MINNEAPOLIS — As we head into a Border Battle weekend, in which the Minnesota Vikings take on the Green Bay Packers Sunday at U.S. Bank Stadium, we're revisiting the aftermath of a different Border Battle game: One which led to arguably Randy Moss' most iconic sound bite.
It was the January 2005 wild card game at Lambeau Field, Moss pretended to moon Packers fans after scoring a game-winning touchdown. As he explained in this 2021 video, his actions were in response to the "welcome" he got from some Green Bay fans that day: "They got all their pants down. There's nothing but white moon all lined up."
The NFL didn't find it funny and fined Moss $10,000.
It was those circumstances that prompted KARE 11 to send Dana Thiede to Winter Park, hoping for a comment.
Thiede, now on the KARE 11 digital team, was a field producer back then.
"Back then, all the media crews would wait outside the main door [at the] practice facility... I turned to my pal, Monica Hanson...and I said, "Moni, he ain't going to come out this door. He's going to go somewhere else," Thiede recalled.
Thiede, Hanson, and another reporter headed to the loading dock.
"The door opens up, a lone figure with a hoodie pulled up over his head slips out, and there we were waiting for him," Thiede said.
This was their exchange:
THIEDE: "Write the check yet, Randy?"
MOSS: "When you're rich, you don't write checks."
THIEDE: "How do you pay, man?"
MOSS: Huh?
THIEDE: "If you don't write checks, how do you pay these guys?"
MOSS: "Straight cash, homey."
"I got back to the station and everyone gathered around the monitors, and we're all laughing, and hooting, and hollering. I'm like, maybe we got something," Thiede said. "[It was] one of those fun moments in your career you can always crack up about and say, "Yeah. That was me."