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Coach Ford on the Radio, 2020


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6 hours ago, billiken_roy said:

i was told rickma always believed he would recover and be back.   as to exact quote, that was quite awhile ago.  dont think i can accurately tell you word for word what someone said to me in a casual conversation that many years ago.   for the record i bet i would be in the majority that would have picked whitesal from the get go.   i would have never picked crews.  the sob was way past his time.  rickma was a basketball genius.   he knew what he was doing.   and thus, my belief is he didnt want someone to come in and succeed with his team.   crews was the right choice for rickma to achieve that vision.   what rickma failed to see was that he was going to die.     

i think expecting a saint louis university athletic director to deny a hall of fame coach his wish is very unrealistic.   if you could have told him no and then started a national search you are one cold hearted mf.   i didnt like rickma the person.   i have always recognized he was a basketball genius.   i believe when most people really think about it, they probably are somewhat the same only they recognize the coaching end of the scale WAY more than i do.   my point is, to expect may to overrule rickma is unrealistic.   to not give crews the job after being named national coach of the year is unrealistic.  

what i would take away from the now long ago scenario is that when crews proved to the world he wasnt the guy and failed bigtime once all of rickma's guys were gone and that tells me may did his job as expected.   we would have never gotten a recruiter the ilk of ford when rickma picked crews.   maybe the whole scenario was good karma finally for the billikens. 

-there are no facts in this post that support the Roymur that Coach Majerus picked Crews as his replacement, interim, permanent or any dream scenario one can concoct 

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17 hours ago, glazedandconfused said:

Hindsight. If there's a nationwide search, and some of Jett/Evans/McCall/Loe transfer, that would've been seen as a major failure too. Kneecap the best SLU run of the 21st century right in the middle of it. 

 

16 hours ago, billikenfan05 said:

Yeah. I think bringing in a new guy from a national search to take over a program off 3 straight NCAAs would have been a better deal. 

Hindsight?  No.  Go back and read my comments -- as well as a core group of posters on this Board PRIOR to the removal of the interim tag and hiring of Jim as permanent coach.  I, along with many others on this Board, repeatedly said the team was coaching itself and winning despite Crews as our interim coach.    If we could tell that guys had no respect for Crews, then why should AD May have not also seen this?  Again, AD was either incompetent  or he closed his eyes (I suggest this) as it was painfully obvious at the time -- not just in hindsight.

And guys, again, get your timeline in order.   We went to the NCAA Tourney 3 years - yes.   The first year was with RM.   The second year was with Crews as the Interim coach.   The third year was with Crews in his first year as our permanent head coach.   In short, had we NOT hired Crews as permanent head coach, we still would have had 2 NCAA Tournament years and our new coach would have had the chance to coach Jett, McCall, Evans, Loe and KM - all as Seniors.   Even if the new head coach brought a different style of play, I see all 5 of these guys staying together as they liked each other/were a tight group for their Senior year - and as mentioned, KM had no options left to transfer.  And just for the record, Crews changed the screens (on ball vs. off ball screens) and tried to add his own touches to the team.  This new coach would have been able to an equal/better job than Crews and we would not have had to experience the absolute failure/embarrassment of our next 2 years.   Instead, maybe we reload prior to waiting for Coach Ford.  Maybe we land Tatum as well?

 

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16 hours ago, Clock_Tower said:

No.  Go back and read my posts - and the posts of many others.   I, along with many others, have consistently opposed the hiring of Jim Crews.  

How do you not hire the National Coach of the Year?  Easy - bc you set out the ground rules early.  You hire him for the Interim year only, you announce that the program is looking for young replacement, you have 4 extra months to see what interest exists, you publicly reward Crews with honors, plaque and for his stepping in to "save the program" but you then hire a real coach.   If the AD does his job and actually talks with the players , he finds out what they think -- and no one raved about Jim Crews.   And keep in mind, Conklin, Cassity and Remekun already graduated after the Interim year so your only remaining players was the soon to be Senior class of Loe, Jett, Evans, McCall and KM.  KM already used up his redshirt year with Situation I and those other guys are not transferring their Senior year if we bring in a Travis Ford type of hire.

