In 130 years of Minnesota sports, essentially from 1890 to 2020, the biggest single turning point occurred in 1960 when Minnesota became “big league.” Frankly, we think that Minnesota was big league previous to 1960 because we (principally but not only the Minnesota Gophers) competed at a national level, and not just regionally. But, of course, most people today don’t see it that way. Conventionally, the big leagues are MLB, the NBA, the NFL and the NHL and maybe the MLS and the WNBA. The PGA tour is big league. The Olympics are big league. Still, it’s awfully hard to say that the Big 10 and the ACC and the SEC and Notre Dame aren’t big league. On the other hand, the MIAC and the NSIC and the high schools are not big league. Mostly, they compete regionally, not nationally.
Still, the fact remains that Minnesota sports changed forever, and changed for the better in 1960 and 1961. In 1960, it was announced that the Minnesota Twins and Minnesota Vikings would be created and, then, in 1961, they played their inaugural seasons here in the Twin towns. The Minnesota North Stars followed in 1967 and 1968 to further establish Minnesota and the Twin Cities as big league. The Twin Cities became big league towns where the Twins, Vikings and North Stars enjoyed a most-favored status and the greatest fan loyalty. The investment in big league sports paid off with the Twins appearance in the 1965, 1987 and 1991 World Series, the Vikings playing in four Super Bowls from 1969 to 1976, the North Stars playing in the Stanley Cup finals in 1981 and 1991, and in the Lynx’ four WNBA titles in the 2010s.
But, every action has an equal and opposite reaction. In this case, the reaction was a loss of interest in and loyalty to the Minnesota Gophers. Football attendance had peaked at more than 60,000 in the late 1950s and early 1960s. It dropped into the 40s in 1966 and the 30s in 1967, despite tying for a Big 10 title.
The Gophers are almost unique among the original ten universities in the Big 10 in that the Gophers share their home market with those major league franchises. Iowa has no major league teams to compete with the Hawkeyes. Illinois has the Chicago Bears, Black Hawks, Bulls, Cubs and White Sox, but they’re two hours away from Champaign, home of the University of Illinois. The Indiana Hoosiers had to compete with the Fort Wayne Pistons until 1957, and has competed with the Colts since 1983, but even they (the Colts) are an hour up the road in Indianapolis. Michigan and Michigan State are 40 and 90 miles, respectively, from Detroit, home of the Lions, Tigers, Pistons and Red Wings. Madison, WI, home of the Badgers, is more than a hour’s ride from Milwaukee, and two hours from Green Bay. Northwestern, like Minnesota, competes with Chicago’s professional sports teams for the affection of Chicagoland fans and sports reporters. But, even in Indiana, Michigan and Wisconsin, where the big league teams are only about an hour away from their Big 10 college towns, the hometown university has its own media who show a consistent bent toward supporting rather than tearing down their college teams.
Here in Minnesota, sports fans and sports media alike have shown a clear preference for major league professional sports, and something of a disdain for the Gophers. In the case of the media--the Strib and the Pioneer Press, and especially the Minneapolis Strib--the disdain for anything to do with the local college has been just palpable and dispiriting. Apparently, we're supposed to love a bunch of horses asses who write about sports and disrespect those who play and coach at the college level. What a load of horse manure. This is a cross that Minnesotans and, especially, the Minnesota Gophers bear as a part of our embrace of the “big leagues.”
Minnesota sports changed some more, and changed for the better, with Title IX, as girls and women’s sports came online. Janet Karvonen, Kelly Skalicky, Coco and Kelly Miller, Natalie Darwitz and Krissy Wendell, Lindsay Whalen, Lindsey Vonn and many others have added their names to the list of Minnesota sports heroes.
Minnesota sports changed some more—though, whether for the better is in the eye of the beholder—with the advent of free agency in our professional sports. For 100 years, pro athletes had been held in perpetual bondage thanks to the so-called “reserve clause” in professional contracts, which stated that the athlete would play for a specific team “this year and the next.” This clause was successfully challenged in court in the 1970s and, after playing for their team this year and next year, many would now be free agents. This drove up the cost of professional athletes, and it meant that poorer professional teams, such as the Minnesota Twins of Calvin Griffith, would have difficulty competing. Eventually, the “mom and pop” sports franchise was driven out of our games, to be replaced by much wealthier individual and/or corporate owners. Compared to the Calvin Griffiths of the world, they were better equipped to sign and pay athletes for their teams. They were also better equipped to demand more and more public support for their teams, meaning public subsidies for their stadiums. And, if a particular city didn’t pony up, then they would leave for another city that would.
Minnesota was threatened more than once in this way by the Twins and Vikings and the Timberwolves. Ironically, when the North Stars left town in 1993, it had nothing to do with the customary stadium extortion racket. It was not for lack of public support of the beloved North Stars. It was simply because the owner, Norm Green, was a greedy and incompetent bastard. No matter how much revenue his businesses produced, he could always spend more. And, he couldn’t keep his hands to himself. He was sued by a female employee for sexual harassment, and his wife announced that she would leave him unless he moved the team to another town.
The first 40 years of big league sports in Minnesota, then, saw three World Series, four Super Bowls, two Stanley Cup finals, the arrival of three-plus major league teams, the departure of two more (the Lakers in 1960, and the North Stars), and the emergence of girls and woman’s sports, and Minnesota becoming “the state of hockey,” among much more. It wasn’t quite the best of times, nor was it altogether woebegone. It was above average. It could always be worse.
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