Tag Archives: brad childress

Vikes Coach Brad Childress Dead Right in His Assessment of Sunday’s Blowout.

Posted on January 17, 2010 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment

Here is what our local football guru wrote in a Winnipeg newspaper this week:

“The Vikes have a lot of people thinking their Week 17 walloping of the Giants was a playoff primer. Not us. Their defence is suspect and their offensive line could prove porous to a big D like the one in Dallas.”

He went on to say: “The Vikings have lost three of their last five games and while many believe their season-ending thumping of the Giants was a show of strength, we believe it was smoke and mirrors. The Cowboys match up very well against the Vikings with a huge offensive line that can slow down the pass rush and move the ball on the ground. Look for the Dallas defence to push the Vikes around at the line of scrimmage.”

I wouldn’t bring it up if it had been a close football game, but like Vikings coach Brad Childress suggested on Sunday afternoon, it was so off-base it was hard to ignore. Now, to be fair, that’s just what was written in Winnipeg about Sunday afternoon’s game between the Vikings and the Dallas Cowboys. It wasn’t a whole lot different anywhere else. In fact, Childress heard the talk in the Twin Cities all week and it pissed him off.

So yesterday, after the Vikings drilled the Cowboys 34-3 here at Mall of America Field, Childress took a little time to go off on all those who thought Dallas was the be-all and end-all of professional football teams.

“I heard all the nonsense and all the hype about the Dallas Cowboys coming to town, the hottest team in the playoffs,” Childress said. “I asked my players this week to just choke it back and shut up. And we’ll play the game when they get here on Sunday.

“The game is always won on the football field so I’m tickled to death for our guys. I knew they’d play their tails off and dispel the myth about whoever was coming to town.

“All I heard all week was that the Tasmainian Devils from Dallas were coming in to bombard the state of Minnesota and were about to run through us like Sherman through the south. That was the aura that was left after last week’s games. Our guys had enough of it by Tuesday. They did a great job by shuttimng up because sometimes it’s hard to listen to that stuff.

“So that was a team victory. We were a good football team all season and a good football team today.”

You can check the numbers at www.nfl.com. Needless to say, the Vikings were much the superior team.

But while so many of the so-called experts were calling for Dallas to win easily on Sunday, it took former Vikings coach, Mike Tice, to assess the situation best.

On Friday, Tice was interviewed by Dan Barreiro on 1130-The FAN in Minneapolis. Tice said: “Under duress, Romo will revert, get sloppy and then go fetal.”

That’s exactly what he did. That’s why the Vikings had six sacks, why Romo fumbled three times, threw an interception and got his ass kicked. So much for “Their (Minnesota’s) defence is suspect and their offensive line could prove porous to a big D like the one in Dallas.”

Brett Favre was brilliant, Sidney Rice was unstoppable and the Vikings defence was a monster. 34-3. This one wasn’t even close.

But now comes the real test. Can the Vikings win on the road, in New Orleans?

Sure, But will they? Guess all the experts will know in seven days.

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Favre Spectacular. Rice Wonderful. Defence Solid. Vikings Ready for Post-Season.

Posted on January 4, 2010 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment

MINNEAPOLIS — While the Indianapolis Colts were blown out again and the New Orleans Saints lost their third straight, the Minnesota Vikings prepared for the NFL post-season by destroying the New York Giants.

A final score of 44-7 is one thing. The surgical beauty of Sunday’s evisceration of the Jints was even more impressive, now that the post-season looms.

And there is no doubt that the Vikes are ready for the post-season. On Sunday, Favre completed 25 of 31 passes for 316 yards, four touchdowns, no interceptions and an eye-popping 148.7 passer rating. He was replaced by Tarvaris Jackson with the Vikings leading 41-0 with 4 minutes, 39 seconds left in the third quarter.

The four touchdown passes tied Favre’s season high, and it was the sixth time he’s thrown for 300-plus yards this season. Since the end of the first half at Chicago last Monday night, Favre put up 71 points in a little more than four quarters. He completed 46 of 62 passes for 601 yards, six touchdowns and no INTs.

Funny, but it appears the mainstream media has forgotten the bullshit story it created two weeks ago, suggesting there was dissent in Minnesota. The big numbers have chased the fiction away.

Meanwhile, Favre’s brilliance — along with the brilliance of Chester Taylor, Visanthe Shiancoe, Sidney Rice, Bernard Berrian, the offensive line and a defence that appears to be adjusting to the loss E.J. Henderson –  provided the Vikings faithful fans, the 65,000 that sell out Mall of America Field at the Metrodome every single week, with something to get all giddy about.

