There Can Only Be One "See you tomorrow night!"

Baseball is a great sport for many reasons. One of them is that there are so many words that you can use to describe it. To hear a good announcer, like Vin Scully or Jack Buck, call a baseball game is like listening to someone reading poetry.

Scully and Jack Buck have several memorable quotes just stick into your brain. They were almost always during big moments of a game that when you saw the replay, it wouldn't be complete without the broadcasting call. Can you see Kirk Gibson's walk off home run in Game 1 of the 1988 World Series without hearing some of these quotes?

"Here comes Kurt Gibson...with TWO bad legs..." - Scully

"Gibson hits it to right and she is...GONE!" - Scully

"I don't believe what I just saw!" - Jack Buck

Jack Buck had several more memorable quotes, but there is one that holds near and dear to Minnesotans.

Twenty years ago, the Minnesota Twins were down 3-2 in the 1991 World Series. Staring elimination in the face, Kirby Puckett stepped into the batters box with the game tied at 3. After taking one circle change from Atlanta Braves reliever Charlie Leibrandt, he lined the second one over the left-center fence. Jack Buck screamed from the broadcast booth...

"And we'll see you tomorrow night!"

I don't remember the '91 World Series because I was too young, but I've seen the clip played over and over throughout my childhood. That quote belongs with that moment even if it wasn't Kirby Puckett blasting one over the fence. It was creative, resourceful, and well-timed. All three things Jack Buck seemed to master.

Fast forward twenty years later. The Texas Rangers and the St. Louis Cardinals are in a slugfest in Game 6 of the 2011 World Series. The Rangers have already gotten the Cardinals down to their last strike twice, but St. Louis keeps battling back. Finally, Cardinal 3rd baseman David Freese steps into the batters box and belts a home run to center. As the ball is in flight, Joe Buck, the son of Jack, says...

"And we'll see you tomorrow night."

I may never call a World Series game, but there is one thing I know about broadcasting in that situation: you make a unique call.

This has been Joe Buck's problem throughout his career. He isn't creative enough to capture the magic that his dad had. This morning I typed into Google "Joe Buck quotes" and I got this. I don't know about you guys, but I think this one is my favorite...

"I think the two best teams are meeting. I don't know that every year you can say that."

Classic! So original! So creative! I remember the moment he uttered those words! It was when...um...uh...actually I have no idea. Well, I did Google "Jack Buck quotes" this morning too, and this is what came up. See the difference?

What really strikes me is what other people had to say about Jack Buck. I could never see other people saying that about Joe.

I realize Buck was trying to pay tribute to his dad, but the fact is, he came off just like he always does: flat and uninteresting.

The "We'll see you tomorrow night" call should stay with the '91 series. Perhaps next time, Buck might go with what he knows best, "the no-call."*

* The Joe Buck no-call is where the action gets so intense, he says nothing. This has been a technique Buck has mastered in multiple Yankee-Red Sox games and NFC East matchups.

Frazier Makes His Mark On Vikings

Coaching changes happen all the time in the National Football League. This year, there are seven new head coaches foraying into new jobs. Some of them are learning on the job. Leslie Frazier falls into this category, but he also falls into another familiar demographic of first time head coaches. He's cleaning house.

This is a common trend in the NFL. When new regimes start, changes are made. Take a look at the Detroit Lions.

When Jim Schwartz was hired for Detroit, he did everything to change the culture. The Lions were coming off the ugly Matt Millen era. Schwartz did everything down to changing the color of the locker rooms to try and erase Detroit's past. Schwartz also did another thing: He took out the trash to bring in some of his own guys via the draft (Matthew Stafford, Ndamukong Suh) and through free agency (Kyle Van Den Bosch).

The same thing is going on at Winter Park. Much like when Brad Childress was cutting people left and right when he took over in 2006, Frazier is doing the same to send a message.

At the beginning of training camp, a 400 pound Bryant McKinnie showed up out of shape and lethargic. Frazier didn't want that to represent his team, so he cut him. Many Viking fans will point to the job that McKinnie is doing with Baltimore and say that it was a mistake. However, Frazier had to send a message. Even at the expense of starting...ewww...Charlie Johnson...

The message has been delivered loud and clear to some players in the locker room, and the ones who aren't getting it are getting pink slips. Bernard Berrian is the latest casualty of the Frazier era.

Berrian was shockingly overpaid after the 2007 season when the Vikings were desperate for receiving help. While Berrian had a good first season with 964 yards and 7 touchdowns, his production had dropped off since. As Berrian's stats went down, his moodiness went up.

