Author: David Shama

Former Twins left-hander Kyle Lohse, who won 14 games combined during the previous three seasons, is 13-4 with a .380 ERA for St. Louis.  His 13 wins lead the staff.

Tom Mahoney, the former Fairmont High School football coach who died earlier this month, was a friendly, warm-hearted Irishman who was one of the winningest coaches in state prep history and a leader among his peers.  “We called him the idea guy,” said Don Swanson, the former Patrick Henry coach.  Both Swanson and Mahoney were leaders in the Minnesota High School Football Coaches Association.  “He could come up with something five days a week,” said Swanson who knew Mahoney for 50 years.  Swanson gave Mahoney credit for developing the Butch Nash award that honors high school assistant coaches and helping to revive the Minnesota High School All-Star Football Game.

Gopher football coach Tim Brewster said he has no plans to switch former Cretin-Derham Hall quarterback John Nance to another position.  He said Nance, a 6-4, 185-pound freshman, needs to add strength.

Brewster has a bed in his office so he can sleep over night during the demanding work days and nights of August as he prepares the Gophers for their opening game with Northern Illinois at home on August 30.  He plans to sleep in his office until about a week before the first game.

Brewster is a high energy person, even for a coach.  He jogs and also eats what he describes as a “boring” diet that emphasizes fruits and vegetables, minimizing red meats and desserts.

Jason LaFrenz, director of marketing and ticket sales for the Gophers, told Sports Headliners on Sunday that he expects season ticket sales (public, staff and students) to total about 39,000.  He’s projecting another 4,000 will be sold prior to the Gophers moving into TCF Bank stadium next season.  A 43,000 total means a sellout for the season in the 50,000 seat stadium because about 3,000 seats are committed to premium seating and another 3,000 are kept for fans of visiting teams.

LaFrenz said about 2,000 people attended last Sunday’s Gopher Nation Fan Fest that included autographs from Brewster and players.  He also said 750 seats with unobstructed views are still available for Gopher basketball season tickets.

Bill Fitch, the former Gopher and NBA coach, told Sports Headliners that Timberwolves rookie Kevin Love was deserving of being picked among the top five players in the June NBA draft, but local fans will need to be patient with his development.

The 6-10, 250-pound power forward will need “at least two years” to develop, just like other big players when they come into the league, according to Fitch who is now retired and living in New Mexico and Texas.  “He’s a project,” Fitch said.  “He’s got a lot of growing (improving) to do.  What you’re seeing now is just the beginning. …”

Fitch said it’s important for a rookie to join an NBA team where he’s needed and fits the personnel.  Love is a match with the Wolves who need another big player to complement center Al Jefferson.

The plan is for Love to help Jefferson with rebounding, plus feed the ball to the 6-10, 265-pound 23-year-old center and ease defensive pressure on him by scoring from the outside.  Last season Jefferson scored 21 points and 11.1 rebounds per game (fifth best in the NBA) after coming to Minneapolis a year ago in the Kevin Garnett trade with Boston.  “I think the kid from Boston is going to be a helluva player,” Fitch said.

Fitch also said Love was probably as well coached in college as anyone coming into this year’s NBA draft.  Love is “very coachable” as proven by his willingness to accept instruction throughout his life including from his dad, Stan, a former NBA player.

Fitch would have no part of any comparison between Love and Larry Bird, a player he coached in 1981 when the Celtics won the NBA title.  Love has been an outstanding passer, rebounder and scorer in college, three areas that Bird excelled in, too.  “I don’t see anybody like Bird,” Fitch said.   He believes when healthy and at his best that Bird was as good as any player ever.

Wolves vice presidentKevin McHale, who was also on that 1981 team, has said Minnesota could win another 20 games next season after being 22-60 during the 2007-08 season.  Fitch indicated that’s ambitious but he thinks the Wolves have some “good young players” and it’s an asset to be in the Northwest Division, and not in the Southwest where they would face Dallas, Houston, New Orleans and San Antonio.

 The Twins’ Rick Anderson is one of baseball’s best pitching coaches, an authority on pitching to hitters.  I mentioned to him that the Twins’ Justin Morneau has so much plate coverage with his swing that he can reach for an outside pitch and stroke it for a base hit.

“Amazing,” Anderson said.  “And he’s a pitcher’s nightmare because you think, ‘Well, I am not going to come into him because he can hit one 400 feet to right field.’  But then you stay away…he can hit it 400 feet to left field. …He says, ‘When I am swinging the best, I use the whole field.’ When he’s not, he’s trying to pull home runs, but when he stays with his plan and trying to use the whole field, he’s tough to pitch to. …”

Anderson said if Morneau were on another team he wouldn’t “know how” to pitch to him.  The 6-foot-4, 230-pound Morneau is second in the American League in RBI with 89 while batting .311 with 18 home runs.

The Twins, who have a 24-30 road record and lost two of three games in Seattle earlier this week, are nearing their longest road trip of the year starting on August 21.  The Twins will play in Anaheim, Seattle, Oakland and Toronto before returning to Minneapolis for a series against Detroit starting on September 5.

Before the 2008 major league schedule was made the Twins communicated to major league baseball officials that Republican Convention organizers asked that the team be out of town during the convention, September 1-4.  Team president Dave St. Peter told Sports Headliners the first draft of the schedule had the team in town during the convention.  The final draft changed that but resulted in an unusually long time away from Minneapolis.

St. Peter described the Twins as “disappointed” the schedule wasn’t made more favorably but said MLB has requests from all 30 teams and faces a challenge in sorting things out.  He also said it’s a “quirk” in the schedule that the Twins didn’t play Seattle until this month and now play the Mariners nine times in August.