Now that’s professional sports.

There was no coaching scared, no worry that precious Brett might get his undies dirty. This wasn’t the candy-assed approach of the lily-livered Indianapolis Colts (have they returned the ticket money from Week 15′s dishonorable debacle yet?). Vikes head coach Brad Childress sent the playoff-bound Vikings out to win a football game on Sunday and he got all $12.5 million worth out of his 40-year-old quarterback.

“It would appear that we picked up right where we left off (in the second half in Chicago),” Favre said during his post-game news conference. “I thought that what we did at the start of the game was what we needed to do. I think it’s proof of what we are capable of doing. For whatever reason we have been inconsistent at times. I think there were 20 first downs in the first half and 22 in the second half of last week’s game. That’s 42 first downs in a game or so. Not that you would expect that all of the time, but that’s what we are capable of doing.”

Nobody is quite sure what some of the other playoff-bound teams are capable of doing. The Colts, the team that threw Game 15 and allowed the New York Jets to eliminate the Houston Texans from the playoffs, were just brutal for the second straight week. Fact is, the Colts were  lucky to get past such powerhouse teams as Jacksonville (the Colts beat the Jags 14-12 and 35-31), Miami, Baltimore, New England and San Francisco, it’s hard to imagine they’ll be ready for anyone in two weeks time.

In fact, by the time the Colts play a post-season game (on Jan. 16 or 17), they will not have won since Dec. 17.

Of course, it could be worse. The New Orleans Saints have lost three straight and when they play again on Jan. 16 or 17, they will not have won a game in five weeks. The Colts and Saints will essentially be starting a new season (and not just in the hyperbolic sense) when they play their next game.

Meanwhile, Philadelphia, Cincinnati and Arizona were dreadful this week, but while Arizona played nobody in the butt-kicking they took at home against Green Bay, the Eagles went all-out in the 24-0 shellacking they received in Dallas while the Bengals played all their stars in that 37-0 whooping they suffered in New York.

Right now, the best teams in the NFC are Minnesota, Dallas and Green Bay while the best teams in the AFC are San Diego, Baltimore and the Jets.

And if anybody suggests even for one second that the signing of Brett Favre was a mistake — no matter what happens in the playoffs — then that person knows absolutely nothing about football or professional sports. Favre is spectacular and the Vikings are great to watch.

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The Shooter Gets it Right. Because He’s Actually Worked up a Sweat.

Posted on December 25, 2009 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment

Merry Christmas. Here’s a special Christmas greeting to someone who actually gets it.

Charley Walters writes a column for the St. Paul Pioneer-Press. Known as “The Shooter,” he pitched for the Minnesota Twins in the late 1960s.

Walters is a terrific columnist, not because he’s going to challenge Thomas Boswell for a writing award, but because he’s a great reporter who writes from the point of view of the people who play the game and the ones who actually buy tickets and watch it.

He’s right a lot more often than he’s wrong. In fact, his insights are often sensational and, you guessed it, he’s seldom wrong.

On Thursday, he wrote a column with Tommy Kramer, the former Vikings quarterback. It’s the first place I’ve read or heard that the Brett Favre-Brad Childress “blow up” was a crock of media-created bullshit.

“Tommy Kramer watched the Vikings suffer an embarrassing loss to the Carolina Panthers on Sunday night, and Kramer, who for 13 seasons was a free-spirited quarterback for Vikings coaches Bud Grant and Jerry Burns, has followed the subsequent headlines depicting the sideline disagreement between Vikings coach Brad Childress and his star QB, Brett Favre,” Walters wrote.

“‘Bunch of nothing is all that is,’” Kramer said Wednesday. “‘Those things happen all the time. Childress was just trying to protect Favre because (offensive left tackle Bryant) McKinnie was getting pushed back by (defensive end Julius) Peppers like he was on roller skates.’”

Thank you, Charley Walters. And thank you, Tommy Kramer.

The Minnesota Vikings have lost two of their last three games because their offensive line can’t block anybody. Against Carolina, Phil Loadholt and Bryant McKinnie were terrible. That 26-7 shellacking had little to do with Favre or even Adrian Peterson (another whipping boy). It had everything to do with an offensive line that has not been very good and if they aren’t better on Monday night, the Vikings could get thumped in Chicago.

Here’s a little Sports Journalism 101: The Favre-Childress story is what’s known around the NFL as a “Tuesday story.” In a sport like football, where teams practice six days to play one, there is so little to write about in the middle of a week late in the season, that journalists fabricate stories in order to earn a living.

