Jul/091
Minnesota Gophers New TCF Stadium
Future home of 2009's Traveling Trophies:
Gophers vs. Wisconsin = Paul Bunyan's Axe
Gophers vs. Iowa = Floyd of Rosedale Trophy
Gophers vs. Michigan Little Brown Jug
Gophers vs. Penn State Govenor's Victory Bell Trophy
Jun/095
Rubio Pick Now Becoming More Clear
When the Timberwolves drafted 4 PG's in the 2009 NBA Draft they had basketball fans worldwide scratching their heads. One day later the moves are starting to make a little more sense.
In today's economy it is no secret the most valuable players in NBA are one's with expiring or low contracts. Twelve teams have received loans from the NBA front office. Watching the NBA draft you'd think every team was trying to sell their pick for dead beat expiring players or cash (two did, LA and WAS).
It is this environment that MN found itself with 4 picks in the first round of what many experts were calling the worst draft class since Kenyon Martin's #1 overall 2000 draft. Direct from wikipedia:
Sports Illustrated named this entire draft class (as opposed to individual players) the 6th biggest "draft bust" of the modern era - making it the only draft class among the site's top 20 list. Just before the 2009 draft, ESPN.com columnist David Schoenfield wrote a piece in which he rated all of the drafts since the institution of the draft lottery in 1985, and the only draft which he gave a grade of 'F" was the 2000 draft. Side note: It's ironically funny because the draft was held in MN and every draft since then has been held in NY.
The Wolves then potentially have 4 picks in what many people think may be a top 5 worst draft class since 1985. What to do? Would it make sense to develop a 2 or 3 year plan? Try fixing the one glaring PG need and horde picks and players in the future? Would there be a way to take this years 4 and instead turn it into 3 picks in next years draft? A draft with more talent?
It's no secret Glen Taylor is a business man first. There is no reason to invest tens of millions into players that won't create wins in a tough Western Conference. The only logical thing to do is build for 2 or 3 years out.
With that said Ricky Rubio wasn't or will never be in MN's 2 or 3 years out plan. Here's what hoopshype.com looked like on Friday, June 26th.
When you consider Rubio doesn't want to play for MN and it would cost an est. $5-$6M to buy him out of his Euro contract MN was never going to be the place Rubio played.
The Wolves new GM is David Kahn. Kahn spent the better part of a decade in the Indian Pacers front office. His boss - the new New York Knicks GM Donnie Walsh. ie. the perfect trade partner. Rubio has said he wants to play in NY. NY is the only team that can really afford to throw millions at Rubio to buy him out and sign him to a long term deal.
Ricky Rubio's agent is Dan Fegan. Fegan got Chinese YI Jianlian out of Milwaukee and into New Jersey a larger market where he preferred to be. The Knicks coach Mike D'Antoni was just on ESPN radio praising how he loves coaching Euro players so much he traded for one of the NBA's biggest draft pick flops - Darko Milicic.
Rubio holds all the cards, he can play one or two more years in Spain if he likes. But the Wolves made the smartest move when they took him anyway. They now own the rights to a player many NBA teams will covet. The Wolves own the bait and will get much more for him in return (ie. expiring contracts, draft picks, maybe even a sleeper).
If you do believe the Wolves are 2 or 3 years away then trading Rubio for a small forward, saving a bunch of money, maybe getting a draft pick or two makes the most sense. Trading away Lawson to Denver for a future draft pick also makes sense.
The Wolves know they have to run the team like a business and there is no way they can compete in the West this year with what they currently have with Rubio or not. By making the right moves to clear salary, horde future picks and maybe pick up a solid speedy PG with a 40" inch vertical...the Wolves are erasing a dozen years of draft day blunders under former GM, God Bless his Soul, Kevin McHale.
Here's a snapshot of the salary situation before this years draft. I like the idea of creating enough space now to go grab 1 or even 2 max deal elite players in free agency in 2011 and 2012. That is if we can convince someone to handle the cold. The Wolves are setting themselves up to go shopping in 2011 and 2012.
It's all part of the 2 or 3 year plan. Too bad there isn't a Roy and/or Mayo around, instead of talking rebuilding we'd be talking about what one piece we could add to make a deep playoff run.
