Vikings – Page 112 – David Shama's Minnesota Sports Headliners

Early Word: 10 Wins for 2019 Vikings

Posted on June 11, 2019June 11, 2019 by David Shama

The Vikings finish spring practices this week and Bob Lurtsema is ready to predict their 2019 regular season total number of wins.

The former Viking defensive lineman remains a close observer of the team. He is known for his accurate predictions about the Purple including a late April projection Minnesota would use its first round draft selection on North Carolina State center Garrett Bradbury.

What does Lurtsema see in his crystal ball for 2019? “Ten (wins) will be easy,” he told Sports Headliners. “Of course, it’s never easy, but you got your second-year with (quarterback Kirk) Cousins coming in there. I am guaranteeing 10.

“I look at it more toward the 11 mark than I do the nine mark because it takes a year for a quarterback to get in sync with his receivers. Not too many quarterbacks…(can get on) the same page like that.”

Lurtsema expects to see a revised Vikings offense featuring plenty of play-action passes to take pressure off Cousins, and also a much improved running game. The Vikings ranked No. 30 in rushing yards among NFL teams last season. “You’ve got to have a running game,” Lurtsema said.

A productive offensive line is part of the formula. Lurtsema approves of adding Bradbury and switching Pat Elflein, last season’s starting center, to guard. Overall, Lurtsema doesn’t see the offensive line unit as a weakness.

“It won’t be below par,” Lurtsema said after being asked to rate the o-line. “It will go up a little bit (from last year). Different coaches are coming in, a little more play action, (and also) how they are going to have their blocking schemes (revised).”

The Vikings disappointed last year, failing to make the playoffs after nearly qualifying for the Super Bowl the prior postseason. The team flopped in the final game, letting a potential win over the Bears get away, when the victory would have sent Minnesota to the postseason.

The Vikings’ effort wasn’t good enough against the Bears. “Had we won the last quarter…of that game we were in the playoffs, and they didn’t pick it up a notch,” Lurtsema said.

Will the Vikings be in the playoffs after the 2019 season? “Of course, I guarantee it because they learned so much from that (Bears game),” Lurtsema answered. “Coach (Mike) Zimmer even said some negative things in the paper about his players not picking it up that notch.”

Lurtsema emphasized that what championship teams do is deliver peak performance at the most meaningful times. Maybe the Vikings can fall in that category in 2019. Observers see a “chip on the shoulder” attitude coming out of spring practices led by a self-described grumpy head coach in Zimmer.

Zimmer has long been known for his defensive coaching IQ, but the Vikings slipped on that side of the ball last season, too. Word was other teams made adjustments to the defense’s way of doing things. Now Zimmer is adjusting in the offseason. “He has to,” said Lurtsema, who from the start has been a Zimmer admirer.

Worth Noting

With Mike McCarthy having been replaced by the Packers in the offseason, Zimmer, now in his sixth season with the Vikings, is the senior head coach in the NFC’s North Division. McCarthy lasted 13 seasons with the Packers.

Kevin Warren, the Vikings Chief Operating Officer who will become the sixth commissioner in Big Ten Conference history next year, is licensed to practice law in Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota and the District of Columbia. USA Today reported seven days ago that outgoing commissioner Jim Delaney will receive about $20 million in future bonuses.

Who replaces Warren as the organization’s lead executive for the business side of operations? Speculation about internal candidates could include executive vice presidents Lester Bagley, Steve LaCroix and Steve Poppen. Vikings real estate expert Don Becker doesn’t live in Minnesota but his name could come up in conjecture regarding Warren’s replacement.

It only takes a glance at the 2020 ballot for the College Football Hall of Fame to be reminded that too few of the best prep football players from the state continued their careers at the University of Minnesota. On the ballot are two former Minneapolis area great players—wide receiver Marcus Harris who won the Biletnikoff Award as the nation’s premier receiver at Wyoming, and James Laurinaitis, three time All-American linebacker at Ohio State.

State legend Joe Mauer speaks to the Twin Cities Dunkers group on July 16. The Dunkers have been hearing from sports and other newsmakers since 1948.

Prep finalists for the Mr. Baseball and Ms. Softball awards have been announced with the winners to be named at a June 23 banquet at Target Field. Baseball finalists are Will Anderson, St. Michael-Albertville; Will Frisch, Stillwater; Drew Gilbert, Stillwater; Adam Mazur, Woodbury; Ben Pedersen, Marshall (Duluth); Trent Schoeberi, White Bear Lake; Evan Shaw, Fridley. Softball finalists are McKayla Armbruster, Faribault; Claire Bakkestuen, Forest Lake; Holly Blaska, Champlin Park; Tori Chute, Stillwater; Ava Dueck, Maple Grove; Olivia Hazelbaker, Farmington; Brianna Olson, Park of Cottage Grove.

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Several Twins Deserve All-Star Look

Posted on May 28, 2019May 28, 2019 by David Shama

Enjoy a Tuesday notes column leading off with the Minnesota Twins, a club that seems certain to have multiple representatives in July’s MLB All-Star Game in Cleveland.

