HoosierPal Posted April 27, 2016 Share Posted April 27, 2016 Two new items: He just got back from a 2 days international recruiting trip. He has hired a couple more for his staff, and it will all be announced 'in a day or two'. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CBFan Posted April 27, 2016 Share Posted April 27, 2016 From the outside looking in it appears coach Ford knows what he is doing on rebuilding the SLU program. He is putting a staff together and really going after players and each day I am more confident that coach Ford will get the job done. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kshoe Posted April 27, 2016 Share Posted April 27, 2016 From the outside looking in it appears coach Ford knows what he is doing on rebuilding the SLU program. He is putting a staff together and really going after players and each day I am more confident that coach Ford will get the job done. I have faith/hope in Ford but I'm not sure that I'd say that the mere act of him putting together a staff and offering up a bunch of scholarships increases my confidence. Start signing some kids or getting international recruits and then the confidence meter goes up. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JMM28 Posted April 27, 2016 Share Posted April 27, 2016 I have faith/hope in Ford but I'm not sure that I'd say that the mere act of him putting together a staff and offering up a bunch of scholarships increases my confidence. Start signing some kids or getting international recruits and then the confidence meter goes up. Yep. Doing basic job requirements don't impress me much. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ACE Posted April 27, 2016 Share Posted April 27, 2016 Ford also mentioned that he has learned from past situations and will not just carelessly throw out offers to fill scholarships right after taking over. He will be selective. Assuming we only have two scholarships to fill, I would think landing one HS kid and a transfer (perhaps the kid from Rutgers) would be a realistic recruiting goal for this spring. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billiken_roy Posted April 27, 2016 Share Posted April 27, 2016 I have faith/hope in Ford but I'm not sure that I'd say that the mere act of him putting together a staff and offering up a bunch of scholarships increases my confidence. Start signing some kids or getting international recruits and then the confidence meter goes up. Been a long time since I agreed with Kshoe on much of anything. He's completely on the mark here. Anyone can get a list of players and make offers. It's about solid commitments. Then what do you do after that. It will be awhile before we know if our new coach is the right hire. Honestly unless it's bad, it's probably gonna be 3-5 years before we know if we're on the right path and we might see the ncaa for longer than that. Anyone expecting faster and better than that are setting themselves up for disappointment. Folks we were buried the last two years. It will take time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cheeseman Posted April 27, 2016 Share Posted April 27, 2016 Been a long time since I agreed with Kshoe on much of anything. He's completely on the mark here. Anyone can get a list of players and make offers. It's about solid commitments. Then what do you do after that. It will be awhile before we know if our new coach is the right hire. Honestly unless it's bad, it's probably gonna be 3-5 years before we know if we're on the right path and we might see the ncaa for longer than that. Anyone expecting faster and better than that are setting themselves up for disappointment. Folks we were buried the last two years. It will take time. Roy, I generally agree with this but I do think that if Ford can get some decent transfers that his second season could be a pleasant surprise. This current group will be seniors and unless they are really just bags of rocks they should be able to be at least a productive supporting cast. In one year or so Ford will have 4 schollies to give from this group and if he is working the recruiting trail right he could make a pretty good haul. I am not saying in his second year that we will be an NCAA team again but we could be respectable and that would be a big deal in my opinion. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Clock_Tower Posted April 28, 2016 Share Posted April 28, 2016 Been a long time since I agreed with Kshoe on much of anything. He's completely on the mark here. Anyone can get a list of players and make offers. It's about solid commitments. Then what do you do after that. It will be awhile before we know if our new coach is the right hire. Honestly unless it's bad, it's probably gonna be 3-5 years before we know if we're on the right path and we might see the ncaa for longer than that. Anyone expecting faster and better than that are setting themselves up for disappointment. Folks we were buried the last two years. It will take time. No. We will know after 1 to 2 years if we are on the right path. 3 to 5 years? Kids only play for 4 years. Ford's 2nd class will have graduated after 5 years!! Yes and no about normal job descriptions. It is a given that we will have a full staff of coaches and that we are handing out offers but I dont recall any international recruiting trips ever for Crews. And putting toether 2 respected, active assistants with A10 and geograpical connections along with a list of recruits is not the same as calling your loyal flunkee Jim Platt with whom you failed at Army. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheA_Bomb Posted April 28, 2016 Share Posted April 28, 2016 I expect him to recruit well and put together a solid staff. He's done it before. Where he's faltered is NCAA Tournament wins. I think SLU could be in the tourney in 3 years. The deal is so far he's shown his ceiling is making the tournament when faced with another quality team presumably with a quality coach in a pressure situation he loses. That is his track record. If in 6 years we've made 2 or 3 tourney appearances and had first round exits will we accept that's Ford's ceiling? Will we want to make a change? I know right now, that sounds so much better than the previous 2 years because it is but we want Sweet 16s, a Great 8 one day. That's why I was advocating for another coach even one we didn't know the ceiling on because there was possible upside. Like signing a veteran free agent you know what you're getting or trading for a unproven rookie with potential. We signed the veteran free agent and I think we've seen his capabilities. I'm liking the offers. I'll get excited with the signings. I'm just skeptical and my skepticism won't be disproven for a while. Though I'll take swigs of Kool-Aid for sure when we start winning. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billiken_roy Posted April 28, 2016 Share Posted April 28, 2016 No. We will know after 1 to 2 years if we are on the right path. 3 to 5 years? Kids only play for 4 years. Ford's 2nd class will have graduated after 5 years!! Yes and no about normal job descriptions. It is a given that we will have a full staff of coaches and that we are handing out offers but I dont recall any international recruiting trips ever for Crews. And putting toether 2 respected, active assistants with A10 and geograpical connections along with a list of recruits is not the same as calling your loyal flunkee Jim Platt with whom you failed at Army. you guys are under the impression that ford is going to walk in and start recruiting A+ classes immediately. Far above the crews recruits. While i expect the quality to go up, i believe it will be a gradual elevation of talent. the bigtime recruits are not going to all at once come to play for slu. it will take a marked improvement of the program before those higher echelon players begin to give us a second thought. that is why goodwin and the althoff kids were important. we had the advantage of a local that showed interest that if he lived in dustbowl oklahoma wouldnt have given us a second thought. but until the likes of jordan goodwin start committing to the billikens, i say you all are naive to believe we are going to start signing 4 star recruits coming off of back to back horrible laughingstock seasons. every coach in the country will use that against us. i hope i am wrong. but like i said, it will not come easy, it will be a long slow crawl back to the ncaa tourney. as of now, i believe coach ford will not be the billiken coach that completes the journey, somewhere in the next 10 years we will likely make another chance which of course brings all the questions of where we are again. the damage that crews did to this program was monumental. and for now i just want to see us get to 500 and be respectable. we got to crawl before we can walk then after that we start to run. but if ford indeed does hit a couple of homeruns like goodwin things indeed can change quickly. we shall see. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Billiken4life5 Posted April 28, 2016 Share Posted April 28, 2016 The one positive of how bad the last two seasons have been is that Crews can sell immediate playing time to recruits when he is on the trail. That's a big selling point these days and if I was a 4 star and I saw a coach with a history of developing NBA guys and saw this roster I would think I could go there and be "the man" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billiken_roy Posted April 28, 2016 Share Posted April 28, 2016 The one positive of how bad the last two seasons have been is that Crews can sell immediate playing time to recruits when he is on the trail. That's a big selling point these days and if I was a 4 star and I saw a coach with a history of developing NBA guys and saw this roster I would think I could go there and be "the man" all four star recruits think they can go to anywhere and be the man. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Billiken4life5 Posted April 28, 2016 Share Posted April 28, 2016 all four star recruits think they can go to anywhere and be the man. All 5 stars do but there are some 4 stars who are more realistic and look at a team coming off a sweet 16 and understand that they would be a role player for at least a year Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CBFan Posted April 28, 2016 Share Posted April 28, 2016 you guys are under the impression that ford is going to walk in and start recruiting A+ classes immediately. Far above the crews recruits. While i expect the quality to go up, i believe it will be a gradual elevation of talent. the bigtime recruits are not going to all at once come to play for slu. it will take a marked improvement of the program before those higher echelon players begin to give us a second thought. that is why goodwin and the althoff kids were important. we had the advantage of a local that showed interest that if he lived in dustbowl oklahoma wouldnt have given us a second thought. but until the likes of jordan goodwin start committing to the billikens, i say you all are naive to believe we are going to start signing 4 star recruits coming off of back to back horrible laughingstock seasons. every coach in the country will use that against us. i hope i am wrong. but like i said, it will not come easy, it will be a long slow crawl back to the ncaa tourney. as of now, i believe coach ford will not be the billiken coach that completes the journey, somewhere in the next 10 years we will likely make another chance which of course brings all the questions of where we are again. the damage that crews did to this program was monumental. and for now i just want to see us get to 500 and be respectable. we got to crawl before we can walk then after that we start to run. but if ford indeed does hit a couple of homeruns like goodwin things indeed can change quickly. we shall see. I think you misunderstand Roy, my point was I like what coach Ford has done so far and all I have is to base that on is the body of work in a short time. Clock Tower articulated my point by saying, "And putting toether 2 respected, active assistants with A10 and geograpical connections along with a list of recruits is not the same as calling your loyal flunkee Jim Platt with whom you failed at Army". I like the international recruiting trip and I hope for the type of recruits like Rob Loe and Cody Ellis. The coaching legend Rick Majerus took several years to get SLU back to the big dance so I would not expect coach Ford to get there any faster. The next step for coach Ford is if he can close the deal with scholarship offers of good players offered for 2016. If coach Ford closes the deal on a couple good players for 2016 then his body of work will trend upward. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CBFan Posted April 28, 2016 Share Posted April 28, 2016 No. We will know after 1 to 2 years if we are on the right path. 3 to 5 years? Kids only play for 4 years. Ford's 2nd class will have graduated after 5 years!! Yes and no about normal job descriptions. It is a given that we will have a full staff of coaches and that we are handing out offers but I dont recall any international recruiting trips ever for Crews. And putting toether 2 respected, active assistants with A10 and geograpical connections along with a list of recruits is not the same as calling your loyal flunkee Jim Platt with whom you failed at Army. You articulated my point about coach Ford's body of work so far perfectly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Clock_Tower Posted April 28, 2016 Share Posted April 28, 2016 you guys are under the impression that ford is going to walk in and start recruiting A+ classes immediately. Far above the crews recruits. While i expect the quality to go up, i believe it will be a gradual elevation of talent. the bigtime recruits are not going to all at once come to play for slu. it will take a marked improvement of the program before those higher echelon players begin to give us a second thought. that is why goodwin and the althoff kids were important. we had the advantage of a local that showed interest that if he lived in dustbowl oklahoma wouldnt have given us a second thought. but until the likes of jordan goodwin start committing to the billikens, i say you all are naive to believe we are going to start signing 4 star recruits coming off of back to back horrible laughingstock seasons. every coach in the country will use that against us. i hope i am wrong. but like i said, it will not come easy, it will be a long slow crawl back to the ncaa tourney. as of now, i believe coach ford will not be the billiken coach that completes the journey, somewhere in the next 10 years we will likely make another chance which of course brings all the questions of where we are again. the damage that crews did to this program was monumental. and for now i just want to see us get to 500 and be respectable. we got to crawl before we can walk then after that we start to run. but if ford indeed does hit a couple of homeruns like goodwin things indeed can change quickly. we shall see. Roy. I am NOT comparing Travis Ford to Rick Majerus but Majerus rebuilt our teams and programs to levels we have not seen in over 40 years -- and he did so without the help of local players such as Goodwin. And while the our kids did knot come from dustbowl oklahoma, they did come from Oregon, Wisconsin, Austrailia, New Zealand and Chicago/Northern Illinois. Often times the locals are the hardest to truly land. Yes, Crews blew it because Majerus built the program up to such high levels that even the locals (from Goodwin to Tatum) were interested but then Crews then ran the program into the ground. I sure hope we land the best local players but I believe that Ford will need to win without them first. Going forward, again, I believe there is enough talent without any new players, to be a .500 team if the kids are properly coached, are able to gain confidence lost and are put in proper positions to succeed. The addition of a few new players (2 to 3 star kids) would greatly help. And again, if we are trying to see if Ford has the team on the right path, upwards of 5 years seems excessive. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cheeseman Posted April 28, 2016 Share Posted April 28, 2016 you guys are under the impression that ford is going to walk in and start recruiting A+ classes immediately. Far above the crews recruits. While i expect the quality to go up, i believe it will be a gradual elevation of talent. the bigtime recruits are not going to all at once come to play for slu. it will take a marked improvement of the program before those higher echelon players begin to give us a second thought. that is why goodwin and the althoff kids were important. we had the advantage of a local that showed interest that if he lived in dustbowl oklahoma wouldnt have given us a second thought. but until the likes of jordan goodwin start committing to the billikens, i say you all are naive to believe we are going to start signing 4 star recruits coming off of back to back horrible laughingstock seasons. every coach in the country will use that against us. i hope i am wrong. but like i said, it will not come easy, it will be a long slow crawl back to the ncaa tourney. as of now, i believe coach ford will not be the billiken coach that completes the journey, somewhere in the next 10 years we will likely make another chance which of course brings all the questions of where we are again. the damage that crews did to this program was monumental. and for now i just want to see us get to 500 and be respectable. we got to crawl before we can walk then after that we start to run. but if ford indeed does hit a couple of homeruns like goodwin things indeed can change quickly. we shall see. You don't need 4 stars - you need 3 stars with upside - can Ford get those kids now - who knows but I think tamping down expectations is fine but lets not rule a faster pace out either. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billiken_roy Posted April 28, 2016 Share Posted April 28, 2016 Roy. I am NOT comparing Travis Ford to Rick Majerus but Majerus rebuilt our teams and programs to levels we have not seen in over 40 years -- and he did so without the help of local players such as Goodwin. And while the our kids did knot come from dustbowl oklahoma, they did come from Oregon, Wisconsin, Austrailia, New Zealand and Chicago/Northern Illinois. Often times the locals are the hardest to truly land. Yes, Crews blew it because Majerus built the program up to such high levels that even the locals (from Goodwin to Tatum) were interested but then Crews then ran the program into the ground. I sure hope we land the best local players but I believe that Ford will need to win without them first. Going forward, again, I believe there is enough talent without any new players, to be a .500 team if the kids are properly coached, are able to gain confidence lost and are put in proper positions to succeed. The addition of a few new players (2 to 3 star kids) would greatly help. And again, if we are trying to see if Ford has the team on the right path, upwards of 5 years seems excessive. And Rickma "rebuilt" a program where the previous season had won 20 games and returned billiken all time greats Kevin lisch and Tommie liddell. And it took him longer than the two years you are inferring this is going to happen with a horrible roster returning and consecutive horrible seasons. You are way off base. Now if all of you are considering 500 a return to greatness, then I apologize for my overzealous expectations. We better be 500 in 3-4 seasons. I guess I just want more. But maybe I just need to understand we are the direct TV settlers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wgstl Posted April 28, 2016 Share Posted April 28, 2016 nm Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kshoe Posted April 28, 2016 Share Posted April 28, 2016 And Rickma "rebuilt" a program where the previous season had won 20 games and returned billiken all time greats Kevin lisch and Tommie liddell. And it took him longer than the two years you are inferring this is going to happen with a horrible roster returning and consecutive horrible seasons. You are way off base. Now if all of you are considering 500 a return to greatness, then I apologize for my overzealous expectations. We better be 500 in 3-4 seasons. I guess I just want more. But maybe I just need to understand we are the direct TV settlers. But Kevin Lisch and Tommie Liddell, as great as they are, didn't really contribute to the rebirth of billiken basketball so their presence on the team is irrelevant. Rather, it was the Kwamain/Conklin class that as sophomores should have been in the NIT and as juniors would have made the NCAA tourney if not for the situation. Apply that same timeline to Ford and what he needs to get done with the 2017 class and transfers: 2016-17: we suck again 2017-18: Above .500 but showing typical freshman flashes and inconsistencies: 2018-19: NIT caliber or close to it with a core group of sophomores and some help from transfers 2019-20: NCAA or bust with junior core. Not exactly a 10-yr plan. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JMM28 Posted April 28, 2016 Share Posted April 28, 2016 Every time Tommie Liddell is referred to as one of the all time greats it makes me cringe at how mediocre/bad the program has been. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
slufan13 Posted April 28, 2016 Share Posted April 28, 2016 I think Roy's point is that having a 20-win team with respectable players like Lisch and Liddell allowed Majerus to land recruits who could lead us to that point. Ford is inheriting a terrible roster and he may need to land the Lisch's and Liddell's before he can get the guys who will lead us back to the tourney. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kshoe Posted April 28, 2016 Share Posted April 28, 2016 I think Roy's point is that having a 20-win team with respectable players like Lisch and Liddell allowed Majerus to land recruits who could lead us to that point. Ford is inheriting a terrible roster and he may need to land the Lisch's and Liddell's before he can get the guys who will lead us back to the tourney. I think that's a stretch at this point. Kids are going to come here because Ford sells them on the vision for SLU and ample playing time. I doubt Majerus was able to use the "opportunity to play with Lisch and Liddell for one season" as a key to getting his first real class. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
slufan13 Posted April 28, 2016 Share Posted April 28, 2016 I think that's a stretch at this point. Kids are going to come here because Ford sells them on the vision for SLU and ample playing time. I doubt Majerus was able to use the "opportunity to play with Lisch and Liddell for one season" as a key to getting his first real class. But he could use the fact that he had a 20 win team and not a team that has barely combined for 20 wins the last 2 seasons combined. I don't think it's going to take 10 years either, but I could see it taking until 2020 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ACE Posted April 28, 2016 Share Posted April 28, 2016 Every time Tommie Liddell is referred to as one of the all time greats it makes me cringe at how mediocre/bad the program has been. And the "20 win season" is really overstating where the program was at. It was a very soft 20 wins, a 20-13 record, 8-8 in conference and a 7th place finish in the A-10. Also, Ian was graduating and RM was hired so late in the process he had no time to recruit that spring. The talent level RM inherited was very weak outside of KL and TL. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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