Right in the midst of their vaunted Culture of Accountability, the Vikings have become national poster children for "It's not my fault."

This is going to come to a bad end for Kevin Williams, Pat Williams and, most of all, Vikings fans. Nobody out-lawyers the National Football League. In fact, the NFL keeps a Manhattan warehouse fully stocked with somber-looking, dark-suited attorneys just waiting to be unleashed in times such as these.

Call out the hounds!

I maintain that it would be better for the Williamses to serve the four games and return for the playoffs. It's not an admission that they took steroids. I don't know of anybody who believes they did. They messed up by taking a questionable supplement.

I do have a hard time conjuring up much sympathy. Anyone who makes millions of dollars playing Football, and surely knows his league has become increasingly paranoid about drug abuse, should not ingest anything that doesn't have the commissioner's personal autograph prominently displayed. That includes tap water and raw milk.

We should learn today if the injunction that allows them to keep playing is upheld. It's better in the long run if it isn't. The team does not need the Williamses in Detroit this Sunday. It can make the playoffs without them. But the Vikings definitely will need them in the postseason.

If the Williamses play Sunday, and then the NFL eventually gets the injunction reversed -- and it likely would -- the four-game suspension would carry into the playoffs. But because Pat and Kevin are determined to challenge this, and the players association is determined to go along for the ride, I have one piece of advice:

See if Al Franken's lawyers are available.

And then delay, delay, delay. File motions, switch courts, poll dead judges, contest the rulings, do whatever it takes to draw the whole thing out. Then perhaps the guys will be able to play out the season and deal with the punishment in 2009.

That would give the Vikings time to prepare, too. They could sign temporary help over the summer. Minnesota had an idea that it wouldn't have Bryant McKinnie at the start of this season, so it was able to plan. In this manner, the Vikings would be able to absorb the four-game suspensions much better in 2009.

But clearly that strategy isn't a sure thing. The Williamses could play Sunday and then see the injunction lifted at any time. Then they'd miss the first, and probably only, playoff game.

There is a very noble way to view this situation. If the injunction is struck down today in court, the Vikings will have a chance to display valor and grit. Instead of being viewed as perennial underachievers, they can fight their way into the postseason despite this terrible setback. They can bow their backs and earn something that has eluded many other Vikings teams: universal respect.

Is there a fan who wouldn't be proud to see his or her team persevere through this tough break? Then think of how excited everyone would be when those two return for the playoffs. It would be like watching the cavalry charging over the hill.

This is a chance for the Vikings to shed their image as losers. Maybe they won't reach the Super Bowl, but they still could give a gutsy account of themselves under trying conditions, thus making it a season to remember.

Don't see it my way? Well, maybe the injunction will remain in place. The legal battle royal really will begin at that point. Then it's a race against the clock. And the players would do well to go into the legal equivalent of the four-corners offense.

Football players know how to kill time off the clock late in close games. The question here is: Can they kill a month or so?

Tom Powers can be reached at tpowers@pioneerpress.com