Twins starters Jose Berrios, Jake Odorizzi and Martin Perez have all won seven games, a total exceeded by only two pitchers in the American League, per stats from Baseball-reference.com. Odorizzi leads the AL in ERA at 2.16 ERA. Berrios was the team’s lone All-Star a year ago and that won’t hurt his chances of being on the AL team in 2019. Perez won only two games last season pitching for the Texas Rangers and is a Comeback Player of the Year candidate.

Minnesota shortstop Jorge Polanco and outfielder Eddie Rosario have compiled All-Star credentials this spring, too. Polanco’s .332 batting average is second best in the American League. He is tied for third in Wins About Replacement. Rosario leads the league in RBI with 45 and his 16 home runs are tied for second.

The Twins haven’t had more than three players in the All-Star Game since 1991 when Rick Aguilera, Scott Erickson, Jack Morris and Kirby Puckett represented Minnesota.

The Twins announced this morning that pitcher Michael Pineda is on the 10-day Injured List with right knee tendinitis. Pineda has started 11 games, with a 4-3 record and 5.34 ERA. To replace Pineda on the roster, the Twins selected the contract of left-handed pitcher Devin Smeltzer from Triple-A Rochester. Smeltzer made four starts for the Red Wings, going 0-1 with a 1.82 ERA. He was acquired last season as part of a trade with the Dodgers.

The Twins have three more games remaining in May and have won 19 games this month. The club record for wins in May is 21. The most Minnesota has won in any month since 2017 is 20 in August of that year.

Minnesota’s 36-17 record remains the best in MLB after last night’s 5-4 loss to Milwaukee.

As the Minnesota Vikings go through Organized Team Activities this spring it appears No. 1 draft choice Garrett Bradbury will be the center, although he is learning the guard positions, too. The presence of Bradbury is prompting the move of last year’s starting center, Pat Elflein, to left guard.

What was Elflein’s reaction on draft night to the Vikings selecting the talented Bradbury who played at North Carolina State? Excited, he said, to add another “great lineman” to the roster.

Elflein is taking a team first approach about moving to guard, a position he played in college at Ohio State. “I think we have really athletic offensive linemen all across the board, so however we can utilize that best is what we want to do,” he said.

Elflein likes what he has seen so far of Bradbury. “He’s smart. He’s learning the offense very quickly.”

Rookie tight end and No. 2 draft choice Irv Smith Jr. is impressed with the Vikings’ offense. “It’s going to be a scary (good) offense,” he said.

Vikings wide receiver Adam Thielen is a two-handicapper in golf. After his pro football career might he consider a run at pro golf? Probably not, he told Sports Headliners. “I wish I was good enough,” he said. “I love the game of golf and it would be really cool to be able to do something like that, but I am not even thinking about that right now.”

Football fans in Minnesota will like the 2019 Division II and III preseason national rankings by Street & Smith’s College Football magazine on newsstands now. Minnesota State is No. 3 and Minnesota-Duluth No. 11 in the D-II rankings. Three MIAC teams are in the D-III top 10 with No. 3 Saint John’s, No. 6 St. Thomas and No. 10 Bethel.

St. Thomas games will again be broadcast on WCCO Radio. Sources believe the school will continue to buy the air time for the broadcasts.

Deepest condolences to the family and friends of Mignette Najarian who passed away last week. The Najarians, including Mignette’s husband Dr. John Najarian of the University of Minnesota, have for decades been one of the great families in Minneapolis and Minnesota. They have inspired people through medicine, business and philanthropy.

The “Cinderella” Golden Gophers softball team, in the program’s first ever Women’s College World Series, are seeded No. 7 among eight teams and play No. 2 UCLA starting at 1:30 p.m. Thursday in a game to be televised by ESPN. Names to watch on the Bruins include pitcher Rachel Garcia with a 1.01 ERA, third lowest in the country, and Kelli Goodwin hitting .446, ninth best.

No. 1 seeded Oklahoma should be the crowd favorite with the May 30-June 5 tournament being played in Oklahoma City, located about 20 miles from the OU campus in Norman. The talented Sooners lead the nation’s D-I teams in batting average at .355 and also ERA at 1:06. The Gophers rank No. 7 in ERA at 1.63 but aren’t in the top 10 for batting average.

Season tickets are sold out for Gopher softball 2020 home games and the athletic department has started a waitlist.

The Gophers baseball team finished the year with a 29-27 overall record, the 36th time in 38 years that head coach John Anderson has led Minnesota to a winning record. Anderson’s 64th birthday was earlier this month and he has one year remaining on his contract. He should be given a contract extension to continue leading the program indefinitely.

Earlier this month on CBS an estimated 10,000 TV households in the Minneapolis-St. Paul market watched golf’s Nick Faldo, along with Minneapolis philanthropist Wayne Kostroski, announce the first-ever Taste Fore The Tour. The Tour’s first stop will be July 1 at Interlachen Country Club in Edina, and is part of a national charity culinary series created to raise awareness and donations for hunger relief causes. The Minnesota culinary event will precede the PGA’s 3M Open that starts July 4 in Blaine.

