The Minnesota Wild In A Nutshell

The Minnesota Wild are more or less my pet peeve. The Kool-Aid drinking in this town after ten years has really worn me down. I want to like the team, I really do, but year after year of bad drafting and trading high draft picks for mediocre players has added up to a very mediocre team with little offensive ability. The team should be thankful the Wolves are still around to steal negative attention away from them.

I was shocked to see on Facebook how many people were pumped up after the Wild beat inter-divisional rival Edmonton at their home opener last week. Edmonton might be one of the two or three teams that are worse than them in the conference. The only difference between us and the Oilers is they have has  top-5 draft picks in recent years and have upside.

Us? Not so much.

But back to the Kool-Aid drinkers. I want to single out the Martin Havlat signing. The offensively-skilled, yet injury-prone forward was hailed as a great replacement to Marian Gaborik (a more offensively-skilled, yet injury prone player.) In year two of the Havlat era, he still hasn't instilled nearly the fear Gaborik did in the opposition. And for some reason local fans act surprised.

Consider from 2001 (Gaborik's rookie year) through last year:

Gaborik averaged 28 goals and 58 points while playing 64 games.

Havlat averaged 20 goals and 50 points while playing 60 games.

I'm not saying the Wild should've resigned Gaborik (especially at the cost it'd take to keep him over signing Havlat) but I am saying why would the Kool-Aid drinkers expect anything more than what they've gotten to replace Marian? More injury prone, less productive and a year older is the recipe for success when replacing your franchise player?

At what point do the fans realize the team is less than average at best and no one considers this "The State of Hockey" besides the Kool-Aid drinkers?

Brewster Out. Who's In The Mix?

With Golden Gopher football coach Tim Brewster on the way out, here’s my list of potential replacements.

In no particular order…

1. Mark Richt: Current Georgia coach is on the hot seat after a slow start with the Bulldogs. 11 players have been arrested in the last year so it’s not like much will change on campus if he comes to town. Could be a "Tubby" like hire with an established coach who needs to get away from a pressure situation in the SEC.

2. Mike Belotti: Former Oregon coach has won a lot of games while establishing Oregon as a national power. Gophers also wear Nike clothing so he’d be familiar with hideous attire.

3. Mark Trestman: Current Montreal coach led the Alouettes to a Grey Cup title in the CFL. SLP grad, personal favorite of Tony Dungy.

4. Brian Billick: One Minnesota team already screwed up in not giving him a head-coaching job…

5. Kevin Wilson: Oklahoma O-Coordinator has Sooners putting up 36 a game in a non-whacky offense.

6. Glen Caruso: Coaches the best college football team in the cities. Handsome, too.

7. Mike Guentzel: Long-time Gopher assistant was a player’s favorite. Team hasn’t been the same since he left. Sorry, Wrong sport.

8. Paul Chryst: Wisco O-Coordinator goes by the motto “If you can’t join ‘em, beat ‘em.” Only draw back is that (from everything I’ve read) he’s a friend of AD Joel Maturi, which should immediately disqualify him from any discussion.

9. Mike Grant: Sure going from Eden Prairie to The U is a demotion and he’ll have to take a pay cut, but at some point he needs to prove himself. Son is a linebacker on the team. That’s a plus.

10. Glen Mason: Former coach got the short end of the stick. Rehire Gordy Shaw and get the team back to the glory days of the Sun Bowl and first day draft caliber players.

Hall of Famer Deacon Jones All For Going Upside a Women's Head

Just skip ahead to about 14 seconds...

10/10/10 Reminds Me of 9/9/99 (Prepare For Your Head To Explode)

As we've reached October 10th, 2010 I can't help but remember 9/9/99. You see I haven't forgotten that day. Why? Because that was the night Chris Rock hosted the MTV Video Music Awards. I'm not going to say this was an extravaganza, but I don't think that show has ever returned to form.

