Throwback Thursday: The Day Keith Millard Killed Monte Kiffin

The Minnesota Vikings closed their 52nd training camp at Minnesota State Univesity-Mankato yesterday. They won't return. The Vikings are scheduled to open their spacious new digs next March in Eagan. They will hold begin holding training camps there next summer. It's an exciting and sad change. Mankato has been the Vikings training camp home for my entire time as a fan. There are so many stories. One of my favorites was recently retold by Minneapolis Star Tribune writer Mark Craig.

Monte and his mannequin?

Longtime equipment manager Dennis Ryan’s work in Mankato is serious business. But there was that one classic exception back in the ’80s.

In 1986, coach Jerry Burns concocted a prank he wanted to pull in camp. It required Ryan borrowing a mannequin.

“For three straight summers, I went to Sears down here and took a mannequin out on loan,” Ryan said. “I had no idea why Burnsie needed a mannequin. I just got it and hid it in my closet in the dorms until Burnsie said he needed it.”

Two summers passed.

“Finally, the time was right and Burnsie told me to go get the mannequin,” Ryan said.

The prank began with Burns orchestrating a shouting match in the training room between linebackers coach Monte Kiffin and defensive lineman Keith Millard. Soon, the entire team was talking about it.

“So Burnsie dresses the mannequin up to look like Monte,” Ryan said. “Monte and Keith take it way up to the rooftop of the Gage Hall towers.”

Down below, as practice is starting, Burns at least tried to be nonchalant in getting the players to notice the ruckus atop Gage Hall.

“Keith and Monte staged this big tussling match up there,” Ryan said. “Then they went behind the chimney. Then Millard comes out and throws the mannequin off the roof.”

That story has been told enough times that the mannequin really should be put in the Vikings’ Hall of Fame. But it won’t be.

“I took it back to Sears,” Ryan said. “Fortunately, nothing got broken in the fall.”

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Mankato will be missed.