Is it unfair to expect an AD to know what his coaches can really do and not do?   Or is he just to read the national newspaper and make only what appears to be "safe" choices.    Why did Wisconsin not give the job to Brad Soderberg after Bennett unexpectedly quit?  Wisconsin knew better --- and its a shame SLU did not know better with either Soderberg or Crews.

 

 

16 hours ago, Clock_Tower said:

So a nationwide search scares away players?   You know this how?   You know that SLU cannot speak directly with coaches under contract and during the season especially so not much publicly goes on during the season, right?   You know that we had 2 really good runs by Crews with RM's players and that the first year would have happened anyway b/c RM was sick to start the season, he died December 1st and no player could have transferred and played that season, right?

You do know that KM could not have transferred the following year bc he used up his redshirt right?  You do know that SLU could have run by the name of their next head coach to gauge the reactions of the then Senior Class of Jett/Evans/McCall and Loe right?  

And as precedent, when we let Grawer go and hired Spoon, Charlie actually got Highmark and Claggett to stay.   And when Spoon left, Marquee Perry and Josh Fisher chose to stay and play for Romar.   And when Brad was fired, Lisch and Liddell chose to stay and play for RM.   So you still think our really good Senior class all leaves and goes in different directions if we don't hire Crews?  Jim Crews?  They came to SLU for RM - not Jim Crews.   And they stayed at SLU despite Jim Crews.

 

1 hour ago, Clock_Tower said:

 

Hindsight?  No.  Go back and read my comments -- as well as a core group of posters on this Board PRIOR to the removal of the interim tag and hiring of Jim as permanent coach.  I, along with many others on this Board, repeatedly said the team was coaching itself and winning despite Crews as our interim coach.    If we could tell that guys had no respect for Crews, then why should AD May have not also seen this?  Again, AD was either incompetent  or he closed his eyes (I suggest this) as it was painfully obvious at the time -- not just in hindsight.

And guys, again, get your timeline in order.   We went to the NCAA Tourney 3 years - yes.   The first year was with RM.   The second year was with Crews as the Interim coach.   The third year was with Crews in his first year as our permanent head coach.   In short, had we NOT hired Crews as permanent head coach, we still would have had 2 NCAA Tournament years and our new coach would have had the chance to coach Jett, McCall, Evans, Loe and KM - all as Seniors.   Even if the new head coach brought a different style of play, I see all 5 of these guys staying together as they liked each other/were a tight group for their Senior year - and as mentioned, KM had no options left to transfer.  And just for the record, Crews changed the screens (on ball vs. off ball screens) and tried to add his own touches to the team.  This new coach would have been able to an equal/better job than Crews and we would not have had to experience the absolute failure/embarrassment of our next 2 years.   Instead, maybe we reload prior to waiting for Coach Ford.  Maybe we land Tatum as well?

 

Good posts, Clock, though I don't necessarily agree with everything you say and don't care to verify whether you posted that you didn't want to Crews to be retained when March 2013 rolled around (as far as I'm concerned, that's all water under the bridge).  I do want to correct a few factual errors.

Corey Remekun was not in the same class as Brian Conklin and Kyle Cassity (which also initially included Kwamain Mitchell, Willie Reed, and Femi John [and Ruben Cotto — remember him? Heh!]).  Remekun came in with Cody Ellis, Christian Salecich, Jon Smith, Justin Jordan, and Jeff Reid the next year.  Remekun's senior year was with Mitchell during Crews's interim year.

Josh Fisher came to SLU with Romar from Pepperdine; he was not a holdover from Charlie Spoonhour like Marque Perry.

Mitchell was a senior during Crews's interim year, 2012-13, so a new permanent coach would not have had him available.

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34 minutes ago, Quality Is Job 1 said:

 

 

Good posts, Clock, though I don't necessarily agree with everything you say and don't care to verify whether you posted that you didn't want to Crews to be retained when March 2013 rolled around (as far as I'm concerned, that's all water under the bridge).  I do want to correct a few factual errors.

