Author: David Shama

David Shama is a former sports editor and columnist with local publications. His writing and reporting experiences include covering the Minnesota Vikings, Minnesota Twins, Minnesota Timberwolves and Minnesota Gophers. Shama’s career experiences also include sports marketing. He is the former Marketing Director of the Minnesota North Stars of the NHL. He is also the former Marketing Director of the United States Tennis Association’s Northern Section. A native of Minneapolis, Shama has been part of the community his entire life. He is a graduate of the University of Minnesota where he majored in journalism. He also has a Master’s degree in education from the University of St. Thomas. He was a member of the Governor’s NBA’s Task Force to help create interest in bringing pro basketball to town in the 1980s.

Twins to Explore Free Agent Market

Posted on September 12, 2018September 12, 2018 by David Shama

Enjoy a Wednesday notes column on baseball, basketball, football, sports wagering and tennis.

Twins president Dave St. Peter said the club will look at the free agent market this offseason, but that won’t be the main path for improving a team that had Central Division title ambitions last spring but is 12 games under .500 with the schedule ending September 30.

St. Peter said in an interview with Sports Headliners this summer that the roster core in the future will be comprised of players with the club now and in the farm system. He expressed confidence in the personnel already under the franchise’s contractual control.

Although the results and impact weren’t significant from the club’s free agent shopping last winter, St. Peter termed the efforts “aggressive.” He also debunked speculation that for whatever reasons free agents aren’t interested in coming to the state and playing for the Twins.

“I don’t think there is anything that detracts free agents from wanting to come to Minnesota,” St. Peter said. “I think that’s a fallacy. I don’t think it’s accurate. We haven’t played significantly in that space (pursuing free agents) so there really isn’t a lot of track record.

“I can assure you this past offseason we spent a lot of time talking to some very prominent free agents and they were all very willing to come to Minnesota. Normally, it comes down to dollars. That’s ultimately the driver.”

A remarkable half century association with St. Thomas ends next spring when Tommies athletics director Steve Fritz retires. Fritz will end an affiliation of 52 consecutive years with the school that began with being a student-athlete in basketball. He has known various roles at St. Thomas including coaching the men’s basketball team to the 2011 Division III national championship.

St. Paul Saints owner Mike Veeck has his team in the finals of the American Association playoffs against the Kansas City T-Bones. This could be the Saints’ first league playoff championship since 2004. The Kansas City, Kansas based T-Bones were originally the Duluth-Superior Dukes.

Veeck told Sports Headliners yesterday morning he was evacuating his home in Charleston, South Carolina and was headed to Florida because of hurricane Florence.

Before Joe Mauer came to the plate last night with the bases loaded, the Target Field public address system played the theme song from the Rocky movie, “Gonna Fly Now.” Mauer responded with a 416-foot home run to center field and later came out of the dugout for a curtain call. After the sixth inning blast, the Twins went on to defeat the Yankees 10-5, ending an eight game losing streak to New York.

The Vikings’ Mike Zimmer after being asked if he ever feels like he has the wind at his back while coaching in the NFL. “No, I always got the wind in my face. …”

When Mark Coyle was the athletic director at Syracuse he was interested in P.J. Fleck. Coyle was looking for a new head football coach in the fall of 2015 and Fleck was among recommended potential candidates. Fleck was coaching at Western Michigan and Coyle told Sports Headliners that people he trusted suggested contacting the young head coach who was gaining national attention.

Coyle said the two had a brief conversation because Fleck let it be known that coaching in the Big Ten was his dream and he didn’t want to pursue the Syracuse opening that ultimately was filled by Dino Babers. Coyle described the talk as a “really good conversation” and appreciated Fleck’s honesty and career ambitions.

The Broncos’ record was 8-5 in 2015 and then 13-1 the next season. That near undefeated 2016 season certainly got Coyle’s attention and on January 6, 2017 the then 36-year-old Fleck was named Minnesota’s head coach.

If there was a negative about the Gophers’ quality win against Fresno State last Saturday night, it was the home attendance at TCF Bank Stadium. The announced attendance of 38,280 was the lowest for a nonconference game in stadium history. It was also the second smallest crowd since the stadium opened in 2009.