The Favre-Childress feud was a fabrication from the moment the two had a discussion on the sidelines and, once again, when these gutless newspaper reporters snivel, “Don’t shoot the messenger,” they’re wrong.

The world would indeed be a much better place if we did shoot the messenger from time to time.

There is so much undeniable bullshit in the mainstream media that it’s becoming embarrassing. What makes it worse, is that far too many people read it, hear it and believe it.

It was Thomas Jefferson who wrote: “As for what is not true, you will always find abundance in the newspapers.”

The alleged Favre-Childress feud is a classic example of Jefferson’s insight.

And it was also a great source for Walters to write the contrary opinion. As the business model of the daily newspaper drives them all closer to extinction, we get a mob mentality and we seldom get the contrary opinion. Heck, we seldom get the one-phone-call opinion anymore. Nice work, Shooter.

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The Sports Media Never Disappoints. Another Week of Stunning B.S.

Posted on December 22, 2009 by Scott Taylor| 1 Comment

I promised myself I would not criticize the mainstream media this week. Like far too many of THEM, I was becoming a one-trick pony.

Then the bull cupcakes hit the industrial-sized fan and we were blasted by a another week of utter insanity.

So with apologies to those who think I’m getting a little obsessed with this crap, here’s another look at another week of the mainstream media’s crazy talk.

1) The Winnipeg Football Club sent out a news release on Monday announcing that ticket renewals were running at a 97 per cent pace for 2010. And very few of those renewals had come in since the firing of Mike Kelly late last week.

Nice job. Good for the football club. Is it true? Who knows? But if it is, it means that almost every word written by our local papers during the last football season was a fabrication.

We all read this stuff every day. Both papers made it sound as if Kelly’s presence would mean that every single Bomber fan would cancel his season tickets. According to the papers, the fans all hated Mike Kelly so much, they were never going to go back to another game. They were never going to buy another ticket, period.

We were told that most of the Bomber board was so worried that if Kelly stuck around, the club might never sell another ticket again.

Well, apparently all the people screaming about never buying another ticket, never bought one in the first place. 97 per cent renewals?! That’s damn good.

If that’s true, only one thought comes to mind here: Liar liar pants on fire.

And we’re not referring to the Bombers. We’re referring to the newspapers. If the 97 per cent renewal thing is true, why would you believe a word written in a Winnipeg newspaper? The entire Kelly mess was the creation of a group of people so embarrassed by the fact the local football coach called “B.S.” on ‘em, that they waged war. The papers won, but apparanetly they did it with what we now see as outright lies.

2) There has not been a major trade in the NHL this year and there are fewer major trades every year, thanks in no small way to the NHL’s salary cap. However, if you read the Winnipeg Sun on Sunday, you’d think teams were making deals daily.

Sun Media’s Bruce Garrioch, who writes in Ottawa, now has every player in the NHL with the exception of Joe Thornton, Sidney Crosby and Alexander Ovechkin on the trading block. This weekend, the Sun had Sheldon Souray, Vincent Lecavalier, Teemu Selanne and Eric Staal on the road to different teams, while almost every starting goalie in the NHL was apparently heading to the Philadelphia Flyers. Just for fun, the Ottawa Sun added Philly’s Jeff Carter and Edmonton’s Shawn Horcoff and Lubomir Visnovsky to the list of players about to be moved, “Any second. Maybe now. Tomorrow. Next week. We’re sure of it. Unnamed sources told us. Who nows?

Oh, poppycock.

Sun Media’s NHL trade rumours have gone way past just the rumour stage. It’s now reached the level of completely silly.

3) The Associated Press is convinced that Brett Favre and Brad Childress dislike each other and Favre is righteously angry at Childress because the coach even suggested that he might take Favre out of a game.

The game was Sunday night’s debacle against Carolina, a 26-7 loss  in which there wasn’t a member of the offensive line who could block the Panthers’ Julius Peppers — or anybody else for that matter. Favre was getting killed in there and Childress said on Monday that he suggested to his quarterback that it might be safer if he came out of the game.

Favre didn’t like the idea, the two talked about it and Favre stayed in. And then he nearly got his head ripped off by a Carolina defensive line that had a field day with a lethargic Vikings O-line.

Monday, I listened to the Childress news conference and the coach made an interesting point. He said: “We don’t do anything in a vacuum. On the sidelines we talk a bout a lot of things. In terms of my question to Bret, it was something that was talked through. I wish I could remember how it finished.”

