See, after Monday's 4-0 home Loss in Game 1 -- as dispiriting, humiliating and emasculating a performance any Twin Cities team has put out there since, well, the Vikings -- I was ready to fuckin' trash this team as yet another underachieving edition this franchise puts out on the regular. But I shut my mouth because 1) I was too busy to bitch and 2) this is hockey, and for reasons strange and non-existent, fortunes can change on the tumble of a puck.
Wednesday's rousing 6-2 Game 2 Win righted the ship, but it was last/Friday night's Game 3 victory that proves that anything can happen in postseason hockey. Not only did we ... er, the Wild beat the Blues, they fucking destroyed them, 5-1 -- in St. Louis. Being able to go over there and kill them after they came up here and killed our team is a strong testament to the toughness and resilience of this crew, something I truly doubted after Monday night. While the theory that the playoffs demand a brand of "heavy hockey" (basically checking and wrestling and getting away with slowing down skill players and only scoring on gritty rebound Goals and things of that nature) may be true, the Wild have been able to fly and score in their two victories like it's still the regular season. Kirill Kaprizov, a phenomenal skill player who's supposed to get locked down this time of year, has four Goals and one Assist. Mats Zuccarello and Jared Spurgeon, two regular season wonders who, in a recent Athletic article, were singled out for coming up short under the "heavy hockey" theory, have played well, dirty Spurgeon hit in Game 1 (for which he was fined $5,000) excepted. Best of all, Mark-Andre Fleury is earning the value the organization traded to Chicago. Blues Nation, at least on Twitter, is yelling at its own club for disappearing, and I think The Specter Of The Flower is getting to them.
Again, the worm could turn yet again and the Wild could be ushered out of the playoffs in six Games. But at least this club will get six Games, being played tomorrow/Sunday afternoon, Tuesday night (at 8:30, like all the other Games except Game 4, which fucking sucks), and some time Thursday. Buckle up.
#-1: Twins (Last Week: -1). At what point is this not an anomaly but a pattern? We're past the first month; are the Minnesota Twins ... actually good? Sure, they settled for a mid-Week split of their series vs. The Bastard Milwaukee Brewers (I did not know till just now that this franchise was born in Milwaukee -- thank you, Baseball Reference!!!)/St. Louis Browns in Baltimore; the two Losses at the back end of the series ended their winning streak at four. But the last two contests of that winning streak took the series against the Bay Rays in Tampa, and they have begun a weekend series at Target Field last/Friday night by holding off The Bastard Philadelphia-By-Way-Of-Kansas City Athletics, 2-1. The starting pitching has been exemplary; in last night's tilt, Josh Winder went six Innings, didn't issue a single Run, allowed only three Hits and struck out eight. And the Bullpen has calmed down after a very rough start to the season. The Lineup could round into form more, but four freshly-minted or relatively new minor-leaguers were batting last/Friday night, so the future is here, and it might be bright. Of course the more salient point about this organization's success right now is that they are leading a weak American League Central Division (what else is new). Keep having successful Months like April and fans will stop believing this is a fluke.
The ballclub has just started a nine-Game homestand. After the A's this weekend, Houston comes to Target for three starting on Tuesday and the newly-named Cleveland Guardians have a three-Game set here beginning Friday.
#-2: Gopher softball (Last Week: -3). OK, so the screening Week for these young women began with dropping the back two and thus the series at Michigan. They then swept Wisconsin at Cowles on Wednesday. I was able to get to the second Game of the Doubleheader, and as someone not entirely versed in the lineup rules for college softball, it was a hell of a hard time understanding what the substitutions were.
But this weekend brings the last regular season series of the Year, and they get to host the sixth-ranked team in the nation, Northwestern. And yesterday/Friday afternoon, not only did they upset the Wildcats, they slaughter-ruled them, 8-0 in five Innings. This ballclub is only 25-22-1 overall and below .500 in Big Ten play, and they shut out the sixth-ranked squad in the country by fewer than the conventional seven Innings?!?! (The Wildcats' marshmallow wasn't really harshed; since second-place Nebraska got shut out by Indiana last/Friday night, they have won the conference regular season title and will be the top seed in the B1G tournament next Week.) Will they be able to do that again this weekend? And where will the Golden Gophers place heading into the tourney at Michigan St.?
#-3: Vikings (Re-Entry!). Yes, the draft began last Thursday. Just got lazy and didn't include them last Week. Also, a little perspective is in order, and waiting almost a Week after the NFL Draft got over isn't the worst thing in the world.
