And the 24-16 win was not flawless, by no means. The inability for this team to put the screws into the Niners and absolutely dominate this game, especially after that pick-six about five minutes into the Third Quarter, is a familiar sight to many Vikes fans. But they won this game, and they have 15 more games to get even better. So let's look at the superlatives. First of all, Kirk Cousins looked very good. There were a couple precise strikes where I went, "Wow, how did he do that?" That includes this touchdown to Stefon Diggs, Cousins's 100th TD pass as a pro:
The offense did bog down in the Second Half, and that needs to be fixed. Also, and even though this didn't rear its ugly head yesterday, Case Kennum was very good when plans go awry and the O needed to improvise. Sure, Kennum bogged down late in the year, but Defenses remain good enough where I think being able to think on the fly is a requirement to succeed. I want to see Cousins scramble, at least tactically. Maybe that comes next week when the squad starts its first of two tough stretches in its schedule where they go to Lambeau and face
But let's end on a high note and praise that Defense, huh? Three Interceptions, including that Mike Hughes Interception Return For A Touchdown? Sweet. Jimmy Garoppolo suffers his first loss as San Francisco QB, even though he threw some spectacular passes? Even better. And Safety Harrison Smith (seven solo Tackles, two Tackles For Loss, one Sack, and one INT)? We need to start talking about Canton for him. He was freakin' everywhere.
#-2: Gopher football (Last Week: -1). As is the Golden Gopher football team's current lot in life, this game vs. Fresno St. was close. The U. was leading, 21-14, but late in the game the Bulldogs were driving. And then this happened:
We were trying to come up with a clever caption for this but...we'll just let @liltweeze26 and his interception do all the talking. pic.twitter.com/3xzZE2EC4I— Minnesota Football (@GopherFootball) September 9, 2018
Wow. Antoine Winfield, Jr., that was fucking impressive. You father, who could ball back in the day despite his relatively small stature, should be proud.
For that win-preserving pick, Winfield has been named B1G Defensive Player Of The Week. Congratulations also go out to Kicker Emmit Carpenter for becoming Big Ten Special Teams Player Of The Week. Hey, it could be worse than 2-0. And it should be 3-0 after Fleck & Co. beat Miami (OH) at TCF Bank Stadium Saturday afternoon.
#-3: Gopher soccer (Last Week: -4). This needs to be discussed. You can't park at Gopher soccer games anymore!
So I saw on Twitter from a friend that they had extreme trouble parking. What has happened, for years, is that there are a couple places relatively close to Elizabeth Lyle Robbie Stadium where you could park, for free, and you could walk to the stadium. One of them is Les Bolstad Golf Course, which is on the same grounds as Robbie; you could park in the lot and cut through the driving range to the entrance. What I do is park at Falcon Heights City Hall, walk through a tract of crops which I assume is owned by the University of Minnesota (the St. Paul Campus is just south of Robbie Stadium), then dodge traffic coming up and down Cleveland Ave. It's a pretty walk, and even if I didn't want to walk, I could get a shuttle provided by the U. to get to the front arch of the pitch. Simple -- and free.
But my friend tweeted out that those places were closed. Now, these were for the matches the side was playing during the Minnesota State Fair, so I thought that was the reason the golf course and the city hall was not open for parking. But he further stated that the U. gave him instruction for the places he could park -- and he was charged for parking. And not only that, it was for over ten bucks. Ten bucks?! What the hell? This is for a University of Minnesota soccer game!
Last week, realizing that the game vs. North Dakota St. was on a Friday and not a Thursday (even though I said in last week's WMNSS that the match was on Friday ... man, I don't know how my brain works sometimes, it was an oversight [I'm so going to develop Alzheimer's]), I scoured Twitter to see what the deal with parking is. And this is what I saw:
🚨PARKING UPDATE🚨— Minnesota Soccer (@GopherSoccer) September 7, 2018
Great news fans, additional parking lots have been opened! SC 175 has been added in addition with limited spots at the Les Bolstad Driving Range. Charges for lots noted by the $ symbol will be $6. pic.twitter.com/1dpHxxWbFT
So City Hall is no-go and Bolstad, along with other new lots, now charge? And six bucks, at that?! Fuck no!
And so I sojourn out into the town of Falcon Heights for that most elusive of things, free parking. There is a residential zone east of Falcon Heights City Hall, and there were ample spaces, but I saw this sign (and I thought I would embed my first-ever personal photograph on WAF here, but I can't), and it was so damn confusing that I put my tail between my legs and left. I did find a street with that same exact sign, but since others were parked along that street, I figured it was safe to do so ... well, that or I would be able to commiserate getting my car towed with a few other strangers.
