Sid Hartman: Vikings fans show their enthusiasm

The Vikings sold 100 new season tickets the day that the trade for Jared Allen was announced, and the renewal of season tickets jumped to more than 80 percent.

The fan interest in the Vikings is amazing, and it is too bad that Gov. Tim Pawlenty and some of the anti-stadium people in the Legislature were not on hand Saturday at Winter Park, where some 4,000 of the team's most rabid fans attended the annual draft day party.

There's always the danger of Minnesota losing the Vikings if a stadium is not built. Playing at the Metrodome, the Vikings' revenue ranked last in the NFL, Forbes magazine reported last year; it falls well short of teams such as Washington and New England, which ranked 1-2 in the league for revenue in 2006. Even Kansas City, with a market much smaller than the Twin Cities, ranked much higher than the Vikings in revenue.

The Vikings said they have taken in $46.8 million in ticket sales for 2008, an increase of some $2.2 million from last year. Ticket sales and national television are just part of the revenue of each NFL team, along with concession sales, local radio rights and such.

Still, the Wilfs -- who aren't listed on Forbes' list of richest Americans, unlike the Twins' Carl Pohlad or the Timberwolves' Glen Taylor -- keep on spending money to sign such players as Allen, even though Zygi Wilf claims the team has lost money the past two years. They have more than $700 million invested in this franchise, including spending money on remodeling Winter Park and increasing the payroll of the football department. The Wilfs and their partners have contributed $50 million personally to improve the quality of the team. Maybe they are doing it because it will take a Super Bowl team to get a stadium.

When Allen walked into the draft party Saturday, he got a cheer you could hear in downtown Eden Prairie, and later on, a long line of fans built up to get the defensive end's autograph. He said he never witnessed such fan enthusiasm in Kansas City.

"Kansas City fans are good, but they never came out on draft day like this," Allen said. "You guys out here are good to go."

"You know what, it's better for people to be excited than coming out somewhere and booing you. That would be horrible."

Talk about a great freshman class. On Rivals.com's list of 150 top men's basketball recruits for the 2008-09 freshman class, 15 have committed to Big Ten universities. And the Gophers have three of them: center Ralph Sampson III is ranked 59th, guard Devoe Joseph is 61st and forward Colton Iverson is 138th.

Guard Verdell Jones, who is undecided but visited the Gophers last week and is now looking at Arizona, too, is ranked 127th. And because the list only ranks incoming freshmen, it doesn't factor in Devron Bostick, the Gophers recruit who was recently named national junior college player of the year.

Klay Thompson of Santa Margarita, Calif. -- the son of Gophers great Mychal Thompson -- is ranked 51st by Rivals.com. Klay Thompson is headed to Washington State. Two Minnesota high school players are on the list: Princeton center Jared Berggren is 74th and Benilde-St. Margaret's guard Jordan Taylor 125th. Both are headed to Wisconsin.

In his three major league starts this year, recently demoted Twins lefthander Francisco Liriano gave up 13 earned runs in 10 1/3 innings, for an ERA of 11.32. In 2006, before he underwent elbow ligament replacement surgery, the most runs he gave up in one start was five, on April 29 at Detroit. In his first 14 starts that year, when Liriano went 11-2, he gave up 17 earned runs in 92 2/3 innings, an ERA of 1.65.

Former Twins outfielders Torii Hunter, now with the Angels, and Jacque Jones, now with the Tigers, are opponents this weekend. Jones drove in a run in Detroit's 6-4 victory Saturday but is hitting only .203 with one home run and five RBI. Hunter, who went 0-for-4 with a run Saturday, is hitting .297 with four homers, 12 RBI and 14 runs scored. Among Hunter's teammates is former Gophers standout Robb Quinlan, who has barely played this year, going 2-for-7 in three games. ... Former Twins righthander Matt Garza came off Tampa Bay's disabled list, giving up three runs on five hits in five innings against Boston on Friday. ... Carlos Silva is pitching well after receiving a four-year, $48 million contract with Seattle over the offseason. In five starts, the former Twins righthander is 3-0 with a 2.83 ERA.

While awaiting his appeal in his lawsuit against the University of Minnesota, in which he claimed he quit his job as an Oklahoma State men's basketball assistant coach because he already was hired to do the same job with the Gophers, Jimmy Williams is conducting a clinic for young players, and one his students is Gerald Green, the former Wolves player who was traded to Houston and subsequently released by the Rockets.

Former Gophers men's hockey player Ryan Potulny scored at 2:58 of the fifth overtime to give the Philadelphia Phantoms a 3-2 victory over the Albany River Rats in Thursday's Game 5 of their American Hockey League playoff series. The game was the longest in AHL history at 142 minutes, 38 seconds. In the 2001 North Dakota state championship game, Potulny's Red River team beat Fargo North in five overtimes. Albany won 1-0 Saturday to force a Game 7.

Brooks Michel, a highly recruited offensive lineman from Carmel, Ind., was among the visiting recruits at the Gophers spring football game.