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Burwell's Article Today


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This not meant to be an attack on Burwell - he actually has been fair with us the last two years so I have no real complaints. However in his article today he says that the only way SLU can continue to fill the seats is to have local kids on the team. He does say that he had no problem with the talent that RM brought in but sees the lack of local players as a draw problem. This idea that local players bring in ticket purchases is honestly a small minded approach - when has all the local players that we have had created sell outs? - the only sell outs at the Chafietz have been since RM has been here and this year. I know about Spoon but honestly that was a Spoon thing as much as anything. Yes we had Highmark and Claggett but the odds of us getting the top two players out of StL ever year is very slim if ever.

The other issue in his article that I find wrong headed is when he talks about Crews showing he can do the day to day coaching required so he should get the job. All these media types who are pushing Crews all seem to manage to leave out or forget the entire recruiting part of the job. They simply think that recruiting is something that everybody can do apparently. If SLU hires Crews I will still be supportive of the program but I will also be watching carefully and if it looks like things are going south I will be the first to start calling for heads. Crews and May are on a short leash with me.

Agreed. We had a starting lineup of four local kids (Polk, Lisch, Liddell and Meyer) and folks weren't eactly busting down the doors to get in. Why? Those guys combined for zero postseason victories. Why did people start filling the Fetz late last year and throughout most of Feb. this season? Winning. It's simple.

Sure, it would be nice to get good local players, but it seems that the media tends to only look at it one way. They are falsely assuming that SLU doesn't want good local players or that they are somehow "missing" out on good locals. They miss the point that recruiting is a two-way street. Just once, I would like to hear them give the message to the top local high school kids encouraging them to stay at SLU. Highlighting that SLU has a great facility, had a Hall of Fame coach in RM and has shown that they can be a top 25 program. "Look kids, you can play big time basketball in your hometown." "Be a part of a winner in your hometown." If you want to get away from mom and dad and play out of town fine, but don't assume SLU is to blame every time a local player goes away.

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ACE has a good point.

How do you recruit anywhere? You win and show recruits that they can win and be noticed too.

I've been extremely hard on the SLU program for the 5*/4* guys that have left, but it can't be all SLU's fault. Other schools who have won or are winning a lot can use success that the Billikens cannot. Saint Louis is building a successful base for recruiting as we speak. 2 straight tournament appearances wasn't in the playbook for coaches here previously.

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ACE has a good point.

How do you recruit anywhere? You win and show recruits that they can win and be noticed too.

I've been extremely hard on the SLU program for the 5*/4* guys that have left, but it can't be all SLU's fault. Other schools who have won or are winning a lot can use success that the Billikens cannot. Saint Louis is building a successful base for recruiting as we speak. 2 straight tournament appearances wasn't in the playbook for coaches here previously.

Getting into the Big East is obviously another huge component. Take Cameron Biedschied for example. We DID offer him a scholarship early. He could have played for his hometown team and been ranked in the Top 25 and actually won an NCAA Tourney game, unlike the team he played for. The only thing missing... they were in the Big East and we are not at the moment. Hopefully Scott Suggs enjoyed watching his hometown team in the Dance the last couple of years. Always offer the good locals, but don't lower your standards by taking second tier locals. Keep winning and the good locals should take notice. If they still want to go away, you do what RM did. You go find good players elsewhere.

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while i agree that recruiting should not be tied to local or not, i dont know if majerus gave any mind to any local recruits. and if we could have found a local player that was as good as say mike mccall, what is wrong with saying that player should have been recruited instead of mike? while i like cody ellis, there were no players between here and australia of equal or greater talent?

again, i dont want the local recruit just because he is local. but the ones that are truly as good, why arent we pursuing?

Agree.

If you have two players ranked the same, one local and one not, take the local kid.

I think the Ellis thing is a little different though.

Hopefully bringing in a kid like Ellis/loe will open the door for more southern hemisphere players who are better than stateside talent.