The so-called experts gave the Vikes a good/B grade, and who am I tell them they're wrong? (Doesn't really matter anyway; you need at least a few Years, if not more, to properly grade the players any team drafts.) It is getting kind of boring to see the franchise trading down again, even though a new General Manager is at the helm. It makes you think of the end of an episode of Scooby-Doo, when Fred rips off the mask of the bad guy to see who really did the crime; instead of Kwesi Adofo-Mensah ... it's been Rick Spielman all along??
Fan sentiment focuses on the fact that the squad traded not only the First Round pick they had at the beginning of the draft, which was the twelfth overall, but also an early Second Round pick they picked up as a result of the trade of that First Round pick. And fans are real pissed that the trade partners for both trades were fellow teams in the National Football Conference North Division: The Detroit Lions in that first trade and the Green Bay Packers in that second. Both foes draft Wide Receivers with the Vikes' ex-picks, and fans are dreading those rookies (Jameson Williams with Detroit, Christian Watson with Green Bay) shredding a Secondary that was peppered many times last season.
To that end, however, Minnesota did address that weakness. The trade with Detroit yielded the final selection in the First Round, which they used to pick Georgia Safety Lewis Cine, the last of five Bulldog defenders, an all-time record for one side of one college team. And that continued with the team's second draft pick, Clemson Cornerback Andrew Booth, Jr. Along with another CB, Fourth-Round draftee Akayleb Evans out of Missouri, the Secondary has gotten younger and, fingers crossed, fitter.
In the meantime, draftniks, especially the analytically-bent ones, think those two trades favored Minnesota. There is that oft-worn Jimmy Johnson trade value chart, the first one in this article, an idea ahead of its time but created without actual number crunching. Then there are other charts such as the Rich Hill one that appears below Johnson's in that piece. There are other charts floating around the Internet, and many of their creators have opined that the Vikes actually got more value as a result of trading in-division. The club gave up a higher draft pick to accumulate more picks later in the draft, and after one adds up the numbers in those proprietary draft value charts, Minnesota came out ahead. OK, so I'll trust those people. As for the young men they selected, who knows?
#-4: United FC (Last Week: -2). A disappointing 2-0 loss at LAFC Sunday night. The Loons actually kept what some people call The Best Team In The League out of the net, but that XI was knocking on the door all Match, and finally Dayne St. Clair & Co. shipped Goals in the 83rd and 90th Minutes.
Therefore, as of now, MNUFC sit in sixth place. Meanwhile, Chase Gasper, a Loons draftee who recently returned from drug rehab, was traded to the Los Angeles Galaxy Wednesday. It appears that Gasper saw that he was the odd man out (a result of the relentless roster churn inherent in professional soccer) and could have used a fresh start somewhere else; it looks like Gasper was open to a trade, if he didn't ask for one, and the organization helped him with that. Best of luck, Chase.
And best of luck to Minnesota United FC. Tonight/Saturday night they host FC Cincinnati, and The Orange And Blue are no longer the doormats they've been ever since they entered top-flight American soccer. I remember one time where United FC castrated FCC 6-1, and I'm scared they're going to do the same to us.
#-5: Lynx (Re-Entry!). The Lynx are back! And they began the season last/Friday night on free TV!! And they also began with an early First Quarter lead that eventually melted away into a 97-74 ass-kicking at the hands of the Storm in Seattle!!!
This is a squad far removed from their dynasty days. But there is ample reason to now believe that this team is closer to the worse half of the WNBA (which, by the way, has too few roster spots and not enough money for too many very good college basketball players) than the better. Sylvia Fowles has stated this is her last ride, but there's a solid chance the Lynx don't even reach the postseason. I'm not saying this team's about to falter back to the "Jynx" that was execrable the first decade or so of this franchise's life -- but I can't rule that out, either.
The home opener is tomorrow/Sunday night versus the Washington Mystics. They then play at Indiana Tuesday.
#-56: Gopher baseball (Last Week: -4). Woof, y'all. Got swept at Michigan St., then began a three-Game series at Siebert with a 12-5 defeat to pretty mighty Nebraska. Their losing streak currently sits at four, they've only won two conference Games and a dozen Games overall. The league now has beaucoup money, and they need to devote some to rehabilitating a program that, by all rights, is in freefall.
After playing against the Cornhuskers, they will travel to Indiana for three beginning Friday.
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