like the sort of tradition you’d introduce if you wanted to solidify your team’s brand identification among white nationalists.
Deadspin would also like to celebrate the Vikings, and congratulate them on successfully getting a half-billion dollars in public subsidies, so last year we bought a “Legacy Brick,” one of thousands of personalized commemorative markers purchased by fans and placed in a plaza just outside the stadium.
The Deadspin brick has been installed. Our tribute to the Vikings will now stand forever, or until the team threatens to move to Berlin in order to force Anoka County to cover half the costs of constructing a $25 billion stadium and entertainment complex in Coon Rapids, in about 20 years.
Now, like in your “augmented reality” Pokemon apps, it is up to you to go out into the real world and find it.
Our brick is not signed, but you should know it when you see it, if you are familiar with the Minnesota Vikings franchise, and with Deadspin.com, the sports site. Still, with over 12,000 bricks outside the stadium, this will not be an easy task. The team has placed “Vikings Greatest Moments Markers” as guideposts around the plaza. Here’s a hint to finding ours: It’s somewhere in the sections denoted by greatest moments markers 10 (the Vikings’ loss in Super Bowl 8) through 13 (the Vikings’ loss in Super Bowl 11).
Send us your best guesses by Monday, September 19, 2016 to [email protected]. The first person to send us the correct answer will win a leftover Deadspin Awards trophy, as well as an invitation (if available and legal) to battle Deadspin staff in a private DraftKings NFL daily fantasy contest, with Deadspin covering your entry fee. As always, our standard Contest Guidelines apply.