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.

Gopher AD List May Include Hawkeye

Posted on April 20, 2016April 20, 2016 by David Shama

A lot of names are being mentioned as candidates to become the Gophers’ next athletics director but one drawing minimal speculation is Gene Taylor, the No. 2 leader in the Iowa Hawkeyes Athletic Department.

Taylor was athletics director at North Dakota State for 13 years prior to joining the Hawkeyes in 2014. Taylor, 58, helped put in place the Bison football program that is working on a run of five consecutive FCS national championships.

Taylor has an extensive background in athletics administration dating back to his first job at the United States Naval Academy. His career commitment to female and male athletes, involvement with funding to improve facilities, success with football, and his understanding of this geographic region should resonate with Turnkey Search, the firm retained by the University of Minnesota to identify and vet candidates.

Multiple sources report Turnkey is interviewing candidates this week in the Midwest and East. One source told Sports Headliners over a dozen candidates will be interviewed in the first round of talks. Eventually Turnkey will vet those who the firm believes are the best candidates and bring those names to a 16-person search committee of volunteers headed by co-chairs Katrice Albert and Perry Leo. Albert is the University’s vice president for equity and diversity. Leo is professor of aerospace engineering and the U faculty athletics representative.

Recommendations by the committee will go to University president Eric Kaler. After Kaler’s disastrous hire of Norwood Teague in 2013, the president’s reputation and perhaps legacy is in play with a decision on the next AD who is expected to be on the job by July 1.

No candidate has probably been more open about his interest than former Gophers linebacker and Wall Street whiz Pete Najarian. The 52-year-old Minneapolis native and TV personality appears ready to start a new life leading the Gophers athletics department.

Najarian spent last weekend in Lincoln, Nebraska where daughter Alexis is on the University of Nebraska track team. He also visited with Cornhuskers legend Tom Osborne to learn more about running an athletics department. Before retiring, Osborne won national championships in football and was the school’s athletics director.

Najarian raves about Osborne’s wisdom and inclusive, caring approach with people. The two have known each other since the early 1980s when Osborne tried to recruit Najarian to become a Cornhusker. Najarian said Osborne was one of the few coaches who still showed interest in him as a person after he committed to the Gophers.

Najarian, former Gophers All-American defensive end Bob Stein, and WCHA commissioner and St. Paul native Bill Robertson are names with Minnesota roots who have been mentioned with the AD opening. Many Gophers boosters favor candidates who have local relationships and understand the culture here. Najarian, Stein and Robertson have ties to the Minneapolis-St. Paul business community—an asset critics assert has been underutilized by the Gophers.

Although he hasn’t lived in Minnesota for years, Blake James attended Coon Rapids High School and Minnesota State-Mankato. Now the athletic director at the University of Miami in Coral Gables, James will no doubt at least cross the minds of Turnkey executives, even if he has no interest in coming to Dinkytown.

Another no-brainer for Turnkey is Northern Illinois athletics director Sean Frazier. Highly praised by Sports Headliners sources, he is a favorite to be on a list of finalists. Frazier is African-American as is McKinley Boston, who was the Gophers’ AD in the 1990s. Boston has mentored Frazier who has worked as a top assistant to Wisconsin athletics director Barry Alvarez. Frazier and Kaler know each other.

Sources tell Sports Headliners the best athletic director in the country could be Northwestern’s Jim Phillips who supposedly has turned down other jobs including Michigan to stay in Evanston. If Minnesota and Turnkey leaders wanted to take a “nothing is impossible” approach, they could access a private jet and fly to Evanston with an offer to make Phillips the best paid AD in the country—and bring along a briefcase stuffed with articles about the quality of life in Minnesota.

Not a bad thought considering the potential revenue an athletic director could affect at Minnesota, where both winning and income aren’t what they should be.

Worth Noting

The Wild, who appear to be building momentum, shouldn’t lack for confidence going into tonight’s Game Four against the Stars at Xcel Energy Center. Wild players seemed unsure in Game 1 of their Stanley Cup Playoff Series in Dallas, losing 4-0. Then a close loss in Game 2 in Texas was followed by the Wild’s 5-3 win on Monday night in St. Paul.

The Wild entered the series having faltered at the close of the regular season and facing the Stars without Zach Parise, Minnesota’s best player. The Stars were among the NHL’s better teams during the season while featuring a productive offense. But the Wild has slowed down Dallas and found its own playmakers including Erik Haula, who has impressed with a line that includes Jason Pominville and Nino Niederreiter.

The Stars want to force Wild turnovers tonight and turn those into scoring opportunities. If that works, there will be more pressure on Wild goalie Devan Dubynk. Goalie, though, is a position where the Wild should be better than the Stars.

