As the Christmas season winds down, it’s always a time of reflection for me.

I look back at all the great times I had this year. All the new experiences I had and all the places I visited.

But let’s be honest, it’s also a time to look at the things that didn’t happen — the ways we were disappointed.

During this time, I have looked back at all the things I didn’t get to see this season.

I have to admit, personally, it was a good year. But when it comes to sports, it was anything but exciting.

Here is a list of my top disappointments of this sports year.

10. The Buffalo Bills didn’t make the playoffs — again. You’d think I’d be used to it by now, but it still stings. I guess the low expectations of the team is why it’s No. 10 on my list.

9. I didn’t see a Cubs win in my trip to Chicago. I think this again goes back to expectations. The Cubs weren’t lighting the world on fire this year, but in three games, I thought they’d win at least one. No such luck.

8. The United States’ loss to Ghana in the World Cup. I figured the Americans weren’t going to win the cup. But after the team captivated me with thrilling wins, it let me down with a heartbreaking loss in the Round of 16.

7. Tiger Woods. I have to admit, I was a big fan. But his fall and subsequent lack of success was a big disappointment. Perhaps this is better on last year’s list, but his falling out — and his winless season — was more documented this year.

6. Not winning our football pick ‘ems. Again, I shouldn’t expect to dethrone the football guru that is Lucas Knutson, but I have higher hopes of myself. There is a couple weeks left this season, but his latest victory is all but locked up.

5. The lack of my team’s success when I’m in the stadium. I already mentioned the Cubs’ losses, but I watched Iowa fall to Wisconsin and the Bills lose to the Vikings. I just brought them bad luck. Or I cheer for bad teams.

4. The Iowa/Minnesota game. It was my first trip to TCF Bank Stadium, which was a blast. But the disappointment of the Hawkeye’s loss overshadowed the immaculate stadium.

3. The Minnesota Vikings. Enough said.

2. That Iowa is playing its bowl game on Dec. 28. With this team, the expectations were higher. I won’t say I thought they were going to win a national championship, or even make a BSC game. But I did figured they would be playing on New Year’s Day — or later — again this year.

1. I never watched a Twins game at Target Field. While this was the biggest disappointment this season, it’s the first item on my list of New Year’s resolutions.

I’m sure some of these will turn around in the coming year, I’m not fully convinced that I won’t be writing the exact same thing at the end of 2011.

On Saturday, Tsuyoshi Nishioka met with the media, donned his new Twins jersey, and officially became the first ever Japanese player to sign with the Twins.

If you haven’t found the time yet to figure out just who the heck this guy is, then keep reading.

Nishioka has spent his entire career until now with the Chiba Lotte Marines in Japan’s professional baseball league, the NPB (Nippon Professional Baseball). The Marines play in the Pacific League (the other is the Central League).

In his rookie year in 2005, he was a key player in a Marines team that surprised everyone by winning the Japan Series, sweeping the much favored Hanshin Tigers. Bobby Valentine was the Marine’s manager that season, and continued managing the team through 2009.

This past season, the Marines once again won the Japan Series, this time beating the Chunichi Dragons. Nishioka’s stellar season was less of a surprise this time around, but equally significant in bringing the Marines the championship. This year he became the first player to record at least 200 hits in the 145 game regular season since Ichiro Suzuki.

In between Japan Series championships, Nishioka was the starting shortstop for team Japan in both the 2006 and 2009 World Baseball Classics — both of which were won by Japan.

In short, Nishioka seems to bring championships wherever he goes.

I’ve always hoped that the Twins would sign a Japanese player, so when they acquired negotiating rights with Nishioka I was stoked. Now that the deal’s official, I’ll be the first person to buy a personalized Nishioka Twins shirt.

The question now for the Twins: is Nishioka the right Japanese player to have signed?

