Vikings – Page 94 – David Shama's Minnesota Sports Headliners

Wolves Find Point Guard, But Not Defense

Posted on February 13, 2020February 13, 2020 by David Shama

Enjoy a Thursday notes column starting with the revamped Timberwolves who have played three games since president of basketball operations Gersson Rosas shook up the roster last week with new player acquisitions.

D’Angelo Russell is the long sought answer at point guard. The former NBA All-Star has played in two games for Minnesota including last night’s loss to the Hornets. He scored 26 points with 11 assists, at times showing deft ball handling and passing.

While in the game, Russell was a +12 and he had only three turnovers. No teammate was even close to that efficiency, showing the importance of the player Rosas sent to the Warriors in exchange for the much less valuable Andrew Wiggins, who despite his considerable talent never caught on at any position for Minnesota including point guard.

An announced sellout crowd at Target Center was energized last night, particularly in the first half when the Wolves moved out to a 66-50 halftime lead. Late in the second quarter fans chanted: “Defense! Defense! Defense!” Nice try, but defense is not a strength for the 16-37 Wolves who are 1-15 in their last 16 games.

The Wolves gave up 65 points in the second half to the Hornets and their offense slowed down in a 115-108 loss. Similar story on Monday night in Toronto against the defending NBA champion Raptors. After leading 75-74 at halftime, the Wolves went on to lose 137-126. The Wolves entered last night’s game yielding 116 points per game, ranking No. 27 in the 30-team NBA, per Fox.com.

A veteran hockey insider puts the chances at “100 percent” the Wild will make another trade before the NHL’s February 24 deadline. He also told Sports Headliners the team is too inconsistent and predicted a “40 percent” likelihood the Wild makes the playoffs after missing out on the postseason in 2019.

The Wild traded veteran forward Jason Zucker to the Penguins this week and acquired forward Alex Galchenyuk, defenseman Calen Addison and a 2020 conditional draft choice. The source said the Penguins have been interested in Zucker, 28, for about a year and hope he will bolster their scoring.

It remains to be seen if the trade will increase the effort and consistency of Wild players with Minnesota GM Bill Guerin on record that more deals could be coming.

The hockey Gophers have a young roster and could be special in another year or two if they retain their outstanding freshman class and players like sophomore forward Sammy Walker. “No question they’re better than at the start of the season,” the insider said.

Still, he thinks the Gophers are too inexperienced to win the Big Ten and might miss the NCAA Tournament.

WCCO Radio “Sports Huddle” co-host Dave Mona speaks to the CORES lunch group Thursday, March 12 at the Bloomington Event Center, 1114 American Blvd. Gophers athletic director Mark Coyle speaks to the group May 14. More information is available by contacting Jim Dotseth, dotsethj@comcast.net. Reservations for the March program must be made by Monday, March 9. (CORES is an acronym for coaches, officials, reporters, educators and sports fans).

Minnehaha Academy’s Jalen Suggs could become the first prep athlete ever to win both the Minnesota Mr. Football and Mr. Basketball awards. Suggs won the former in December and looks like a favorite among the finalists for Mr. Basketball.

Isaiah Washington, the former Gopher point guard who transferred after last season, has started 13 of 18 games for Iona. He is the team’s third leading scorer at 10.4 points per game and leads in total assists.

R.J. White’s NFL mock draft for Cbssports.com on Tuesday had the Vikings selecting Gophers wide receiver Tyler Johnson in the third round with the team’s No. 25 selection. White refers to the Minneapolis native as an “intriguing slot option” for the Vikings when they use “three receiver packages.”

Quoting Mike Zimmer who is preparing for his seventh season as Vikings coach, and is the third longest tenured head man in franchise history after Bud Grant (18 seasons) and Dennis Green (13):

“We’ve been fortunate that we’ve played decent, but at the end of the day we’re looking forward, and we’re not trying to look back on the last seven years. We’ve still got a lot of things that we haven’t accomplished yet that we need to accomplish.”

Marc Trestman, the St. Louis Park native and former Gophers quarterback who coached Grey Cup champions in Canada, is the head coach and GM of the Tampa Bay Vipers in the new XFL spring league. His Vipers lost their opener last Sunday to the New York Guardians, 23-3.

The average XFL player earns $55,000 with marquee players possibly making up to $500,000, per a Reuters story three days ago quoting Fox Business.

Minneapolis area native Tim Herron, who recently turned 50, is making his Champions Tour debut this week at the Chubb Classic in Naples, Florida. Herron is seen on TV ads in the Minneapolis-St. Paul market for 2nd Swing.

Former Gophers tight end and pro wrestling start Jumpin’ Jim Brunzell is the latest guest on “Behind the Game,” the Twin Cities cable TV program co-hosted by Patrick Klinger and Bill Robertson. “Behind the Game” episodes can also be viewed on YouTube.