Corey Remekun was not in the same class as Brian Conklin and Kyle Cassity (which also initially included Kwamain Mitchell, Willie Reed, and Femi John [and Ruben Cotto — remember him? Heh!]).  Remekun came in with Cody Ellis, Christian Salecich, Jon Smith, Justin Jordan, and Jeff Reid the next year.  Remekun's senior year was with Mitchell during Crews's interim year.

Josh Fisher came to SLU with Romar from Pepperdine; he was not a holdover from Charlie Spoonhour like Marque Perry.

Mitchell was a senior during Crews's interim year, 2012-13, so a new permanent coach would not have had him available.

Thanks.  On second though, believe you are correct. KM came in with Conklin and then finished a year later.   Conklin's last year was with RM as head coach - 1st NCAA run, so yes, KM was part of the 2nd NCAA run.  

And, yes, Josh came in a year after Marque.   I recall comments from Romar at the MAC luncheon.  Didn't Charlie unsuccessfully recruit Fisher but then he chose Romar/Pepperdine - only to then come to SLU later with Romar?

And yes, I sure do like having Coach Ford (though it's a shame his plans were set back by dramatically by Situation 2) but my preference would have been a Coach Ford type of guy hired after the Crews interim coach year.   

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2 hours ago, Clock_Tower said:

 

Hindsight?  No.  Go back and read my comments -- as well as a core group of posters on this Board PRIOR to the removal of the interim tag and hiring of Jim as permanent coach.  I, along with many others on this Board, repeatedly said the team was coaching itself and winning despite Crews as our interim coach.    If we could tell that guys had no respect for Crews, then why should AD May have not also seen this?  Again, AD was either incompetent  or he closed his eyes (I suggest this) as it was painfully obvious at the time -- not just in hindsight.

And guys, again, get your timeline in order.   We went to the NCAA Tourney 3 years - yes.   The first year was with RM.   The second year was with Crews as the Interim coach.   The third year was with Crews in his first year as our permanent head coach.   In short, had we NOT hired Crews as permanent head coach, we still would have had 2 NCAA Tournament years and our new coach would have had the chance to coach Jett, McCall, Evans, Loe and KM - all as Seniors.   Even if the new head coach brought a different style of play, I see all 5 of these guys staying together as they liked each other/were a tight group for their Senior year - and as mentioned, KM had no options left to transfer.  And just for the record, Crews changed the screens (on ball vs. off ball screens) and tried to add his own touches to the team.  This new coach would have been able to an equal/better job than Crews and we would not have had to experience the absolute failure/embarrassment of our next 2 years.   Instead, maybe we reload prior to waiting for Coach Ford.  Maybe we land Tatum as well?

 

There’s no proof a new hire would’ve done an equal/better job than Jim Crews. In fact, without some really good coaching we don’t beat Nc State in the tournament in the first place. I’m also agreeing that it would’ve been nice to replace Jim after the Jett senior year, but there’s just no way they were going to drop him after the interim year, unless SLU thought they were going to land a big name coach. I don’t care if a handful of random Billikens.com posters wanted him gone, we don’t run the program.

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40 minutes ago, glazedandconfused said:

There’s no proof a new hire would’ve done an equal/better job than Jim Crews. In fact, without some really good coaching we don’t beat Nc State in the tournament in the first place. I’m also agreeing that it would’ve been nice to replace Jim after the Jett senior year, but there’s just no way they were going to drop him after the interim year, unless SLU thought they were going to land a big name coach. I don’t care if a handful of random Billikens.com posters wanted him gone, we don’t run the program.

Not only was it implausible (or impractical, at least) to refrain from removing the interim tag from Crews after '13, but it also would have been an injustice (not to mention expensive) to fire him after '14 (as you suggest would have been "nice").  Once they made the decision to make him the permanent coach after he won the (babysitter-disguised-as) coach of the year honor in '13, they had to give him adequate time to demonstrate whether he could maintain an acceptable program level with his own recruits.  That meant he had to have a full-term contract to recruit with, complete with the buyouts.  And it wouldn't have appeared fair to dismiss him after the first bad year, because it takes longer than one year with one recruiting class to get the system rolling — I think every coach proves that.