Mar/0931
1,600 Club Now Available
In the NFL record books you'll find one interesting WR record - Torry Holt along with Marvin Harrison are the only receivers with multiple 1,600 yard receiving seasons. It just happens both players are now free agents having been cut by their respective teams. With the Vikings looking to add threats that compliment AD, let's take a look at the numbers.
Harrison enters his 14th year in the league, the last two saw Marvin play a total of 20 games and collect 80 receptions for about 900 yards with 6 TD's.
Torry "Big Game" Holt enters his 11th season having played all but 2 games in his career. Holt has been a model of consistancy generating 80-100 receptions each year and at least 1,000 yds. Never a big TD guy only grabbing 10 or more in 3 seasons, Holt instead generates consistant deep routes and possession receptions while averaging about 12-14/yds per catch.
It's easy to see how both players could add a new element to the Vikings attack, but Holt is by far and large the bigger threat at this point in his career. Signing Holt to a 2-3 year deal would be well worth it from a financial and production standpoint. Convincing either player to join the QB-less Vikings might be another matter.
Feb/091630
The Minnesota Vikings Draft Needs
The pink elephant in the room is QB. What will the Vikings do at QB? In today’s NFL you have a short window to be great, then a window to rebuild so you can have a short window to be great again.
All Day isn’t getting younger. With LT’s latest woes it’s safe to say an RB has 3-8 great years in him. With a run heavy offense and an all around superior, but aging D, the Vikings window in now 2…maybe 3 years.
Let’s not forget going into last year and the year before expectations were high with the Vikings and they failed to deliver. To this point the team has underperformed in a very weak NFC North Division.
With the league’s #1 rusher you can only blame the offensive play caller or the quarterback to why the offense shuts down in big games (and little one’s, ie. Detroit twice when most teams where winning by 20).
I can’t reiterate the play calling failures enough when you consider having the #1 rusher. The rusher makes the passer better. When teams put 8 in the box 90% of the time you have to make smart throws, you have to make play action throws – where were all the play action throws?
The Vikings were the 25th rated passing team in 2008, Detroit was 24th.
So diehards will argue T Jack will work in 2010, but these are same ignorant people who thought Troy Williamson would replace Moss (just give him more time, they say). But we don’t have time. The window of opportunity is closing.
With that said, here are the 2009 Minnesota Vikings Draft Needs.
The first two you can’t really draft for in 2009, I’d be looking to trade a #1 or #2 pick to get them.
QB – Don’t draft one, you don’t have time. Find someone in Free Agency while the window is open. As we learned with Jared Allen, a proven veteran is worth far more than any 1st round pick.
Unrestricted Free Agents:
Warner, Garcia
Trading a 1st or 2nd Round Pick for guys I would target who are FA’s in 2011 and their team may not want them:
Hasselbeck – I would go after Hasselbeck pending a back check
Thigpen (how did we let him get away? Oh, thanks Brad Childress)
Remember this is a 2 year solution you need to address now while you have a window of opportunity.
If I were the Vikings I would be pursuing Hasselbeck and/or Thigpen asap.
Shut Down Corner – Antwoine Winfield only has a couple more years and the Vikings are one shut down corner away from being unbelievably great. With the Viking front line, a healthy LB core and hard hitting safeties, just imagine what taking out both WR threats each game would mean for this team?
Will the Vikings make a run for Nnamdi Asomugha?
What you can draft.
Kick Returner / WR – If the Vikings don’t trade away the 1st round pick for a QB, I’d look for them to consider filling one of their biggest glaring needs, the kick return game. The Vikings have no return threat and last year’s hope broke his leg half way through the season in the most disgusting way.
If Jeremy Maclin (doubtful) or Percy Harvin (probable) is available here in the 1st, I take him. A slot solution to help your passing game ala DeSean Jackson, ala Steve Breaston. A solid threat to return kicks and punts. You fill two needs.
OT and/or C – Will Birk be back? What about the right side of the line? Do you move Cook to his college position of Center? Does Bryant McKinnie run block or just sort of stand up and whiff at a guy while he looks confused? Isn’t he about one strike away from being suspended for a year?
Punter – Think Eagles Playoff Game...Please can we find someone with hangtime? Or do we have to sit through another year of our punter kicking long line drives 20 yds in front of the coverage? I’d take 5-10 less yards of kicking distance for a higher chance of no return. My favorite line from the video, "By the way, don't kick to Reggie Bush right now. They did Mike. And it's a line drive."