Minnesota had an announced crowd of 41,291 for its first game of the season. That was on a Thursday night instead of a Saturday evening like the Fresno State game. The weekend night figured to pull more customers and so, too, did the opponent because Fresno is much better than New Mexico State who the Gophers opened against on August 30.

The Gophers, 2-0 going into Saturday’s home game against Miami of Ohio, have a number of intriguing freshmen and sophomores. Because Blaise Andries plays in the interior offensive line, he is more difficult to observe than many of the other young players but the redshirt freshman guard from Marshall, Minnesoa has caught Fleck’s attention. The coach refers to the 6-5, 315 pound Andries as someone who is “going to be a really great player.”

Part of Andries’ skillset is his intelligence. Fleck said, “He’s going to be an actuary, right. Remember, I didn’t even know what an actuary even was, and he wants to be that.”

Fleck believes Andries could eventually be moved to tackle. That switch would partially be determined by where he is needed as Minnesota also has promising young offensive linemen like true freshmen Curtis Dunlap Jr. and Daniel Faalale.

Former Gophers football player Kim Royston was named athletics director at Southwest High School in Minneapolis earlier this summer. The city school system might be close to naming a replacement for ex-Gopher basketballer Trent Tucker who resigned last winter as AD for all the public high schools in Minneapolis.

Former Gopher football captain Jim Carter is grateful for all the get well wishes this week after being hospitalized and receiving two angiogram procedures. He suffered a heart attack last Saturday with one of his arteries being 90 percent blocked. Now recovering, he texted yesterday that the response from people “has been humbling and somewhat overwhelming!”

Vikings safety Harrison Smith was named NFC Defensive Player of the Week today. In Minnesota’s opening win against the 49ers Sunday he had eight tackles, one interception and one fumble recovery. Smith could become a finalist for NFL Defensive Player of the Year.

Gopher basketball coach Richard Pitino said on WCCO Radio’s “Sports Huddle” show Sunday he is still waiting word from the NCAA whether Pittsburgh transfer and guard Marcus Carr will be eligible this fall. Carr averaged 10 points and four assists as a freshman last season at Pittsburgh.

Playing tennis added an average of 9.7 years to a person’s life, according to a Danish study reported last week by the Dailymail.com.

Shelley Buck, tribal council president for the Prairie Island Indian Community that owns Treasure Island Resort & Casino, said on a recent segment of TV’s “Behind the Game” that legalized sports betting won’t be as profitable for operators as other forms of gambling already in place. She also said casinos like Treasure Island have the experience and infrastructure to handle sports betting if and when it is approved in Minnesota.

A pro football source predicted to Sports Headliners that the approval of legalized sports betting in Minnesota is only a couple of years off.

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Kirk Cousins Can End QB Carousel

Posted on September 10, 2018September 10, 2018 by David Shama

In his debut game Kirk Cousins justified ownership’s investment in him, and the $84 million quarterback set expectations he can lead the Vikings offense at a high level for years to come.

Cousins completed 20 of 36 passes in Minnesota’s 24-16 opening game win over the 49ers yesterday at U.S. Bank Stadium. He threw touchdown passes to Stefon Diggs and Kyle Rudolph in a game the Vikings seemed to control most of the time.

Showing a powerful arm, he even side-armed a completion while being hit. But he also threw the ball with finesse when needed. Not known for his running, he was mobile enough to avoid defenders yesterday. He was also tough enough to put his head down and dive for an attempted first down late in the game. No sliding to avoid tacklers and possible injury.

Although Cousins was ruled inches short of gaining a first down, he received the approval of Mike Zimmer after the game. The expected response might have been no way does the coach want his high-priced quarterback risking injury, but Zimmer told KFAN Radio listeners differently.

“I want him to get the first down,” Zimmer said. “That’s how our team plays. If he gets it there, we have a chance to run out the clock and win the football game.”

Cousins was a grinder both passing and running against the 49ers including 26 yards carrying the ball. For the game he threw for 244 yards and had an impressive 95.1 passer rating.

Now in his seventh NFL season, Cousins played his first six years with the Redskins before signing with Minnesota during the last offseason as a free agent. He is the Vikings’ seventh starting quarterback since the 2008 season. Meanwhile, Minnesota’s three rivals in the NFC North have collectively experienced a lot more stability at the most important position on the field.