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Getting into the Big East is obviously another huge component. Take Cameron Biedschied for example. We DID offer him a scholarship early. He could have played for his hometown team and been ranked in the Top 25 and actually won an NCAA Tourney game, unlike the team he played for. The only thing missing... they were in the Big East and we are not at the moment. Hopefully Scott Suggs enjoyed watching his hometown team in the Dance the last couple of years. Always offer the good locals, but don't lower your standards by taking second tier locals. Keep winning and the good locals should take notice. If they still want to go away, you do what RM did. You go find good players elsewhere.

I have personal knowledge of several of high profile recruits including David Lee and Cameron. The fact is that some kids just want to go out of town and some are wowed by a particular nationally known program. David was never considering staying home and nothing we could do would have changed his mind. Cameron and his family were wowed by the idea that he could go to Notre Dame and they were not interested in SLU. That does not mean we did a bad job of recruiting nor does it mean that the Big East was the reason he went to Notre Dame. The Big East had little to do with it and that is a good thing for ND because they will no longer be in the Big East! The fact is that many kids want to leave their home town and some want to stay. We need to find out who will seriously consider staying and then, if they are truly good enough to contribute and fit in academically then we should pursue them with vigor-- and that is what the staff is currently doing right now.

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Anybody with a brain knows that if we recruited some local stars it would increase interest, and if we also play well we will get more casual walk-in fans at the game because of the local name recognition.

We got some 2* - 3* types, IMO it helped interest and attendance overall. But they were not "stars". Damn good players, sure.

The 4*-5* types, "stars", however, can go to the Big 10-ACC-BE-Pac 10-SEC against the best and be on national TV, so why play in the A-10? To boot, some of these players obviously could not go to SLU where there are no jock friendly classes like at Missouri, Arkansas, etc. SO we are stuck, not going to get them, unless we get into the new league.

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The recruiter could be a younger guy that has done well at a lower level. One of the selling points of coming to SLU as an Assistant would be ... how long does JC have. 5-6 years? I'd love to see us grooming our next head coach

I hope his contract is not that long. It should be structured so that if "the powers that be" don't feel he's bringing in players that will keep the ball rolling, there's a buyout waiting for him at the end of next year. Why give him more? I liked the job he did this year, but he's still got a lot to prove. Those guys were RMs players. And I don't think he'd have a problem with a very limited term deal. Heck, he was out of coaching until RM called him. Guys like RM or Howland get multi year deals to rebuild. JC gets a very short term deal in my opinion. Plus, he's gonna be making a pot load more money than whatever he was doing up in Indiana. Last I heard coaching a 6th grade girls team doesn't pay that much.

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The only people that care whether they are local are the 382 people that personally know the kid. And it's been proven that out of the 382 people that know him 3.927% will go to any given game. Therefore we can be 100% certain that each local recruit will increase attendance by 15 people per game. In addition, half of those people will get in free reducing the number of seats for paying customers who want to come to the game to yell Aussie, Aussie, Aussie ... Oy, Oy, Oy or to see if a tall black is actually a tall black.

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Only 15 people were influenced to see Highmark & Claggett? Lisch & Liddell? Bonner? Hughes? It wouldn't be cool to have Ed Goddam McCauley's grandson here (3*)?

I think it matters.

Awh, nevermind.

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Anybody with a brain knows that if we recruited some local stars it would increase interest, and if we also play well we will get more casual walk-in fans at the game because of the local name recognition.

We got some 2* - 3* types, IMO it helped interest and attendance overall. But they were not "stars". Damn good players, sure.

The 4*-5* types, "stars", however, can go to the Big 10-ACC-BE-Pac 10-SEC against the best and be on national TV, so why play in the A-10? To boot, some of these players obviously could not go to SLU where there are no jock friendly classes like at Missouri, Arkansas, etc. SO we are stuck, not going to get them, unless we get into the new league.

