The Skolney Blog

The final Sunday of September, or occasionally the 1st Sunday of October, is always one of the busiest sports days of the year. NFL in full swing, final day of baseball's regular season. Had a good chance to take it all in this time with the Vikings off. The Twins wrapped up a tremendously disappointing season, albeit one with a bunch of wins at the end to pad the record to a misleadingly not terrible 78-84. They swept the White Sox. And there was the day long Joe Mauer sendoff  which was pretty great. I honestly have been pretty certain he will NOT retire. But then he comes out for the 9th inning in catchers gear. It all collectively played out as one of the best sendoffs ever for a Minnesota athlete. There WAS crying in baseball today. Mauer doesn't mean to me what he seems to for fans in their teens or 20s, who know nothing of a Mauer-less Twins(he was drafted 6 months after I graduated college), but the day still struck a chord. And now the Twins embark on an offseason tha...

Rams 38 Vikings 31 Shades of 2015. The Vikings suffer a blowout at home(then Seattle, last week Buffalo), then go on the road for a Thursday night game at one of the league's best(then Arizona, tonight LA). Then they give that team a hell of a fight, only to lose on a game ending strip sack. The season is not lost. Far from it. Even if they lose at Philly, a 1-3-1 record will.not doom them in this division. BUT.....the Super Bowl dreams can not possibly live on if we continue to see what we are seeing from this once proud defense. They were solid against the 49ers, then just ok against Green Bay but made big stops to keep hopes alive. But this unit has now cratered 2 weeks in a row. Now, the whole damn team imploded against Buffalo, but tonight the offense was back on track. And the defense got worse. Now yes, we must acknowledge that the Rams are a budding juggernaut, a team loaded with weapons, who already lit up 3 other teams before tonight and likely will light up a bunch...

Of course the same scumbag circle jerkers are all outraged about two women doing pxp for the Vikings-Rams game, and not even on the main broadcast. But that's still enough to trigger their misogyny. Now even a woman's VOICE in an environment these holier than thou fuckwads deem inappropriate makes them fly off the handle and show off what REAL MEN they are. Can't imagine the amount of whining these losers would engage in if they were black  It never ends with these people. Same reason they all stick up for rapists like Kavanaugh and Trump. We all know that these circle jerkers have the same skeletons in their closet. You're not fooling anybody, you perverts.

Good lord. First off, once again congrats to the corporate media for failing us all and handing like 90 uninterrupted minutes over to this bloated cocksucking traitor. This thing was held for only one reason, and that is to get the Kavanaugh news off the air. Well you assholes fell for it again. Now please get back to addressing the fact that a Russian agent is pushing to implant a rapist onto the SCOTUS. And they let this dementia-ridden maniac speak for what? He says NOTHING. The admitted serial sexual predator has never once in his disastrous presidency answered a question. You ask him something, and he just is allowed to ramble for like 10 minutes about some completely different topic. It's basically performance art. He says NOTHING. His appalling stupidity is clear every time he opens his mouth. You ask him any sort of question that deals with an actual policy and he is lost. He calls all the Kavanaugh stuff fake news, cause of course he does. Brett Kavanaugh's history a...

This meets Twitter's standards, but I told a couple RWNJs to fuck off so I'm banned for life. Makes sense.

What we know is something happened with Everson. There are a lot of different reports, even from REAL news sources. While the rumors swirled the last day or so though I saw another rather grotesque display by that especially nauseating subsection of Vikings fans, those dickheads who spend all their time pretending to have scoops and inside information, always from their "sources" that they claim to have with zero evidence. Everson may be having a serious issue, that goes far beyond whether or not he will see the field again soon, this year, maybe ever. But that doesn't stop the self-appointed insiders, who use their fake sources to spread any bullshit that enters their fucked up minds. Everson was not arrested. That's been confirmed. Yet according to these people he attacked a cop, he was on a cocaine binge, he threatened people with a gun....and there are others I can't even recall. My twitter banishment should at least spare me exposure to these awful people...

I know they've had some early season stumbles in recent years and then by November they're dominant again, but this feels different. The Lions handled them tonight.