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Zimmer Gets Idea Guy in Dom Capers

Posted on February 11, 2020February 11, 2020 by David Shama

A Tuesday notes column starting with Vikings head coach Mike Zimmer who spoke to reporters on a conference call this morning.

Zimmer hired Dom Capers, with 32 years of NFL coaching experience, as his senior defensive advisor this week. It had been on Zimmer’s mind since late last season to add someone like Capers whose experiences include being an NFL head coach and defensive coordinator.

“We’ve been running this defense for a long, long time and I just thought it would be good to get some new, fresh ideas,” said Zimmer who has been leading the Vikings for six seasons.

Zimmer has long been known as a high IQ defensive mind, and even as head coach been involved with the details of the Viking defense. The defense, though, had more issues last season than anyone liked including a sometimes leaky pass defense.

Capers will be counted on for help. “He’s always been a guy that has been very innovative in the pressure package of his defenses,” Zimmer said.

Zimmer doesn’t see himself being any more or less involved with the defense than in the past. He has new co-defensive coordinators in son Adam Zimmer and Andre Patterson. Zimmer said he may call defensive plays but the decision will be made as the Vikings work through the spring and months that follow.

Gary Kubiak, a senior offensive advisor and assistant head coach last season, is now the new offensive coordinator. He has won a Super Bowl as a head coach and has 24 years of coaching experience.

Zimmer was “relieved” after the playoffs when Kubiak agreed to succeed Kevin Stefanski as offensive coordinator. “I thought he (Kubiak) did an outstanding job last year and I anticipate it will be even better (in 2020),” Zimmer said.

Zimmer expects some changes with the offense next season but said “the majority” of it will remain the same.

Faced with a salary cap problem this offseason, it seems plausible Vikings management will consider cutting loose some or all of the following: cornerbacks Xavier Rhodes and Trae Waynes, defensive linemen Linval Joseph and Everson Griffen, and offensive lineman Riley Reiff.

Perhaps also in the mix of juggling numbers could be asking quarterback Kirk Cousins to restructure the final year of his $84 million contract over a longer period.

With the recent trades of center Gorgui Dieng and forward Andrew Wiggins, only center Karl-Anthony Towns remains with the Timberwolves from the promising 2015-2016 roster the late Flip Saunders put in place. The Wolves former president had several young players in the group beyond Dieng, Towns and Wiggins—including Nemanja Bjelica, Tyus Jones, Zach LaVine and Shabazz Muhammad.

Eye-opener: The low-key Wiggins playing with the Warriors now and max-voltage competitor Draymond Green.

That was former Timberwolves coach Randy Wittman who convinced legendary Indiana Hoosiers coach Bobby Knight to return last weekend to Assembly Hall in Bloomington after a 20-year absence, per the Indystar.com.

Forbes.com writer John Perrotto yesterday described best-case and worst-case scenarios for the 2020 Twins season.

Best: “(Josh) Donaldson, (Nelson) Cruz and the rest of the Bomba Squad hit home runs in bunches again in 2020, and the Twins ride those power bats to another division title, overcoming a suspect rotation.”

Worst: “The rotation becomes a mess as (Homer) Bailey breaks down before spring training ends, (Rich) Hill is slow to recover from surgery, and (Kenta) Maeda doesn’t adjust well to switching leagues.”

Maeda, acquired this week from the Dodgers, was 10-8 with a 4.04 ERA last year. The 31-year-old likely emerges as Minnesota’s No. 3 starter and his presence could put the Twins second only to the Yankees among American League teams in preseason power rankings of MLB clubs.

Twins president Dave St. Peter told Sports Headliners he would like to see the club draw around 2.5 million fans to Target Field this year. The franchise attracted 2,294,152 last season, ranking No. 15 among 30 MLB clubs, per Espn.com

Look for big changes coming in major league baseball in the next several years including a pitch clock to speed up the game. The average MLB game took over three hours and overall attendance declined in 2019.

The first Twins spring training game on Fox Sports North will be a 12:05 p.m. start February 23 from Fort Myers against the Blue Jays.

Did anyone else notice the Timberwolves and basketball Gophers announced home game attendances of over 10,000 and 11,000 respectively when they played head-to-head last week? The Wolves rank last in NBA attendance while the Gophers haven’t sold out a game all season and didn’t even come close to filling 14,625 seat Williams Arena on February 5 despite playing border rival Wisconsin.

If former Hopkins star Zeke Nnaji, now a 6-foot-11 freshman force for Arizona, had joined the Gophers to play with 6-foot-10 sophomore Daniel Oturu, Minnesota would have its best “Twin Towers” since Kevin McHale and Mychal Thompson played together in the late 1970s.