Dating back to the 2008 season the Packers’ No. 1 guy each year has been Aaron Rodgers. Matthew Stafford has owned the starting job in Detroit since 2009. Even the lowly Bears have known continuity with Jay Cutler being the man from 2009-16. Since then Mitch Trubisky has the job.

Cousins’ predecessors are Gus Frerotte, 2008; Brett Favre, 2009-10; Christian Ponder, 2011-13; Ted Bridgewater, 2014-15; Sam Bradford, 2016 and Case Keenum, 2017. Favre was wonderful but couldn’t defeat old age. Frerotte and Ponder weren’t up to the opportunity. Bridgewater and Bradford were too fragile. Keenum, considered a journeyman until his impressive play last year, got snubbed by the front office during the offseason in favor of Cousins.

Despite the revolving door at quarterback the Vikings have managed to win four division titles since 2008. This is both an accomplishment and a gift from inept rivals. Rodgers, no worse than the NFL’s second best quarterback, is a load to compete against each season. The Lions and Bears, though, have been erratic and dysfunctional operations during the previous 10 years.

Since 2008 the Vikings have just two playoff wins and no conference titles. Cousins, with his $84 million three-year deal, will be expected to be a leader in changing that.

The teams he quarterbacked in Washington didn’t have big ambitions or results but he did create some impressive numbers. He had 4,093 passing yards and 27 touchdown passes with the Redskins last season. He is one of two quarterbacks (Philip Rivers is the other) with 4,000+ pass yards and 25+ touchdown passes in each of the past three seasons.

Yesterday Cousins led an offense that overall was okay. The Vikings didn’t have a lot of success running the ball, gaining 116 yards in the game. The highlight for the offensive unit beyond the debut of Cousins was the return of second-year running back Dalvin Cook who didn’t play most of last season after his ACL injury.

Cook had been used minimally in the preseason but didn’t show any “hangover” from his injury, surgery and rehabilitation. The Vikings used Cook as a receiver and runner on the first four plays of the game.

As compelling as the Cook and Cousins storylines were, as usual the defense was the foundation of the win. The 49ers tried to get the unit off balance with an imaginative approach that featured bootlegs, crossing patterns and receivers who might have been considered unlikely targets.

The 49ers also picked on rookie cornerback Mike Hughes. While they had some success, it was Hughes who came up with one of the game’s biggest plays when he ran a third quarter interception into the end zone for a 17-6 Minnesota lead.

Twice in the game San Francisco got inside the Vikings’ five-yard line. The best the 49ers could do was come up with one field goal, even though Minnesota was short-handed because of injuries in the secondary.

Cousins might have watched that defense yesterday and said a few “amen’s” of gratitude. It was a good beginning for the 30-year-old quarterback who no doubt would like nothing better than to build the kind of longevity that Rodgers, Stafford, and even Cutler, have earned in the NFC North.

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Ex-Captain Opens Up on U Football

Posted on September 7, 2018September 7, 2018 by David Shama

P.J. Fleck has more than a boatload of critics and doubters but the captain of the last Golden Gophers Big Ten championship football team believes Minnesotans should get behind the second-year coach, including filling up TCF Bank Stadium on game days.

Tom Sakal, captain of the 1967 Gophers, is retired now from a career as an insurance executive. Anyone who knew Sakal back in the 1960s isn’t surprised he climbed the corporate ladder. The former All-Big Ten defensive back from Aliquippa, Pennsylvania has long been a leader, and a person with the courage to say and do difficult things including military service in the jungles of Vietnam.

Between 1960 and 1968 the Gophers won one national championship, two Big Ten titles and split two Rose Bowls. During their best stretch, from 1960-1962, Minnesota’s record was 22-6-1. Sakal’s 1967 team tied for the Big Ten title and had an overall record of 8-2. That 1967 bunch, he will tell you, could play with any team in the country.

Minnesota’s title drought of more than 50 years has bugged the hell out of Sakal for a long time. More often than not, Minnesota hasn’t even been good enough to play better than .500 football during a Big Ten season. Since 1990, for example, the Gophers have just five years when they won more conference games than they lost. The Gophers have played in one New Year’s Day bowl game during their drought.

