Doogie: Jimmy Williams wins 1.2 million dollars

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BleedGopher

BleedGopher

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I'm sure more details will follow quickly.

Go Gophers!!
 



Finally, it's over. 1 down (Tubby-Jimmy trial), 3 (Nolen, Mbakwe, White) to go. Hopefully all off-court headaches resolved for good by October 15th.
 



This is a.......

travesty. I guess it's a case of awarding the "poor me," sales pitch, and taking from someone with deep pockets of tax payer money.

Don't spend it all at Runyon's Jimmy!
 

Another masterful stroke by Maturi! This could've been settled out of court for probably a quarter of the judgment. Now if they appeal it, it'll only get more and more expensive. I personally think Maturi should've let Williams come on, but okay, he made his decision. But no sense in letting this thing go to court. This should've been settled a long time ago.
 

Seriously, our Athletic Department is a joke.
 

Tubby blew this one.

You may not think Williams deserves anything, but if as Tubby says, once he knew about Williams' infractions he knew it wasn't appropriate to hire him . . . then the real question is HOW IN THE HELL DID TUBBY NOT KNOW ABOUT WILLIAMS' PAST?

This is a man he was about to hire. So he either didn't know him very well - or didn't do any sort of checking up on him whatsoever. Or both. In this day of Google and wikipedia, this would not have been difficult. In fact, I just did it. I got About 946,000 results . . . and it took me a grand total of (0.18 seconds) .
 



KyGopherfan said:
Another masterful stroke by Maturi! This could've been settled out of court for probably a quarter of the judgment. Now if they appeal it, it'll only get more and more expensive. I personally think Maturi should've let Williams come on, but okay, he made his decision. But no sense in letting this thing go to court. This should've been settled a long time ago.
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One of my lawyer friends said it's simply not worth it for the U to appeal it.

I have a question - since they did find Tubby at fault (regardless of what those on this board think) - is this like a red mark on his record. Are there any repercussions, other than financial? Probably a dumb question, but I thought I'd ask.
 

facts

Facts34 said:
Tubby blew this one.

You may not think Williams deserves anything, but if as Tubby says, once he knew about Williams' infractions he knew it wasn't appropriate to hire him . . . then the real question is HOW IN THE HELL DID TUBBY NOT KNOW ABOUT WILLIAMS' PAST?

This is a man he was about to hire. So he either didn't know him very well - or didn't do any sort of checking up on him whatsoever. Or both. In this day of Google and wikipedia, this would not have been difficult. In fact, I just did it. I got About 946,000 results . . . and it took me a grand total of (0.18 seconds) .
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What I would like to know is how or why Williams' name popped into Tubby's mind to begin with.

:confused:
 

GopherLady said:
One of my lawyer friends said it's simply not worth it for the U to appeal it.

I have a question - since they did find Tubby at fault (regardless of what those on this board think) - is this like a red mark on his record. Are there any repercussions, other than financial? Probably a dumb question, but I thought I'd ask.
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My guess is that he'll have to come up with $1.27 million (not The U) if that amount sticks.

I doubt it has much of an impact on his "record" though.
 

C'mon people. I know many of you hate on Joel, but do you really think a billion dollar organization is going to allow the AD to make the decision on whether to settle?

That decision was clearly made by the general counsel's office.
 



This makes me angry. It's 1.2 million settlement for a coach who can't find a job since 2007. In the coaching world doesn't a coach review a contract before accepting a job and quitting his current position? Maybe I missed something as I did not follow all the details closely. He wasn't truthful if he didn't disclose to Tubby up front about his past with the U. He is dishonest and a slime ball.

$1.2 less for the practice facility.
 

So who pays? If it's a personal suit against Tubby, why is U handling it? Tubby is an employee of the university, so I don't see how Tubby pays out of his pocket.
 

KyGopherfan said:
So who pays? If it's a personal suit against Tubby, why is U handling it? Tubby is an employee of the university, so I don't see how Tubby pays out of his pocket.
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How about Maturi? Maybe we can get him to pay. After all, isn't he the go-to scape goat for everything that goes wrong at the U. I had to take a crap at one of the football games last year and the toilet was filthy. I didn't say anything about it at the time, but in retrospect, I think I should have sent Joel and email bitching him out about it. Then I should have sent Bruininks a letter demanding that Maturi be fired for gross incompetence. Once we get rid of Maturi there will be no stopping us. Rose Bowl here we come!
 

anonymous said:
C'mon people. I know many of you hate on Joel, but do you really think a billion dollar organization is going to allow the AD to make the decision on whether to settle?

That decision was clearly made by the general counsel's office.
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Welcome to the club, anonymous. You and I apprear to be among the few posters in GopherHole who understand how a large organization operates - whether in the public sector or the private sector. Mark Rotenberg, the U's General Counsel, is closely involved in every matter with the potential for legal consequences at the U. Maturi is just one person of many who have input on such decisions. The same goes for the Royce White and Trevor Mbakwe controversies.
 

