Twins 2013: Once More Into The Cellar

Gulf Coast League Twins (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

After two years of nearly triple-digit losses, is there anything the Minnesota Twins can do in the 2013 Major League Baseball season that might cause their fans to cancel their vacations and their Netflix subscriptions to come and spend their hard-earned money at Target Field?

The short answer is no.  General Manager Terry Ryan is in the midst of a makeover with this team, with the aim of making them more competitive by 2015.  Until then, he has to deal with an untried pitching staff, the questionable futures of two of his biggest stars, and how long he can stick with a manager who's gone stale.

Want more than that?  OK. 

With the Twins declining once again to participate in the off-season free agent market, the reputation of the Pohlad family for being cheapskates continues into a second generation.  Denard Span and Ben Revere were traded to the Washington Nationals and Philadelphia Phillies (in that order) for pitching prospects, none of whom will be ready for years--if ever.  The best (if most erratic) pitcher they're had in the last few years, Francisco Liriano, now toils for the Pittsburgh Pirates.

The pitching now?  Let's just say it's a work in progress.  Vance Worley, Cole DeVries, Mike Pelfrey and Kevin Correia will try their best to keep the Twins (and themselves) in the game for as long as possible.  If not, there's always the Rochester Red Wings.

Hitting won't be a problem as long as Justin Morneau and Josh Willingham keep producing.  But their futures here might depend on whether the Twins can make a deal with a contending team for more pitching help later this season.  As for Joe Mauer, will he be a better player now that he's a married man, and will soon be the father of (what else) twins?  Or will his legs give out as the years of crouching down behind the plate with all that catcher's equipment on takes its toll?

The big rookie sensation is centerfielder Aaron Hicks, so the Twins must have felt comfortable in unloading Span and Revere, who used to play that position.  Is Hicks worth it?

Ryan must be the most loyal person in the world to have kept manager Ron Gardenhire on for so long, even after two dreadful seasons.  That will be tested this season if the overhaul in coaches doesn't translate into an improvement on the field.

The Twins will once again bring up the rear in the American League Central division.  There is one silver lining, though.  Thanks to the Houston Astros, who are switching from the National League to the American League West, the Twins won't be the worst team in their own league.

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Our division and wild card picks, for what it's worth.

AMERICAN LEAGUE

EAST  Tampa Bay Rays
CENTRAL  Detroit Tigers
WEST  Los Angeles Angels
WILD CARD  Texas Rangers and Toronto Blue Jays

NATIONAL LEAGUE

EAST Washington Nationals
CENTRAL  Cincinnati Reds
WEST  San Francisco Giants
WILD CARD  Atlanta Braves and Pittsburgh Pirates

The Tubby Smith Principle

Tubby Smith (Photo credit: rburtzel)

Maybe you've heard of the Peter Principle, where in business the farther you go in your profession, the higher your level of incompetency becomes.  Or something like that.  Which is why so many CEO's who ran their corporations into the ground got nice, fat paychecks on their way out the door.

Tubby Smith, the University of Minnesota men's basketball coach, is working on a similar philosophy.  Having once coached a national championship team at Kentucky, Smith was hired to turn around a moribund program mired in scandal.  Since then, he's been running on the fumes of his past reputation.  In his six years of sideline pacing at Williams Arena, the Gophers have made two NCAA tournament appearances and almost as many in the National Invitation Tournament.

This season, Smith and the Gophers will make their third appearance into what the NCAA (and CBS) calls "March Madness".  They will play UCLA Friday night in the South regionals at Austin, Texas.  (It will be televised on a cable channel called truTV, the home of "Hardcore Pawn", "Lizard Lick Towing" and "Full Throttle Saloon".   They're one of the networks involved in the NCAA's current TV deal with CBS and Turner Sports.)

It's an amazing feat, given that the Gophers have lost 11 of their last 16 games, mostly in Big Ten conference play.  They have a 20-12 overall record, with their league record at 8-10.  But the committee that decides which teams get in the tournament figured that the Gophers, with their stellar non-conference wins against teams like Northwest Podunk State and "quality wins" over the likes of Indiana and Wisconsin at home was good enough to get in, even if nobody else believes that.

During their long Big Ten tailspin, the Gophers played uninspired basketball--blowing leads, losing by double digits to teams they should have beaten, etc.  Fans and local hoops pundits, seeing that their coach is losing his ability to lead his players, have been calling for Smith to resign or get fired.

Presumably, this is not the way seniors Rodney Williams and Trevor Mbakwe envisioned the end of their college basketball careers.