It was no big deal, but the AP, along with a few other outlets, wanted to turn it into a big deal. Just like they turned “Unhappy Randy Moss hates Tom Brady,” into a story that wasn’t a story two weeks ago.

In guess you missed it, Moss was absolutely tremendous last week in a 17-10 Patriots win in Buffalo and the mainstream media was wrong. Again.

I guess when you’re not selling any papers and your business model has virtually collapsed, manufacturing stories works a lot better than the truth.

4) Because I’m always criticizing, I must admit that I go on daily searches looking for good stuff. Found a nice rant yesterday afternoon on ESPN radio, when host Kevin Cowherd went after a caller who suggested the National League was more exciting than the American League because the NL does not have the designated hitter.

Cowherd went nuts. And in a good way. He asked the caller why the NL is better without a DH and the guy responded, “the strategy,” and Cowherd echoed everything I’ve been thinking for years.

“When baseball was in trouble in the 1990s, what saved it?” Cowherd asked, “strategy or home runs? You don’t even have to answer that.

“Home runs saved baseball. McGwire and Sosa saved baseball. Strategy? Nobody goes to baseball games to watch strategy and don’t start handing me this ‘baseball traditionalists’ stuff either. Nobody cares about strategy. Strategy doesn’t make you hot. Home runs make you hot. The old double-switch. I love the old double-switch. Oh, that’s exciting. Your girlfriend gets so hot after the double-switch that she says, ‘Honey I’m so hot, I have to go back to the hotel right now.’ What a crock!

“Home runs saved baseball. Two-out bunts by pitchers didn’t save baseball.”

Then he got personal with the caller, who just happened to be from St. Louis.

“Even in St. Louis, the only person who cares about strategy is Tony LaRussa and yet his best friend is Mark McGwire. His best friend on the field right now is Albert Pujols, a guy who hits home runs.  David Eckstein is strategy. Yeah, everybody loves David Eckstein. The biggest heroes in St. Louis are Albert Pujols, Mark McGwire and Stan Musial — all power guys! Strategy nearly killed baseball. Home runs saved it. I’d rather watch a DH hit than a pitcher hit every single day. And there is nothing more boring than the old double-switch. Baseball is entertainment, not homework.”

Kevin Cowherd is a our media monster of the week.

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Vikings Go To 8-1 With Easy Win Over Detroit.

Posted on November 15, 2009 by Scott Taylor| 1 Comment

MINNEAPOLIS — OK, so it wasn’t their best effort of the season, but in front of 63,854 spectators — including thousands of Winnipeggers — the Minnesota Vikings drilled the Detroit Lions 27-10 at Mall of America Field on Sunday afternoon.

With the win, the Vikings improved to 8-1. The Lions fell to 1-8.

The Vikings were handed a load of penalties (there were times when this thing looked fixed), many of which, head coach Brad Childress had little trouble questioning. In fact, a roughing the passer penalty against Ray Edwards, caused Childress to call out the official who made the call.

“I said to the official, ‘Ray never hit the quarterback on the head and he didn’t tackle him low so where did he tackle him that would result in a penalty?’,” a frustrated Childress explained. “The official said, ‘He (Edwards) launched himself at the quarterback and hit him high.’ And I said, ‘Where does it say in the rules that you can’t launch yourself at the quarterback?’ When I looked at the replay I noticed that Ray didn’t make contact at all. That wasn’t a very good call.”

It didn’t help that the Vikings lost a couple of fumbles, one by Adrian Peterson near the Detroit goal line, but Minnesota’s Sidney Rice did pitch-in with a career-high 201 yards receiving (on only seven catches) while Peterson did rush for 133 yards (100 in the first half) and scored two touchdowns.

The win gave Minnesota its best start since 1998 when the Vikes went 15-1 and then lost the NFC championship game to Atlanta.

Vikings quarterback Brett Favre (in his 300th consecutive start) completed 20 of 29 passes for a season-high 344 yards with one touchdown pass to backup tight end Jeff Dugan. Meanwhile, Rice’s 201-yard game was the fourth 200-yard receiving game in team history. It was just nine yards short of Sammy White’s team record (210 against Detroit in 1976).

“Wde were coming out of the bye and we were loose,” said Childress. “Maybe we were too loose. We have to tighten things up and play better next week against Seattle. It’s all about improving. We still need to improve.”