The last straw might have been the Twitter war with State Rep. John Kriesel, who made fun of Berrian's inflated ego. Berrian defended himself saying that he had been open "the past four years" and that Kriesel, a supporter of the Viking stadium bill, should "sit down and shut up."

Two gameday deactivations later, Berrian is looking for work.

It's hard to praise a coach that is 1-6, but Frazier is simply in the first step of rebuilding. No NFL coach will ever tell the media that because there is no time to rebuild in the league. Yet, with a couple of solid drafts and personnel decisions, Frazier could be making the first step for setting the Vikings up with success.

A Step In The Right Direction

On Sunday, the Minnesota Vikings lost to the Green Bay Packers 33-27. While the Packer fans will rejoice in beating a team with a rookie QB, a depleted secondary, a junk offensive line, and no receiving corps to speak of by six, the loss for Viking fans seems different than the other ones in 2011.

First of all, the Vikings began a new era by making Christian Ponder their new quarterback. It wasn't a Cam Newton type debut, but Ponder threw for 219 yards and two touchdowns. On the negative side, he also completed just 13 of his 32 passes and threw two interceptions, but these things are to be expected from a rookie quarterback.

Ponder set some milestones along the way, as well. Ponder is the first rookie quarterback to throw for two touchdowns in his debut since Tommy Kramer in 1977. More importantly, he's the first quarterback to throw two touchdowns for the Vikings in any game since last December's win over the Buffalo Bills.

The bottom line is that Ponder made some plays for a stagnant offense. It may take some time for Ponder to develop into a legit starting quarterback, but he has some promise.

Second, the Vikings receiving corps showed some signs of life. Michael Jenkins had a solid game with three catches for 111 yards. Jenkins also had a 73 yard catch that started the festivities at the Metrodome. The play was easily the longest pass play of the season for the Vikings, and it got the crowd into the game.

The receivers thrived despite Benard Berrian being deactivated for the second time this season. The first time Berrian was deactivated, October 9th against Arizona, Viking head coach Leslie Frasier said it was due to "disciplinary actions." You have to assume that this was not a "disciplinary action." The guy who's been open for the past four years simply isn't good enough to be on the field as a starter anymore. It was time to give other options a try. That's what happened Sunday.

Finally, the Viking offense decided to use their best offensive weapon repeatedly: Adrian Peterson. In the past, we've seen teams with rookie quarterbacks lean on their running back to ease the load off the rookie. On Sunday, Peterson had his best game of the season, picking up 175 yards on the ground.

With McNabb at quarterback, the Vikings may have leaned to heavily on a depleted pass game. Don't get me wrong, McNabb is insanely inaccurate and unable of running a NFL offense at this point of his career, but if the Vikings used Peterson the way they did Sunday, would they still be 1-6?

The development of Ponder, the re-emergence of the receiving corps, and the use of Adrian Peterson, made Sunday's loss a little more tolerable. With all the obstacles the Vikings faced, to lose by six to the best team in the NFL is nothing to be ashamed of in this chapter in Viking history.

Will the Big Ten Stop the Wisconsin Badgers?

An argument could be made that the Wisconsin Badgers are the best team in college football right now. With an electrifying offense lead by quarterback Russell Wilson, the Badgers are trying to capture their first national championship.

What they have done so far is pretty impressive. As of today, the Badgers lone test was a visit from the Nebraska Cornhuskers. The result was Wisconsin torching a defense so traditionally tough that they're called the Blackshirts en route to a 48-17 win.

In all likelihood, the Badgers have just two more challenges left in their schedule. The first comes Saturday night when the Badgers travel to East Lansing to take on the Michigan State Spartans. The second will be the first ever Big Ten Championship game on December 3rd in Indianapolis. With two wins in these games, the Badgers could be on their way to the Bowl Championship Series championship game...

Or could they?

While the leaders of the Big Ten have looked stellar, the rest of the conference has not. The Minnesota Golden Gophers are abysmal. The Indiana Hoosiers are pretty bad too. Every conference has their cellar dwellers, but it's the other teams at the top that have weakened the Big Ten.

While the teams at the top of the conference have pretty good records, it's the way they've won games that could keep the Badgers out of the BCS championship game if there more than two undefeated teams.

For example, Ohio State completed just one pass in their 17-7 victory over Illinois last Saturday. That's not a ringing endorsement for Big Ten football right now.

The cellar dwellar teams are also getting destroyed. Looking at the Gophers in particular, there was a stretch where Jerry Kill's team had given up 94 unanswered points. Again, this is not something that will help voters put an undefeated Badger team into the BCS championship game.

