TD
Recruit
Posts: 42
|
Post by TD on Jan 30, 2006 21:10:00 GMT -5
How come the thread is no longer closed?
|
|
|
Post by fwalum on Jan 31, 2006 11:49:23 GMT -5
I am a little surprised at the tone of this thread. I don't consider myself to be an apologist but I wonder how many of you have any real coaching experience above the grade school level. How many of you have been a regular at practice or in the huddle of a college level team. Coaching a team at this level reminds me of a little skit on the show "Whose Line is it Anyway" were one guy can not use his extremities and the other guy stands behind and becomes his arms and legs. The guy in front can only indicate to the man in back by the way he speaks how he wants his arms and legs to move. Sometimes they do things right and sometimes not. Sometimes they appear to act on their own no matter what is said. Unfortunately the guy standing in front is normally the one that has to take all of the flack.
There is a large matrix of components that make up a college level basketball team. If any one of those components is missing or not up to snuff, the end product suffers. From some conversations earlier this year and from the posts that supposedly indicated players were criticizing the coaches, I can surmise that all is not quite right with this team and a number of these components are not the way they should be. Can things get back to there proper balance? Homer is still a good coach and the players are still the same athletic players we all were excited about earlier in the season. I believe that they will come up with the proper mix to make this a team.
|
|
|
Post by rick on Jan 31, 2006 12:13:58 GMT -5
I am a little surprised at the tone of this thread. I don't consider myself to be an apologist but I wonder how many of you have any real coaching experience above the grade school level. How many of you have been a regular at practice or in the huddle of a college level team. Coaching a team at this level reminds me of a little skit on the show "Whose Line is it Anyway" were one guy can not use his extremities and the other guy stands behind and becomes his arms and legs. The guy in front can only indicate to the man in back by the way he speaks how he wants his arms and legs to move. Sometimes they do things right and sometimes not. Sometimes they appear to act on their own no matter what is said. Unfortunately the guy standing in front is normally the one that has to take all of the flack. There is a large matrix of components that make up a college level basketball team. If any one of those components is missing or not up to snuff, the end product suffers. From some conversations earlier this year and from the posts that supposedly indicated players were criticizing the coaches, I can surmise that all is not quite right with this team and a number of these components are not the way they should be. Can things get back to there proper balance? Homer is still a good coach and the players are still the same athletic players we all were excited about earlier in the season. I believe that they will come up with the proper mix to make this a team. Don't ever be surprised at the tone of an unhappy fan. They will always be pissed off as they should be. It would be one thing if we had players that were not any good. No one would expect them to win. It is quite another when a team with a winning tradition in a mediocre conference allows other less-talented teams to whip on them. One should get angry about that and one should be able to be critical and it should wake up the echoes and heat should be applied to anyone in power who is so complacent that they might believe it doesn't matter or that they are above criticism. It doesn't even take a grade school kid to figure out something is rotten in Denmark. Some changes need to be made. Something is wrong!!! You don't have to have a degree in coaching to know when you see bad coaching anymore than you have to have a degree in medicine to know that someone bleeding profusely has a medical problem. If positive change is going to be made and if we have any chance of turning this season and the future direction (now downward) around, everyone from top to bottom has to be open to criticism and has to take a hard look at what the problems are. No one should get a pass from this examination including the honorable Homer Drew. After all, the person at the top has the ultimate responsibility for the job he is supposed to be doing. You don't blame your underlings for your own failures. I think Homer is a good man, an admirable man, a man who I look up to as a very good human being but somewhere in my mind I think he chose to make his retirement decision for a good reason. Only he knows what that reason is. Larry Bird, Magic Johnson, and others make the same kinds of decisions because something happens in their own minds which gives them the signals that they just can't do what they used to be able to do or that the younger guys are kicking their butts or that they just don't have the desire anymore - whatever. And they decide to retire to keep from embarrassing themselves and ruining their legacies. I don't claim to know why Homer retired but my guess is that there was in his mind a good reason and that when he did it demonstrated very good timing to go out when he was at the top. But then he decided to return to coaching to help his son. That too is a classy thing to do but was that decision the best decision for the university and the team? I don't know. Perhaps(I hope we do) we will make the dance this year and be a play-in team and Homer can reevaluate whether he wants to bow out gracefully or put himself through this kind of inevitable scrutiny that will come with the job of being a head coach at a university that wants to continue a tradition of winning and being the dominate team in the Mid-Con. Homer and his sons had everything to do with getting us where we are and that can never be forgotten. But some realistic assessements have to be made and some hard decisions have to be made for the good of the program.
|
|
|
Post by fwalum on Jan 31, 2006 18:20:06 GMT -5
Why is everybody assuming that the long term trend is down. Lets remember that major changes have happened recently to this coaching staff. I would tend to believe that Bryce coming on board is a very positive development for the program. His impact should be huge in the area of recruitment. We have never had anyone as recognizable and easy for current players to associate with as Bryce will be. The one downside is that it will take a couple of years to make a difference on the floor
I dissagree that the average lay spectator can tell the difference between bad coaching and poor execution of strategy. Anybody can put on a tourniquet but it takes a professional to fix the underlying problem. It is way too early and irresponsible to be asking, expecting or IMO suggesting drastic changes.
|
|
|
Post by rick on Jan 31, 2006 18:42:39 GMT -5
Why is everybody assuming that the long term trend is down. Lets remember that major changes have happened recently to this coaching staff. I would tend to believe that Bryce coming on board is a very positive development for the program. His impact should be huge in the area of recruitment. We have never had anyone as recognizable and easy for current players to associate with as Bryce will be. The one downside is that it will take a couple of years to make a difference on the floor I dissagree that the average lay spectator can tell the difference between bad coaching and poor execution of strategy. Anybody can put on a tourniquet but it takes a professional to fix the underlying problem. It is way too early and irresponsible to be asking, expecting or IMO suggesting drastic changes. When looking at an investment opportunity, one way of determining the long-term trend is to place the performance on a graph. If we do something similar with the performance since 1994 with Valpo Men's basketball, I think the graph would indeed reveal a downward trend which should be cause for concern and intermediate corrective action must not only be anticipated but also immediate action should be taken. Whether Bryce will turn out to be as good as Scott in the recruiting department remains to be seen. Let's hope he can do even better. Drastic changes? Perhaps not drastic but I'm sure you are familiar with the story about the frog placed in a pot of warm water. The fire gets turned on and as the water becomes hotter and hotter the frog's body adjusts and the poor creature doesn't even know he is about to die as the boiling point is reached. If nothing else, this losing streak to inferior talent should raise a caution flag and merely to assume it's a little bump along the way not worthy of serious attention is assuming the status-quo will take care of itself - and this as the temperature is rising..
|
|