Ford contract

[brianstl]

12 minutes ago, Brighton said:

Yes, but the usual suspects are fretting for no reason.

Who is really fretting?

[cheeseman]

1 hour ago, CBFan said:

I said, “if they decided” in my post not that were going to lease.

The point was not to get worked up or read too much into if they go that route because of the hot area market.

It would be nice to be in a financial position to know what the 5 million dollar market is.

Happy Friday 

Well not to draw this issue out but it is common that what we write we think is clear but to others who are not in our head it may not be so clear.  I went back and reread what you said and you use the word "if" when had you said "should" would have made it more clear but no worry I understand your point.

[RUBillsFan]

3 hours ago, Taj79 said:

As I said we'll agree to disagree because we won't really know Majerus/ intent until we ask him.  It is my contention, and others, that Majerus had no intentions of doing any more once his contract was up.  He was fed up with the Biondi crap and wasn't going to put up with it any more.  How else do you explain a cupboard left bare because that's all it was with Manning and Glaze?  BLUF:  we will never know.  Done with rehashing this old subject.

And I don't know why I called you "Cowboy,"  must've been the C and O in "Clock."  Sorry.

Uhhh.  Majerus did not leave the cupboard bare.  He left a cupboard that made 2 NCAAs while Jim Crews alienated pieces that could be useful in the future, chose not to recruit, and struck out on the recruiting trail.

[NH]

12 minutes ago, RUBillsFan said:

Uhhh.  Majerus did not leave the cupboard bare.  He left a cupboard that made 2 NCAAs while Jim Crews alienated pieces that could be useful in the future, chose not to recruit, and struck out on the recruiting trail.

It’s hard to argue against the fact that Majerus’ last two recruiting classes stunk: Glaze, Manning, Jared Drew, Keith Carter. Having said that, we had no playing time to offer so it was likely tough to recruit during that period. Crews made the problem worse by striking out with his first recruiting class of Crawford and Agbeko, which left us in a situation where the 2013-2014 team had no impact players other than 4 seniors and maybe the redshirting Ash Yacoubou.

[billiken_roy]

2 hours ago, Clock_Tower said:

Yes. And most likely Dick Bennett recommended his friend Brad Soderberg but Wisconsin chose Bo Ryan instead who successfully coached Wisconsin for over a decade.  And when Romar left, the players all lobbied for and got Brad Soderberg but I suspect they would’ve been happy with a Rick Majerus or a Travis Ford. And yes there was pressure upon athletic director May after the National Coach of the Year though a one year extension tender to the formerly retired Interim coach following Jim Crews’ first year as interim coach would not have been out of line  i said it then  Roy said it then ...many others as well  Does anyone think Jim Crews would have said no? Does anyone think we would have replaced him with a worse coach?

But everyone knew of Jim Crews’ age, his inability to relate well with the players and his prior multiple failures as a head coach. Remember he had been retired, completely out of the game after having left to prior places because he could not relate with the younger players.  These were unusual certain circumstances- the death of a Hall of Fame legend midseason, and a one-year extension would not have been unusual under these circumstances if AD May could not bring himself around to changing coaches and going in a different direction. Athletic directors are paid good money to make tough decisions, not go with flow and whims at the time. Add a minimum, the one year extension could have allowed the program to conduct a national search for a younger coach to take the Billikens in a direction for the next decade. No one thought Jim Crews could coach for a decade. 
And if Fr. Biondi equally disliked Rick Majerus why would he honor or factor in Rick Majerus’ alleged wishes in his hiring decision?

ithink rickma disliked fr biondi.  i dont know or think the feeling was mutual.   rickma was still calling most of the shots for the basketball program having to do with players and coaches.   business wise, like recruiting budgets etc were controlled by biondi.   

[slu72]

1 hour ago, brianstl said:

Who is really fretting?

Fretting is in Bilikens.com DNA. I thought you'd learned that by now. If the sky didn't fall today, just wait till tomorrow and wear your hard hat. In Billiken.com land pain and agony is always right around the next bend in the road. I'm not a worrier by nature, but when it comes to Billiken hoops I become Apocalypse Andy. 

