I'm a longtime lurker (I remember Wren and kept expecting to read of his civil commitment) but new poster. As these Reusse threads seem to appear bi-weekly, and as I had some dealings with him quite a while back in a different professional life of mine, I thought I might offer a few insights that might keep these from reoccuring so often. Take this for what you want; I'm not him or related to him, haven't spoken to him in 15 years, and wasn't ever what you'd call close to him; I highly doubt he'd recognize me today.
First of all, were most of you to deal with in person, you'd probably like him. He's friendly, irreverent, and hilarious, and doesn't seem to take himself too seriously (unlike a former Strib columnist who also works in radio now at a different sports station, initials DB); the sense that I got was that his rather interesting life story - adopted by a funeral director in very rural Minnesota, dropping out of college yet still having a successful newspaper career, and overcoming a severe drinking problem that had a huge impact on his family life - led to him keeping things in perspective.
Second, there is nothing he likes more in life than needling people. If he gets the response he gets from some of the people on here, that's exactly what he wants because he knows he's hit a nerve. I honestly think he takes it too far; everybody knows he hates and doesn't understand or care about hockey, and that he thinks Gopher football has been pathetic for four decades, and I don't really see what the point is in continuing to jab people like he does, but that's how he operates. Quite honestly, starting threads on here complaining about him, when we know he checks out this board, will only lead to more of the same.
Another thing to keep in mind about him is that he divides the world into "characters", and all others. Basically if you're good or at least competent at your job, strike him as a good guy, and are colorful and eccentric, you're pretty much golden. If he ever wrote a negative word about Tom Kelly I don't remember seeing it; Harvey Mackay, Mike Lynn, Clem Haskins, and Lou Nanne are others who he never treated as harshly as he might have because they were "characters". If you're not a character, though, it's open season; he's currently staging a frontal assault on Kevin Love, whose worst sin appears to be saying publicly what everybody thinks - that David Kahn is clueless - but talked this week about how much he misses Clem and doesn't care what others think. For me, I'll take Kevin Love over that slimeball Clem every day of the week and twice on Sunday. For whatever reason, nobody involved with Gopher football ever seems to get promoted to "character" status, and thus the program never gets kid glove treatment from him; you could tell early on he wanted to like Kill, but for whatever reason he's soured on him somewhat.
As to his writing ability, you can take issue with his cynicism or other aspects of how he does his job - and I have at times - but there is no question he is an artful writer. As to whether he "couldn't make it in a bigger market", as I've read on occasion on here, I was told by an impeccable source that earlier in his career he had numerous lucrative opportunities to move to bigger markets but chose to stay in Minnesota.