Ever since Hideo Nomo stunned the majors — and everyone in Japan too — by successfully transitioning from Japan to MLB (called the “dai-leegu” in Japan) back in 1995, the prospect of the best Japanese players crossing the Pacific to the USA has been a fixture of most off-seasons. Ichiro Suzuki’s crossing before the 2001 season put this trend into overdrive.

Ichiro was the first position player to try to play in MLB, and to date has by far been the most successful. His success sent major league teams looking for the next Ichiro, positive that Japan was full of players just like him.

The US media has already made comparisons between Nishioka and Ichiro — though these comparisons of course have to be taken with a grain of salt.

There is only one Ichiro (although it is actually a very common first name in Japan). It is not Nishioka. Nishioka probably still gets butterflies every time he meets Ichiro, even though they are teammates on the Japanese national team.

That’s not to say you shouldn’t expect special things from Nishioka. He possesses qualities that make him successful at what he does best — put the ball in play and hit for a high average. He is the type of player the Twins sorely need, a bona fide leadoff man, and I have no doubts he will excel in that role.

However, no matter how much hype a Japanese player receives when first entering the dai-leegu, there is no guarantee that his success will translate to the American game.

How will Nishioka compare to the other Japanese players that have tried playing in the big leagues?

The next big position player to follow Ichiro to the US was Hideki Matsui. Matsui played for the Tokyo Yomiuri Giants, Japan’s sacred team, and spent his career in Japan lauded as Japan’s next great home-run king after Sadaharu Oh (who was also a Giant). His home-run stroke didn’t translate fully to the majors, but, in spite of his injuries, for the past eight seasons he has been as solid and consistent a hitter as any other major league player.

Then there was the other Matsui – Kazuo. He was hyped when he came over from the Seibu Lions, but found less success playing shortstop for the New York Mets. He was traded to the Colorado Rockies, where he became the team’s every-day second baseman and helped lead the team to the 2007 World Series, but he wasn’t able to take his mile-high success to Houston. He finished his career in the US with the Triple-A Colorado Springs Sky-Sox, and will return to Japan next season to play with the Rakuten Golden Eagles.

Focusing solely on other infield players that have come to the US from Japan, we have had Tadahito Iguchi, Akinori Iwamura and catcher Kenji Johjima.

Iguchi was a power hitter for the Softbank Hawks, and was successful more as a speedster for the White Sox in 2005 and helped them win the World Series that year.   Iwamura, who was a power-hitter in Japan for the Yakult Swallows but was turned into a contact hitter by the Rays, was a part of their 2008 World Series team. Johjima, who was also a power hitter for the Hawks in Japan, never quite turned into the long-term option behind the plate that the Mariners needed.

All three ended up returning to play in the NPB. Iguchi came back in 2009 and was Nishioka’s teammate on the Marines championship team this season, Johjima was in Japan playing for the Tigers this season, and Iwamura will play with Kazuo Matsui on the Golden Eagles next season.

Nishioka’s three-year contract shows that the Twins are hoping that Nishioka bucks the trend of Japanese infielders only having short-term success, and will fit more into the Ichiro or Hideki Matsui model.

For every hit Japanese player, there has been a comparable bust. The Red Sox got Daisuke Matsuzaka from the Lions before the 2007 season, and the Yankees got Kei Igawa from the Tigers. Matsuzaka had the more successful career in Japan, though Igawa was also a star. Matsuzaka won the World Series in 2007, while Igawa failed miserably with the Yankees.

There have also been Japanese players that weren’t hyped much at all when they came to the majors, but ended up being successful anyway. For example, Nomo wasn’t much of a star when he played for the Kintetsu Buffaloes in Japan. He was a solid starter, but more in the way that Ted Lilly has been in recent seasons as compared to, say, Tim Lincecum. The Buffaloes fought to keep him anyway, which led Nomo to invent the current system that Japanese players use to come to the US — the posting system.