Kluwe ranks 33rd in Net Avg and 25th in fair catches with 8. By comparion the leagues top 5 punters all have more than 20 FC’s. It’s all about hang time and as we saw with SD in the playoffs, when you have a punter with 5+ sec hang times you can single handedly win a game. Kluwe meanwhile I’m sure will keep trying to kick it 60 yds inbounds with 3 sec of hangtime.
And that’s about it for needs that need to be solved before the season starts. The rest of the Viking needs would be for development reasons.
DT and/or S – Pat and Sharper will be shutting it down soon. Use your late round picks to find value and talent that can develop under these two in the next year or two.
Special Teams Coach – if only you could draft someone to fix the worst punt coverage unit in NFL history.
I’m sure I missed something or you have a different opinion. I’d be glad to hear it.
Dec/0834
Williams Wall Has Yet to Crumble, Yet
Another day in the StarCaps drama brings us a little closer to the end. Today with the courts getting invovled it is looking a little more promising for the players to play this weekend, but probably not beyond that. It seems as though there are three main issues at hand.
According to an article from ESPN, via the Associated Press (see link below)
http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=3747957
the result of the case will boil down to three main points that the judge will consider. The first, coming from the players side and like we talked about yesterday, is that they were not fairly warned by the NFL that the StarCaps pills contained the banned diuretic Bumetanide. According to the NFLPA league officials knew that StarCaps contained the banned substance but withheld this information from players. In addition, the label on the bottle never mentioned it contained the banned substance.
The other point that we can take from the AP article is that the NFL says the burden is completely on the player to know what they are putting in their body. The league says that the collective bargaining agreement "does not require the league to issue warnings about specific products and argues an effective steroid policy requires players to be responsible for what they ingest." (taken from http://www.twincities.com/sports/ci_11137136?nclick_check=1http://www.twincities.com/sports/ci_11137136?nclick_check=1)
The final blow that will probably win it for the NFL is the statement issued by them in 2006 that said, "Balanced Health Products, the distributor of StarCaps, had been added to the NFL's list of banned supplement companies." (also from the above Pioneer Press article)
So it remains to be seen what will happen, but that last statement from the NFL seems pretty incriminating for the players. If the league issues a statement banning all products from a certain company why would a player ever use a product from said company, especially a professional athlete with so much on the line? I thought they had a chance, but if that 2006 statement is true then I can't blame the NFL for suspending the players. Maybe we will add it to the list after all.
Dec/081700
Add it to the list, maybe
A common theme amongst Minnesota sports fans is having things begin to go our way and then having the proverbial "rug" being pulled out from underneath us. Well, we can add the Vikes to the list for 2008. I know, I know, all cities and states have their relative issues with sports teams such as Seattle this year and maybe Jacksonville with the Jags, or even San Antonio and the Spiz-urs, just to name a few. However, these teams have other things or recent success to fall back on. For example, the Seahawks, even though they are having a down year, (a really down year) have been to a Super Bowl and/or NFC Championship in the last five years. They may not have won but they still made it and gave the city some hope and generated some genuine excitement. Watch, this year they are on pace to get a top five pick and will be back better than ever after drafting Michael Crabtree and housing teams for size in their division (just my humble opinion from looking at it from the outside). I digress.
Amongst us Goldseaters, we have a common expression whenever something happens to one of our beloved teams. We say, "add it to the list" a line referring to all the times other teams from the land of 10,000 lakes have gotten our hopes up only to see them come crashing down in one fell swoop. The latest example is the Williams Wall and the StarCaps situation. As of now both Pat and Kevin will not see the field in the coming four games unless a savvy lawyer can pull something out of the hat. That leaves a huge hole in the middle of the D-line and a more challenging mountain to climb into the playoffs.