Actually I consider that I have a brain and completely disagree with your position. (what a tool)

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The only people that care whether they are local are the 382 people that personally know the kid. And it's been proven that out of the 382 people that know him 3.927% will go to any given game. Therefore we can be 100% certain that each local recruit will increase attendance by 15 people per game. In addition, half of those people will get in free reducing the number of seats for paying customers who want to come to the game to yell Aussie, Aussie, Aussie ... Oy, Oy, Oy or to see if a tall black is actually a tall black.

Funny

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Only 15 people were influenced to see Highmark & Claggett? Lisch & Liddell? Bonner? Hughes? It wouldn't be cool to have Ed Goddam McCauley's grandson here (3*)?

I think it matters.

Awh, nevermind.

Yes but he did not want to come here - what don't you understand about that.

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Yes but he did not want to come here - what don't you understand about that.

No you do not understand the issue at hand.

The issue is "whether or not it would be appealing to fans and increase interest to have some very good local high school players play for Saint Louis University".

I say, yes.

You say, then, "no"?

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Only 15 people were influenced to see Highmark & Claggett? Lisch & Liddell? Bonner? Hughes? It wouldn't be cool to have Ed Goddam McCauley's grandson here (3*)?

I think it matters.

Awh, nevermind.

Even Easy ED could not make his grandson stay in town for college-kids want that go away experience. Getting kids from Chicago seems the best solution to me they have a load of competition at the high school level. Rarely, will you get small town kids who can step up but it is amazing that Oregon's Karezemi not sure of spelling was from Iran where we have poor if any diplomatic relations. But there was one high D1 recruit. RM was not afraid to recruit in Kansas City, if that kid hadn't got concussed we might have had a real 3 point threat. I would say only CR and DE had enough other skills to interest RM in spite of lacking high accuracy 3 pt shooting

Increase the recruiting budget-hire Lisch and Conklin to recruit after they finish playing downunder. Get more cheerleaders-oh we already did that.

Get a Chicago recruiter-that is what Porter Moser was; that is what RM was

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Getting into the Big East is obviously another huge component. Take Cameron Biedschied for example. We DID offer him a scholarship early. He could have played for his hometown team and been ranked in the Top 25 and actually won an NCAA Tourney game, unlike the team he played for. The only thing missing... they were in the Big East and we are not at the moment. Hopefully Scott Suggs enjoyed watching his hometown team in the Dance the last couple of years. Always offer the good locals, but don't lower your standards by taking second tier locals. Keep winning and the good locals should take notice. If they still want to go away, you do what RM did. You go find good players elsewhere.

+1

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I have personal knowledge of several of high profile recruits including David Lee and Cameron. The fact is that some kids just want to go out of town and some are wowed by a particular nationally known program. David was never considering staying home and nothing we could do would have changed his mind. Cameron and his family were wowed by the idea that he could go to Notre Dame and they were not interested in SLU. That does not mean we did a bad job of recruiting nor does it mean that the Big East was the reason he went to Notre Dame. The Big East had little to do with it and that is a good thing for ND because they will no longer be in the Big East! The fact is that many kids want to leave their home town and some want to stay. We need to find out who will seriously consider staying and then, if they are truly good enough to contribute and fit in academically then we should pursue them with vigor-- and that is what the staff is currently doing right now.

What I see you indicating here follows what Coach Majerus had to say in his book...he did not believe in wasting time on kids who did not show a real interest in coming to the school he was HC.

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I call Burwell's theory that SLU needs to bring local kids, the "Steamers" mindset. For those unfamiliar with the St. Louis Steamers, they were part of the Major Indoor Soccer League, whose success was attributed to bringing in a bunch of local soccer stars, sprinkled in with a few non-locals (Slobo). While it worked then, I don't think it's necessary today. Winning will fill up the seats. It worked in the MISL because St. Louis used to be a strong source of soccer talent.