In its 2020 NBA mock draft yesterday, Nbadraft.net projected Oturu going No. 8 to the Wizards in the first round, and Nnaji being taken at No. 16 by the Nets.

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Vikes’ 2021 Super Bowl Path Unclear

Posted on February 2, 2020February 2, 2020 by David Shama

The Vikings, while deserving of a top 10 ranking among NFL teams, are clearly inferior to the two teams playing in tonight’s Super Bowl—the Chiefs and 49er’s. The question in this town is whether in the next 12 months Minnesota can transition to a Super Bowl quality team.

During the regular season the AFC Champion Chiefs, playing without star quarterback Patrick Mahomes, defeated the Vikings 26-23 in Kansas City. In the playoffs, the 49er’s dominated the Vikings and embarrassed them 27-10 in Santa Clara. The Vikings’ best moment in either the regular season or playoffs was their opening postseason win, 26-10, versus the Saints in New Orleans. Minnesota mostly struggled against quality opposition in a 10-6 regular season.

Whatever the Vikings lack, whether it’s more star power, team speed, work ethic, player development or better coaching, general manager Rick Spielman, head coach Mike Zimmer and other decision makers better execute on a to-do list in the offseason. There is a truism in football that warns: “Your team either gets better or worse from season to season, but never stays the same.”

The 2018 Vikings failed to make the playoffs, so 2019 was a laudable upgrade. Spielman will be forced to make changes not only based on performance, but salary cap issues. Expensive quarterback Xavier Rhodes, who turns 30 years old in June, seems all but certain to be gone from next season’s roster. Cornerback play was a soft spot last season and needs to be fixed as does the inconsistent offensive line. Those struggling included guard Pat Elflein, who had many difficult moments.

Addressing the offensive line problem feels like the movie “Groundhog Day,” the Bill Murray classic where events keep repeating themselves. As the NFL draft approaches this spring, there will be the usual speculation about the Vikings targeting an early-round offensive lineman.

The draft could give the Vikings a boost as it did in 2019, with promising center Garrett Bradbury. He needs to be one of several players who have break-out performances to help the team improve overall.

A trade of talented but temperamental wide receiver Stefon Diggs seems possible. He and Rhodes led the team in visible temper tantrums in 2019. With wide receiver Adam Thielen fighting off injuries late in the season and playoffs, the front office could be cautious in moving the 26-year-old Diggs.

Minnesota has young star power in 24-year-old running back Dalvin Cook and 25-year-old defensive end Danielle Hunter, but this is an aging team in some starting positions on defense and offense. It will be intriguing to see which way the Vikings trend in the next 12 months.

Worth Noting

It wouldn’t be shocking if 31-year-old Vikings quarterback Kirk Cousins quit the NFL after next season at the end of his three-year, $84 million contract. NFL stars Rob Gronkowski, Luke Kuechly and Andrew Luck retired before they were 30 years old. Football is a collision sport, Cousins is a great family man, and suitors from the private and public sectors will be lined up at his door when he transitions from football. He is that impressive of a person.

History lesson: not only are the Vikings 0-4 in Super Bowls, their closest loss was by 10 points in the games (losing 16-6 to the Steelers in 1975). Overall, the Vikings were outscored by 61 points in the four games.

Linebacker Damien Wilson can become the first former Gopher to play on a Super Bowl-winning team since 2009 if his Chiefs win today. Ex-Gopher tight end Matt Spaeth played on the 2009 Super Bowl champion Steelers.

A Michael Bloomberg TV commercial on tonight’s Super Bowl telecast cost an estimated $10 million, per the January 17 Wall Street Journal.

Early departures for the NFL by three Wisconsin standouts including running back Jonathan Taylor could make Minnesota the pre-season favorite to win the Big Ten West and advance to a first conference championship game in Indianapolis. January top 25 national rankings for the next season included SI.com’s placement of the Gophers at No. 11, with the Badgers at No. 13.

It’ll be interesting to see what local golf courses new Twins super slugger Josh Donaldson frequents on his days off next summer. Nicknamed “the bringer of rain” for his baseball power, Donaldson appeared on the Golf Channel in 2014 and hit a golf ball an estimated 309 yards in a simulator.

Harvey Mackay, the University of Minnesota alum and former Gophers golfer, signed copies of his new book at Barnes & Noble in Edina last week. The book jacket of You Haven’t Hit Your Peak Yet includes this endorsement from former Gophers football coach Lou Holtz: “Harvey Mackay may be the most talented man I’ve ever met.”

Former pro wrestling “High Flyer” Jim Brunzell is wearing an immobilizing brace this winter after a third surgery on his right knee. Following a career of 5,000 matches over a 25-year career, Brunzell has had both knees replaced, plus a shoulder and hip. The ex-Gopher football receiver has undergone eight total surgeries in the last 10 years.

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