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On 2/28/2021 at 7:02 PM, willie said:

You are a very good Monday morning quarterback. If you were saying all this back then I would like to see it. My memory was what’s taking May so long to name Crews. 

Monday morning quarterback implies I was silent and said nothing on Sunday. Wrong.  And I have proved it several times and not interested in yet again.  Ask BRoy - he said the same. And ask Thinks and Steve - they both recall me proving old posts by posting new on old posts and upsetting  the Board. Not doing that again. Several others all said the same thing.  Nothing all that unusual. Surprised you were not one of them. 

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On 2/28/2021 at 5:44 PM, Clock_Tower said:

Good leaders lead and bad leaders get led or don’t lead at all. Often times they do nothing. That was the case with Chris May and Jim Crews. Waiting until Jim Crews won the national coach of the year was too late.  From the beginning, Chris may should have controlled the narrative, said he would not be hiring any of our assistant coaches, said our new coach would a younger coach.... None of our assistants were up to the job. AD May knew what he had: an out of touch fossil - who I would have taken in the 1980’s - but not following RM in 2010’s. The game passed him by. You don’t think the players liked him and related to him as an assistant coach and that things suddenly changed once he became the head coach do you?  And you know how he (and Jim Platt) were run out of Westpoint bc of his personality and how he treated even the most accepting of his old school discipline, right?  What indication did he show while on Frost campus that he was up for our head coaching job?  Hints could have been dropped the whole year.  A coach could have been indirectly and secretly contacted and all but hired behind the scenes.  

Maybe Clock you can fill me in, I do realize this all conjecture but you seemed to be the most connected in the AD:

Majerus last act after the 2012 tourney run was to promote Whitsell to associate coach as far as I know. He then disappears to the West Coast, I guess for treatment, but passes around 6 months later. End of the 2013 season Crews gets the full-time coaching position, Whitsell bolts for St John's to work for Lavin. Some say it was to be closer to his wife who was in the brokerage business but I wonder if that was the whole story. Lavin is fired and Hurley picks him up at Buffalo. Hurley leaves for ASU and Whitsell gets the HC job. Granted he's no Hurley homerun but he's doing okay. To get these positions he must have something going for him. My question: Did May overlook Whitsell over Crews? 

I agree about Crews and May should have known. Once Majerus's players left, those last 2 years was some of the worst basketball I ever witnessed. Anything would have been better. And, I go back to the Buddy Brehmer years so it includes alot of lulus. I would tape a game on TV, watch 2 minutes and hit the delete button. I still have nightmares of Yarbrough's coast-to-coast misses. TF has been a godsend. 

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40 minutes ago, Cowboy said:

-not a fact

 

Majerus seemed pretty high on Whitsell. Little mention of Crews (of course he's not going to knock him) by Majerus. 

https://www.stltoday.com/sports/college/slu/slu-promotes-whitesell-to-associate-head-coach/article_76cfbf86-c13d-11e1-bf13-001a4bcf6878.html#.T-yS9_ItbIY.twitter

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5 hours ago, tarheelbilliken said:

 

Majerus seemed pretty high on Whitsell. Little mention of Crews (of course he's not going to knock him) by Majerus. 

https://www.stltoday.com/sports/college/slu/slu-promotes-whitesell-to-associate-head-coach/article_76cfbf86-c13d-11e1-bf13-001a4bcf6878.html#.T-yS9_ItbIY.twitter

Tarheel

Wish I could solve and end the contested debate once and for all but I cannot.   Here's what we know:

1.  RM had 2 older, former head coaches on his staff in Crews and Whitells

2. RM thought highly of both

3.   Some key Billiken insiders have reported that RM gave his preference for Crews over Whitesell (and I believe this story though not all do)

4.  AD May chose Crews as Interim HC over Whitesell and Whitesell left

Now to me, assuming the above preference of Crews over Whitesell was made, what did the preference mean?   RM wanted Crews as the caretaker and public face of the program until RM returned or that RM wanted Crews as our full-time next, permanent head coach.   I believe the former and your article supports my theory.

RM was not some long-time Billiken loyalist or separated from the program. Should a non-head coach loyalist like Dr. C give his wishes on his death bed, that's one thing.   But RM already was the head coach and most likely did not think he would die "so quickly" even though he had been dying for years and years with heart disease.  To me, even as bad as it was for him then, and no doubt RM knew things were bad and that his disease became worse and the doctors' option became fewer each time, RM always survived I believe he thought he would would somehow survive yet again.   And the article is typcial RM: praise for those around him... but to me, the key is that he found Whitesell to be a balance to him.   He stopped reading Whitesell's reports until RM watched them first and RM made his one determination. RM did not delegate.  It was not in his DNA.  RM did everything himself - he was a perfectionist.   Those who wanted responsibility delegated to them either left RM to get it elsewhere or never coached with him to start.  RM's coaching tree legacy is not much -- b/c IMO RM hired guys not to replace him but to complement him - to be a balance.  And Crews was no different.  IMO, RM clearly knew that neither could or should replace him but both were key balances to him.  As I (and several others) said at the time, neither Crews nor Whitesell were good enough to be our next head coach.   We had hired sucessful veterans in Spoon and RM and then we took a chance on an up and coming young coach in Romar ... but hiring older guys who previously failed in the Valley/MCC (Loyola, Evansville), Indiana State (Porter) and average years at SD State and Loras (Brad) is not the way for us to go.

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2 hours ago, Clock_Tower said:

Tarheel

Wish I could solve and end the contested debate once and for all but I cannot.   Here's what we know:

1.  RM had 2 older, former head coaches on his staff in Crews and Whitells

2. RM thought highly of both

3.   Some key Billiken insiders have reported that RM gave his preference for Crews over Whitesell (and I believe this story though not all do)

4.  AD May chose Crews as Interim HC over Whitesell and Whitesell left

Now to me, assuming the above preference of Crews over Whitesell was made, what did the preference mean?   RM wanted Crews as the caretaker and public face of the program until RM returned or that RM wanted Crews as our full-time next, permanent head coach.   I believe the former and your article supports my theory.

RM was not some long-time Billiken loyalist or separated from the program. Should a non-head coach loyalist like Dr. C give his wishes on his death bed, that's one thing.   But RM already was the head coach and most likely did not think he would die "so quickly" even though he had been dying for years and years with heart disease.  To me, even as bad as it was for him then, and no doubt RM knew things were bad and that his disease became worse and the doctors' option became fewer each time, RM always survived I believe he thought he would would somehow survive yet again.   And the article is typcial RM: praise for those around him... but to me, the key is that he found Whitesell to be a balance to him.   He stopped reading Whitesell's reports until RM watched them first and RM made his one determination. RM did not delegate.  It was not in his DNA.  RM did everything himself - he was a perfectionist.   Those who wanted responsibility delegated to them either left RM to get it elsewhere or never coached with him to start.  RM's coaching tree legacy is not much -- b/c IMO RM hired guys not to replace him but to complement him - to be a balance.  And Crews was no different.  IMO, RM clearly knew that neither could or should replace him but both were key balances to him.  As I (and several others) said at the time, neither Crews nor Whitesell were good enough to be our next head coach.   We had hired sucessful veterans in Spoon and RM and then we took a chance on an up and coming young coach in Romar ... but hiring older guys who previously failed in the Valley/MCC (Loyola, Evansville), Indiana State (Porter) and average years at SD State and Loras (Brad) is not the way for us to go.

Thanks Clock. Good objective analysis.

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