The newest Pro Football Hall of Fame class gets officially inducted on Saturday in Canton, Ohio. It includes one of the most popular players in Minnesota Vikings history, and another Hall of Famer from a long list of dominant defensive lineman who played in purple.
Jared Allen came to the Vikings for the 2008 season, and for six seasons was one of the top defensive linemen in the National Football League. He had at least 11 sacks each year, including a franchise record of 22 in 2011.
Allen has already been enshrined in the Vikings "Ring of Honor" in 2022.
The congrats for Allen also came from current Viking coach Kevin O'Connell, who never coached him, but definitely knows his impact on the game and franchise.
"He knows how much even our current coaching staff and a lot of the folks here, that maybe haven't been here very long, we've already all formed really great relationships because we've had him around our team and our organization since I've gotten here. Which has been awesome," O'Connell says.
The head coach also notes how important these honors are for the franchise.
"I know I speak for all of our fans and every member of our organization, ownership, everyone, when just saying congratulations to him," O'Connell added. "How proud we are of him, and being a part of our great history of our organization, and another member going into the Hall of Fame there in Canton, it's a big deal."
Raised on a horse ranch in Northern California, Allen was audacious enough at age 8 to tell his father he planned to become a professional football player.
He fulfilled that vision with a relentless vengeance on the offensive tackles tasked with blocking him and the quarterbacks who tried to escape, using exceptional quickness, creative moves and pure strength to accumulate 136 sacks and four first team All-Pro selections as a defensive end over a 12-year career in the NFL.
“When you're doing what you love to do, you want to honor the game by being great, not in an arrogant way but in a way to show respect and gratitude for all those who came before you,” said Allen, who will be honored at the ceremony next weekend along with Antonio Gates, Eric Allen and Sterling Sharpe. “I always wanted to go out there and let people know I genuinely loved playing this game.”
Allen also played for Kansas City, Chicago, and Carolina racking up an NFL record four safeties.
One of the more colorful Vikings players, Allen would claim his alma mater was a culinary school, and after making sacks he would pantomime roping a calf, rodeo-style, and ended by raising both arms in celebration.
He announced his retirement by posting on social media a video of himself rising a horse into the sunset.
Allen averaged more than 14 sacks per season over six years with the Vikings, including a career-best 22 sacks in 2011 that came within one-half of the record set by Michael Strahan and later matched by T.J. Watt.
Allen is officially 12th on the career sacks list, a statistic the NFL didn’t compile until 1982. Research by Pro Football Reference on all games played before then produced a comprehensive list that has Allen with the 16th-most sacks in history, after winding down his career with the Chicago Bears in 2014 and being traded to the Carolina Panthers the following season.
The crossroads of Allen's career came upon consummation of the 2008 trade that sent him from the Chiefs to the Vikings, his promising start in the NFL tainted by off-the-field trouble that followed him from Idaho State.
Chiefs general manager Carl Peterson, who drafted Allen in the fourth round in 2004, soured on the prodigious pass rusher after two different citations for drunken driving in 2006 and declared him a “young man at risk.” Allen was irked by the lack of front-office support and asked to be dealt, absent a new contract.
After accumulating 15 1/2 sacks in 14 games in 2007 after serving a two-game suspension, Allen finally got his wish. Having given up alcohol after the second arrest, he redoubled his conditioning efforts in determination to prove his worth.
“I loved Kansas City. I wanted to spend my whole career there. Unfortunately, you learn the business side of the game can be a little ruthless, and I'm just stubborn enough to want to get my way,” Allen said.
While he ditched his drinking problem and cleaned up off the field, Allen never lost his thrill-seeking lifestyle, once running with the bulls in Spain, and killing a wild boar in Texas with a knife. He was a joke-cracking, wide-smiling life of the locker room with the Vikings, where he forged lifelong friendships that transcended the bitter disappointment of losing in overtime to the New Orleans Saints in the NFC championship game after the 2009 season.
Picked up at the airport in Minneapolis after the trade by defensive line coach Karl Dunbar and the alpha males of the position group, Kevin Williams and Pat Williams, Allen quickly knew he was in the right place.
“I am as competitive as they come, and it was brought to another level walking into that room,” Allen said. “The minute I got into that car, Pat and Kevin started talking trash about how I couldn’t play the run.”
Allen formed the alpha center of those Vikings teams with the Williamses on one of the best defensive lines in the league. He frequently was at his best when the lights were on, including a 4 1/2-sack game on Green Bay’s Aaron Rodgers when Brett Favre quarterbacked the Vikings to a 2009 victory in his first revenge matchup against the Packers.
The Vikings have a long history of dominant defensive linemen, with Alan Page, Carl Eller, Chris Doleman and John Randle all enshrined before Allen in Canton. The famed Purple People Eaters — Page, Eller, Jim Marshall and Gary Larsen — helped the Vikings reach four Super Bowls and set a high standard for their successor.
“You’re never going to race ’em, but I wanted people to talk about myself, Pat and Kevin,” Allen said. “We wanted to be the fiercest, nastiest front four you could be, and that was all to pay respect to the guys who did it before us.”