Seven Big Ten teams, including Minnesota, have been invited to play in the NCAA tournament.  This is either a comment on the strength of the conference this season, or the weakness of the rest of the field, or both.  Defending champion Kentucky, whose five starters last year left en masse for the NBA, isn't here this year.

Meanwhile, Tubby Smith has done his part.  He's gotten the Gophers into another post-season tournament, and has earned $100,000 just for showing up.  Unless the team makes it past the first round, the university bigwigs will no doubt be under pressure to release Smith from his contract, which could be much costlier than keeping him.  That means Smith will have reached his level of incompetency--and would be paid handsomely for it.  Just like any corporate CEO.

UPDATE:  Let the buyout begin.  Smith was let go Monday after going 1-1 in the NCAA tournament, beating UCLA and losing to Florida.  We can't say we're surprised, because we're not.   Smith leaves behind a 124-81 overall record over a six-year period, but 46-62 in the Big Ten.  He's still a respected coach nationally, but now he'll have to earn that someplace else if he wants to.  Virginia Commonwealth coach Shaka Smart and former Gopher player and Wolves coach Flip Saunders are considered the early favorites to replace Smith.

UPDATE#2:  After Smart, Saunders and others turned down the Gophers, the best they could come up with was Richard Pitino, who last coached at Florida International.  That's Richard, not Rick.  He's the son of the Louisville coach whose team is in the NCAA Final Four.  Obviously, the U of M thinks the old Pitino magic could rub off on their struggling basketball program.  Next thing you know, ESPN and CBS will want to schedule a father-son matchup between the Pitinos.  As for Tubby Smith, he's landed on his feet as the new coach at Texas Tech.

Wild 2013: Not Ready for Prime Time

Alternate logo since 2003. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

On January 6, 1980, the Minnesota North Stars slammed the brakes on the Philadelphia Flyers' NHL-record 35-game unbeaten streak with a 7-1 blowout win.

On March 5, 2013, the Minnesota Wild tried to do the same thing to the Chicago Blackhawks, who have yet to lose a game in regulation time in a lockout-shortened regular season.  Instead, the Wild got blitzed for four goals in the first period before the Blackhawks ultimately won 5-3 to extend their streak.  As of March 7, they are now 21-0-3 through the first 24 games of the season.  Thirty straight if you go back to last season, not counting the playoffs.

The differences?  (1) The Flyers' streak-breaking loss was played in Minnesota.  The Hawks continued theirs at home in the United Center.  (2) The Wild are not the North Stars, who have been residents of Dallas, Texas for the last two decades.

In a season where much has been made about the improvements the Wild have made, they currently stand at 11-9-2, equaling 24 points.  That's good for a three-way tie with the Dallas Stars and St. Louis Blues for the eighth and last playoff spot in the Western Conference.

Behind the mediocrity is their inability to put the puck in the net.  With high-priced talent like Ryan Suter and Zach Parise, along with holdovers Pierre-Marc Bouchard, Devin Setoguchi and Dany Heatley, the Wild have managed to scare up 56 goals--which is among the fewest in the NHL.  The goaltending is hit-or-miss with Niklas Backstrom and Darcy Kuemper, a Houston callup who took over when Josh Harding was sidelined due to complications from multiple sclerosis.

Not surprisingly, this leads to the Wild's brain trust being looked upon with suspicion.  Coach Mike Yeo's job is in jeopardy because he's threatening to bring back the glory days of Jacques Lemaire, the team's original defensive-minded coach.  Chuck Fletcher, the general manager, is between a rock and a hard place when it comes to improving his team's talent.

The Wild, for most of their brief history, have blamed part of their problems on the division they're in--the Northwest.  The rivalries with the Vancouver Canucks, Edmonton Oilers and Calgary Flames have been intense over the years.  But they were also time-consuming, as the Wild bounced between three time zones and two countries.

The new realignment setup proposed by the NHL (and the players association just gave their blessing) would put the Wild in the same division with the Blackhawks, Blues, Stars, Winnipeg Jets, Nashville Predators and Colorado Avalanche starting next season.  That's great for local TV ratings and travel because most of these teams hail from the Central Time Zone.  But the competition would be much tougher than the Northwest is now.

Until then, in the remaining few weeks of the truncated regular season, the Wild need to find a way to increase the scoring and hold on to their leads.  If they don't, the division they'll be playing in isn't the only thing that's going to get realigned.

Wolves 2012-13: Lowering Expectations

English: Jerry Buss (LA Lakers owner) playing at the World Series of Poker (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Everyone, from the players to the fans to the supposedly in-the-know, thought this would be the year their NBA team would rise to new heights, taking their place among the elite.  Well, that's what they said about the Los Angeles Lakers.