Bills 27 Vikings 6 Last week a Bills player realized he didn't have it anymore, and retired at halftime. In tribute, the entire Vikings 53 man roster, as well as the coaching staff, apparently decided to retire BEFORE the game. Where to start on this? This was easily one of the worst Vikings games I have even seen in person. I entered the purple palace today wary yet very confident the Vikes would handle the Bills, and that Zimmer would demolish rookie Josh Allen. Sure we had a few guys out, but c'mon we are FAR better than the Bills. I still think we're better than the Bills. But this was a total disaster, from damn near the opening kickoff. When Linval got that BS roughing flag it was like the game went into some alternate dimension. This defense that, while not stifling, was very solid in containing Jimmy G and holding the Packers to a bunch of 3s and making last week's comeback possible, completely imploded. The offense that seemed to really find itself at Lambe...

Not that this Gophers squad is expected to win a ton of games. Maybe sneak out a bowl bid, but that's about it. Still the 1st 3 games passed the eye test more than certainly I thought they would. This looked like a team that could go play a mediocre Maryland team and at least be in the ballgame if not win it. Yeah about that... I gave up around the middle of the 3rd quarter to go clean gutters, and I think I had more fun with the gutters. This was just a gross display by the Gophers. Annexstad looked every bit the freshman. There was no running game. And the defense completely imploded, giving up multiple huge plays in amateurish fashion. Sure it's on some level expected growing pains, but man, it doesn't inspire much confidence that they can compete yet in the Big Ten. What might still save them is they have 3 or 4 games left that they can potentially win, 3 of which are at home.

This isn't quite the film it was billed as. Yes, it has its parts attacking Donald Trump, but Michael Moore is too good a filmmaker to simply do a Trump takedown. This film is much more of "how did we get into this nightmare?" and "how do we get out of this nightmare?" I would not put it up there with Bowling For Columbine or Fahrenheit 9/11. This one is a little all over the place. Lots of digression. There is a lot of material here, particularly the Trump stuff, that I've seen or heard. Maybe not pieced together just this way. The best stuff here is when Moore gets more focused. There is a lot here about the Flint water crisis that is very infuriating. And the material dealing with strikers and protestors should be mandatory viewing for the circle jerker types who think these people are all lazy or ignorant. Moore has always been willing to go after Democrats, not that his haters acknowledge this, but he has never been harder on the left. Hillary, Pelo...

I hate being right sometimes. The Thibs hire is the most damaging thing the Timberwolves franchise has ever done. Yes, worse than Kahn. Worse than any botched draft picks. And the long term damage is only beginning to be felt. Thibs has been a disaster. He foolishly went into win now mode, when the Warriors and Rockets were unmatchable. He pissed off KAT. He stunted Wiggins's growth. He traded Rubio away for no reason. He became a leaguewide punchline for his addiction to bringing in his washed up ex-Bulls. He refused to change his antiquated ways of coaching. The one feather in his cap was the Jimmy Butler trade. And now that's gone too, with the news that Butler has demanded a trade. Thibs guy wants to get away from Thibs. This franchise is fucked. Jimmy Butler is a fucking prick as far as I'm concerned. He's a very good player, but he seems to be under the impression that he is Lebron James. Sorry dude, but you are not anything close to that kind of elite player ...

So the Vikings pulled the trigger on the kicker situation, cutting Dan C and signing Dan B. Had to be done. Carlson's postgame comments came off as weirdly clueless, like he had no earthly idea what he did wrong....even though all 3 of his kicks at Lambeau looked the same. Dan Bailey is not a savior. He will miss kicks, hopefully just the occasional one, but they will happen. I'll be curious how the fans react. Having now fully immersed myself in Vikings Reddit during a game that counts I can say the fans there are way more rabid than the twitter fans. They want everybody cut and fired after every mistake. What happens if Bailey clanks one off the goalpost in a big game? But again, good move, and good to see Spielman willing to admit a mistake early. This one was easy. With Blair Walsh the issue was the guy had a pricey contract extension(which I believe they might still be paying this year). I'm not going to jump on the bandwagon of folks who want Spielman caned for dra...

Vikings 29 Packahs 29 Even before the absolute INSANITY that was the 1st border battle of 2018 had even ended I dubbed this The Nine Lives Game. And it remains appropriate given that it remained a carnival of absurdity right up until literally the final second of overtime. The Vikings lost this game. A bunch of times. They lost when the Pack seemed sure to get a TD for a 24-7 lead. They lost when the Pack went up 9 late. They lost when the Pack burned clock and went up 5. They REALLY lost when Cousins got picked on the 1st play of what was his last chance to deliver a win. They lost when Kirk got ANOTHER chance but was picked on a deep ball, only to be bailed out by a sketchy RTP call (the thickness of THAT irony). They lost when prevent defense gave GB a FG shot...which was missed(when does Crosby EVER miss against us?). They lost when the Packers were right at the edge of GW FG range in OT, only to.be saved by a sack. They lost SO many times. Yet each time something...some guardi...

