Patrick Kessler ‏ @PatKessler

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Racino added to #Vikings stadium bill, which author says will kill it.#mnleg

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In a slight sign of movement, Senate Majority Leader David Senjem said after Dayton’s comments Thursday that a Senate panel where the nearly $1 billion Vikings stadium plan has been stalled for weeks would now likely meet Friday to reconsider the legislation.

Senjem’s comments came after Senate Minority Leader Tom Bakk, the lead DFLer in the Senate, said DFLers on the 14-member panel would agree to put up the majority of the votes needed to pass the Vikings plan in the committee.

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On his general take on the bounty scandal involving Gregg Williams and the New Orleans Saints:

“I think that the facts, when they first came out, I took a strong position. I was outraged by it. The players I talked to from my generation are outraged about it. We didn’t play with bounties. Dick Butkus didn’t have bounties on anybody, or there wouldn’t have been anybody to play because he would’ve killed them all. This is nonsense. Goodell came down strong, then we hear this Gregg Williams on tape. They’re doing a documentary: he knows he’s being taped! So he is saying, “let’s hit him in the head.” He’s very graphic, “let’s go check the ACL out, see if that ACL is really there, if it’s really healed, let’s see if that concussion’s really healed with Crabtree.” All these vicious, awful, knowing he’s being [taped], so you got to think this guy thinks it’s ok. Now I hear these ex-jocks, modern ex-jocks, back then “ah, this is the way it is in football, this is just the way things are,” and now I’m hearing some of the same stuff from the ESPN jocks doing that. The American people should be outraged. This is not the way it is. That’s not what the foundation of football was about. Goodell has already come down hard on Payton and Loomis and Gregg. Gregg Williams should never be able to be in the NFL again. He has done this at Tennessee, he did it in Buffalo, he did it with the Washington Redskins, he’s done it here. I got a YouTube video of when Peyton Manning’s neck got hurt the first time because he had a bounty on him by Gregg Williams where someone hit him low and another guy hit him around the head and twisted his neck. It was unbelievable. That’s where it started. That would trickle throughout the league. That would trickle down to college, down to high school football. The American public should be outraged at this, and I know Roger Goodell is outraged because if this spreads, this sport is dead.”

Bolded my favorite line.

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THIS ISN'T OFFICIAL, JUST A POSSIBLE LEAK

Take this with a grain of salt, but the full NFL schedule may have been leaked. Vikings are after the jump.

Highlights:

12 games at noon, 2 games at 3, 2 games at night.

Week 2 - Andrew Luck

Week 15 - RG3

Week 3 - MNF (Really, ESPN? Titans-Vikings was the best you could come up with? This may set records for least watched MNF ever.)

Week 7 - Thursday night football against the Pack.

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I know that sometimes it seems like more bounty stories are posted here than on the Saint's blog, but I can't help myself on this one.

After hearing this, I'm firmly jumping on the "ban Gregg Williams for life" band-wagon. Just disgusting how he cajoled his players to hurt other human beings.

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via stmedia.startribune.com

via stmedia.startribune.com

via stmedia.startribune.com

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This time it was on Brad Johnson in '06 while Old Gregg was with the Redskins. $15,000 from the defensive coordinator to knock Johnson out of the game.

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http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2012/03/06/saints-defender-after-favre-injury-pay-me-my-money/

In a must-read account of the Saints’ three-season bounty system, Peter King of Sports Illustrated shares plenty of intriguing and compelling details. MDS already has highlighted portions of the article relating toRoger Goodell’s reaction to the situation and linebacker Scott Fujita’s position on the subject. But there’s even more good stuff.

During the 2009 NFC title game, which both sparked the league’s investigation and served as the most obvious example of assault and battery of an opposing quarterback, King writes that, after an unflagged high-low hit on Brett Favre resulted in a sprained ankle, an unnamed Saints defender was heard saying on an on-field microphone, “Pay me my money!”

(We know what you’re thinking: The league killed Monday’s re-air of the game on NFL Network because the comment could be heard during the broadcast. Apparently, however, it was a different microphone.)

King also explains that defensive end Anthony Hargrove can be heard saying, “Favre is out of the game! Favre is done! Favre is done!”

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The Vikings finally seem to be closing in on their long-awaited new stadium. And it won’t be built in Southern California.

A.J. Monsour of KFAN reports that the Minnesota Legislature could pass a stadium bill as soon as Thursday. A press conference has been scheduled for 9:00 a.m. CT.

If the deal is finalized, a new stadium will be built close to the site of the Metrodome, with the Vikings playing in the existing structure for two or three years while construction proceeds. Then, the Vikings will spend one full season at the University of Minnesota’s TCF Bank Stadium before moving into the new venue, which would open in 2016.

Under the deal, Vikings will pay half of all construction and operating expenses. It’s expected that the stadium will cost $975 million.

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