A not-so-similar situation is taking shape in Minnesota, where the Timberwolves were thought of as this team on the rise and everyone expected big things from them.  Unlike the Lakers, whose goal is that of another NBA championship, the Wolves were battling just to get into the playoffs for the first time since the Kevin Garnett era.

Instead, the Wolves are 19-31 following the All-Star break.  If the season ended today, neither the Lakers nor the Wolves would make the playoffs.

That's where the similarities end.  The Lakers have a serious lack of chemistry in meshing star players Kobe Bryant, Dwight Howard and Pau Gasol into a cohesive unit, resulting in one coach (Mike Brown) being fired and another (Mike D'Antoni) struggling.  The Wolves have a serious lack of healthy and talented players, hampering their playoff quest.

Injuries have hit the Wolves hard, to the point where they have played some games short handed.  Kevin Love has a hand injury.  Ricky Rubio is back in the lineup, but is clearly not the same player he was before he hurt his knee--against the Lakers, as it happens.  This opens the door for guys named J.J. Barea, Luke Ridnour and Nikola Pekovic to get some significant playing time.

Even coach Rick Adelman hasn't been immune.  He took several games off to tend to his ailing wife, leaving assistant coach Terry Porter to man the bench.

A sense of despair lingers over the Wolves.  Empty seats have returned to Target Center.  Nobody talks about the playoffs any more.  Instead, it's another year in which they're just playing out the schedule, and hoping the ping-pong balls don't doom them to another questionable Number One draft pick.

Glen Taylor, who has owned the Timberwolves since rescuing the franchise from going down the Mississippi to New Orleans in the mid-1990s, is in the process of eventually selling the team.  To make it more attractive to a potential buyer, the least Taylor and/or General Manager David Kahn can do is to get more talent to go with Rubio and Love.  Then you can stop making promises you can't keep to the fans.

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Speaking of the Lakers, their longtime owner Dr. Jerry Buss passed away Monday.  He was 80.

Since buying the Lakers in 1979, Buss' teams have won ten NBA titles (16 in its entire history, dating back to when they were in Minneapolis).  That's a span running from Magic Johnson, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Pat Riley in the 1980s to Kobe Bryant, Shaquille O'Neal and Phil Jackson in the 2000s.

Buss' efforts made the Lakers the most successful franchise in the NBA, attracting all sorts of celebrities courtside first at the Forum, and now Staples Center.  It also helps that there hasn't been a pro football team in Los Angeles for nearly two decades.

The Lakers will go on with Buss' two children--Jim and Jeannie-- running the franchise.  The question is:  Are they up to the challenge of improving on their father's legacy?  If not, there's no shortage of people who would love to have a crack at owning the Lakers.

IOC Takes Down Wrestling

Pictograms of Olympic sports - Wrestling (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The International Olympic Committee has been taking a lot of heat for its decision to drop wrestling from the 2020 Summer Games (site TBD).  The sport has only been around since the original Olympiad in ancient Greece, in which men competed in the nude.

Granted, there are a lot of other Olympic sports which people would like to see dropped.  Such as rhythmic gymnastics, synchronized swimming and events that belong at the X Games.  Modern pentathlon, a track and field event, ended up spared from the IOC chopping block.

So why did wrestling get taken down?  Maybe the IOC was swayed by the dwindling number of participants.  In the United States alone, the number of high schools and colleges who offer wrestling and the number of athletes who participate have gone down.  School officials cite budget issues, Title IX and feeding the beast that is football.

College wrestling still has a following, if only in the Midwest.  Since 2000, Minnesota, Iowa, Oklahoma State and Penn State have won multiple NCAA titles.

The other factor is TV appeal.  Be honest.  When was the last time NBC aired an Olympic wrestling match in prime time that wasn't packaged as a feel-good story?  Other than that, the sport usually gets shown on one of Comcast/NBC's many cable channels along with field hockey and badminton.

Have you ever watched a wrestling match in person?  Or tried to?  It's like a three-ring circus with several matches in different weight categories going on at the same time.  The scoring system makes roller derby and figure skating seem simple.

Most of us now consider wrestling to be a TV show, where athletes who are given flamboyant names choreograph their moves in front of sellout arenas and pay-per-view audiences, and storylines are written for their characters.  The WWE long ago admitted that their product is not exactly on the up-and-up, which is why they're now known as World Wrestling Entertainment.

The wrestling federations, who were blindsided by the IOC's decision, have a slim chance at getting the committee to change its mind.  If that fails, then the 2016 Games in Brazil will be the last time you'll see grapplers at the Olympics.  It'll also be the first time you'll be seeing golf as an IOC-sanctioned sport.