Went to my 1st Gophers game of the Fleck era. They dispatched with Miami of Ohio rather easily. It was a rather nondescript game. Offense was okay. Defense was solid. The punter was great. The heat was oppressive. At least I sat in the shade. Towards the end of the game a giant roar of applause erupted behind me. The Badgers had just shanked a field goal and lost at home to BYU. What fans stuck it out through the heat also roared their approval when the play was shown on the scoreboard. Didn't expect a "B-Y-U" chant to cap the afternoon. Hopefully the Vikings can get the job done Sunday and keep the tears flowing over there.

But you can bet the national media will lap it up all week. Cris Collinsworth basically called Sharon the bravest man to ever live. He wasn't hurt.

Vikings 24 49ers 16 As openers go, this one had its expected share of rustiness and miscues, even a few things that could be of concern long term. But they got the win, and as you look around the league today, you take that ugly win and run with it. This was not a dominant performance by the Vikings. Their offense had moments, but sputtered a lot in the 2nd half and failed to put the game away. The defense was not dominant. They gave up quite a few explosive plays, a couple of which blew momentum, but they got several huge turnovers, and never really broke. Fans seemed to be pretty grumpy about Kirk Cousins's debut, but I thought for the most part he played fine. He was under pressure all the time, though the line was never 2016 bad. But he hung in there. He scrambled effectively a few times, and the 2 throws he made for scores showed his value. Case Keenum does not make those throws. And for the fans mad he didn't throw for 400 yards and 4 TDs, remember that Brett Favre a...

This Gophers club has some moxie.

Heading to the purple palace tomorrow for the Vikings opener against Jimmy G and the Niners. It's the start of a season that has the highest expectations for any Vikings club in many years. Even the Favre years began more as question marks than with the team as a Super Bowl favorite. So this might be the most expectation-heavy Vikings club in 2 decades. And with those expectations come a common refrain of "super bowl or bust." Now, this is I think largely media driven, but a lot of fans form their opinions based on what the media says, so a lot of people out there have it in their heads than anything short of a Super Bowl win not just be a disappointment but an abject failure. This is SO wrongheaded. Just from a mathematical standpoint, no one team is ever THAT big a favorite that winning a title is the only acceptable outcome. It ain't the NBA. The NFL is too random, too dependent on injuries and luck. There are tons of things that could happen to keep the Vikings...

Oof. Throw a ball where a receiver has a chance, man.

That was what I thought it would be, but the route to get there was a little different. Mystics almost had to go it without EDD. And Seattle was pushed to the absolute limit by Phoenix. Never a bad thing to see Diana Taurasi lose. Seattle in 4.

I would not be surprised if this season the NFL had a season like the WNBA just did. Lots of parity. Lots of evenly matched teams. Wide open playoffs. Well, in the NFC anyway. The NFC is loaded with teams that could be in the playoffs. In fact, other than Tampa Bay I would not be completely shocked if any team made it in. The AFC looks to still be the Patriots bitch. A few teams look to be on the rise but as far as Super Bowl contenders I really only see the Steelers, and maybe the Chargers as threats. In the NFC, I have the Vikings of course, but not for homerism. Even if they lose ALL those tough road games(they won't) they should still be able to get in that 11-5 range and win the north. The Packers are still nothing but Aaron but that non-playoff season gave em an easy schedule and they will be a wild card. Chicago and Detroit won't be cupcakes but aren't playoff teams. The Eagles won't be as dominant. Defending champs never really are, but they're still the...

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More surprising developments today than I saw coming. Guess that's what make them surprises. Brian Robison is cut. The longest tenured Viking, he spanned 2 eras of Vikings defenses. He began with the Williams Wall and Jared Allen. Then after the Leslie Frazier abyss, he had a major role in the Zimmer-led revival. But given the amount of young talent this team has on the DL it's not that surprising to see him go. Why keep him for at most 1 more year when you can get equivalent production from a younger, cheaper guy like Bower or Weatherly? But Robison had a great run. Sort of the Gary Larsen of this era. Always surrounded by bigger stars, but was always super reliable. Terrence Newman retires, and becomes an instant coach. I bet he'll make a great coach. I'm mostly sad cause he was the last Viking, maybe ever, who was older than me. There are now no Vikings older than 30 or 31. Among other cuts, it was not that surprising to see Kendall Wright go. Similar reasons to R...