Jared Allen: The Minnesota Vikings nice aiming for an Olympics Curling spot

Ever hear the one concerning the daredevil plasterer who lit an Olympic flame in a four-time first-team All-Professional defensive finish?

Jared Allen roars on the point out of Eddie ‘The Eagle’ Edwards, the face of the 1988 Winter Video games and embodiment of Pierre de Coubertin’s mantra. The beaming, bespectacled British ski jumper completed final within the 70m and 90m occasions in Calgary however gained hearts and minds the world over.

After 136 sacks in 12 NFL seasons, a fortunately retired Allen and an previous good friend watched the feelgood 2016 biopic that celebrates the life and instances of Michael David Edwards. It had penalties.

“Yeah! Eddie the Eagle! Nice film,” Allen tells The Athletic on the phone from Nashville. “That’s what impressed me to make a guess with my buddy to attempt to make the Olympics!

“Eddie the Eagle needed to work his butt off to qualify and develop into a ski jumper, which was the inspirational facet of it. However the level I liked about it was like, ‘Oh, yeah, I simply must go discover a sport that’s not on the books that we don’t actually do properly at and go be part of that’,” says Allen, bursting into laughter.

And what of the guess?

“The quantity was pointless. My buddy threw a quantity out. I used to be like, ‘Positive, no matter’. Sure, it was over beers… It’s extra only a gentleman’s guess. However no one needs to welch on a guess! I don’t wish to have to inform him he was proper — I need him to should eat crow and inform me that I used to be proper!”

So Allen set to work. In 2018, he fashioned the All-Professional Curling Crew with three former NFL gamers — quarterback Marc Bulger, linebacker Keith Bulluck and offensive sort out Michael Roos — and set his sights on Beijing.

“I began off as skip, nobody had curled ever — we had been 4 soccer gamers. Life took off and I ended up becoming a member of another groups. I had no ego, so I ended up enjoying lead and enjoying fairly good at lead and sweeping fairly good. In order that’s sort of the place I discovered my spot. I actually like enjoying second — I feel second is a enjoyable place. However wherever they inform me they want me is the place I’ll slot in.”

Whereas he didn’t make the 2022 Video games, Allen has had some minor miracles on ice.

“I beat (John) Shuster two years in the past on the nationals in Denver, we beat a staff final yr that had been high 30 on this planet, we had some success over in Switzerland and Canada, I’ve acquired to play some actually robust groups, and it’s been a enjoyable deal.”

However brace yourselves. Simply because the Milan-Cortina Winter Video games loom into view, right here comes the plot twist.

“I’ll most likely not play this yr,” Allen, 42, says. “My staff sort of broke up. One man in my staff retired. One other man has moved on. After which I truly acquired invited to play with Korey Dropkin as his alternate this yr, however USA Curling and the USOPC put the kibosh on it, saying I didn’t have a adequate curling resume.

“Their actual phrases. We gained nationals and all of the trials, however they’ve changed me because the alternate.

“After which they modified our guidelines — we used to have a two-year level run-up for Olympic trial qualification and now they’re taking the highest three point-earners for the yr primarily based on their yr up to now, after which they’re doing a one match play-in.”

Does that imply that the Olympic dream is… over?

“No! No! I’ve nonetheless acquired time. I nonetheless love curling, I’m nonetheless gonna practise, we’ll determine it out,” Allen says. “Lots of people aren’t enjoying this yr. Until you’ll be able to go to the Slams, Shuster, Dropkin, and (Danny) Casper just about have already got the highest three spots locked up.

“All people is like, ‘Why are we going to journey, waste our time on these tournaments that imply nothing for us over the following yr and a half?’. So everyone’s attempting to simply practise for the following yr, put a staff collectively for The Challenger and attempt to win the play-in.”

Ought to Allen win his wager, it will characterize one other story to inform for one of many NFL’s greatest personalities of the twenty first century.

Drafted by Kansas Metropolis in 2004, Allen was traded to Minnesota 4 years later because the then highest-paid defensive participant.