[Cowboy]

22 hours ago, Taj79 said:

Cowboy:  how about we agree to disagree?  I have it from multiple sources that Majerus recommended good friend [dead] to take over for him, over and above former Loyola Coach Jim Whitesell.  [dead] came out of retirement to work for Majerus for free.  Majerus and [dead] might have even been on an Olympic team coachign staff once upon a time.  Majerus and [dead] were tight, anyone that says otherwise is kidding themselves.  That move was why Whitesell moved on to St. John's (now head coach at Buffalo after Oates went to Alabama).  Now, Majerus may have thought he was coming back but we all know he didn't.  It is then my opinion (and others) that May could not fire the recent Coach if the Year in [dead] for fear of the public relations image that would create and we all know how badly that went.     Enter Travis Ford (Yay!).

 

 

-to answer your question, nope, not on this one

[Clock_Tower]

4 hours ago, willie said:

For what it's worth I was hearing that Biondi wasn't going to renew Majerus's contract. Either way he was probably gone. No love lost between the two. 

Agree about the no love lost between the two. As to whether Fr Biondi was going to renew his contract, Father Biondi most likely did not want to resign RM and while Fr Biondi did a lot of foolish things, he was no fool. And if Jim Crews did as well as he did with RM’s teams, does anyone think that RM would not have done even better? And if RM did as good or better would there not have been the huge public support with the fans, the boosters, the University, the city and Dr C to keep RM at all cost?  Would not this public pressure which “forced” AD May to sign Jim Crews have also not forced Fr Biondi to extend RM?  I believe RM would’ve stayed at SLU as long as RM wanted to be here. And with the broken promises and negative actions Fr Biondi, things were not looking good.  But with all that said, I also do not believe RM was trying to sabotage and ruin the program.  Were there some weak recruits on our team brought in by RM? Sure. Then again RM started with and also brought in a lot of weak recruits, most of whom, good or bad, he showed them the door as he reloaded and tried again. 

[slu72]

RM had his fair share of misses on recruits, but he also landed a bunch of gem in the rough types who gave us 4 years of good BB. Also some of the best technically sound teams we’ve ever seen. 

[billiken_roy]

11 minutes ago, slu72 said:

RM had his fair share of misses on recruits, but he also landed a bunch of gem in the rough types who gave us 4 years of good BB. Also some of the best technically sound teams we’ve ever seen. 

i think rickma was a pretty good developer of talent, thus the technical aspect.   i think he creamed his roster and ran players off to find his right players that would develop and play his way which i dont agree with.   but there is no doubt that team that was nationally ranked and taken to the tourney with crewsplatt was one that rickma developed and overachieved with if you consider where they all started as freshmen.    

[slu72]

2 hours ago, billiken_roy said:

i think rickma was a pretty good developer of talent, thus the technical aspect.   i think he creamed his roster and ran players off to find his right players that would develop and play his way which i dont agree with.   but there is no doubt that team that was nationally ranked and taken to the tourney with crewsplatt was one that rickma developed and overachieved with if you consider where they all started as freshmen.    

And they coached themselves when Dead took over. They didn’t really need him other to make sure they made the planes on time and arranging for meals on road trips. You or I could have been the HC and got the same results for those 2 seasons. 

[willie]

1 hour ago, slu72 said:

And they coached themselves when Dead took over. They didn’t really need him other to make sure they made the planes on time and arranging for meals on road trips. You or I could have been the HC and got the same results for those 2 seasons. 

Look Cruse was a disaster . Could not recruit . But to say he didn’t coach Rick’s team well is wrong. Players don’t coach themselves. Your narrative is just wrong. 

[AnkielBreakers]

4 minutes ago, willie said:

Look Cruse was a disaster . Could not recruit . But to say he didn’t coach Rick’s team well is wrong. Players don’t coach themselves. Your narrative is just wrong. 

Wow. Maybe “Cruise” was always his name? I mean, that is exactly what he did.

[majerus mojo]

15 minutes ago, willie said:

Look Cruse was a disaster . Could not recruit . But to say he didn’t coach Rick’s team well is wrong. Players don’t coach themselves. Your narrative is just wrong. 