In the series so far the storyline for the Wild is the team gets better each game. Can the script continue tonight?

The International Champions Cup match between Chelsea and A.C. Milan will be played on real grass at U.S. Bank Stadium. Vikings and amateur baseball games will be played on artificial turf but the August 3 soccer event, the first sports activity in the new covered stadium, will use sod.

St. Thomas football coach Glenn Caruso told Sports Headliners Gopher transfer Jacques Perra, who will be a sophomore next fall, is a leading candidate for the starting quarterback job. Tommies’ spring practices started earlier this month and continue into May.

A source emailed yesterday that the Timberwolves are talking to former NBA guard and Warriors coach Mark Jackson about their coaching vacancy.

Condolences to family and friends of Bill Light who passed away last Friday after struggling with pancreatic cancer. Bill was a great high school football player at Hopkins and an All-Big Ten linebacker for the Gophers in 1970-71. He was also team captain in 1971. He was inducted into the “M” Club’s Hall of Fame in 2014, and once owned Billy’s Lighthouse restaurant in Long Lake.

Vashti Cunningham, daughter of former Vikings quarterback Randall Cunningham, is a senior at Gorman High School in Las Vegas. Ed Graney, writing Saturday for the Las Vegas Review-Journal, reported in an online story that Vashti, who turned professional in March, will next month be the first American women’s high jumper in 20 years to be featured on the cover of Track & Field News.

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Could Izzo be Next Wolves Coach?

Posted on April 18, 2016April 18, 2016 by David Shama

A sports industry source told Sports Headliners Tom Izzo has been contacted about the vacancy created last week with the dismissal of Timberwolves interim head coach Sam Mitchell. Izzo, 61, is one of college basketball’s icons because he has coached Michigan State to a Big Ten record 19-straight NCAA Tournaments including seven Final Fours and a national title.

Izzo came to Michigan State as a part-time assistant coach in 1983. He has been MSU’s head coach since the 1995-1996 season and earlier this month was elected to the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame. NBA teams, including the Cavaliers and Pistons, have reportedly flirted with hiring him previously.

Flip Saunders (Photo courtesy of Minnesota Timberwolves).

It’s believed the Wolves were also one of those teams two years ago. The late Flip Saunders, as the franchise’s president of basketball operations, was looking for a coach to succeed Rick Adelman in the spring of 2014. Saunders and Izzo were buddies, and it’s possible Izzo may have been offered the Wolves job. Ultimately Saunders made himself coach and continued in that role and as the franchise’s basketball boss until his death last fall.

Jim Dutcher coached Saunders with the Gophers. He said Saunders and Izzo became close friends years ago. “He (Izzo) read scripture at Flip’s memorial service,” Dutcher remembered.

Izzo is a highly likeable personality and is known for having a big heart. A native of Iron Mountain, Michigan who attended college at Northern Michigan, Izzo has loved mentoring young players and shown unusual loyalty by staying so many years at MSU. Would he want a new career challenge at this stage of his life?

Maybe he would be drawn to Minneapolis by his relationship with Saunders. The opportunity to continue the work of his friend in changing the Wolves from a joke franchise to a place among the NBA’s elite could be rewarding for Izzo.

The Wolves’ coaching job is attractive, too, because of a young and talented nucleus of players that Saunders assembled. Led by forward Andrew Wiggins, last year’s NBA Rookie of the Year, and center Karl-Anthony Towns, a lock to win the same award this year, the Wolves have a roster that still needs more playing experience. That roster also needs a few personnel changes and superior coaching to move toward division, conference and—possibly one day—Minneapolis’s first NBA championship since the Lakers won it all in 1954.

Indications are Wolves owner Glen Taylor is ready to spend significant money to hire a power coach. The source referred to in the opening paragraph said three other well-known names have already been contacted about the vacancy—Scott Brooks, Dave Joerger and Tom Thibodeau.

Brooks and Thibodeau have ties to the late Bill Musselman, the Wolves first coach. Brooks played for Musselman in the early 1990s while Thibodeau was an assistant during that period. Brooks was head coach of the Thunder until last year and successfully helped develop a young roster in Oklahoma City. Thibodeau was dismissed as the Bulls’ head coach last year after wowing the NBA with his defensive tutoring—a skill set that has to be on the to-do list of Wolves players. Joerger, currently the Grizzlies head coach, is a Minnesota native and it’s believed Saunders and Taylor were interested in hiring him two years ago.

