B1G 2016 // A Minnesota Tradition That No One Wants To Match

Let's not bury the lede here. Sports journalism in Minnesota, as a whole, is a steaming pile of dogshit.  The number of people that can do their job properly could be counted on one hand, and we're not even going to touch on the icon/monolithic piece of crap that is Sid Hartman.  Sid's a hustler, and I can respect anyone that was a HS dropout that made themselves into an icon simply by outworking and outsmarting everyone else. But...

His newspaper employs a number of people that are unfit to work at a small-town South Dakota newspaper. Columnists Patrick Reusse and Jim Souhan are atrocious rabblerousers that do their best to attempt to use logic that would only be tolerated by the lowest common denominator. Because no one is completely without a redeeming quality, I will say that Reusse is an outstanding baseball mind. And Souhan has wonderful posture in his Star Tribune bio picture.  But any time these two attempt to cover college sports, it's usually an effort to make up details without having any insight or knowledge of the subject that we here at OTE would deem unacceptable for our football coverage. Souhan is such a wonderful individual gifted with such a strong grasp of the English language that even Jerry Kill told him he could kiss his ass. Reusse, a individual blessed with the charm usually reserved for retired stevedore, doesn't seem to grasp the concept that turning around athletics programs takes time to do properly. He simply mocks teams for not turning around their fortunes immediately or for not winning national titles every year.  And just in case his columns in the Strib aren't enough, he also has a radio program AM 1500 to gift his brilliance to the masses on a daily basis.  The dream is that if they continue to work hard enough, the columnists and reporters at the Star Tribune will get their Pulitzer for reporting on a scandal at the University of Minnesota that they so desperately covet. Or not. Because the scandal that earned cross-town rival St. Paul Pioneer Press a Pulitzer was a once-in-a-lifetime academic and payola scandal with the basketball team. Nonetheless, the Strib monkeys will continue to look at every horrific instance of scandalous underage drinking by an athlete as an opportunity to try again.

Fortunately for everyone in the Twin Cities, he's not the only person available to listen to on the radio.  The competing Twin Cities sports radio station, KFAN, could be the largest collection of ignoramuses ever gathered that weren't subject to scientific experiments.  It has been described by the aforementioned Star Tribune as "a talk station that sometimes discusses sports." Dan Cole "The Common Man" has been doing the same schtick since about 1997, despite it not being funny the first time. Dan Barriero is a gutless weasel who used to be a columnist, but found the standards of truth and accuracy and content knowledge to be too strenuous.  He now spends his time (when he can be bothered to be wrong about sports) talking about how people should be fired, only to turn around and orally pleasure them once they've been fired.  But the best example of pathetic idiocy is horse track announcer turned Viking ventriloquism dummy Paul Allen.  Having been blessed with the voice of a God and a gaping anal orifice to allow sponsors and employers to easily fit their hand up it, he was thrust into an AM radio job when Jesse Ventura was elected governor of Minnesota (The impact of that butterfly flapping it's wings will be felt in Minnesota for generations) along with lovable sad sack Jeff Dubay. When Dubay was terminated due to succumbing to a drug addiction, it left Paul Allen to spend his entire time on air fellating the Vikings and offering wonderful insight as to exactly what Zygi Wilf wants people to think.  He does spend time with the Gophers, however.  Shortly after ascending into the HC job Tracy Claeys was invited on the program to spend an entire segment talking about the Vikings.

If print media and radio aren't where you'd like to get your idiotic incoherent thoughts on college athletics, we've always got TV too. KSTP sports reporter Darren "Doogie" Wolfson is a "graduate" of KFAN in that he was a producer that somehow got promoted to being on-air "talent."  Doogie's biggest strength is his ability to call out people that point out his errors on twitter.  Or, if you prefer your newsreader to have a more prominent role while being a scurrilous troll, KMSP lead newsreader Seth Kaplan is your buffoon.  Having had to leave wisconsin to find a job, he spends his time here espousing the greatness of his home while ignoring that it has more than it's fair share of issues. It doesn't matter that Richard Pitino's excess jet usage was approved by his boss, but he deserves to be fired and shamed.  And you know what? The fact that wisconsin had to investigate whether or not Bo Ryan was using school funds to shuttle his mistress around? No where near as important or relevant to the discussion. So let's get back to beating the dead horse that is Richard Pitino.

Someday, maybe we'll get some people that can offer a reasonable dissection of Gopher athletics by people who have connections to sources and the knowledge of their subject to make it worthwhile to everyone. Someone like Michael Russo,  who is able to understand his sport and break it down in a way that anyone can understand regardless of their level of fandom.  Or not, because the Vikings wouldn't want people to actually think. Just shut up, get another beer, and go nuts when that stupid fucking horn gets blown.

Who's the worst Twin Cities media personality? /cc @DailyNorseman @TheDailyGopher #gophers

— Off Tackle Empire (@offtackleempire) June 1, 2016