Pretty sure Evans stated on a podcast they coached themselves and I’m not giving Crews any benefit of the doubt on that 

[3star_recruit]

A guy who can't coach would never have won at Evansville.  Creating a system and recruiting players to that system is the only way to win there. 

Crews just threw a roster together that was incapable of doing what he wanted when he became the head man.  He would have been better off recruiting three guys who could really shoot the ball and getting a Chris Heinrich clone to set screens.

 

 

 

[slu72]

I recall Dead saying he liked to play off ball screens, ie motion offense from IU days, whereas Rick preferred on ball screens. Rick’s tactics stuck with his guys and we were successful. When those guys departed, I don’t know what the hell the system was. That is, unless helter skelter is a system. 

[dlarry]

11 hours ago, majerus mojo said:

Pretty sure Evans stated on a podcast they coached themselves and I’m not giving Crews any benefit of the doubt on that 

This is exactly right.

Evans definitely talked about coaching themselves and I thought another player hinted at the same thing?

 

 

[dlarry]

11 hours ago, 3star_recruit said:

A guy who can't coach would never have won at Evansville.  Creating a system and recruiting players to that system is the only way to win there. 

Crews just threw a roster together that was incapable of doing what he wanted when he became the head man.  He would have been better off recruiting three guys who could really shoot the ball and getting a Chris Heinrich clone to set screens.

 

 

 

I’m not saying that Crews never knew how to coach.

I‘ll even say that in his younger days he was probably a brilliant basketball mind.

Unfortunately by the time he got here his passion for the game had left and the game most likely had passed him by. He should have never agreed to coach knowing he wasn’t not going to give it his all.

 

[JMM28]

Can we get an automated bot poster to automatically post "You people in Evansville" whenever Crews and Evansville appear in the same topic? 

Also - Jim Platt is the worst assistant coach in Billiken history and one of the worst in America. People forget that. 

[RUBillsFan]

54 minutes ago, JMM28 said:

Can we get an automated bot poster to automatically post "You people in Evansville" whenever Crews and Evansville appear in the same topic? 

Also - Jim Platt is the worst assistant coach in Billiken history and one of the worst in America. People forget that. 

Crews: Hey, I'm an old fart who doesn't understand modern college players and has no way of relating to them.  Instead of hiring a young-ish hotshot recruiter, I'll bring in another old fart who doesn't understand modern college players and cannot relate to them in any way at all.  I'll also give this guy total control over recruiting.  He should probably also be named Jim because it is such a cool name.

[Compton]

14 hours ago, 3star_recruit said:

A guy who can't coach would never have won at Evansville.  Creating a system and recruiting players to that system is the only way to win there. 

Crews just threw a roster together that was incapable of doing what he wanted when he became the head man.  He would have been better off recruiting three guys who could really shoot the ball and getting a Chris Heinrich clone to set screens.

An Illinois native, IU alum, recruiting Indiana and Illinois kids, at an Indiana school can work occasionally in the MVC. A team led by Roby, Yarbrough, Reynolds, Bartley and Welmer might have done pretty well at Evansville. 

But that lineup wouldn't/didn't work at the A10 level, and that recruiting approach would never generate the type of depth we have (and need) now. 

[3star_recruit]

23 minutes ago, Compton said:

An Illinois native, IU alum, recruiting Indiana and Illinois kids, at an Indiana school can work occasionally in the MVC. A team led by Roby, Yarbrough, Reynolds, Bartley and Welmer might have done pretty well at Evansville. 

But that lineup wouldn't/didn't work at the A10 level, and that recruiting approach would never generate the type of depth we have (and need) now. 

Going to a Crews practice was like watching Groundhog Day.  He was spending way too much time trying to teach guys who had been playing one way their whole lives a totally different way.  If you want to play like Davidson, then recruit jump shooters who know how to use screens and 80% of the job is done. 

Note that when Yarbrough and Reynolds went elsewhere and we're allowed to play their games, they did just fine.

[White Pelican]

I just remember Yarbrough pulling down a rebound and rolling up the floor like a bowling ball intent on converting a 3 pin spare. A charging foul is a charging foul I don’t care what league you’re in. Maybe his next coach cured him of that. I didn’t miss him.