The Wolves leadership is influx. General manager Milt Newton, who held that title under Saunders, now has more basketball personnel power but Taylor told Sports Headliners a couple weeks ago his GM is being evaluated too. A source said the Wolves are open to a structure like they had when Saunders carried the titles of both coach and president of basketball operations.

Perhaps Taylor decided awhile ago to fire Mitchell. In his interview with Sports Headliners, Taylor offered few words of praise about Mitchell who had been an assistant under Saunders.

The Wolves are receiving assistance on their coaching and front office review from search firm Korn Ferry.

Worth Noting

Ron Gardenhire has been hired as a special assistant to general manager Terry Ryan. The Twins made the announcement this afternoon that Gardenhire, who managed the team before being replaced by Paul Moltior after the 2014 season, will be a roving instructor and evaluator in the club’s minor league system.

Three sources told Sports Headliners Gary Trent Jr., the highly recruited Apple Valley High School shooting guard, is considering a prep school in 2016-2017. He has apparently visited at least two prep schools and one of them might be national basketball power Findlay Prep in Henderson, Nevada.

Trent, who is finishing his junior year at Apple Valley, may want to compete against better and stronger players in practice by playing for a prep school. Already considered a potential NBA prospect, Trent is physically strong and has superior strength compared to Eagle teammates.

“I feel a guess is he is headed out (from Apple Valley),” said a source who knows Trent.

Trent, who averaged 26.4 points per game last season, hasn’t selected a college but Ohio State or Duke could be his final choice, the source said.

Former Cooper High School star Rashad Vaughn transferred to Findlay for his senior year and then played one college season at UNLV. Vaughn, a shooting guard, was a first round pick in last year’s NBA Draft. Playing for the Bucks in 70 games this season, he averaged only 3.1 points while making 29.5 percent of his field goal attempts.

Casey O'Brien (photo courtesy of Abe Booker III, Stratman Photography). — Casey O’Brien (photo courtesy of Abe Booker III, Stratman Photography).

There were many recipients last night at the Minnesota Football Honors event at the Hilton Minneapolis but only one person received a standing ovation from the audience. Casey O’Brien, who twice has dramatically recovered from cancer, received the Courage Award at the event organized by the Minnesota Chapter of the National Football Foundation and College Hall of Fame.

The Cretin-Derham Hall junior has taken inspiration from football and hopes to be a co-captain and holder on the Raiders team next season. The Raiders new coach will be former Viking Brooks Bollinger who played collegiately at Wisconsin. Asked by emcee Frank Vascellaro for confirmation about Bollinger’s Badger roots, O’Brien quipped, “Sadly.”

At the event the Vikings announced the following 2015 award winners: Community Man of the Year Chad Greenway; Rookie of the Year Stefon Diggs; Offensive Player of the Year Adrian Peterson; Defensive Player of the Year Linval Joseph; and Special lTeams Player of the Year Adam Thielen. All of the players were present to accept awards except Peterson who was out of the country on a Starkey Hearing Foundation mission.

For a complete list of those honored last night, including scholar-athlete winners, see the March 16 Sports Headliners.

The Wild learns tonight whether home ice can help make a series out of Minnesota’s first round matchup with the Stars. In franchise history the Wild is 12-14 in Stanley Cup Playoff games at Xcel Energy Center including 7-4 the last two postseasons. The Wild trails Dallas 2-0 in the series and it looks like Minnesota will play again without injured leaders Zach Parise and Thomas Vanek.

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‘Ballet Genes’ Gave Max Kepler Edge

Posted on April 15, 2016April 15, 2016 by David Shama

There are several interesting things about Max Kepler but the most important to the Twins’ future is whether he can become a regular in their lineup—perhaps even a star.

The 23-year-old rookie outfielder was called up from Triple-A Rochester last weekend to replace infielder-outfielder Danny Santana who went on the 15-day disabled list. Kepler played in Sunday’s game as a late inning defensive replacement in right field for Miguel Sano. It didn’t take long for Kepler to show his athleticism when he raced toward the fence and made a spectacular catch on a ball that could have gone for extra bases.

“To tell you the truth I don’t know how he caught that ball,” Jim Rantz told Sports Headliners. “It turned him around about three times, I think, and he caught that ball.”

Max Kepler (photo courtesy of Minnesota Twins).

Rantz is a retired Twins executive who was involved with personnel development when the club signed Kepler as a 16-year-old undrafted free agent in 2009. The Twins found Kepler in Germany and liked his potential so much they gave him a reported $800,000 signing bonus—believed at the time to be the largest ever for a European player.

The Twins were willing to take a gamble on a prospect from far away (going into the 2016 season only 43 German-born players had ever been major leaguers). “I think the genes were there,” Rantz said of the long and athletic Kepler. “His mother and father were ballet dancers.”