A year ago Sakal was in town for a 50-year reunion of his 1967 championship team. He was invited to breakfast with Fleck, who has been met with criticism and indifference by a lot of Gophers fans and media. Sakal told Fleck about his frustrations with U football for half a century. Sakal talked about how tired he was of losing games over the years, sometimes by large and embarrassing margins.

“I said this has been ridiculous over the years. It’s a disgrace,” Sakal told Sports Headliners in a telephone interview this week.

Sakal said he “pulled no punches” during the breakfast conversation with Fleck. “I said you need to recruit some big-time players. You need to get these facilities built up and continue to increase (them) on this campus.”

Fleck has two recruiting classes in as Gophers head coach after being named to his position in January of 2017. He and his staff had only a couple of weeks to work on the first recruiting class but since then things have become more interesting. The Gophers, in comparison with other major college programs, have drawn higher national rankings from recruiting experts than has historically been true at Minnesota. Another distinction from the past is Minnesota is bringing in more players that other major programs wanted, sometimes even convincing a recruit to say no to a blue-chip team like Georgia.

Sakal knows the importance of gifted talent from his own experiences in college football. He was part of a much publicized 1964 recruiting class at Minnesota that brought players in from football strongholds like Pennsylvania and as seniors they formed much of the 1967 title team’s core.

Now Sakal observes what Fleck is doing in recruiting and expresses some caution but also optimism. “Everything looks good on paper,” he said.

Sakal thinks about Fleck’s personality and sees a coach who can resonate with the teenagers he is trying to recruit. “The guy runs about 10,000 RPMs a second. He just has a different personality, a different approach to things. Enthusiastic. Boy, I haven’t seen anybody like him in a long time. Those are the things that I kind of like about the guy.”

Fleck is the first to acknowledge that not everyone likes him. His Row the Boat mantra and outspoken promotion about a new culture for the program has been too rah-rah for many in Gopher Nation. More to the point for many fans is that Minnesota won just two Big Ten games in Fleck’s first season after a 5-4 conference record in 2016. The overall record slipped from 9-4 to 5-7.

Fleck’s critics include friends Sakal made at the U while playing for the Gophers. Many were admirers of the Jerry Kill-Tracy Claeys era at Minnesota but are far from on board with Fleck. Those friends say Fleck hasn’t given credit to the foundation and good things from that Kill-Claeys era including the remarkable turn around in academics among players. Kill, known for his straight talk and folksy demeanor, was particularly popular with almost all Gophers fans and he had the program on the rise until health issues drove him out of coaching.

Sakal has watched the negative reaction of his longtime friends to Fleck and he is critical of them. “It started from day one. What the hell is wrong with you guys? He (hadn’t) even stepped on campus yet. You gotta give a guy a chance.”

Sakal receives second-guessing for being open-minded that Fleck can become successful at Minnesota. “I always get blasted. There’s only one thing I know about—winning and losing. All the other side rhetoric shows that go on, I could give a crap about. They were making a big deal out of this Row the Boat, Ski-U-Mah (stuff). …All I want is to look at the (news)paper and see Minnesota 9-1, 10-0, playing in a big bowl game, going for the national championship. I could care less about this stuff.”

Sakal isn’t guaranteeing the Gophers will become a consistent winner under Fleck but he argues everyone should give the 37-year-old coach time and support before making judgments. “I personally think it will take four to five years (to establish the program),” Sakal said. “And I think it needs a thousand percent support by all Minnesotans. There is no reason, no reason whatsoever, that we can’t have a full stadium regardless of what our record is. They need to support the Gophers. …I think we can be a power again.”

The Gophers have 113 players on their roster and 60 of them—or 53.1 percent—are true freshmen or redshirt freshmen. Those are the highest numbers in the country among major college football programs.

Those figures indicate a Gophers breakthrough isn’t coming this year. Sakal agrees with others, including local and national media, that Minnesota’s win total will be around five games. But a conversation with Sakal includes hints he believes the program is going in the right direction.

Some day, Sakal said, the U may have to make Fleck among the best paid coaches in the land. “I think the Gophers are going to find out they’re going to pay for his success in the end. He’s not going to come cheap, that’s for sure.”

If so, Sakal will consider the cost a long overdue debt that was finally paid off.

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