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National Football Magazine: U ‘Dangerous’

Posted on May 23, 2019May 23, 2019 by David Shama

When it comes to offseason college football predictions, some things never seem to change like forecasts Alabama and Clemson will play for the national championship, or Ohio State will again wear the Big Ten crown. But there is variable and contrary chatter during the winter and spring including about the Golden Gophers program.

In early January Sporting News placed Minnesota No. 25 in a (how could you be earlier?) rankings of America’s best college teams for 2019. This week a few web searches of more recent top 25 national rankings produced no such good news for Gophers fans.

Sporting News’ post-spring practice listing of April 29 had Nebraska No. 25, Northwestern 24th and Wisconsin 21st but didn’t include the Gophers in the rankings. Pro Football Focus and Athlon came out with top 25 rankings Tuesday, but again Goldy was absent.

My research did discover a “nugget” that will please Gopher optimists. Athlon’s college football magazine, now on newsstands, includes an article by algorithm specialist Bill Connelly. He includes Minnesota among six national “Teams on the Rise” after deciphering data such as efficiency, explosiveness, field position, finishing drives and turnovers. He references the Gophers’ lack of consistency last season (Minnesota played in only two of 13 games decided by a touchdown or less) but concludes his write-up with these words: “This team will be dangerous.”

Read most anybody who offers a detailed preview on the Gophers, including Connelly, and be prepared to hear about inconsistency, including at the quarterback position last season. The Gophers played two freshmen there last year, Zack Annexstad and Tanner Morgan. Athlon includes Minnesota in a two-page spread titled “QB Battles” and predicts Annexstad will win the job because he is “the better pure passer.”

Both Athlon and Street & Smith’s college football magazines forecast the Gophers will finish fifth in the Big Ten’s seven-team West Division—perhaps the most unpredictable division in the country. The two publications say Nebraska will win what is expected to be a close race to play for the Big Ten championship against Ohio State from the East Division.

Street & Smith’s predicts Purdue will finish second in the West, while Athlon has the Boilermakers sixth behind Minnesota. S&M sees Iowa finishing sixth, while Athlon projects the Hawkeyes placing second in the Big Ten. (More evidence of how crystal balling varies and changes during the offseason.)

The Gophers, after an awful early season Big Ten performance, closed fast in 2018 by impressively winning two of their final three league games. Then they soundly defeated (34-10) a capable Georgia Tech team in the Quick Lane Bowl to finish 7-6 overall, 3-6 in conference games.

Among the most inexperienced teams in the country last year, the Gophers are loaded with key returnees on both offense and defense. There is also more talent to work with than Minnesota coaches have been accustomed to having. The quality of the finish last season is countered, though, by the poor performance earlier in the season, and the contrasting results have forced college football authorities to be a bit inconsistent and cautious in their outlooks about the Gophers.

Both magazines have Minnesota senior wide receiver Tyler Johnson on their regionally produced covers. S&M tabs JD Spielman, the Eden Prairie alum, former lacrosse player, and speedy receiver and returner for Nebraska, as the Big Ten’s best athlete. Athlon includes the Gophers’ Carter Coughlin, another Eden Prairie alum, on the line of its third-team All-American defense.

Worth Noting

Golden Gophers coach P.J. Fleck likes to recruit players with ties to the program like Coughlin whose dad and grandfather played for Minnesota. Maybe he will take a look at Gracen Bell, a tight end at Lee’s Summit North in Lee’s Summit, Missouri. He is the grandson of legendary Gophers lineman Bobby Bell, a two-time All-American and perhaps the greatest player in University of Minnesota history.

Vikings quarterback Kirk Cousins and Texans defensive end J.J. Watt are drawing praise this month for commencement speeches at their alma maters, Michigan State and Wisconsin respectively.

If new Timberwolves president of basketball operations Gersson Rosas wants the inside word on Ricky Rubio, he can probably get it from Jazz boss Dennis Lindsey. Rosas and Lindsey worked together with the Rockets before being hired to work for the Wolves and Jazz respectively.

Rubio is a free agent who the Wolves traded to the Jazz in 2017 and it seems possible he could end up back in Minneapolis. His name is being conjectured with multiple NBA destinations, and the Wolves might like to replace the point guard he was traded for, Jeff Teague.

It doesn’t hurt the fan popularity of the successful Gophers softball team that 10 of the 14 players on the roster are Minnesota natives. Among the Minnesotans is pitcher Sydney Smith, who joined the Gophers after transferring from LSU, Minnesota’s opponent starting Friday at 4 p.m. in Minneapolis for a NCAA Super Regional matchup. Smith, who while pitching at Maple Grove High School was 54-1, figures to offer some insights to her coaches about the Tigers who will be in a town for the best of three series.

All-session chair backs for the Super Regional at Sage Cowles Stadium are priced at $40, with bench seating at $35 and $30. Standing room is also $30. ESPN2 televises Friday’s game.

Ex-Pioneer Press sportswriter Gregg Wong and former Washburn High School three-sports star Gerry Clark play in the Tzatskees band Saturday night June 1 at the Eagles Club in southeast Minneapolis.

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