I expected controversial, but what I got was a delightful sports conversation. I was glad to be wrong. I caught up with Jim Souhan, the long-time sportswriter at the Minneapolis Star Tribune newspaper, during an interview for a weekly podcast I co-host called Minnesota Sports Weekly. If the old saying is “never judge a book by its cover,” I get what that really means.
“I’ve been with the Star Tribune 28.5 years,” he said. “I was an Air Force brat growing up and moved all over the country, but I’d never visited Minnesota until I came here for a job interview in February of 1990. Back then, my industry was mobile, so I thought I’d be here for a bit and then head someplace else. Had kids and settled in, so, as I always tell people, I’ve been here 28-and-a-half years and, if I make it another 30, Minnesotans might almost think of me as a native.”
Souhan describes himself as a “geek” growing up, so he was an avid reader. He played Strat-O-Matic baseball, Sports Illustrated baseball, and was really into reading about sports, especially baseball (he’s a baseball guy, in case that hadn’t clicked yet). Souhan grew up in the Pennsylvania/Maryland area when the Baltimore Orioles were one of the best franchises in baseball. It was during the era of colorful characters like Earl Weaver, Brooks Robinson, and Jim Palmer.
“I have a thousand autographs from each of them,” Souhan said. “Going to big-league games wasn’t very expensive, so you could go to a lot of them. That was in my formative years. I loved reading and I loved sports. When I went to high school, I ran track and cross country. The student newspaper wasn’t covering it, so I volunteered to write about it myself. That was my introduction to getting published and I loved it. I was living in St. Louis at the time and went to college at the University of Missouri.”
During the early years of his career, Souhan described himself as a “grunt,” typing in box scores while making six dollars an hour with no benefits. After that, he was promoted to an assistant high school writer for ten dollars an hour with no benefits. Then, he became the primary high school sports writer for the Dallas Morning News. Souhan then took a big jump, getting promoted to the Dallas Cowboys beat writer position. After a year in that job, he said the Star Tribune came calling.
Souhan made the jump to become the Vikings beat writer for a few years. He’s also covered the Twins and was a roving feature writer for the Trib back when “budgets were a little bigger.” A column position came open in 2004 and he’s been doing that ever since. Souhan has even gotten into podcasting, starting his own company called Talk North. His early years in the beat writer position, combined with his experience writing columns has given him unique insights into the Minnesota sports market. A recent column on the Timberwolves dysfunctional situation, saying the NBA is a little bit more public than other leagues when it comes to this.
“I haven’t seen a winning team with this much dysfunction,” he recalled. “That’s where the NBA is different from other sports because it’s all about personalities, egos, money, and how all those things mesh together. I’ve really never seen anything like the last year in Timberwolves history. Here they go, winning close to 50 games, they go to the playoffs, they win a game against a very good team in the playoffs, they have loads of talent, and nobody is happy.”
It’s hard for anybody in the Wolves organization to know what will happen next. Souhan says it’s hard to know what (Head Coach/GM) Tom Thibodeaux is going to do, if it’s sustainable, and whether he can maintain relationships. He’s basically made star player Jimmy Butler a de facto assistant coach, who might be leaving after next season. And that’s not the only challenge ahead.
“Karl-Anthony Towns is said to be less-than-thrilled with the way things are going and I get that,” Souhan said. “He’s the most talented guy on the team and he’s not the focal point. You never know when Andrew Wiggins is going to play hard. Jamal Crawford came in eager to play with this team but couldn’t wait to leave after the season. It’s fascinating, but troubling, that two years ago, they looked like the most promising young team in the league. While they are still promising, there are some big decisions ahead.”
On a brighter note, the Minnesota Vikings are gearing up for a Super Bowl run after falling one game short of being the first team in history to host a Super Bowl. After signing quarterback Kirk Cousins away from Washington, Souhan said the Vikings season will be fun to watch because this team is loaded.
“This team looks really good on paper,” he said. “Cousins is going to do really well in this offense. (Running back) Dalvin Cook being back in this offense could make them really dynamic. You could even see (wide receiver) Laquan Treadwell finally emerge. Kendall Wright is a very good slot receiver. They are really loaded but keep in mind, so is the rest of the NFC.”
Looking into professional baseball, he said a lot of the Twins challenges this summer have been multiple injuries to several key players. Souhan said the team did a great job of building what may be the deepest pitching staff they’ve had in years, and that’s with Ervin Santana eventually coming back from an injury. There are some middle relief issues they need to figure out, but he said, “that’s not unusual for any team.”
Souhan offers some additional thoughts on the injury situations surrounding young Twins stars Miguel Sano and Byron Buxton:
You’ll find a lot more sports conversation like this at http://www.blogtalkradio.com/minnesotasportsweekly.