Twins – Page 39 – David Shama's Minnesota Sports Headliners

Vikings QB Process: No Need to Panic

Posted on April 19, 2023April 19, 2023 by David Shama

There is endless speculation about when and how the Vikings will find their next quarterback to replace 34-year-old Kirk Cousins. No need to overthink the process.

The Vikings are highly likely to find their guy sometime in the next 12 months or so. They may acquire a quarterback via trade or free agency within that period. Of course, next week’s NFL Draft will be an opportunity, too, and so will the 2024 draft.

To find a coveted prospect in the opening round of the 2023 draft, the Vikings will have to move up from their No. 23 position in the first round. While that could happen, chances are more likely the Vikings will move down from No. 23, trading that selection to acquire more picks in draft. Minnesota has just two draft spots in the top 100 and only five total in the seven round draft that starts April 27 and continues through April 29.

GM Kwesi Adofo-Mensah, head coach Kevin O’Connell and others in the organization have spent a lot of time looking at quarterback prospects who will be in the draft, including those who will go in the later rounds. While Minnesota has been linked to likely first rounders Will Levis (Kentucky) and Hendon Hooker (Tennessee), the Vikings seem more likely to end up with second or third round quarterbacks. Possibilities could include Tanner McKee (Stanford) and Dorian Thompson-Robinson (UCLA), prospects the Vikings could develop during the coming season and not rush into game action.

Cousins, who turns 35 in August, is in the last year of his contract. If he and the Vikings push far into the playoffs, O’Connell and the front office are all but certain to want Cousins to return for the 2024 season. The Vikings, though, need a major upgrade to their defensive personnel to be a team that gets deep into the postseason.

The possibility is Minnesota could have a losing season and for next year’s draft have a top 15 or better draft position in the first round. Next year’s draft looks quarterback friendly, too, starting with big names Caleb Williams (USC) and Drake Maye (North Carolina)

Clearly there is time and options for the Viking quarterback scenario to play out.

Worth Noting

Minnesota sports hero Joe Mauer’s 40^th birthday is today. It’s a noteworthy year for the three-time American League batting champion who retired in 2018 and will be inducted into the Twins Hall of Fame August 5.

The Wild might be on a run of good fortune after winning Monday night’s two-overtime thriller in Dallas against the Stars, 3-2. The Wild haven’t won an opening round playoff series since 2015 and that was the last time Minnesota was victorious in the first game.

Hot goalies always weigh heavily in determining postseason success and Minnesota’s Filip Gustavsson was superb Monday night and entered the game with an impressive regular season goals against average of 2.10 and 22-9-7 record. Marc-Andre Fleury, the Wild’s 38-year-old backup goalie, struggled as the starter in the team’s opening playoff series a year ago when the Blues eliminated Minnesota in six games, but Gustavsson was brilliant Monday night with a franchise record 51 saves.

The Wild likely caught a break, too, in facing the Stars instead of the defending Stanley Cup champion Avalanche. Colorado struggled with injuries and performance much of the season but came on late to win the Central Division, with the Stars finishing second and the Wild third. The Avalanche are gritty and talented.

Word is Wild GM Bill Guerin has a new contract, with an established hockey source telling Sports Headliners it’s probably worth $1.5 to $2 million per year.

The Wild announced this morning the club has recalled forward Sammy Walker from Iowa. The former Gopher led the Iowa Wild in goals with 27.

The Athletics’ poll results of NBA players have Wolves’ forward Jaden McDaniels voted the fifth most underrated player in the league, with teammate and guard Anthony Edwards No. 8. McDaniels is also No. 7 as the league’s best defender.

The poll, asking players questions in various categories while providing anonymity, has Wolves center Rudy Gobert ranked as the fifth most overrated player (tied with Jarren Jackson Jr. from the Grizzlies). Former Wolves’ head coach Tom Thibodeau, now leading the Knicks, is the No. 1 coach players don’t want to play for.

The Minnetonka girls’ basketball team could be the best girls prep team in the state next season. The Skippers will take on another power, Providence Academy, in a January 27 game at St. Michael-Albertville. Players to watch include Minnetonka guard Tori McKinney and Providence Academy’s Maddyn Greenway, daughter of former Vikings linebacker Chad Greenway, who as a freshman last winter gave notice she will be a special player.