I guess that's The New Normal now: Residential street parking. It's a longer and a much less bucolic walk, but I'll take it -- assuming Falcon Heights lets me. I think there was some push-back from the city and from Bolstad officials into continuing to allow people to park for free. But I'm not sure if this drastic change, from very little charged parking to nearly total charged parking, is going to go over well -- especially for a non-revenue program that hasn't made a whole lot of noise so far in its existence. Now, this was for a Friday match. The Gophers host Northwestern Sunday, so maybe Falcon Heights will open up City Hall for parking on the weekend. But I'm not sure how many fans, diehard or casual, know about this new policy, and for those who got blindsided by it, I don't know how many will slough it off or just ... not go anymore.
As for on the field, the U. kicked ass over the Bison, 4-0. The club scored three Goals in the Second Half, all of them in 2:29. April Bockin braced; she "opened her account" for the year with those that brace, it was the first two of those three Second Half Goals, and she scored them just 24 Seconds apart. Nice!
So the squad ends the non-con on a high note. But let's be honest: The awesome goodwill from starting off the season 3-0 with two of those victories on the road were dashed with three straight losses, all of them at home, the most inexplicable of which was the 1-0 defeat to DePaul. That win over the Bison ended that streak, but the team now sits at a pedestrian 4-3, and so I don't think they have any margin for error as they begin conference play. They've got to run the table, I think.
They host Illinois Friday; probably will go to that game because I've been invited to a party around town that night. Then there is that aforementioned contest versus the Wildcats Sunday afternoon, playing at the same time as Vikes-Pack.
#-4: Twins (Last Week: -3). Truly irrelevant team this point of the year. So irrelevant that I wonder if I just stopped talking about them, would anyone notice?
Began the screening week getting swept at Houston. They were in Boston over the weekend and took two-of-three, the preview of possibly the American League Championship Series. Saw a photo of Fenway Park where a section of the stands were festooned in Astro orange. Not too long ago the Astros were terrible, losing 100 games or more. They were so bad that the organization got into a fight with cable companies over carriage fees for the sports network the owner of the Astros owned. But with tanking comes top draft picks, and credit to the Astros Front Office for drafting the right guys and building what is now a juggernaut that should be good for the next few years, at least.
The Twinks should take a page out of the Astros' playbook, or just take some Astros front office people. ESPN The Magazine lamented the latest manifestation of sabermetrics, tanking in order to get championship-caliber players, before the season started. The conclusion the essay came to is that baseball fans (what is left of them, anyway) have also realized that you have to stoop so low in order to rise so high. Losing 100+ games used to be cause for humiliation; now it's seen as a clear-the-brush tactic that will all but guarantee greatness in the future. And it's that clinging to hope, the willingness to being emasculated now because that will ensure (if not entitle) you to a pennant and more later, that makes being shitty not only no longer bad, but almost like a badge of honor. It is fucked up ... and totally right, as you can see by what the Astros have done. Do that, Twinks!
Lately, the squad has tried another sabermetric wrinkle, the "opener." This phenomenon serves as the opposite of the Closer. A reliever actually starts the game and, if he does his job, he will give his team about three Innings and one run through the opponent's starting lineup before the "scheduled Starting Pitcher" replaces him. With more Pitchers pitching fewer Innings, starters now frequently only go through the lineup twice before being pulled. If that's the case, how advantageous is it for a reliever to start the game? I mean, if a Pitcher has to see a batter twice, does it matter if he does it in the last two-thirds of the game and not the first two-thirds? Couldn't this all be solved just by getting damn good Pitchers?
Damn good Pitchers is not what the Twinks have, because when they've tried this "opener" idea, they've gotten shelled. Have no idea if they used it this screening week, but at the very least they won their series vs. Kansas City. I don't know if this works if you don't have arms worth a shit.
This week: I don't remember seeing the Yankees coming to Target Field this late in the season, but their three-game series starts Monday. The club then embarks on their final roadtrip, and their final long roadtrip, with four games at K.C. against the Royals.
#-5: Gopher volleyball (Last Week: -2). It would be just like a Minnesota sports team to shit the bed just as they reached the pinnacle. Last Monday Minnesota reached #1 in the AVCA Top 25 the week just as they went to Palo Alto and drop back-to-back four-set matches to ranked Oregon and Stanford in the Big Ten/Pac-12 Challenge. Not the worst thing, of course, and I think it's good to face big opponents (and suffer losses) early in the year. But I wonder how far these guys will fall in the poll.
The final of four non-con weeks is back at Maturi. The Gopher Fall Classic (is this new? Is this made-up?) has the U. hosting Green Bay (Thursday) and Kansas St. (Saturday).
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