David Shama's Minnesota Sports Headliners

U Waits for Summer to Find Burner

Posted on April 12, 2013April 12, 2013 by David Shama

The Gophers are working their way through 15 spring practices but one of the team’s potentially most explosive playmakers won’t arrive until summer. Freshman running back Berkley Edwards, 5-9, 190 pounds from Novi, Michigan, is already on the minds of head coach Jerry Kill and offensive coordinator Matt Limegrover.

Edwards has game changing speed, the kind of attribute otherwise absent on the Gophers’ running backs roster. “He’s one of (the) top 10, 12 sprinters in the country,” Kill said in February when he announced Edwards will play for Minnesota. “Those things we need. And he’s a great fit for us at running back because we got some big backs, but we’d like to have one just to hand it off and it’s over. Goodnight. And he can do that because he’s got that kind of speed.”

The longest run from scrimmage by a Gophers’ running back last season was 38 yards by Donnell Kirkwood. In some games the Gophers didn’t have a running back with a run longer than 15 yards.

Limegrover is diplomatic about the running backs he has now and said he’s “very excited” about what they can do but he knows Edwards will complement the punishing style of Kirkwood and Rodrick Williams, the team’s two leading rushers from last year after now departed quarterback MarQueis Gray.

“I think the great thing about Berkley is that he truly can bring that change of pace over what we have right now,” Limegrover said. “The more weapons you have…the better off you’re going to be because every time you do that, it makes defensive coaches stand up and take notice, and be aware of, ‘Okay, they have a tailback in but which one is it?’

“So having a guy like Berkley with his speed and the things he can do getting the ball to the perimeter I think is going to be just a fantastic complement to what we already have in place.”

Limegrover won’t have to be envious of a team like Wisconsin if Edwards comes through for the Gophers. The famed Badgers’ running game pounds away for yards over and over…and then a speedy Wisconsin back darts through a hole, or jets outside for a long run.

Limegrover said it’s difficult for an offense to just rely on long drives for touchdowns. “Every once in a while you need to have that two play, 80-yard drive. …That’s what we’re working towards and that’s what we need, and Berkley is that kind of kid.”

Worth Noting

Limegrover said he isn’t set on naming the starting quarterback after spring practice ends later this month. “Not really. I think that what it comes down to is I think the offense is kind of bigger than who the starting quarterback is going to be.”

Kill emphasizes competition at all positions. “I think it shows up every day with the way kids compete,” Limegrover said.

Two of the three finalists for the Hobey Baker Award are Minnesotans for the first time in the award’s history, spokesman Wally Shaver told Sports Headliners. The winner of the 33^rd annual award will be announced tonight with coverage beginning at 5 p.m. CDT on the NHL Network.

Finalists are Boston College sophomore Johnny Gaudreau from Carneys Point, New Jersey; Quinnipiac senior goalie Eric Hartzell from White Bear Lake; and St. Cloud State senior forward Drew LeBlanc from Hermantown.

A Minnesotan, UMD’s Jack Connolly who attended Duluth’s Marshall High School, won the award last year. The last Gopher to win was Jordan Leopold in 2002.

With recent announcements that five juniors will be leaving school early, plus the end of eligibility for senior Seth Helgeson, the Gophers’ hockey program has lost more than 25 percent of its roster.

Two football games will be played at sites within walking distance of one another on Thursday, August 29. That evening the Gophers host UNLV in a nonconference game at TCF Bank Stadium while the Vikings play their final preseason game against the Titans at Mall of America Field.

The Vikings’ other home preseason game will be August 9 against the Texans.

Last Sunday in Atlanta Lewis Garrison, the former Gophers football player, officiated the Division II men’s college basketball championship game for a second consecutive season.

This is a big weekend for the Carol Fitzgerald Memorial Fund with a benefit tonight at the Metropolitan in Golden Valley, and a community celebration tomorrow at the Martin Luther King Center in Minneapolis. Pro Bowl wide receiver and Minneapolis native Larry Fitzgerald Jr. will be at both events and sign autographs at a fundraising session on Saturday. Other guests at the Metropolitan event will include Jamecia Bennett, Cris Carter, and Big Sy Huff. The fund supports multiple causes and honors Carol Fitzgerald who passed away from breast cancer in 2003.

A local source told Sports Headliners assistant basketball coach Ben Johnson interviewed on Monday for a position on Minnesota coach Richard Pitino’s new staff. Johnson, a former Gopher player, joined the Nebraska staff last year.

The 2013 Division I men’s basketball tournament, televised on four networks, was the most-watched NCAA tourney in 19 years, according to a Wednesday story by Sportsmedianews.com, attributing viewership statistics to Nielsen. “The tournament averaged 10.7 million total viewers, up 11% from last year’s 9.6 million total viewers, and is the highest average for the NCAA Tournament in 19 years (11.2 million, 1994),” Sportsmedia.com reported.

The story also said Monday night’s title game between Louisville and Michigan had 23.4 million viewers, an increase of 12 percent from the 2012 game.

The Timberwolves FastBreak Foundation will host a jersey auction after tomorrow night’s game against the Suns at Target Center. Fans can bid on jerseys worn by Timberwolves players during the game. The winning bidders will have jerseys signed and photos taken with players.

St. Thomas men’s basketball coach John Tauer, who led the Tommies to a 30-2 record and the NCAA tournament semifinals, is the Basketball Times Division III Coach of the Year.

Vance Worley (0-1, 5.73 ERA), acquired in the offseason from the Phillies, makes his third start of the season tonight for the Twins against the Mets and Jonathon Niese (1-0, 2.13 ERA) at Target Field. Worley has a 3-3 career record with a 5.17 ERA against the Mets.