The way the system works is that MLB teams first bid for the right to negotiate with a player, then see if they can reach a contract — which is how the Twins got exclusive negotiating rights with Nishioka. Beforehand, Japanese players would have to wait until they became a free agent before being able to come to the US, which is only granted after nine years of experience — a measure that stopped pretty much any Japanese player trying to come to the US in the pre-Nomo era.

 Even the players that have come through the posting system have usually waited until late in their careers to make the leap to the US — which probably explains the lack of longevity of a lot of Japanese imports.

One player that hasn’t had a problem with longevity? Ichiro, of course. He came over at 27, and Nishioka is only 26 – that’s a good sign that over his three-year contract with the Twins we can expect Nishioka to put up prime-time numbers.

The final verdict on Nishioka won’t come until he steps onto the infield dirt at Target Field and starts playing ball. As we suffer through a horrendously cold winter until that point, we are left only to speculate at how spectacular that day will be.

My verdict?

I’ve paid very close attention to the past nine years of Japanese major leaguers, and I am among the crowd that believes that Nishioka will be one of the best of the bunch.

His numbers from Japan won’t translate perfectly — so don’t expect him to add the American League batting title to his Pacific League one (after all, he’ll have to beat out teammate Joe Mauer for that honor) — but do expect him to be an upgrade in the middle infield over any player the Twins have had in that position in the past nine years. I’ll say he’ll be better than a Luis Castillo, Orlando Hudson, Christian Guzman or Jason Bartlett.

No matter how Nishioka does, be prepared to see a throng of Japanese reporters at every Twins game this season. Japanese major leaguers make the headlines in Japan whether they hit a game-winning homer or whether they go 0-for-4.

Besides being surrounded by Japanese media, he may feel a bit out of place for a while being over 1,000 miles from the nearest ocean, so be sure to let him know you love having him here! Yell “katto-base” when he’s at bat (he is used to a constant stream of cheering throughout every one of his at-bats — band and all), and be ready for a very humble response when he gets a hit for a “sayonara” (walk-off) victory.

Goodbye Matt Guerrier.

So long Jesse Crain.

I can’t say I’m too upset about the Twins’ loss of Crain.

I have never been a fan of the hard-throwing right-hander.

I do have to admit, he was pretty reliable at the end of the season.

But I saw too many leads blown, too many pitches left up in the zone and too many wasted opportunities.

He did finish the season with a 3.04 ERA, including 62 strikeouts in 68 innings while posting a 1-1 record with a save and 21 holds.

But I can’t forget the way he started, with an ERA over five early in the season.

And to add insult to injury, Crain not only left, he signed with a division rival, the Chicago White Sox.
I can see why the Sox wanted him. In 45 games against the south-siders, Crain posted a 1.45 ERA.

And if that wasn’t bad enough, Guerrier bolted to join the Dodgers

Guerrier has been spotty at times as well, but he was an innings-eater.

He led the league in appearances in both 2008 and 2009, and since ’07, he has thrown 311 2/3 innings — the most by any relief pitcher.

As someone who watches — and occasionally cheers — for the Twins, the only question left is, now what?

Carl Pavano is still a free agent, and rumors are the Twins are after him.

But so is everyone else who needs a starting pitcher, including those who lost out on the Cliff Lee Sweepstakes.

Right now, Minnesota doesn’t have much in the bullpen.

Joe Nathan remains a big question mark after having Tommy John surgery last season.
I think Minnesota is OK at the end of games, even without Nathan. Matt Capps was a productive closer with the Nationals, and can be again.

Let’s be honest, if you can win with the Nats, you can win with the Twins.

Who can fill the gap between the starters and the closer?

Well, there’s Jose Mijares, a solid left-hander, assuming he can turn in a better spring training than a year ago, when he was demoted to Triple A to begin the year.

Brian Fuentes and Jon Rauch, who were both contributors to the bullpen last year, are still free agents. No doubt Fuentes wants a chance to be a closer again, but Rauch is a definite possibility. With the dollars that both Crain and Guerrier received, a deal for Rauch won’t be cheap.

