Gopher legend Dave Winfield met with Gopher basketball team today

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Carrington is taller than I thought.
Garcia is hidden.
Is that Betts next to the woman? Really tall looking.
 
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Is that a ghost, or one of those "Ring" horror shows behind Dave? Looks like about 10% of someone's head. Put that guy in the other team's lockers before each game.
 




If I'm not mistaken, Coach Thorson actually was an asst. coach back when Dave Winfield played for Gophers...
 

CPTMidnight said:
If I'm not mistaken, Coach Thorson actually was an asst. coach back when Dave Winfield played for Gophers...
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Sorry, you're way off. Thorson coached for Haskins and Winfield played for Musselman about 20 years earlier.
 



Calgoph said:
Sorry, you're way off. Thorson coached for Haskins and Winfield played for Musselman about 20 years earlier.
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Yeah, I know it was a bad joke attempt and an undeserved cheap shot at Coach Thorson - LOL. Sorry Coach.

Dave Winfield is a good guy. He was signing autographs before a Gopher basketball game and my 14 YO son stepped up. Dave got a big grin, winked at me and said "hey, you look like you play baseball". After going back and forth on where he played and what baseball position they shook hands and he got his autograph. I think it made my son's whole year.
 

CPTMidnight said:
Yeah, I know it was a bad joke attempt and an undeserved cheap shot at Coach Thorson - LOL. Sorry Coach.

Dave Winfield is a good guy. He was signing autographs before a Gopher basketball game and my 14 YO son stepped up. Dave got a big grin, winked at me and said "hey, you look like you play baseball". After going back and forth on where he played and what baseball position they shook hands and he got his autograph. I think it made my son's whole year.
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I'm getting old and apparently slow on the uptake. I need the ;) when people are foolin' around.:)
 


Thorson looks old.

No Parker Fox that I can see. Ihnen is there.
 



In the picture, Ihnen’s left knee looks swollen, but this is expected within a few weeks of surgery. He’s still got his great smile, keep crushing the recovery, Zay!💪🏿
 

CPTMidnight said:
Yeah, I know it was a bad joke attempt and an undeserved cheap shot at Coach Thorson - LOL. Sorry Coach.

Dave Winfield is a good guy. He was signing autographs before a Gopher basketball game and my 14 YO son stepped up. Dave got a big grin, winked at me and said "hey, you look like you play baseball". After going back and forth on where he played and what baseball position they shook hands and he got his autograph. I think it made my son's whole year.
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Actually, a good joke attempt.

I'm a couple of years younger than Dave and attended the small Lutheran college across the river, but I saw him play both baseball and basketball a number of times. By far the best athlete I have ever seen play in person.
 

Lion King said:
Dave Who ?
Played what ?
WHERE ?
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Surely some of you must be old enough to have been at UM during 71-72 and 72-73 seasons. Dave was pitching for Gopher baseball and was great outfielder and power hitter when not pitching. He was a first team all american as a pitcher and the MVP of the college world series, but he also hit .385. Think a college version of Ohtani. I watched him pitch a 1-0 shut out at Bierman Field. He was a power pitcher with lots of K's.

At Christmas time of 71-72 season he was playing intrarmural basketball on a team with a lot of the gopher football players. Gopher basketball team was down to 9 players and couldn't scrimmage 5 on 5. He was asked to be a walk on practice player by Coach Bill Musselman. He ended up playing 20 games, starting at forward, averaging 7.0 points and 5.4 rebounds. The next year he started all 26 games, averaged 10.5 points and 6.1 rebounds. Shot 70.4% on his free throws. Great defensive presence. By the way he was drafted 79th overall in NBA draft by Atlanta Hawks (where Lou Hudson was already an all-star). He was also drafted by Utah of ABA. But he was drafted #4 overall in MLB draft by San Diego. He had language in his contract that he had to start at major league level and could only be sent down if he was not successful. He is one of a few MLB players in modern era for sure that never played in a single minor league game. By the way he was drafted by the Vikings in the 1973 NFL draft.

That is a little of the who, what, where. There is a whole lot more to know about his impact on baseball and on American culture. He was 12 time all-star, 7 time golden glove winner, batting champion 6 times. In 2004 he was named by ESPN as the third-best all around athlete of all time in any sport.
 

There is much more too. The 72 team was the one with the Luke Witte/Ron Behagen brawl. I was at that game. Winfield was not penalized but the team lost a number of players and after that pretty much played an iron 5 for most of the minutes. They also won the Big Ten title if I remember correctly. That 1972 team was the first Gopher Basketball team to play in the NCAA tournament. At that time only the conference champion went to NCAA. And the great teams of 60's with Lou Hudson and Archie Clark were derailed by Cassie Russell of Michigan and then by Lou Hudson's broken right hand. Hudson played his senior year (1966 when I was in high school and an avid gopher basketball fan) with soft cast and dribbled left handed and also shot everything left handed including free throws (at .649 percent). He was amazing one handed rebounder averaging 8.1 rebounds per game. And who else remembers that Archie Clark played center field on the 1973 gopher baseball team led by Winfield to the final game of the national tournament. So a baseball player played a key role on a championship basketball team and a basketball player played a key role on a championship baseball team. Winfield had played no basketball between high school and junior year of college (except intramural) and Archie Clark had played no baseball between high school and senior year in college. Winfield is in MLB Hall of Fame and Clark is in NBA Hall of Fame after long career with New York Knicks. There is a whole lot of who, what, where back there. Hope the team appreciated meeting Winfield and getting his support. I am sure Ben and Dave and the rest of the coaches were very pleased to make that happen.
 