I know every conference has these types of performances, but the overall strength of conferences is what concerns me. The Southeastern Conference (SEC) champion will get into the national championship game because it's the strongest conference in the nation. This spot will be occupied by either LSU or Alabama (the two teams play each other next Saturday).

The #2 team in the country is Oklahoma. The rest of the Sooners schedule features a game in Manhattan against #11 Kansas State, a home game against #17 Texas A&M, and Bedlam (@ #4 Oklahoma State).

By looking at the two conferences Wisconsin is up against, it could be a very great possibility that the Badgers would get the same treatment as the 2003 Auburn Tigers. Auburn was the last undefeated team in the nation that season, but were not put into the BCS championship game. LSU was the national champion that year with a 12-1 record and a win over Oklahoma. Auburn wasn't even a split champion in the AP poll as USC shared that honor with the Tigers.

Adding into the uphill climb for the Badgers (as ridiculous of a thought that seems to be), Boise State is also reeling off a undefeated season in the weak Mountain West Conference. If the Broncos can knock off TCU later this year, that's a fourth undefeated team to be worried about.

The Badgers are a championship caliber team. Whether the BCS lets them showcase that is, sadly, up in the air.

Rodgers Is In A Class Of His Own

As we look at a beginning of a new era on the Minnesota side of the Packer/Viking rivalry, one might have to go back and look at the beginning of the last era over in Green Bay.

It was 2008, and Brett Favre had just retired. A young quarterback named Aaron Rodgers was about to be the starter in Green Bay. Then Brett Favre, to quote John Madden, was Brett Favre.

The story has been mentioned several times on this website, so I think it's safe to say that you all know what happened. Favre was traded to the Jets. Rodgers led the Pack to a 6-10 record. Favre played for the Vikings, lost in the NFC Championship game. Rodgers won the Super Bowl the following year as Favre failed to get his John Elway ending to his career.

As a Viking fan, I may be annoyed of the John Deere Cult's worship of Rodgers, but there is one thing that I may agree with them on...

A couple of weeks ago, on Sunday Night Football, NBC showed a graphic. Aaron Rodgers had just thrown his 100th touchdown and had the fewest amount of interceptions at the time of that milestone. Then, NBC showed another graphic comparing Rodgers' numbers to Favre's numbers at the time of touchdown #100. The comparison graphic showed one thing: It's time to stop comparing Rodgers to Favre.

Rodgers is simply on a different level than Favre ever was. They're different quarterbacks. To suggest that Rodgers success is based on the fact that he learned behind Favre is laughable. If anything, when Favre saw quadruple coverage on Antonio Freeman and threw it anyway. At this time, Mike McCarthy's staff turned to Rodgers and said "Don't ever @#$%ing do THAT!"

What Rodgers is to quarterbacking is a symbol of excellence. Rodgers greatness is comparable to that of Peyton Manning or Tom Brady at this point. These are guys who sit down, watch film, and figure out how to pick your favorite team apart. All three of these guys have the potential to win multiple Super Bowls compared to Favre, who won just one. (I say that mainly of Manning and Rodgers as both have just one Super Bowl right now.)

The other thing is that if Rodgers is not better than Favre, he is just as good. This shadow should have been wiped away after Rodgers won the Super Bowl last year, but for whatever reason it's still there. While you could make an argument that Rodgers may still be on Favre's level, can you make an argument that he's worse? Didn't think so.

Don't get me wrong, both Favre and Rodgers* should be hall of fame quarterbacks someday, but the fact is their paths to the NFL, and their successess are completely unrelated. It's time that people start seeing that.

* Rodgers should be a hall of fame quarterback barring injury or depletion of his elite receiving corps. Don't think it's elite? Why did the Vikings go after James Jones to be their #1 receiver last season? An elite group of pass catchers can't hurt.

Let The Ponder Era Begin

Yesterday was a seemingly harmless Sunday. I went out and about in Western Wisconsin, made one of the worst fantasy moves in the history of fantasy football (benching Rashard Mendenhall for Darrius Heyward-Bey), and then watched the Vikings get crushed beyond belief.

At this point, I had decided that I had enough of the Vikings struggles for one Sunday evening, and then something interesting happened. The Vikings let their "quarterback of the future" Christian Ponder enter the game.

I watched the end of the game, and the kid did pretty well for the circumstances. He ran around in the pocket trying to buy time against the ungodly amount of pressure that the Viking offensive line was giving up. He kept his eyes downfield. He was aggressive and went for a couple of deep balls and quick passes. All these were things Donovan McNabb hasn't done this season.