According to an MLB.com report, Minnesota will look at Pat Neshek and Glen Perkins to return to their old form. Anthony Slama, Rob Delaney, Alex Burnett, and Carlos Gutierrez were also mentioned as replacements.

But they are mostly unproven.

Minnesota did make a splash with the signing of Japanese star Tsuyoshi Nishioka for the middle infield.

My fear is they haven’t done enough. And I’m talking just to compete in their division, not to mention the American League.

Both the White Sox (see Adam Dunn and the aforementioned Crain) and the Tigers (Victor Martinez) have made significant additions.

It seems the Twins have only made subtractions.

Orlando Hudson and JJ Hardy are both gone. The Twins hope Justin Morneau is back to start the season. Nick Punto is a free agent, and I have a sneaky suspicion he will re-sign before the season starts.

More than likely, Alexi Casilla will get a chance to be an everyday player — again — and will join Nishioka in the middle infield. Danny Valencia and Morneau should solidify the corners.

Of course, with the outfield they return, the Twins will have a feared lineup once again this season.

And they’ll need it. Because if the bullpen can’t hold a lead, the offense will have to score runs if Minnesota has any hopes of another postseason run.

With the way the 24 hour news cycle has developed in the sports world, could you imagine even a casual sports fan spending an entire day without getting a single sports update?

If you can’t imagine that, then imagining that same fan spending a whole two straight days without receving a single scrap of sports-related information would seem incomprehensible.

Now imagine that person is a sports reporter. Now we’ve entered the territory of the absurd.

Yet that person was me over Thanksgiving break.

I spent Thanksgiving Day and the Wednesday beforehand completely isolated from the greater sporting world. I didn’t watch a single NFL game. I didn’t acquire any sporting information from a single website, TV program, newspaper or magazine. I wasn’t even able to cheat by using a smart phone since I don’t have one.

I spent two days surrounded by relatives, food and conversation, without any sports news to interupt.

This situation shouldn’t seem out of the ordinary. For someone in my generation it’s harder to think back to a time where daily life wasn’t filled with an overload of information, but such a time did exist.

The way that the sports media industry has transformed — where even a mundane story such as Derek Jeter’s contract negotiations is updated almost to the minute — you can be thrown out of the information loop simply by sleeping in too long.

Sports media has evolved the characteristic of having a never-ending pursuit of sports-related news that rivals the pursuit of celebrity gossip in the tabloids.

In reality, we didn’t need to know everything about Tiger Woods’ infidelity and failed marriage, and we don’t need to print swimsuit issues of magazines featuring star athletes, but every day there are 24 hours of sports-related news to fill, so anything remotely related to the sports world is fair game.

This got me thinking — what will happen next winter if the predicted NFL and NBA lockouts become reality? What would the sports media industry look like without the weekly Brett Favre gossip, or whoever claims his space in the media spotlight if he finally retires?

There is always a wealth of college sports to cover, but this country already spends far more time than any other country in the world paying attention to college sports. There are always people who claim that college players should get monetary compensation, because they are already treated like pro athletes in many cases.

The absence of two major professional leagues would lead to even more scrutiny of the daily lives of college athletes, alienating them even further from the rest of the student body. They are, after all, supposed to be student-athletes, and not the other way around.

What surprises me most of all is that the sports media doesn’t seem to be panicking about the prospect of losing two gold-mines of coverage material, and that the leagues themselves aren’t already frantically trying to prevent a work-stoppage.

I agree that changes need to be made within both leagues, but in what world does erasing an entire season seem like a logical solution?

People may already start to be forgetting about the 2004-5NHL lockout and the 1994 MLB strike, both of which did succeed in bringing about change, but at what price? It is no secret that the model for the modern sporting world revolves around money and that fans often become an afterthought, but without fans, what is the purpose of having professional sports anyway?

The sporting world and the sports media that follows its every move need a reality check.