The situation is a sticky one for the Williams' boys, but Vikes fans should not abandon hope yet. Something just is not right about the situation. In doing a little research and making a few conclusions we may find that Pat, Kevin, and the others may have a legit story. According to a press release from the FDA, which can be found here: http://www.fda.gov/oc/po/firmrecalls/balancedhealth11_08.html
the drug which got the players into trouble, Bumetanide, was never listed on the ingredients label on the bottle itself. This would leave the player to believe that the supplement StarCaps would be okay to take in accordance with the NFL's banned substance policy, not knowing the pills actaully contained something which was on the league's banned substance list. The NFL is strict in it's policy saying a player is responsible for whatever they put in their body no matter what. Short of taking it to a lab and having a scientist run a test, how were they to know that the supplement was to contain a banned substance that was not even on the ingredients of the bottle. Nobody else knew, not even the seller of the product (maybe) until the league ran a test on the players and it was discovered.
Further, reading down the FDA press release we see that the bottles of StarCaps containing the banned substance Bumetanide were sold between August of 2008 to October 30 of 2008 which falls in line when the players were in training camp and subsequently tested positive according to league officials. The dates match up almost perfectly with when they would have been taking the weight-loss supplement giving the players more credit to their claims.
Long story longer the players may have a complelling case, but the league and its "make an example of you" attitude was quick to rule against the players, and now we are without two key pieces to our defensive puzzle. If its not this it will be something else, like an immobile QB or a bothced special teams play, that will brings our hopes and dreams of a Super Bowl victory crashing down in the end.
Sep/082349
Target Field!
From the MPLS/St. Paul Business Journal:
Target Corp. has signed on as the naming-rights sponsor for the new Minnesota Twins ballpark, which will be named Target Field.
Under the 25-year deal, the plaza area between Target Center and Target Field will be called Target Plaza.
“We are excited about our partnership with the Minnesota Twins and the opportunity to continue our long history of community support,” Target President and CEO Gregg Steinhafel said in a statement. “We are confident that Twins fans and community residents will enjoy this wonderful addition to our area for many years to come.”
In addition to the naming rights for the ballpark and plaza, Target also will receive extensive marketing and promotional opportunities.
The ballpark is scheduled to open in time for the start of the 2010 season.
Sep/082366
Minnesota Vikings Season Prediction
Ok, it's preseason prediction time. Here is how I see the Vikings' season playing out this year:
Week 1 @GB: On the road, nationally televised game, LOSS (0-1)
Week 2 IND: Home opener against Manning et al., LOSS (0-2)
Week 3 CAR: Carolina's strength is the run, we stop it, WIN (1-2)
Week 4 @ Ten: Titans have a poor passing game, we stop the run again, WIN (2-2)
Week 5 @ NO: Great passing offense gets the best of our average at best secondary, LOSS (2-3)
Week 6 DET: All Day is too much for Shaun Rodgers-less run defense, WIN (3-3)
Week 7 @ CHI: Chicago always plays us tough at Soldier Field, they win in the snow, LOSS (3-4)
Week 8 BYE
Week 9 HOU: We squeak out win at home vs. surprise team in AFC, WIN (4-4)
Week 10 GB: They won opening night, we get revenge in HomerDome, WIN (5-4)
Week 11 @ TB: We haven't won in Tampa since the 80's, I guess Vikings don't like pirate ships, LOSS (5-5)
Week 12 @ JAC: Jacksonville defense too tough on the road, LOSS (5-6)
Week 13 CHI: Bears offense might not score this week, WIN (6-6)
Week 14 @ DET: Vikings get a season sweep of the lowly Lions, WIN (7-6)
Week 15 @ ARI: Tarvaris passes fansy all day vs. weak Arizona defense, WIN (8-6)
Week 16 ATL: Jared Allen flusters Matt Ryan all day, WIN (9-6)
Week 17 NYG: Giants are 7-8 at this point and out of the playoff picture with nothing to play for, WIN (10-6)
10-6 record is good enough to win the division, but not a first-round bye. Vikings will win the wild card game, but fall short of making it to the Superbowl. The team is set up nicely to make a legitimate Superbowl run in 2009.
Ok, I am on record and would love to have everyone with an opinion lay out thier game by game predictions below. I think the Vikings have a team that can beat any team any day, but we got a tough draw this year playing the AFC South which affects our record. If we were playing the AFC East, for example, I think we would have one more win this year, which would mean a first round bye in the playoffs. Where do you think I'm right and where am I wrong? Let me know WHY, don't just say 'you're an idiot...' or 'Green Bay blows!...'
Go Vikings!