Classof 66 said:
Surely some of you must be old enough to have been at UM during 71-72 and 72-73 seasons. Dave was pitching for Gopher baseball and was great outfielder and power hitter when not pitching. He was a first team all american as a pitcher and the MVP of the college world series, but he also hit .385. Think a college version of Ohtani. I watched him pitch a 1-0 shut out at Bierman Field. He was a power pitcher with lots of K's.

At Christmas time of 71-72 season he was playing intrarmural basketball on a team with a lot of the gopher football players. Gopher basketball team was down to 9 players and couldn't scrimmage 5 on 5. He was asked to be a walk on practice player by Coach Bill Musselman. He ended up playing 20 games, starting at forward, averaging 7.0 points and 5.4 rebounds. The next year he started all 26 games, averaged 10.5 points and 6.1 rebounds. Shot 70.4% on his free throws. Great defensive presence. By the way he was drafted 79th overall in NBA draft by Atlanta Hawks (where Lou Hudson was already an all-star). He was also drafted by Utah of ABA. But he was drafted #4 overall in MLB draft by San Diego. He had language in his contract that he had to start at major league level and could only be sent down if he was not successful. He is one of a few MLB players in modern era for sure that never played in a single minor league game. By the way he was drafted by the Vikings in the 1973 NFL draft.

That is a little of the who, what, where. There is a whole lot more to know about his impact on baseball and on American culture. He was 12 time all-star, 7 time golden glove winner, batting champion 6 times. In 2004 he was named by ESPN as the third-best all around athlete of all time in any sport.
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Thanks, 66, for the accurate recap on the state of Minnesota's greatest athlete all-time. I was there for every one of Winfield's home basketball games. Stats don't begin to show the value of what he brought.
 

Classof 66 said:
There is much more too. The 72 team was the one with the Luke Witte/Ron Behagen brawl. I was at that game. Winfield was not penalized but the team lost a number of players and after that pretty much played an iron 5 for most of the minutes. They also won the Big Ten title if I remember correctly. That 1972 team was the first Gopher Basketball team to play in the NCAA tournament. At that time only the conference champion went to NCAA. And the great teams of 60's with Lou Hudson and Archie Clark were derailed by Cassie Russell of Michigan and then by Lou Hudson's broken right hand. Hudson played his senior year (1966 when I was in high school and an avid gopher basketball fan) with soft cast and dribbled left handed and also shot everything left handed including free throws (at .649 percent). He was amazing one handed rebounder averaging 8.1 rebounds per game. And who else remembered that Archie Clark played center field on the 1973 gopher baseball team led by Winfield to the final game of the national tournament. So a baseball player played a key role on a championship basketball team and a basketball player played a key role on a championship baseball team. Winfield had played no basketball between high school and junior year of college (except intramural) and Archie Clark had played no baseball between high school and senior year in college. Winfield is in MLB Hall of Fame and Clark is in NBA Hall of Fame after long career with New York Knicks. There is a whole lot of who, what, where back there. Hope the team appreciated meeting Winfield and getting his support. I am sure Ben and Dave and the rest of the coaches were very pleased to make that happen.
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One other guy deserves mention along with Hudson and Clark. Don Yates. They may have been the best three players together for three seasons the Gophers have ever had.
 

Classof 66 said:
There is a whole lot more to know about his impact on baseball and on American culture. He was 12 time all-star, 7 time golden glove winner, batting champion 6 times. In 2004 he was named by ESPN as the third-best all around athlete of all time in any sport.
Click to expand...
Winfield was also an exemplary professional athlete off the field. He won the Roberto Clemente Award for community and service commitment. Wikipedia summarizes his charitable work as follows:

"Winfield was the first active athlete to create a philanthropic foundation. He began giving back to the communities in which he played from 1973, his first year with the Padres, when he began buying blocks of tickets to Padres games for families who could not afford to go to games, in a program known as "pavilions." Winfield then added health clinics to the equation, by partnering with San Diego's Scripps Clinic who had a mobile clinic which was brought into the stadium parking lot.

In his hometown of St. Paul, he began a scholarship program (which continues to this day). In 1977, he organized his efforts into an official 501(c)(3) charitable organization known as the David M. Winfield Foundation for Underprivileged Youth.

When Winfield joined the New York Yankees, he set aside $3 million of his contracted salary for the Winfield Foundation. The foundation created a partnership with the Hackensack University Medical Center including founding The Dave Winfield Nutrition Center, near his Teaneck, New Jersey, home. The Foundation also partnered with Merck Pharmaceuticals and created an internationally acclaimed bilingual substance abuse prevention program called "Turn it Around"."

Classof 66 said:
There is much more too. The 72 team was the one with the Luke Witte/Ron Behagen brawl. I was at that game. Winfield was not penalized but the team lost a number of players and after that pretty much played an iron 5 for most of the minutes.
Click to expand...
I also saw Winfield pitch and play basketball for the Gophers. I've always liked Winfield. Still do, despite his role in the Gophers' 1972 thuggery against Ohio State, which seems out of character for Winfield. Still, I wish that Winfield would have publicly apologized along the way for his role or tried to make amends, as Corky Taylor and Clyde Turner did directly with Luke Witte.

Given Winfield's role in 1972, it's amazing that he was not penalized at the time. As SI wrote in February 1972, Winfield "joined the fray, too, dodging to mid-court where some Minnesota reserves and civilians were trying to wrestle Ohio State substitute Mark Wagar to the floor. Winfield leaped on top of Wagar when he was down and hit him five times with his right fist on the face and head. When the stunned Wagar managed to slip away, a fan pushed him to the floor and another caught him on the chin with a hard punch from the side." Wagar would join Luke Witte in spending that night in the ICU. Winfield also pounded on OSU guard Mark Minor as the Minneapolis Star's game article recorded ("Dave Winfield singled out Minor and got in some real punches”.)
 

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