Professional sports are such a big part of our culture that they need a thriving news media to monitor them and keep them an honest industry that remains true to community values, which means focusing on their fans and the communites the teams reside in.

The sporting world doesn’t need the sports media to transform it into a soap opera.

Unfortunately for sports fans like myself, it’s hard to break free from the grasp of the never-ending cycle of needing all the latest sports news instantly. But once you spend some time without it — maybe next year if there is no NFL or NBA season — you may come to realize that there really isn’t much you’re missing out on.

It wasn’t a good day to be a Hawkeye.

I’d like to be able to make excuses. But I can’t.

Maybe the refs were against us. But they weren’t.

Maybe we got hosed out of a few calls. But we didn’t.

Plain and simple, Minnesota outplayed Iowa on Saturday afternoon.

I have to hand it to the Gophers, they played like a team with nothing to lose.

Because honestly, they didn’t.

After taking the opening kickoff and marching down the field for a score, new head coach Jeff Horton called for an onside kick.

The Iowa kickoff team was obviously caught off guard, and Minnesota recovered.

Before the Hawkeye offense even touched the ball, they were down 10-0.

What ensued was a great game. The wrong team won, but it was a great game.

The game featured kickoff returns for touchdown, touchdown runs, touchdown passes and even plays which needed review.

With four minutes remaining and a three-point deficit facing Iowa, I was confident.

Our offense had moved the ball well all day. Iowa’s kicker has a good enough leg that a field goal was a possibility.

But then the improbable happened.

Playing a freshman running back, Marcus Coker, the Hawks put the ball in his hands.

He ripped off a nice run, taking Iowa close to midfield.

Then disaster struck.

As he was switching the ball from one arm to the other, Minnesota’s Troy Stoudermire made a nice hit, forcing a game-changing fumble.

The Gophers recovered and their offense took care of the rest.

In the end, Minnesota took a 27-24 victory and re-took the Floyd of Rosedale for the first time since 2006.

For me, the day was depressing. It’s one thing to lose to Arizona on the road — the Wildcats turned out to be a good team. A loss to Wisconsin and a loss to Ohio State — two of the teams which tied for the Big Ten title — are also acceptable. Even Northwestern is a loss many Hawk fans saw coming. But what isn’t acceptable is a loss to the Gophers.

Sure, Minnesota ended on a two-game winning streak.

But the Hawkeyes played uninspired. They looked as if they almost gave up on the season before they even walked into TCF Bank Stadium last Saturday.

But they weren’t the only ones walking into the stadium for the first time.

I was also making my first trip to TCF.

The weather was cold, and there was still snow around the stadium, but I have to admit, it is a great place to watch a game.

We had seats behind the Iowa bench, on the 10-yard line.

What was amazing was the amount of Iowa fans.

I was sitting in the season ticket holder section. The section was nice, seats with backs as instead of bleachers.

Wearing as much Iowa gear as I could (my Hawkeye t-shirt was covered by about three layers), I was a little apprehensive as to the response I would get inside the stadium.

I’m convinced I was in the majority. My best guess is about 60/40 Iowa to Minnesota fans.

Perhaps the Gopher fans gave up on the season. Maybe it was too cold. Perhaps Iowa fans were just more vocal. But either way, it didn’t matter, the home-field feeling the Hawks had didn’t help.

With the temps dropping rapidly, the only complaint I have is the lack of heat. The restrooms were heated, but I was looking for lamps or other forms of heat. There weren’t any.

But we survived.

While the Gophers have momentum heading into next season, Iowa is left to sit and wonder.

What started as one of the most promising seasons in recent history has ended as one of the most disappointing.

Iowa will undoubtedly go to a bowl game. Which one it will be is yet to be seen.

Someday, I hope to return to TCF Bank.

Perhaps in two years when Iowa returns.

With any luck, it will be a different outcome, leaving fans with a much better feeling as they drive away from the new stadium.