THE NOTEBOOK: The Vikings have won 15 of their last 16 games with Detroit… Minnesota was just 3-of-11 on third-down and had 13 penalties for 91 yards, which kept the game close until the fourth quarter… What a great game for Ray Edwards. The Vikings defensive end/linebacker had five tackles, two sacks and a forced fumble… There were 63,854 people inside the Metrodome (the 121st consecutive sellout in Minneapolis) and they were all breathing the same air. Obviously nobody really cared about H1N1… It’s shocking that 16 teams failed to draft Percy Harvin before the Vikings selected him. As Favre said yesterday, “He runs like a runningback, he’s built like a runningback and plays like a receiver. He’s one of the best players I’ve ever seen.” And yet 16 teams passed on him. What does that say about scouting in the NFL?

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Thoughts And News From a Crazy Sports Weekend

Posted on September 29, 2009 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment

From Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson battling it out in Atlanta to Brett Favre’s brilliant comeback at the Dome to Jimmie Johnson’s win at the Monster Mile to the Bombers home victory on Saturday night to the Lions first win in 19 games, it was a wild and woolly weekend.

It’s Tuesday morning. Monday Night Football was a dog and our 92-CITI-FM radio show was highlighted by the announcement that we are “An Official Station of the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Radio Network.” So  here’s what’s left in my head…

1) Favre was magnificent on Sunday afternoon, hitting Greg Lewis with a 32-yard touchdown pass — a 32-yard bullet, by the way — with two seconds left to beat a very good San Francisco 49ers team.

Yesterday, wherever I stopped in Winnipeg, people were jumping up and down with enthusiasm over Favre’s final drive. Many were happy that they were going to next week’s Monday Nighter between the Vikes and Packers at the Metrodome.

It was a truly great moment in football history, a 39-year-old veteran who has retired twice, once again doing what he’s always done throughout his marvelous career — bringing a team back in the final seconds. On Sunday, Favre earbned his paycheque and Vikings head coach Brad Childress earned the respect he might have lost by encouraging Favre to come out of retirement — after training camp had ended — to play another year (or two).

If you get a chance, go to http://www.kfan.com/pages/psn_paulallen.html and listen to Vikings play-by-play star, Paul Allen’s call. It was almost as exciting as the fact Favre threw the pass about 40 yards on a line.

2) Jimmie Johnson, the three-time defending Sprint Cup champion, won the AAA 400 at the Monster Mile at Dover on Sunday, but once again 50-year-old Mark Martin was second and, as a result, Martin remains 10 points ahead of Johnson in the Chase for the Sprint Cup.

It was Johnson’s fourth win at Dover, his second at Dover this year, and he’s now just eight consistent races away from a fourth straight Sprint Cup title.

I love Mark Martin, but if Johnson and his crew chief Chad Knauss keep it together, Johnson should take home the Cup once again. And what an incredible feat that would be.

3) My beloved Detroit Lions won on Sunday, 19-14 over Jim Zorn’s (he’s a former Bomber, you know) confounding Washington Redskins.

It’s funny, but all six people in my NFL pool picked the Lions to win (it was one of my few victories this week) and that suggested that nobody, not anybody, thinks the Redskins are a threat.

The Lions won’t likely win more than two or three games this season, but right now there are six winless teams (and the Redskins aren’t one of them) after three weeks — St. Louis, Tampa Bay, Carolina, Kansas City, Tennessee and Cleveland. And three of them — St. Louis, Tampa Bay and Cleveland — don’t look like they’ll win a game. In fact, if you look at every schedule, there is a reason to think all three could go 0-16.

4) Despite his win on Saturday night, Winnipeg Blue Bombers head coach Mike Kelly is still despised by plenty of Bomber fans. I know, I get the e-mails.

However, to be fair, Kelly could be Bart Andrus, a guy who has lost the Toronto Argonauts’ locker room and who has turned the Argos into a 3-9 last-place team. No matter how bad you might think Kelly is – and I’m not so sure he is that bad – it could always be worse.

Yesterday, another veteran has been sent packing by Andrus as the Argos traded cornerback Byron Parker — who has more interceptions for touchdowns in his CFL career than the entire Argos defensive backfield has interceptions — to the Edmonton Eskimos for a fourth-round pick in next year’s Canadian draft. Nice deal.

There is a chance Parker, who was cut by the Philadelphia Eagles to make room for Michael Vick, could suit up for the Eskimos when they play 4-8 Winnipeg at Canad Inns Stadium on Friday night.

If he plays, Parker could be a difference maker in that game so I guess if the Argos can’t beat Winnipeg on the field, they can make someone else better and hope that team beats Winnipeg.

