There was a moment during a television broadcast last season that perfectly summed up safety Josh Metellus and the impact he makes for the Vikings.

The camera panned to Metellus late in the game between the Vikings and the Las Vegas Raiders, and a graphic popped up showing every position he had played to that point last season. There were 12 positions listed, including both safety spots, every cornerback spot, every linebacker spot, and a couple of spots on the defensive line for good measure.

In total, Metellus ended up playing 1,065 snaps on defense, a massive increase for him after spending the early portion of his career as an ace on special teams. The next step for Metellus is making an even bigger impact for the Vikings.

“I’m trying to build off what I did,” Metellus said. “Just being able to sit down and watch more than a thousand snaps of myself doing the things that I love to do, I was able to understand a lot about myself and the way I play, and my role in the defense.”

His role is hard to explain because Metellus doesn’t really have a position. He was hard to keep track of during training camp at TCO Performance Center, for example, as defensive coordinator Brian Flores consistently moved him all over the field. Asked what more Metellus could do on defense, Flores smiled and responded, “You got an hour?”

“We experimented with a lot of things with Josh last season, and he answered the bell in every way possible,” Flores said. “There’s more meat on the bone, and he wants to do it, so I’m happy to oblige.”

This is nothing new for Metellus. He has prided himself on his versatility ever since he was a star athlete at Charles W. Flanagan High School in Pembroke Pines, Fla. As an offensive player for most of his life growing up, Metellus has vivid memories of a particular 7-on-7 tournament during which he stepped up as a defensive player.

“Our safety went down, so I went out there and played,” Metellus said. “I did good, and I remember thinking after that like, ‘I can probably do anything on the field.’ It’s always been a matter of applying myself. Just doing the work necessary to improve.”

After making a name for himself at the University of Michigan largely because of his versatility, Metellus got selected by the Vikings in the sixth round of the 2020 draft. Though he barely touched the field on defense as a rookie, Metellus recalls angling for playing time any chance he got in practice

“I was constantly out there like, ‘Oh I could play a little bit of cornerback,’ or, ‘Oh I could play some linebacker,’ ” Metellus said. “Just saying stuff and then learning as I go.”

All the while, Metellus established himself as an ace on special teams. Never mind that he wasn’t playing much on defense. He was busy turning himself into a player special teams coordinator Matt Daniels felt comfortable using in every situation.

“Just being on special teams has kind of been a rite of passage in a sense,” Daniels said. “You groom these guys on special teams and send them on their way to their expanded roles on defense.”

That finally happened for Metellus last season as he played more defense than special teams for the first time in his career.

“It’s great for Josh to be in a defense where he’s able to use his versatility,” Daniels said. “That’s really what it’s all about at the end of the day. How can we maximize a player’s ability? I think Flo is doing an unbelievable job of using his strengths and trying to find a way to expose weaknesses of offenses.”

Whether he’s lining up as a safety in the deep portion of the field, bumping down and playing cornerback in the slot, or blitzing off the edge once the ball is snapped, Metellus has become a jack of all trades for the Vikings who is slowly starting to master all of them.

“It’s never too much for Josh,” fellow safety Cam Bynum said. “He’s so smart, and that gives him the ability to do as much as he has been able to do. It all starts with his knowledge of the game, and then he’s able to go out there and he’s a phenomenal athlete on top of that. Just a crazy good player.”

Maybe the scariest part for the rest of the NFL is the fact that Metellus joked that he barely knew what he was doing last season.

“I was going off instincts because everything was new to me,” Metellus said. “Now it’s about getting down to the little techniques, because I know that can make everything that much better.”

Minnesota Vikings safety Josh Metellus (44) breaks up a pass intended for Chicago Bears wide receiver Darnell Mooney during the first half of an NFL football game, Monday, Nov. 27, 2023, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr)

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The Washington County Sheriff’s Office will be adding two new airboats and a digital evidence management system to its fleet thanks to a $963,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Justice.

The county board on Tuesday voted to accept the grant, which is part of the Byrne Discretionary Grant Program run by the Office of Justice Programs for the Bureau of Justice Assistance; the program supports projects that improve the functioning of the criminal justice system, prevent or combat juvenile delinquency and assist victims of crime.

Rep. Betty McCollum, D-Minn., was the sponsor.

“With 251 lakes in Washington County, the waterways patrolled by the sheriff’s office vary in both terrain and accessibility,” county officials said in a statement. “Airboats give rescuers a secure and stable platform to navigate through unstable ice and wetland areas, granting access to remote locations. These boats allow responders to safely navigate and transition from solid ground, swamp, ice or open water with enhanced response times and reliability to perform essential lifesaving operations.”