McKinney, a senior next school year, is likely a recruiting target of new Gopher women’s head coach Dawn Plitzuweit. Word is the new coach has made a more than favorable impression on her players, displaying basketball leadership and likeability.

Minneapolis-based attorney and journalist Marshall Tanick wrote an informative article about Minnesota baseball-related litigation for Minnesota Lawyer. https://minnlawyer.com/2023/04/06/perspectives-new-saints-recall-old-

Congratulations to Ron Stolski, Jim Dotseth and other leaders of the Minnesota Football Coaches Association on the success of their recent clinic that registered 1,542 attendees. That’s the most ever for the popular annual clinic.

The MFCA will sponsor both a recruiting fair and combine for players May 6 at the Vikings’ complex in Eagan. High school coaches will meet with college coaches to discuss prospects at the fair. Players in eighth through 11^th grades will be tested for skills in a variety of categories. https://www.mnfootballcoaches.com/recruit

Comments Welcome

Wolves & Denver Looks Like Mismatch

Posted on April 17, 2023April 17, 2023 by David Shama

There was a significant discrepancy in talent, scrap and performance between the Nuggets and Timberwolves last night. It’s just one game in a potential seven game series, but based on what happened in Denver late Sunday night and the season long reputation of the two teams it appears this playoff matchup could end soon.

Denver, the No. 1 seed in the NBA Western Conference, encountered little resistance from No. 8 seed Minnesota in winning 109-80. The Nuggets, led by two-time NBA MVP Nikola Jokic, finished with a regular season record of 53-29. The Wolves, who prompt a lot of head scratching to figure out their team MVP, were 42-40.

The Wolves look like a team that has regressed from a year ago when they opened the playoffs by defeating a solid Grizzlies team in Memphis after finishing the regular season with a 46-36 record. The 2023 team looks dysfunctional too much of the time including in last night’s game that saw the Wolves out scored 32-14 in the third quarter after trailing 55-44 at halftime.

Even at the intermission the Wolves were drawing criticism from TNT analyst Charles Barkley. Targeting the Wolves’ Twin Towers of 7-foot Karl-Anthony Towns and 7-1 Rudy Gobert, Barkley said “Minnesota’s biggest problem” is the combo isn’t effective enough on offense to justify playing them together.

Gobert, acquired in a controversial trade last summer with the Jazz, scored eight points, while Towns, picking up some late points in the meaningless fourth quarter, had 11. And it wasn’t just scoring where the Wolves’ bigs were lacking. In plus-minus stats that measure a player’s contribution on the floor, Gobert was a team-high -28 while Towns was -11.

The Wolves used 13 players last night and Wendell Moore Jr., who played for two minutes, was the only individual with a plus rating (two).

Denver coach Mike Malone wanted his team to be more aggressive and disciplined than the Wolves for the playoff opener. Combine those elements with better talent, the result is what happened last night.

Worth Noting

Because of national TV scheduling the game had an absurd start time of 10:51 p.m. Eastern, 9:51 Central. The next game is Wednesday (also in Denver) with a scheduled tipoff at about 9 p.m. Central.

Walker Kessler, among five players and multiple draft choices the Timberwolves gave up in the trade to obtain Gobert, is one of three finalists for NBA Rookie of the Year. The 7-foot Jazz center averaged 9.2 points and 8.4 rebounds in his first professional season.

Only three other NBA players bettered Kessler’s 2.3 blocks per game. The other finalists for Rookie of the Year are Paolo Banchero of the Magic and Jalen Williams of the Thunder.

Former Wolves star Jimmy Butler, now with the Heat, is a finalist, along with De’Aaron Fox of the Kings and DeMar DeRozan of the Bulls, for NBA Clutch Player of the Year.

The Wild-Stars playoff series opens tonight in Dallas with possibly seven games needed to decide the winner. The two teams played a combined 55 overtime games during the regular season. Both franchises have recent histories of scoring droughts in the playoffs. The Wild hasn’t advanced out of the first round since 2015.

The Wild was 7-2-3 when star scorer Kirill Kaprizov was injured and unable to play late in the season. Minnesota had balanced scoring during that stretch and must continue that with forwards Matt Boldy, Ryan Hartman and Mats Zuccarello needed to step up on the playoffs.