5) Finally, I was able to announce on 92-CITI-FM this morning that our radio station is now “An Official Station of the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Radio Network.”

That’s tremendous news, but it also means that 92-CITI will carry Canada’s games, plus the medal round of the 2010 Vancouver Olympic men’s ice hockey tournament.

Here’s the schedule and every game is on 92-CITI-FM in Winnipeg:

Tuesday, Feb. 16: 7 p.m., Canada vs. Norway

Thursday, Feb. 18, 7 p.m., Canada vs. Switzerland

Sunday, Feb. 21, 7 p.m., Canada vs. USA

Tuesday, Feb. 23, 7 p.m. Qualification Game (Canada is not likely to play in this game).

Wednesday, Feb. 24, 7 p.m., Quarter-final game.

Friday, Feb. 26, 2:30 p.m., Semi-final No. 1

Friday, Feb. 26, 9 p.m., Semi-final No. 2 (Canada would likely play in this game if Team Canada qualifies).

Saturday, Feb. 27, 9:30 p.m., Bronze medal game.

Sunday, Feb. 28, 2:30 p.m., Gold medal game.

There is nothing better than Olympic hockey. And there is really nothing better than having Olympic hockey on 92-CITI-FM.

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Bombers Horrible in Banjo Bowl. Mike Kelly Should Be Glad He Doesn’t Own a Piano.

Posted on September 13, 2009 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment

(About an hour after filing this, a solid source told me there is reason to believe Casey Printers is now on his way to Winnipeg. Kelly denies it, but maybe Bauer is starting to make his own moves.)

Minnesota Vikings head coach Brad Childress told a story to the St. Paul Pioneer Press. It’s one Winnipeg Blue Bombers head coach Mike Kelly (and probably even CEO Lyle Bauer) should consider:

Childress, whose Vikings looked outstanding in a 34-20 win at Cleveland on Sunday, was talking about the time during the 1980s when he was an offensive assistant coach with the Indianapolis Colts and Art Schlichter was his starting quarterback:

“This is a true story,” Chrildress said. “He (Schlichter) was with us one game. He was our starter. We cut him after the first game. We’re standing in there and just got our butts beat. It was awful. I’m like, ‘I don’t care if it’s the first game for a new staff or whatever. A beating is a beating.’ I’m trying to stay out of the way. I’m soaping up in the shower, and here comes Tom Lovat, who was at Green Bay for years. He was assistant head coach. He says, ‘Well, Bradley, let me tell you something.’ He had a great way about him, a great perspective. He goes on, ‘That game right there will make you damn glad you don’t own a piano, you know what I mean?’ I said, ‘No, Coach, I don’t really know.’ He says, ‘You ever move a piano? Those things are heavy as hell. If we keep playing like that, our butts will be moving. Makes you damn glad you don’t own a piano.’”

It was a wonderful story and yesterday, Kelly was in the same situation. His Blue Bombers fell to 3-7 on the season with an embarrassing 55-10 loss in the Banjo Bowl at Canad Inns Stadium.

It was so bad, my pal Dr. Sports from Hot 103 in Winnipeg called from the stadium to say, “Fold the team and tear down the stadium, it has reached rock bottom. This is the worst I’ve ever seen.”

Well, hopefully, the city will get to tear down the stadium soon and David Asper will build the team a new one at the University of Manitoba.

The Blue Bomber board of directors needs to clean house. Sooner, not later. The board should call in Asper, who will soon take over the team anyway, and let him assume the leadership responsibilities now.

Let’s not pull any punches, the board has been as big a disaster as Mike Kelly or any other failed coach. The board has been as big a disaster as Stefan Lefors or any other failed quarterback.

This franchise hasn’t won a Grey Cup in 19 years and it’s unlikely it will win one this year. In an eight-team league, every team should win at least one Grey Cup in 19 years just by having a little dumb luck.

It’s time for a wholesale change. And that doesn’t mean fire the coach. It means changing the culture of the franchise completely. It’s the only way to salvage what could soon become a very, very embarrassing year.

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More Stuff Banging Around in My Noggin…

Posted on August 24, 2009 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment

I was sitting in the press box at Canwest Park last night waiting for the Goldeyes and Joliet to get it on when my brain started to go thump, thump, thump.

Here’s what fell out onto the page…

1) Last Friday night, Minnesota Vikings head coach Brad Childress felt that Brett Favre would play at least a half against Houston next Monday night.

Childress said all he wanted from Favre last Friday night in Minneapolis was to complete all the exchanges from centre-to-quarterback ad to hand the ball off to Adrian Peterson.