Parents Mark Rozycki and Kathy Kepler raised an athletic wunderkind who played baseball, soccer and tennis. He was a swimmer and skier too. He even earned a tennis scholarship to the Steffi Graff Tennis Foundation in Berlin. Along the way he has also learned to speak four languages including English.

As a 16-year-old, Kepler moved to Fort Myers with his mother. The Twins wanted him working out at their complex while he attended nearby Fort Myers High School. “He didn’t have much time socially to do anything because he went from school to the ballpark,” Rantz said.

Kepler hit .322 with 32 doubles, 13 triples, nine home runs and 71 RBI in 112 games at Double-A Chattanooga last season. He was the Southern League MVP during what was his most impressive of six minor league seasons. He entered this year ranked near the top among Twins’ minor league prospects, and Baseball America said his strike-zone discipline was tops in the farm system.

Kepler, 6-4 and about 205 pounds, has played first base in the minors but he has transitioned to the outfield where he continues to be an intriguing fielding and hitting prospect. “He made himself into a pretty good defensive player,” Rantz said. “He’s got that kind of bat that he’s going to hit for average and show a little power at times. He’s got some versatility. He can play the outfield, he can play first base. He’s just a good all-around athlete.”

Manager Paul Molitor has started Kepler in one game so far, Wednesday night, when Kepler was 0-4 at the plate and played in right field. He might return to Rochester when Santana is healthy, and he may not be back in a Twins uniform for awhile, perhaps even next season. But Rantz expects Kepler will one day be a major league regular—maybe a star.

“I think so,” Rantz said. “I think he’s going to be for sure (at least) an average major league player.”

Minnesota is a state in which Germans are the largest ethnic group. Berlin-born Kepler might just make a second home here.

Worth Noting

The Wild, down 1-0 in its Stanley Cup Playoff series with the Stars, has a short turnaround after tomorrow night’s game two in Dallas. The team heads back to the Twin Cities and has scheduled an 11 a.m. practice Sunday at Xcel Energy Center.

Pete Najarian, the nationally-known investment guru and candidate for the Gophers’ athletic director position, speaks to the CORES luncheon group on Thursday, May 12 at the Knights of Columbus Hall in Bloomington, 1114 American Blvd. Najarian, a Minneapolis native, was a starting linebacker and captain of the 1985 Gophers. He was Academic All-Big Ten three times during his UM career. CORES is an acronym for coaches, officials, reporters, educators and sports fans. Reservations and more information are available by contacting Jim Dotseth, dotsethj@comcast.net.

Leave it to sports savant Dave Mona to come up with a startling comparison of Gophers and Purdue quarterbacks from the last 60 years. Mona researched back to 1956 and learned former Boilermakers quarterbacks—ranging from Len Dawson to Drew Brees—threw 1,340 touchdown passes as NFL/AFL players. Ex-Gophers have a total of five during the same period. Yes, five!

Minnesota’s Mike Hohensee threw four TD passes as a replacement player for the Bears during the NFL strike season of 1987. Gino Cappelletti, playing for the AFL Patriots, had one TD throw on a busted field goal attempt.

The Gophers’ total goes to six if Spergon Wynn is counted. Wynn played one season at Minnesota in 1996 when he attempted three of eight passes for no touchdowns, according to Sports-reference.com. Wynn, who transferred to Southwest Texas State, later played for the Vikings and threw the only NFL touchdown pass of his career for them, according to Wikipedia.com.

James Johannesson, the reserve redshirt freshman running back from Fargo who surprised fans at the Gophers Spring Game by rushing for 130 yards, comes from a football family. His father James played at Jamestown College while his uncle Jon Norstog played at North Dakota State. Johannesson is probably on anyone’s list of most improved Gophers coming out of spring practices.

Reed Larson, Bob Paradise and others will roast the late Herb Brooks for the Old-Timers Hockey Association during the evening of April 26 at the Prom Center in Oakdale. The Minnesota Minute Men will roast Jerry Kill at a noon lunch May 6 at Jax Café. Jim Carter, Joel Maturi and Ron Stolski will be among those roasting the former Gophers football coach. Dick Jonckowski will emcee both roasts.

Last Monday’s column about Gophers sports and the frustrations of boosters prompted more responses than any other since this website began in 2006. Nearly all responses expressed strong concern about the University of Minnesota’s commitment to athletics.

Baseball great Pete Rose, who was a celebrity guest at the Twin Cities’ Tapemark Charity Pro-Am years ago and still dreams of being enshrined in Cooperstown, turned 75 yesterday.

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