I have to agree with 3-Star; in hindsight, everything turned out the way it had to, and in the long run it has been for the best.

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4 minutes ago, cheeseman said:

Crews had very little to do with that epic comeback against NCS.  That game turned on the guards just driving with a bull like attitude.  Crews connection to that win is that he sat in the chair.

So you're saying it wasn't Crews's decision to press or that it wasn't a press that he designed?

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15 minutes ago, cheeseman said:

Crews had very little to do with that epic comeback against NCS.  That game turned on the guards just driving with a bull like attitude.  Crews connection to that win is that he sat in the chair.

We fouled for about 45 minutes straight and put NC State on the line. That and the press won us the game. 

Lancona and McBroom played pretty much the entire OT. That’s a good coaching job by crews.

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26 minutes ago, glazedandconfused said:

We fouled for about 45 minutes straight and put NC State on the line. That and the press won us the game. 

Lancona and McBroom played pretty much the entire OT. That’s a good coaching job by crews.

I'm pretty sure it was reported that we never even practiced a press before that game.  I'm not sure how that you can give Crews credit for that.

We won because NC State missed a bunch of FTs and we basically stopped playing the way Crews had coached them all season.  I'm more confident that it was just the senior players saying f*ck it, we're way behind in this game, let's go out on our own terms and it worked because NC State hadn't scouted / planned for that.

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14 minutes ago, RUBillsFan said:

I'm pretty sure it was reported that we never even practiced a press before that game.  I'm not sure how that you can give Crews credit for that.

We won because NC State missed a bunch of FTs and we basically stopped playing the way Crews had coached them all season.  I'm more confident that it was just the senior players saying f*ck it, we're way behind in this game, let's go out on our own terms and it worked because NC State hadn't scouted / planned for that.

You can be confident in whatever you want, but Crews and co. called an audible mid-game and it gave us a chance to win. Credit should go to both the players and Crews. 

Side-Note: The Screw-Crews Crew has officially passed the M.I.Z F. Mizzou armada in terms of my favorite subsections of this board.

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16 minutes ago, glazedandconfused said:

You can be confident in whatever you want, but Crews and co. called an audible mid-game and it gave us a chance to win. Credit should go to both the players and Crews. 

Side-Note: The Screw-Crews Crew has officially passed the M.I.Z F. Mizzou armada in terms of my favorite subsections of this board.

Are there people who aren’t on the Crews sucks train? He set our program back years. I assumed that was one thing all Bills fans agreed upon.

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5 minutes ago, NH said:

Are there people who aren’t on the Crews sucks train? He set our program back years. I assumed that was one thing all Bills fans agreed upon.

I don't think he's one of the worst coaches ever, no. The death of Majerus/not recruiting kids in 2011 +  2012 is what set us back. That falls on Majerus, Crews and some bad fortune with Majerus falling ill. But he wasn't the grim reaper for our program. 

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2 minutes ago, glazedandconfused said:

I don't think he's one of the worst coaches ever, no. The death of Majerus/not recruiting kids in 2011 +  2012 is what set us back. That falls on Majerus, Crews and a little bad fortune with Majerus falling ill. But he wasn't the grim reaper for our program. 

He was a horrible recruiter and a completely inept game day coach to boot.......

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4 hours ago, cheeseman said:

I have often wondered if some well placed boosters liked Crews and saw him as more pliable to their needs than RM and this is why he was hired?  Just asking.

Check w/ B'roy on this, but I'd heard Dr. C couldn't stand Crews. I recall a video where Crews actually snubbed Dr. C on a walk across the court after one of his rare Ws at the Fetz. 

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FWIW, I don't think he was a good coach. He clearly needed to go and Ford is obviously a lot better both recruiting and Game-planning.  I was just responding to the idea that Crews had nothing to do with us gameplanning vs NC State. He was a bad coach who did a fine job with Majerus' players. That seems pretty obvious. 

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