“If he completed a couple of passes, great,” Childress added. “That’s not what we were after. We have a 39-year-old guy playing his first game of the year after 2 1/2 days of practice. Taking the exchange from centre was a good first step for Brett.”

I asked Childress during the news conference how long he felt it would take Favre to get used to his teammates, the terminology, the surroundings and his own physical capabilities and Childress was forthright.

“Two weeks,” he said.

That sounds about right. Sounds like it was about right for Michael Bishop, too.

2) A website/newsletter/journalistic-type-place called the Bleacher Report, picked the Top 100 players in baseball this month. No. 1 was Albert Pujols. No argument there.

However, at No. 5 was Minnesota’s Joe Mauer. No. 5? Number Freakin’ 5?

I cancelled my subscription. Anyone who picks Mauer No. 5, hasn’t ever seen Mauer play and if they haven’t seen Mauer, they have nothing of interest to a baseball fan.

Mauer is a freakin’ catcher for goodness sake. He plays the toughest position on the field and throws bee-bees from his knees to each of the bases. He handles a pitching staff. He calls for pitches. He has to know everything going on out on the field at all time.

Meanwhile, he hits .380. And he’ll win the American League batting title this year with at least 30 home runs, 100 runs scored and 100 RBI even though he didn’t play a game until May 1.

However, he’ll also lead the AL in slugging percentage (.635) and on base percentage (.449) and right now, he leads Pujols in batting average and on-base percentage (Pujols is slightly ahead in slugging percentage, .665 to .635).

Mauer is a lifetime .328 hitter who won the AL batting title in 2006 (.347) and 2008 (.328) and he’s a freakin’ catcher. Oh yeah, and he’s only 26.

Hanley Ramirez and a couple of pitchers couldn’t carry Mauer’s 6-foot-5, 235-pound jock to the ballpark. The Bleacher Report is not a report. It’s a bunch of dudes farting around.

3) They say female South African runner Caster Semenya is not a woman, but a man. The IAAF is forcing her to undergo tests to determine that she’s indeed a woman. As it is for most sports governing bodies, humiliating people is an easy thing to rationalize. In fact, the IAAF “ordered” her to take the tests. Ordered.

Hey, I don’t know if she’s a man or a woman, but if she says she’s a woman, she’s a woman. What real man would want a woman’s medal anyway?

And besides, despite the humiliation she’s been forced to endure, one thing is certain. She has the best abs in sport … anywhere, anytime, any sex.

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Favre Does Everything Childress Wanted in Debut.

Posted on August 22, 2009 by Scott Taylor| 1 Comment

MINNEAPOLIS, Minn. — It was the two hits.

That was what made Minnesota Vikings head coach Brad Childress smile. It wasn’t so much his team’s  17-13 victory over the visiting Kansas City Chiefs that made him happy as much as it was watching his new quarterback’s ability to take a hit. That’s what gave Childress reason to declare Brett Favre was ready to make some noise in purple this season.

Most coaches wouldn’t want anyone near the team’s prized quarterback, especially in a pre-season game, but on Friday night at the Metrodome, the head coach of the Vikings had no problem with it at all. In fact, when Chiefs linebacker Corey Mays picked up Favre and bodyslammed him to the Metrodome turf in the first quarter, it removed all the concerns that a 39-year-old quarterback could no longer take the physical brutality of the NFL anymore.

“He did tell me nobody’s tackled him off his tractor (at home in Mississippi) so it was good to get hit, knocked on his rear end .. to experience that,” said Childress, during the post-game news conference. “Would I rather have him upright? Yeah, I’d rather have him upright. He’s going to get hit, it’s football. But he’s put together well and he takes good care of himself. He’s strong. He’s built pretty well, he’s not a guy who spent the off-season sitting on the couch eating chocolates.

“Getting hit is part of the game.”

Friday night at the Metrodome, 62,782 fans showed up, cameras a’ flashing, to watch the debut of Brett Favre, the long-hated quarterback of the Green Bay Packers who this week, showed up in Minnesota, signed a two-year, $25 million contract and was on the practice field by 1:30 Tuesday afternoon.

After two and a half days of practice, Favre started Friday night’s pre-season game against the Chiefs and while he didn’t set the world on fire in the two series he played — he went one-for-four for four yards and was drilled twice — he did start to get a feel for Minnesota’s offence.

And, to be fair, that’s all Childress expected.