Yes, Grawer was successful using this strategy, but that was with a mid-major conference. If SLU wants to reach the level of Xavier or Gonzaga on a consistent basis, they need to recruit nationally and not worry about hometowns.

But, it isn't true.

Saying, getting more local kids will increase attendance is roughly similar to saying SLU will draw more fans by playing more geographically closer teams, i.e. the MVC. It isn't true. There have been plenty of seats available in the recent past when SLU has played such teams.

SLU finished in the top ten Nationally last year in the category of increased attendance from the year before. What changed? Winning, a better team playing more competitive games vs competitive opponents. The geographic origin of the players on SLU's team didn't matter.

SLU's home game this year va VCU was one of the loudest Nationally this year. It wasn't because of local players on the team. It wasn't because it was played on a Tuesday night. It wasn't because SLU had a good team, playing a good opponent, in a bigger game.

The quantity of people that wouldn't go to a game because the players aren't local is miniscule. And, many of these same people still go anyway, even if those people would like to see a local player. There are plenty of casual fans out there that would scoop up tickets that have no interest in the geographic origins of the players. Do people think people cheered any less for SLU's players because they weren't from the local area?

Those teams that had higher attendance, just so happened to be good teams.

The crowd wasn't so great playing Blackburn on a weekday afternoon in some of the times of Burden and Leonard. Neither was the team.

Attendance has been down for years across the board in college basketball.

I spoke with many casual fans, many of whom were attending their first SLU game this year. None discussed the local player component as a reason whether they would come more often.

It's always encouraged to leave no stone unturned in recruiting, locally, regionally, nationally, internationally.

This general topic can be applied to other schools too. It isn't SLU specific.

The people aren't going to be less interested because Dwayne Evans is not from the local area, or insert player here. They want to have a good time. They want to see a competitive, exciting game, with good teams, and atmosphere.

They want to have fun. Because SLU has struggled for so long, it will take some more time than others to give it a try. They root for the name on the front.

There were a few good topics in that article. Saying local players will improve attendance isn't one of them.

can't agree more

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And teams w claggett high mark Hughes baniak redden were bringing in crowds of 20,000 and were top 10 in the nation in attendance.

Again, don't lower the roster talent to get local players but to ignore top local talent that is just as good is stupid. At least make the effort

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And teams w claggett high mark Hughes baniak redden were bringing in crowds of 20,000 and were top 10 in the nation in attendance.

Again, don't lower the roster talent to get local players but to ignore top local talent that is just as good is stupid. At least make the effort

Well, 20,000 tickets sold isn't possible. We all know that.

Rick didn't "ignore top local talent." Rick didn't say, "STL has crappy talent, I'm just going to completely avoid recruiting local players." The locals gave him early indicators that they weren't interested in SLU. Therefore, he backed off. Not sure why people (including those in the media) obsess over the local angle. I believe Cameron's first offer was from SLU. Furthermore, I remember when Majerus first took the job he had a parade of local recruits come meet with him at West Pine. Griffey wasn't interested in playing for Majerus (not sure where I read that exact comment). Suggs wanted to play for LoRo. Of the Northstar Trio, SLU ended up with Femi. Brett Thompson was local.

He didn't trust Mclemore or Young making it at SLU. That was probably the right call. Yes, I know they were admitted to KU and UA. Of course, that's not surprising since you have to be a real god damn moron not to get into those schools.

There seems to be this illusion that Majerus didn't care for or recruit local players. That simply isn't true. He