The evidence management system will assist with digital evidence, which is now part of almost every criminal investigation. The sheriff’s office’s current management process “is limited by space, functionality, and performance constraints,” officials said.

The implementation of a cloud-hosted case-management system would give the sheriff’s office and the municipal public safety agencies in Washington County the ability “to efficiently store, analyze and share digital evidence, thereby improving the communication and overall effectiveness of public safety operations throughout the community,” they said.

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If this year’s Minnesota State Fair felt particularly busy to you, you’re right.

With total ticket sales of 1,925,904, this year’s Fair was the best-attended Get-Together since before the pandemic and the fifth-busiest of all time. Compared to last year, the Fairgrounds hosted an average of 7,500 more people per day this year.

Out of the Fair’s 12 days, five — including opening day — broke attendance records. Sunday, Sept. 1, was the second-busiest day in State Fair history, with 256,015 visitors showing up to the Fairgrounds. (The single-day record of 270,426 was set on the second Saturday of the 2018 Fair.)

Gov. Tim Walz, currently on the campaign trail as the Democratic vice presidential nominee, was one of Sunday’s fairgoers; he ate a pork chop on a stick and a milkshake during a short visit.

Massive lines were an unmissable sight at this year’s Fair, with significant wait times for new and popular foods including the buzzy deep-fried ranch dressing at LuLu’s Public House and the Amish doughnuts from Peachey’s Baking Company.

Despite record-smashing days, this year’s overall attendance was sunk by a pair of unusually sparse weekdays that were likely the result of unpleasant weather.

With high humidity and heat indexes in the triple digits Monday, Aug. 26, and rainstorms in the forecast Thursday, Aug. 29, attendance totals on both days barely topped 80,000. That was about half the average daily attendance for this year’s fair.

And a severe storm late Monday into Tuesday morning left vendors and grounds crews scrambling to clean up debris, and the Fair opened two hours late Tuesday — an unprecedented delay. The sun had come out by mid-morning Tuesday, though, and attendance for the day still reached a respectable 124,777.

“This year’s (State Fair) had its share of Minnesota weather, and the State Fair team responded by pulling together to keep people safe and to take care of the fairgrounds amidst episodes of extreme heat and humidity, rainstorms and high winds,” Fair CEO Renee Alexander said in a statement after the Fair concluded. “The Great Minnesota Get-Together is truly a special event where we can celebrate all that is great about Minnesota and each other.”

Few incidents of crime were reported on the Fairgrounds during this year’s Fair.

Late on Aug. 24, State Fair police responded to an altercation on the Fairgrounds and one person was checked for a possible head injury; separately that night, in response to a report of a stabbing, officers found one person with a non-critical leg injury from an undetermined cause, per the Fair.

About 10:20 p.m. on Labor Day, a 17-year-old was shot in the leg several blocks away from the Fairgrounds; that incident took place more than an hour after the Fair had closed for the year.

A 2022 incident in which a person was shot in the leg about 10 p.m. in the Midway area is the only Fairgrounds shooting that State Fair police chief Ron Knafla recalls in his 35 years of working at the Fair, he said last year. In response, security efforts were significantly amped up during last year’s and this year’s Fairs.

Minnesota State Fair by the numbers

The Fair’s creative activities and agricultural competitions, from livestock to flowers to canned fruits, drew more than 34,000 entries and awarded about $2 million in prize money, according to the Fair.

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Although no calves were born at the CHS Miracle of Birth Center due to disease concerns, the popular building still saw the births of 159 newborn animals.

And here are the daily attendance numbers, with comparisons to the 2023 Fair:

Thursday, Aug. 22: 138,875 (32,548 more than last year; a new record for the day)
Friday, Aug 23: 171,233 (6,492 more than last year; a new record for the day)
Saturday, Aug. 24: 184,564 (28,286 fewer than last year)
Sunday, Aug. 25: 134,644 (39,080 fewer than last year)
Monday, Aug. 26: 80,546 (53,600 fewer than last year)
Tuesday, Aug. 27: 124,777 (10175 fewer than last year)
Wednesday, Aug. 28: 145,531 (17,463 more than last year; a new record for the day)
Thursday, Aug. 29: 81,231 (48,270 fewer than last year)
Friday, Aug. 30: 225,521 (35,231 more than last year; a new record for the day)
Saturday, Aug. 31: 207,078 (6,908 more than last year)
Sunday, Sept. 1: 256,015 (114,689 more than last year; a new record for the day)
Monday, Sept. 2: 175,889 (56,158 more than last year)