So that begs the question. Do the Vikings have a quarterback controversy? I would say not, because Christian Ponder should have been starting all along.

Christian Ponder, as you may know, was the 12th pick of the 2011 NFL draft out of Florida State. At the time many of the draft "experts" declared Ponder the most NFL ready quarterback in the draft. It was said that guys like Cam Newton (of Carolina) and Blaine Gabbert (of Jacksonville) would need more time to develop and it would benefit them to sit on the bench for a while.

Things have played out a little bit differently since then. Carolina bucked the conventional wisdom of having a quarterback sit and watch for a couple of seasons by throwing Newton into the fire. Turns out Newton was ready to be a complete and dominant force in the NFL.

Gabbert also was thrown into the fire recently, and although he has struggled a bit, the future still looks bright for the kid because he has exactly zero offensive weapons in Jacksonville.

So you look at the Vikings situation and wonder why Ponder wasn't starting in the first place. The Vikings decided to gamble on McNabb instead of using an unproven rookie quarterback.

It may be that the vetrans convinced first-year head coach Leslie Frasier that they were better than they really were. There is talent on the Viking roster, but there are also way too many holes to have that make up for anything. For example, without a legitimate offensive line, the running game anchored by Adrian Peterson is significantly watered down.

The veterans may also have their pride, but they also have to realize that they won't be winning any Super Bowls with Donovan McNabb at quarterback. It's time to let Ponder play.

With a start next week against the Green Bay Packers, Ponder has a chance to re-energize the jaded fan base. If Ponder could knock off the mighty Packers, Ponder could become a cult hero in Minnesota, and it might be the key to getting what the Viking ownership really wants: a new stadium.

Keeping the focus on the field, Ponder is the best way for this team to go as the season becomes a lost cause. At 1-5, the Vikings are not going to make the playoffs. It makes more sense to have the future of your franchise get his feet wet, and then go from there.

The Ponder era needs to begin Sunday, and if it fails...well, the Vikings could always get "lucky"...if you know what I mean.

Sorry, I Gotta Sit This One Out

They say beggars can't be choosers. They haven't met me.

For years I've been praying to God that he would allow a Minnesota team to win a championship. It's now clear to me he has a sense of humor because he sent me...the Lynx.

The Lynx are one win away from the first professional championship in Minnesota since the Twins won the World Series in 1991. They would be the second pro team in Minnesota history to win a championship as well. (Lynx coach Cheryl Reeve incorrectly stated to her team that they would be the third, but the North Stars didn't win the Stanley Cup until moving to Dallas.)

I don't remember the 1991 championship, as I was five years old, but when I had thought of a Minnesota team winning a championship, I thought I would be really excited. For example, the Vikings, who have been the team closest to grabbing the brass ring during my lifetime, winning the Superbowl would have resulted in me balling my eyes out and saying to my wife, "This is the happiest day of my life. That includes our wedding day, and the birth of our son." But, there's just not the same level of excitement there. Well, why is that?

The Lynx have some very good players. Lindsay Whalen is the best product to come from the U of M since Bobby Jackson. Maya Moore is going to be the face of the WNBA over the next decade. They've worked hard for this, but I can't get excited.

This is the WNBA, and it's not a matter of me being sexist. It's me not liking the product. I can stand passing and fundamentals. I love college basketball more than the NBA, but when you compare college basketball and the WNBA, there's just things that are missing such as the crazy crowd atmosphere seen at most of those games and...yeah, I'll go here...dunking. I like dunking in my basketball.

Also consider that the Lynx have only played a little over 30 games to win their championship and the WNBA is like the second season to them compared to the teams that they play for overseas during the winter. A championship here would be like if the Vikings won the Super Bowl in the 8 game season that was proposed in case the NFL lockout got really ugly last offseason.
However, the biggest thing is that I didn't grow up with this team and have never really followed them. If one of the other "Core Four" sports in town won a championship (Vikings, Wild, Timberwolves, Twins), it would be a "I was there for the whole ride!" experience. With the Lynx, I'd feel cheated...bandwagon. I wasn't there at the beginning of the year when expectations were high. I haven't watched a game all year. Why should I get to cheer? The people who have loyally packed...well, filled the lower bowl of the Target Center all season should be rewarded, not the slew of bandwagon fans packing the upper rafters now.

Again, beggars can't be choosers, but I'm letting the people who have endured this team's ups and downs enjoy this championship. They've earned it. And it begs the question, when will I see one of my favorite teams win it all? I don't know, but I'll enjoy the ride.