The Stars franchise, known as the Minnesota North Stars until relocating to Dallas in 1993, might never have moved if the Metropolitan Sports Facilities Commission had funded a major renovation of Met Center in the late 1980s.

The Frozen Four championship game April 8 on ESPN 2 between the Gophers and Quinnipiac averaged 808,000 viewers, a 100 percent increase over the 2022 title game, per Front Office Sports.

St. Paul native Bill Robertson, commissioner of the USHL, said there were 80 alums of his league playing in the Frozen Four that also included Boston University and Michigan. Twenty-three of those players were from the state of Michigan and 22 from Minnesota.

Since 2017 the Twins are 4-18 at Yankee Stadium in regular season games. That record includes wins Thursday and Friday that ended up giving Minnesota a series split over the weekend.

Minnesota’s Sonny Gray, 2-0 with a gaudy 0.53 ERA, will start Tuesday night in Boston when the Twins open a three-game series against the Red Sox. The Twins’ starting staff, all of whom were acquired from other teams, has been leading MLB in multiple statistical categories including ERA and batting average against.

Happy 90^th Birthday today to former Gophers’ head basketball coach Jim Dutcher. Articulate and sharp as ever, Dutcher has always been a great family man and travelled to Houston this spring to watch son Brian’s San Diego State men’s team finish second in the Final Four.

Joe Salem, who was the Gophers’ head football coach when Jim Dutcher’s 1982 team won the Big Ten title, will be 85 on May 1. He told Sports Headliners via email his health is “okay,” but wife Sue has dementia and is in memory care in Sioux Falls. He spends much of his time following football and literally has a family coaching tree.

Sons Tim (a former Gopher quarterback) and Brad coach tight ends at Pittsburgh and Memphis State respectively. Both programs won their most recent bowl games. Brad’s son Eli is a reserve quarterback at North Central College in Naperville, Illinois and the team won the Division III national championship Stagg Bowl last year. Jeremiah is a freshman quarterback at Eastern Michigan, 2022 winners of the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl.

“The family was 4-0 in bowl games last fall,” Joe Salem wrote. “Not bad.”

Son Wade sells motivational programs to school athletic teams while son Brent, a former college football coach, is an insurance executive in the Twin Cities.

The Capital Club’s next breakfast program at Mendakota Country Club is April 27. Charles Adams III, head coach of the North Community High School Polars football team and a recently retired Minneapolis police officer, will help lead an “important conversation about life, death, humanity and how sports can bring people and communities together,” according to an email from club organizer Patrick Klinger. Former Gopher football star Darrell Thompson, president of the Bolder Options mentoring program, will be the program moderator. More information about the Capital Club is available from Klinger, patrick@agilemarketingco.com

Comments Welcome

Buxton Flashes Early Season MVP Skill

Posted on April 2, 2023April 2, 2023 by David Shama

The Twins are 2-0 this season because of superb pitching, timely defense and (no surprise) Byron Buxton playing like the team (and perhaps American League) MVP.

The team has won two American League Central Division games in Kansas City against the Royals by identical scores of 2-0. Buxton, the Twins’ designated hitter, has scored three of the team’s four runs and “pushed the envelope” with his base running, per manager Rocco Baldelli.

In Minnesota’s opening series win Thursday he stretched an outfield drive into a triple and scored the team’s first run. Yesterday he scored both runs.

Buxton set up Minnesota’s second run in the sixth inning Saturday by doing what few others can. First he advanced from second to third base on a ground ball hit by Jose Miranda to the shortstop. Then he scored on a short outfield fly ball off the bat of Kyle Farmer, running 30.1 feet per second, according to Twins TV analyst Glen Perkins. No wonder after the game, Baldelli said approvingly that Buxton “pushed the envelope” on the bases.

Buxton has a single, double and triple in his first two games. He is two home runs short of hitting 100 in his career.

In Buxton’s early seasons with the Twins he didn’t show a lot of power but that’s changed. In 92 games and 340 at bats last season he hit 28 homers. At 29 years old he has the potential this season to become the fourth hitter in franchise history to join the 40 home run club (the others are Brian Dozier, Harmon Killebrew and Roy Sievers). If Buxton could send 50 over the fence, he would break Killebrew’s single season club record of 49.