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Burwell's comments about the "need" for local players by SLU to maintain attendance is not only wrong but self-serving for his newspaper. No doubt, the local newspaper would prefer convering local kids which would turn into easier converage by the Post Dispatch writers (such as Burwell), additional interest in stories written by local kids considering SLU, committing to SLU and/or playing for SLU, and possibly increased sales of newspapers. Speculation that it has been the winning program (our teams under both RM and Spoon) as opposed to the presence of local kids is probably right. Proof that it is righ, though, can be shown if you actually consider the end of the Grawer era/beginning of the Spoohour era. At that time, both Grawer and Winfield were notable local figures. They had just landed and enrolled probably the largest local class of kids (Claggett, Highmark, Winfield, Bickel, Grant and Grawer). These guys played with local players such as Carlos Skinner and Melvin Robinson (and I'm probably forgetting others). The post dispatch ran articles all the time about not only our local players but then about these new freshmen and the accomplishements not only for the their respective high schools (Highmark's team was the Missouri State Champions) but also their for the play with the local AAU team, the Eagles. Just like the Post Dispatch's current love of writing stories about trolleys and public transportation, the sports page loved to write about our local players back then.

The problem, of course, is that despite all the local kids, they played in front of nearly empty crowds at the old Arena posting a record of 5-23. Attendance was lousy that year and yet I cannot imagine any team having more locals on it than that year (Grawer's last). So if the amount of local players has any correlation to sellouts, then we should have sold out our games that year. Of course, we didn't. Then some of the locals such as Skinner and Robinson quit (along with the other upperclassmen such as McGlother Irvin), Grawer played all the freshmen and the crowds still stayed away. If SLU's attendance is driven by watching locals play, we should have sold out then as well in that we started 4 or 5 locals!! After the season, then, we hired Spoon to replace Grawer, we moved to Kiel/Savvis/Scottrade and while Spoon began charming us all, played the locals and the Spoonball advertising were everywhere, the crowds improved but we were no where close to sellouts as the team won either 10 or 11 games.

The next year, after the additions of non-locals like H Waldman, our team took off and the winning followed. With each win, interest in the program increased, the winning streak became national news as well as local news, and finally the crowds came and the S L U banners/seat coverings were removed and the seats filled.

In short, winning is the only thing that will draw the crowds but locals may help drive interest/sales of the sportspage of the Post Dispatch.

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So what am I supposed to do when SLU has different teams with different attendance, with local players on them?

Liddell, Lisch, Polk etc..didn't have attendance inside of the top 50. They never averaged 10k a game. Am I supposed to wrongly assume that some local players are/were more popular than others?

SLU hasn't averaged 10k per game since the 2002 ending season.

Interestingly enough the attendance rank has remained roughly similar in recent years despite declining attendance. This is because attendance is has declined across the board in college hoops in recent memory.

SLU had another jump in attendance this season after a top ten increase last season.

Not every SLU team was filled with local players, and in some cases close to none. In 1997 SLU ranked 17th nationally in attendance despite a roster of mostly non-local players.

The idea that more local players increases attendance isn't true.

Recruiting is a local, regional, national, and international thing.

I wouldn't take a local player instead of non-local player just to do it. I wouldn't take a local player instead of a non-local player if they were roughly similar players. Something else would have to break that tie. There are plenty of other contributing factors that can decide that.

It's a separate topic, but there are many blue haired SLU soccer fans that think SLU can still roll out a team of locals an compete for national titles annually. They are usually at a loss when its pointed out to them that very thing has happened many time over the years at SLU since the last national title in the early 1970's. This is usually followed up by them with a comment of back when I was a kid we had better players and talent etc...They refuse to believe that the talent has improved and increases throughout the U.S. and elsewhere. Philadelphia Textile is no longer competing for titles.

The cost of tickets was also much less in a much larger venue at a different time.

The people have spoken regarding attendance. Win, with an affordable product, and play good teams. SLU is still in the process of attracting fans back to the program as well as for the first time.

People have referenced past Biondi comments regarding well the new arena is built, as if that's mostly all that was needed. Something similar can be said regarding attendance. The discounted tickets this past year for example was a success in getting more fans in the seats.

All teams have less attendance earlier in the season, on early week days, and against on-competitive opponents.

I'm all for SLU recruiting local players, but only the ones who are good enough in all senses of the word to play at the desired level. It's just one very small aspect of a program, and even recruiting.

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