The 2009 Vikings are one of many NFL’s nice almost groups, with quarterback Brett Favre steering them to the NFC Championship within the Superdome. There, they had been crushed by themselves (six fumbles, three misplaced, two interceptions and 12 males within the huddle within the fourth quarter to knock them out of area purpose vary) and the New Orleans Saints, who had been later punished for the Bountygate scandal.

“If we beat the Saints and we exit and win the Tremendous Bowl, our 2009 season arguably goes down as among the best seasons in NFL historical past,” Allen says. “Sadly, we didn’t make it to the Tremendous Bowl as a result of we misplaced that controversial sport.”

Allen headed to the Chicago Bears in 2014 and was traded to the Carolina Panthers in September 2015 for a final hurrah. The 15-1 Panthers nearly went all the way in which, shedding Tremendous Bowl 50 in opposition to the Denver Broncos.

“It was a blast. It’s a type of surreal moments. I inform folks it was my least productive statistical yr of my profession — I used to be coping with damage and all kinds of stuff — but it surely was probably the most profitable of my profession as a result of the purpose is to get the Tremendous Bowl.”

Allen’s is a profession worthy of Canton (he has been a finalist for the previous 4 years). He led the league twice in sacks (2007 and 2011), the second seeing a tally of twenty-two, making Michael Strahan sweat about shedding his all-time file (22.5).

The spotlight reel moments are many. They embody his one-handed sack of Eli Manning and the tete-a-tete with Donald Penn. After which there’s his contribution to probably the most notorious performs in NFL historical past. You already know the one.

It was 2008 and whereas enjoying for the winless Detroit Lions, quarterback Dan Orlovsky stepped out of bounds within the Metrodome for a security. Orlovsky — now a stellar ESPN analyst — can look again and snicker. Allen is chuckling at it nonetheless.

“I want he wouldn’t have ran out the again — I may have truly hit him! It was my sack. I used to be truly laughing as a result of Kevin Williams had like 4 sacks that sport, so I used to be attempting to catch as much as him. He was pissed. We had been in a good sack race that yr. I acquired a cheapo. I acquired a freebie!

“To my credit score, I did whoop the tight finish. I used to be vast open! May have throttled him. It was a great job they referred to as a security,” Allen says.

Johnny Knoxville was not so fortunate. As the broader public embraced Allen along with his signature mullet and everyman attraction, in 2010 he was invited to California to movie a phase referred to as The Blindside for Jackass 3.

“That was a enjoyable deal. Knoxville is a superb man — I nonetheless discuss to Johnny. I truly came upon later I separated his sternum once I tackled him from behind.

“We filmed the run the place he catches the ball over the center a couple of instances. He’s like, ‘Man, come on!’ Like, properly, if you wish to see what I truly do, let’s drop again for a cross and I’ll hit you from behind. So we did that. There was just one tackle that one!”

Allen, who returns to England for the primary time because the Vikings beat Pittsburgh at Wembley in 2013, can be inducted into the London Ring of Honor throughout Sunday’s sport between the New York Jets and Minnesota.

He likes what he has seen to date this season from his former staff.

“They’re aggressive. What’s most spectacular is they’re getting what they should get out of their new acquisitions, who’re already making large impacts. That’s what you wish to see if you choose up free brokers.

“Hats off to the teaching workers for getting the gamers that match their system and making a system and an surroundings that they are often profitable in.”

And he might properly come face-to-face with a well-known foe. It is going to be nearly precisely 15 years in the past to the day that Favre and the Vikings beat the Packers on Monday Night time Soccer. Allen had a career-high 4.5 sacks in opposition to Aaron Rodgers in a raucous Metrodome. “That was an incredible day,” he says. “Goodness. Time flies. At any time when I see Aaron it’s very cordial!”

However first, he needs to seek out some respectable grub. “My spouse and children are coming, so I wish to present them a few of the sights. I wish to discover some good pubs, have a few pints and a few bangers and mash.”

Who is aware of, maybe he’ll stumble upon Eddie the Eagle.

(High photograph: David Berding/Getty Pictures)