Potential is practically Buxton’s middle name. His career has been one characterized by do-everything talent in fielding, throwing, hitting and base running but also being sidelined by more injuries and missed time than any Twins star ever. Only once in his nine-year career has he played in over 100 games.

For now, the Twins are trying to protect Buxton’s health by not playing him in the outfield where diving for fly balls or crashing into walls to save potential home runs can be hazardous to the uber-talented center fielder. The first two games of the season have shown Buxton doesn’t need a glove to be the team MVP.

Worth Noting

Sports Illustrated’s baseball issue has the Twins finishing second in the division with a 87-75 record, a game behind the Guardians. However, the magazine predicts Minnesota defeats Cleveland in the postseason before losing to the Astros. The World Series forecast has the Yankees beating the Padres.

Weather allowing, the Twins will face an early season test against the Astros in a three-game series in Minneapolis starting Thursday. Minnesota is starting the season against two of baseball’s weakest teams in the Royals and Marlins (Monday-Wednesday in Miami).

Sports Illustrated said the Twins “spent more money on big league free agents this winter ($241 million) than the rest of the division combined ($176.75 million).”

This is Dick Bremer’s 40^th season of Twins broadcasts. The team’s TV play-by-play man will work games with a rotation of four analysts, all Twins alumni: Justin Morneau, Roy Smalley, LaTroy Hawkins and Glen Perkins.

New Timberwolves owner Marc Lore spoke about entrepreneurship at the University of Minnesota’s Carlson School of Management Friday.

Legendary former college football coach Lou Holtz, who coached the Gophers in 1984 and 1985, was just inducted into the Horatio Alger Association of Distinguished Americans, the nonprofit educational organization that honors the achievements of outstanding individuals and encourages youth to pursue their ambitions through higher education.

For over 75 years the Horatio Alger Award has been awarded “to esteemed individuals who have succeeded despite facing adversities, and who have remained committed to education and charitable efforts in their communities.” Holtz, the son of a bus driver during the Great Depression, got his first job at nine-years-old as a paper boy and went to become one of college football’s most famous coaches including at Notre Dame where he won a national championship.

Two days after the football Golden Gophers open at home on August 31 against Nebraska, the North Dakota State Bison will take on Eastern Washington in the first college football game ever at U.S. Bank Stadium. Tickets for the September 2 game went on sale Friday.

NDSU has nearly 15,000 alumni in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area and 26,000 across the state of Minnesota. The Bison drew 34,544 fans to their 2019 season opener against Butler at Target Field. North Dakota State claims about 26,000 alums in Minnesota, including 15 in Minneapolis-St. Paul.

St. Thomas, with the nation’s longest home game winning streak at 26, opens its season September 2 against Black Hills State. The Pioneer league champion Tommies also have nonconference games September 9 at South Dakota and September 16 at Harvard.

A college basketball source told Sports Headliners coveted point guard Andrew Rohde, transferring from St. Thomas, may enroll at Gonzaga.

The Twin Cities and state of Minnesota have long ranked at or near the top for most interest per capita in fantasy football. That obsession in speculating how players and teams preform will carry over if legalized sports wagering is enacted in the state. With about six weeks to the close of the current state legislative session, a bill approving sports betting could pass.

Minnesota native Bill Herzog was a basketball official for 63 years including Big Ten games from 1976 until 1988. Herzog, a Florida resident for 30 years now, worked high school games in that state until 2019. Sports Headliners asked his opinion awhile ago of college basketball officiating this year.

“In general, I think the officiating I have seen this year has been very good,” Herzog said via email. “As an ex official, I look to see if they are using proper floor mechanics and very seldom do I see them out of position. This is important because if you are not in proper position, you don’t have a very good chance to make the right call.

“There are still those marginal calls that can always be questioned. That’s basketball and those calls were there 40 years ago and will always be a part of the game. But in general, I think the officiating that I have seen would grade out at A-. …

“One thing has been very evident this year is that I have not seen many, if not any, overweight officials. That’s a good thing and in general the total staff seems to be young and vibrant, which was not the case when I was working where officials just seemed to hang on forever.”

College officials can make their livelihoods from officiating over a five- month period, working several games per week. Herzog’s understanding is the Big Ten pays $4,000 per game. “Seems like a lot but they have to pay their own travel, hotel and meals with that fee,” Herzog wrote. “I am assuming that the other major conferences pay the same.”

1 comment