In a nutshell, the show featured performances by Smash Mouth, Blink-182, Kid Rock/Run DMC/Aerosmith performing a medley a hits(!), Lauryn Hill, Backstreet Boys, Ricky Martin, Nine Inch Nails, TLC, Fatboy Slim, Jay-Z, Britney Spears and *N-Sync performing "Baby One More Time" and "Tearin' Up My Heart"(!!) and Eminem/Snoop Dogg/Dr. Dre performing a medley featuring "My Name Is"/"Guilty Conscience"/Ain't Nothin' but a 'G' Thang."(!!!)

My lord what a murderers row of talent and pre-packaged bubble gum.

Chris Rock was pretty much at his creative apex. As shown by his monologue. (If you do anything today, just watch that out-dated masterpiece.)

Celebrity appearances by also where made (In order of probable importance)

• 2pac and Biggie's Mothers
• Jay Mohr
• Jeanine Garofalo
• Fred Durst 
• Denise Richards
• Rebecca Romijn-Stamos
• Lil' Kim
• Lil' Kim's dress
• Gavin Rossdale
• Mark McGrath
• Freddy Prinz Jr.
• Method Man
• Moby
• Wyclef Jean
• Carson Daly
• Mary J. Blige
• Renee Zelwegger
• Heather Locklear
• Tommy Lee
• Pam Anderson (Not the first time Tommy had been behind Pam...)
• Heidi Klum
• Tim Robbins
• Susan Sarandon
• Christina Aguilara
• Regis Philbin
• Diana Ross
• Janet Jackson
• Puff Daddy
• David Bowie
• Prince
• Johnny Depp
• Will Smith
• Madonna
• Paul McCartney

GOOD LORD. That's a hodge-podge of A-Listers, C-Listers and D-Cups!

This years show featured the likes of 

• Russell Brand
• Justin Bieber
• Snooki

I think MTV is on-point with ignoring all forms of music on the channel. They improved so much in the last 11-years....

I almost forgot to mention the videos that were up for major awards that year!

• Hill's "Doo-Wop (That Thing)"

• BSB's "I Want It That Way"

• Slim's "Praise You" (So ahead of it's time it's not even funny)

• DMX "Ruff Ryders Anthem"

• Will Smith "Miami" (Sorry Vikings fans)

• Madonna "Beautiful Stranger"

• Lenny Kravitz "Fly Away"

• TLC "No Scrubs"

• Jay feat. Ja-Rule "Can I Get A..."

• Limp Bizkit "Nookie"

• The Offspring "Pretty Fly (For a White Guy)"

• Aaliyah "Are You That Somebody?"

• 2pac "Changes"

• Korn "Freak On a Leash"

• Nas feat. Puff Daddy "Hate Me Now"

• Cher "Believe"

• Martin's "Livin' La Vida Loca"

• Jennifer Lopez "If You Had My Love"

• Barenaked Ladies "One Week"

So awful, yet so fantastic. A roller coaster of emotions. Holy Hannah what a show.

MTV only missed out on Steve Austin, Drew Carey, John Glenn, The Taco Bell Dog and Eric Cartmen appearing as well as references to The iMac, VW Bug and the ending to "The Sixth Sense" in Rock's monologue from making this the penultimate 1999 awards show.

Vikings Poised For Quite A Ride

It's entirely possible this could all blow up in the Vikings face. The team put a lot of chips on the table with Brett Favre and now they certainly are doubling down with the Randy Moss trade. And it's not just a normal double down. This is like doubling down with a 4 of Clubs and a 2 of Spades and the dealer is showing an Ace.

At 1-2 the team needed to take a chance in a mediocre division. Could they get blown out tomorrow night? Entirely possible. But consider this:

• Randy Moss is probably hungry
• Adrian Peterson is a man on a mission
• The defense and special teams have played fantastic
• Sidney Rice will come back this season and doesn't have to shoulder the load

If the offensive line can give Favre any sort of time the Vikes could be in fantastic shape the rest of the season. I don't know how this will end up, but I do know going into tomorrow nights game in the Meadowlands, the Minnesota Vikings have a much better chance of winning. They also have a much better chance against Dallas, at Green Bay, at New England and against the Giants.

One thing is for certain, this season will be one to remember.