One question:  Can anyone imagine Extreme Chariot Racing as an event in the original Greek Olympics?

Grammys: Are We Having fun. Yet?

Cover of LL Cool J

Last year's Grammy Awards were dominated by two female artists--one who had passed away the night before the ceremony, and the other who took home six of those little gramophones for an album that still tops the record charts.  This year, nothing like that happened.  But the latter woman--Adele--who now spells her name in all caps took home another one tonight.

Instead, the 55th Grammys were kind of underwhelming.  Yes, there was "Alice In Taylorland" as Taylor Swift's opening number and Justin Timberlake channeling his inner Bobby Darin. (Look out, ol' Justin is back!)  Other than that, most of the performances weren't that great. But the night belonged to artists who have been around for years, yet the public has never heard of them until now.

The band fun. were rewarded with the Best New Artist and Song of the Year awards for "We Are Young".  Record of the Year went to Gotye for "Somebody That I Used To Know", who seemed awestruck at getting the award from Prince.  Album of the Year was "Babel" by Mumford and Sons.

Everyone seemed to be on their best behavior tonight, having gotten the memo from CBS that no revealing dresses or butt cracks would be tolerated (this means you, Jennifer Lopez).  This from the network that once filmed Elvis Presley from the waist up on the "Ed Sullivan Show" back in the 1950s.  The Grammys, run by an equally conservative organization called NARAS, have had their awards televised by CBS for the last 40 years.  They deserve each other.

The telecast was hosted by LL Cool J, a rap artist who just happens to star in the CBS crime procedural "NCIS Los Angeles".  He would have been a much better host if he made the show less about himself, as illustrated by a clip they showed of his appearance on "American Bandstand" as a way of saluting the late Dick Clark.  But then, Clark had been running a competing awards show, the American Music Awards.

The night wasn't a total bust.  There was a rousing rendition of "The Weight" by Elton John, the Zac Brown Band, Mavis Staples and others as a tribute to Levon Helm, a member of The Band who died last year.

The Grammys are "Music's Biggest Night", all right.  Maybe they should consider cutting back on some of the performances because the running time of the telecast is approaching Oscars territory.  It is now three and a half hours.  We bailed after the Record of the Year was announced, skipping a performance by LL Cool J.  There is such a thing as too much fun.

Super Bowl 47: How Bizarre

Baltimore Ravens logo (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Maybe it could only have happened in New Orleans.  The Baltimore Ravens jumped off to a 28-6 lead over the San Francisco 49ers in Super Bowl 47, capped off by a 108-yard second half kickoff return by Jacoby Jones.  Then half of the Superdome was bathed in darkness as a power surge caused the lights to go out, delaying the game for more than half an hour.

Then things really got weird.  The 49ers' major comeback in the third quarter got to where they trailed the Ravens 34-29 with not much time remaining.  Quarterback Colin Kaepernick threw for the winning touchdown, only to see it fall incomplete.  Some say there should have been an interference call, but the referees disagreed.  And the Baltimore Ravens, for the second time since moving from Cleveland, is taking home the Vince Lombardi Trophy with a 34-31 win over the 49ers.

This means that, in the battle of the coaching Harbaugh brothers, John came out on top over Jim.  The Ravens beat Denver in double overtime and New England in the AFC Championship game to get here.  Ray Lewis, after a 17-year career, gets to go out a champion whether he deserves it or not.  And quarterback Joe Flacco is the Super Bowl MVP.

Other things in and around the Super Bowl:

• Before the game, Jennifer Hudson and a group of students from Newtown, Conneticut sang "America the Beautiful".  It's a pretty safe bet that, if there hadn't been somebody who shot up an elementary school in that very town a few weeks ago, there's no chance this would have happened.  Leave it to the NFL to exploit a tragedy like this.
• Beyonce, fresh from her non-performance of the National Anthem at President Obama's inauguration, did her halftime show in what we believe was her own voice.  She even brought out members of her previous group, Destiny's Child, to perform a number or two such as "Single Ladies".  But the 21st century Diana Ross already has a ring on it, thanks.
• The commercials, like the game itself, also took a bizarre turn.  Plenty of wish fulfillment, coupled with some weird beer ads.  Bar Refali making out with Pocket Protector Dude in a Go Daddy commercial?  Yeah, right.

 It was a great game, despite the weirdness of it all.  At least now we won't ever hear from the 49ers fan in the Bud Light ad who crashed into his old apartment just to sit in his lucky seat.  Your team lost, dude.  Get your own apartment.  As for you folks in Baltimore, go celebrate.