Is Sale Imminent?

Thursday was supposed to be the day that Mike Tice met with Red McCombs to discuss the short-term future of the Vikings. Now it looks like that may not happen at all ... with consequences for people like Scott Linehan.

For the last couple years, it's become a habit for Mike Tice to travel to Texas to meet with Red McCombs to discuss the direction the team is heading. This year, that meeting was supposed to start tomorrow.

But, with talks of an imminent sale of the team coming out, those meetings were postponed -- leaving more than just McCombs' future with the Vikings in question.

Tice was told Tuesday that McCombs wanted to postpone the meetings until after the Super Bowl, which almost assuredly means that the Vikings could lose offensive coordinator Scott Linehan -- whose contract expires at the end of the month.

While Tice was told to remain in Minnesota instead of meeting with McCombs, Linehan was in Miami meeting with Dolphins officials about their offensive coordinator vacancy. VU has been told the Linehan is the frontrunner for the Dolphins opening and has also been mentioned in discussions with the Jaguars, Browns and 49ers -- all of them have job openings of their own.

One of the purposes of the Tice-McCombs meeting was to have a unified front as it pertains to Linehan. If McCombs does in fact blow off the meeting until after the Super Bowl, Linehan may be gone without Minnesota being able to make any sort of substantial offer to keep him.

Some are claiming that the delay is due to the speedy resumption of talks with Arizona businessman Reggie Fowler, who heads up an investment group that includes Minnesota businessman Denny Hecker.

Fowler is said to be near McCombs $600 million asking price, but it will likely take at least a couple of weeks to finalize a formal bid. In that time, the Vikings might be in limbo, which could mean that Linehan becomes a victim of the timetable.