“Small victories there,” Childress said. “The centre-quarterback exchange and handing the ball off. We sat out (Bernard) Berrian, my decision, so he didn’t have a full complement of receivers.

“He’s practised two and a half days. Based on my experience, for a guy to get comfortable with his receivers, comfortable with our terminology, comfortable with the entire offence, it takes about two weeks. He’s pretty good with those kinds of things. Still, it’s something you have to build toward.”

For Favre, Friday night’s pre-season debut was a relief. Even though Mays and Tamba Hall, hit him pretty hard, he came out of the game none the worse for wear. In fact, he was actually pleased with everything that took place, from the buzz in the crowd, to the buzz in his belly, to his contact with the turf.

“In the meetings, and before the game, I started having butterflies,” Favre said. “I was really nervous. Somebody said to me, it’s good for a quarterback who is nearly 40 to get nervous.

“I’m trying to purge myself of [the pressure],” Favre said. “Because with all of the attention it is kind of hard not to feel like you have to live up to all this hype. Not that I don’t want to do that, but the most important thing is to lead this team to victory, somehow, someway. I didn’t want to get off to the wrong start by fumbling snaps. I wanted to call the plays right, get in and out of the huddle and be as smooth as possible. Based on the facts — two and a half days — I consider that to be a small victory tonight.”

Favre said that he expects to play at least a half of the Vikings’ next preseason game, a Monday nighter on Aug. 31, at Houston. Childress said Favre will have all of his receivers this time and will be given every opportunity to get his timing “and his legs underneath him.”

Favre, meanwhile, just wants to play.

“Getting this over with tonight is a good thing,” Favre said. “Preseason is tough anyways, but this week has obviously been a little bit hectic.

“It was nice tonight to play with live bullets. I know that after Brad saw me get hit the first time he really didn’t want me to go back in, but that’s part of the game. I need to get hit. It’s football. I’m back to business as usual. Now I just want to make sure I help this team win.”

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Favre Now On The Vikings Practice Field

Posted on August 18, 2009 by Scott Taylor| 1 Comment

He has a contract, the fans are still going nuts and Brett Favre is now practicing with the Minnesota Vikings.

Remember this? “And that’s why I still believe the Vikings are going to make some news before Sunday, Sept. 13. Whether that news is spelled F-A-V-R-E or V-I-C-K or something else altogether, I just can’t for the life of me see Sage Rosenfels or T-Jack under centre on Opening Sunday in Cleveland.

“How about Favre coming in about Week 3 of training camp?”

That’s what we wrote right here at www.rivercitysportsblog.com on July 29, after Favre said he wasn’t coming to camp. Later that week (on July 30 to be exact), with Tom and Joe on 92-CITI-FM, I guaranteed that Favre would be wearing a Vikings uniform after the team broke camp at Mankato State University. On Thursday, July 30, on The FAN 960 in Calgary, I told Mike Richards that it was an absolute guarantee that Favre would sign because the NFL had already spent millions on “Favre No. 4″ jerseys.

So on Tuesday, Favre and his wife Deanna hopped on the Vikings private jet in Hattiesburg, Miss., flew to Holman Airport in St. Paul, Minn., were picked up by Vikings coach Brad Childress and given a police escort to Winter Park where he signed the contract that was always there waiting for him.

This was always a no doubter.

After all, at the age of 40, Brett Favre wasn’t going to room with Sage Rosenfels or T-Jack in the dorm at Mankato State. Was not going to happen.

There was no sense bringing him in to start camp with all the rookies around and have nothing but Cirque du Favre every freakin’ day.

And, what the heck? For two weeks, Rosenfels and Jackson got to pretend they were the co-starters on a team that’s going to play very, very good football this season.

Now he’s here and suddenly my season tickets have a whole new value.

Yesterday, according to my friends in Minneapolis, Favre arrived in Winter Park just after noon and the place “was a zoo!”

There were TV camera crews everywhere, fans trying to get a glimpse of the new quarterback and only one police officer, attempting as best he could, to keep order.

At 12:50, Favre had signed his new contract. At 1:29, he was on the practice field. At 12:02, you could purchase Favre No. 4 jerseys on the NFL website. Coincidence? I think not.

Meanwhile, at about 11 a.m., former Vikings receiver Cris Carter said on espn.com: “And another news flash, Brett Favre is going to be starting for them (the Vikings) this weekend at quarterback.”

Friday night at 7 p.m. at the Metrodome, it’s the Vikings vs. the Kansas City Chiefs. Wonder how many No. 4 jerseys will be in the building?

According the Minnesota Vikings, purple is the new green.

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