Yesterday was the 52^nd anniversary of the first Twins’ regular season game ever, a 6-0 win in New York against the Yankees. Pedro Ramos was the winning pitcher, Whitey Ford the loser in that 1961 game.

Oswaldo Arcia, the Twins Minor League Player of the Year in 2012, is hitting .458 with three home runs and eight RBI in 24 at bats for Triple-A Rochester.

Comments Welcome

Minnesota’s Backlund WWE Hall of Famer

Posted on April 10, 2013April 10, 2013 by David Shama

Bob Backlund travelled a lot of miles to earn his way into the World Wrestling Entertainment Hall of Fame last Saturday night.

The Princeton, Minnesota native was inducted into that professional wrestling organization’s Hall of Fame with a class that included Bruno Sammartino and Donald Trump, a friend of the McMahon family that runs the WWE. The WWE Hall of Fame event was held at Madison Square Garden, the famous New York venue where Backlund wrestled so many times.

“I sold it out about 68 of 72 appearances,” Backlund told Sports Headliners. “I was an All-American boy.”

Among the appearances he won’t forget was February 20, 1978. That was the night he won the World Wrestling Federation title against Superstar Billy Graham.

Backlund then held the title for five years and 10 months. That rein was second only to his friend Sammartino’s championship run. “I am very happy we’re going in (the Hall of Fame) together,” Backlund said last Friday.

These days Backlund operates a heating oil business in Connecticut, is a spokesman for the WWE and has a training product called Gym in a Box. He’s come a long ways since being trained by Eddie Sharkey at the Seventh Street Gym in Minneapolis during the winter of 1973.

Later that year Backlund set out for his professional wrestling debut in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, driving a 1968 Chevy Impala. “I had $20 in my pocket,” Backlund recalled. “When I arrived I had 30 cents.”

Backlund’s career was launched, beginning a series of one night appearances in various parts of the United States and other places. It was a career that lasted on and off for three decades, and followed his wrestling success at Princeton High School and North Dakota State.

At Princeton High Backlund was a Minnesota state champion at 175 pounds, and he also played high school football for coaching legend Ron Stolski. At North Dakota State he was a defensive tackle who in January of 1972 helped the Bison win the national championship by making 20 tackles and recovering two fumbles. Two months later he dropped 40 pounds and was an NCAA champion at 190 pounds.

USA Network had scheduled a one hour WWE Hall of Fame special earlier this week . The Hall of Fame event was part of a WWE weekend that featured Sunday’s Wrestlemania 29.

Comments Welcome

Rebuilt Twins Leave Early Impressions

Posted on April 10, 2013April 10, 2013 by David Shama

The Twins are already eight games into the season and while it’s too soon to make judgments that could stick for the whole year, we already have a few impressions:

The team’s 4-4 record includes a sweep of two series and two road wins. Not bad for a club that has four players new to their positions in the big leagues, a rebuilt rotation of starting pitchers and before the season was a coast-to-coast pick to finish last in the AL Central Division.

The pitchers, including those coming out of the bullpen, won’t overwhelm with velocity, but often show a lot of grit. The will to compete must characterize the whole team because the Twins are — at best — an ordinary bunch in the talent category.

Pitching always defines a season and maybe the Twins have cobbled together an okay starting staff once left-hander Scott Diamond rejoins the team. Yes, the work of starter Mike Pelfrey was ugly last night giving up eight hits and six earned runs in two innings leading to a 7-4 loss to the Royals, but that kind of performance hasn’t been the norm.

And the bullpen could be at least adequate, led by eighth inning setup man Jared Burton and closer Glen Perkins (two saves and no hits given up in three innings). Better bullpen efforts and surprises have included Anthony Swarzak’s four innings, three hits and one run work last night.

Defense is priority No. 2 after pitching and the Twins are pretty much rebuilt up the middle with rookie center fielder Aaron Hicks, new full time shortstop Pedro Florimon and second baseman Brian Dozier moving over from shortstop, his position last year. No doubts about Hicks covering ground in center with a strong throwing arm (but pardon his hitting, two hits in 30 at bats). Florimon, who played in 43 games with the Twins last season, has made low throws to first base. He and Dozier are working at their double play efficiency.

Dozier gives the Twins outstanding range at second base. Catcher Joe Mauer has dropped a foul ball pop-up, had a passed ball on Monday and at times had trouble trying to handle pitches thrown in the dirt.

Hicks has to cover for the slow moving Josh Willingham in left field. Converted first bseman Chris Parmelee has been okay so far. Mauer shows off a strong arm throwing from behind the plate, converted shortstop Trevor Plouffe has range at third base, and first baseman Justin Morneau is outstanding coming up with low throws. Sum it all up and the Twins could be average or better defensively.

Willingham, despite his slow-footedness, certainly doesn’t have to apologize for being in the lineup. He hit 35 home runs last season and is one of five Twins who have homered so far. Minnesota has hit six home runs (three last night), ranking 12^th out of 15 AL teams.

Last year the Twins tied with the Royals for a league low 131 home runs. The Twins were 10^th in the AL in runs scored, 1,448. They rank 9^h in runs scored with 33 as of today.

This team won’t dazzle with power because other than Willingham, Morneau and maybe Plouffe, no one else is likely to threaten 25 home runs for the season. The club will have to hustle up runs with singles, doubles and savvy base running (only four stolen bases so far). They will need to show grit to score runs.

There’s that word again.

Comments Welcome