The difficult question now is who pays the 1.2 million dollars? Does Tubby pay it himself or does the university chip in and pay all or a substantial portion of it. Either way the university is in a terrible spot, if they pay the judgement that is against Tubby they will be criticized and be put in a terrible financial situation with trying to raise money for additional facilities, etc. However, if they don't financially support Tubby like I am sure he will be expecting then they run the risk of alienating the coach who may feel as if the University threw him under the bus, and we all know what that could spell the next time another program comes calling for Tubby's services.
 


UpnorthGo4 said:
Welcome to the club, anonymous. You and I apprear to be among the few posters in GopherHole who understand how a large organization operates - whether in the public sector or the private sector. Mark Rotenberg, the U's General Counsel, is closely involved in every matter with the potential for legal consequences at the U. Maturi is just one person of many who have input on such decisions. The same goes for the Royce White and Trevor Mbakwe controversies.
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Totally agree.
 


tap said:
This makes me angry. It's 1.2 million settlement for a coach who can't find a job since 2007. In the coaching world doesn't a coach review a contract before accepting a job and quitting his current position? Maybe I missed something as I did not follow all the details closely. He wasn't truthful if he didn't disclose to Tubby up front about his past with the U. He is dishonest and a slime ball.
$1.2 less for the practice facility.
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You can say he wasn't forthright with the former infractions but I wouldn't say he wasn't truthful. If he had specifically been asked about any infractions brought against him and denied them then you can say he wasn't truthful. This did not occur however. Williams could make the argument that he assumed Minnesota and in turn Tubby Smith knew about his past being that it occurred at the same university and being that Tubby was pursuing him for the job versus he applying for the position.
 

I'd think the U is on the hook for this? The whole crux of the U/Tubby argument was that Maturi had the authority to veto the hire and did so. In any case, it would look very bad to leave Tubby out to dry paying this himself.
 

I won't go digging up my prior 1,000 posts saying the U was crazy and stupid for not settling this, but ... the U was crazy and stupid for not settling this.
 

Generally the coach has the authority to hire who he pleases in terms of assistants. This is well known. Maturi panicked and vetoed the hire. The jury didn't buy the idea that tubby did not know about his past and i don't either. However, maturi worried about the effect of hiring someone who had a minor smear on his name and in the process, smeared the name of the dept even more. What a debacle.
 

Based on the testimony of Smith and Williams, I am not surprised by the verdict. I think it was reasonable for Tubby, as the HEAD COACH, to have full authority over who he can hire and fire. If he told Williams that he had a job, I think it was reasonable for Williams to rely on that statement. Therefore, to me at least, the verdict against Smith and the U is not surprising. With that being said, the amount of the verdict seems very high. Hell the guy could have lasted only one season, sucked and gotten fired and he would not have been entitled to the entire contract. I would love to know what Williams last settlement demand before trial was.
 

The reality is that the jury did not believe Tubby. What the jury believes happened (and I agree) is that Tubby and Jimmy agreed on a job (Tubby knew Jimmy's history but also knew that he had an in with Jai Lucas) and Maturi rightfully killed it. The problem is that the job was offered and accepted and, therefore, the U was contractually obligated. Jimmy was a fool to quit his job and sell his house. Tubby was a bigger fool for trying to hire a shady dude who supposedly had an in with a midget point guard.

Tubby has delivered two teams that barely made it in (with Monson's players) and then went one and done. He's cost the state $2.3M a year plus another $2M in settlement and legal fees. Nice guy, though a liar on the stand and in deposition, but he's hardly advanced anything.
 

jamiche said:
The reality is that the jury did not believe Tubby. What the jury believes happened (and I agree) is that Tubby and Jimmy agreed on a job (Tubby knew Jimmy's history but also knew that he had an in with Jai Lucas) and Maturi rightfully killed it. The problem is that the job was offered and accepted and, therefore, the U was contractually obligated. Jimmy was a fool to quit his job and sell his house. Tubby was a bigger fool for trying to hire a shady dude who supposedly had an in with a midget point guard.

Tubby has delivered two teams that barely made it in (with Monson's players) and then went one and done. He's cost the state $2.3M a year plus another $2M in settlement and legal fees. Nice guy, though a liar on the stand and in deposition, but he's hardly advanced anything.
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Interesting point...are the tides turning against Tubby lately? I sense people changing their attitude over the past 12 months :confused:
 

jamiche said:
The reality is that the jury did not believe Tubby. What the jury believes happened (and I agree) is that Tubby and Jimmy agreed on a job (Tubby knew Jimmy's history but also knew that he had an in with Jai Lucas) and Maturi rightfully killed it. The problem is that the job was offered and accepted and, therefore, the U was contractually obligated. Jimmy was a fool to quit his job and sell his house. Tubby was a bigger fool for trying to hire a shady dude who supposedly had an in with a midget point guard.

Tubby has delivered two teams that barely made it in (with Monson's players) and then went one and done. He's cost the state $2.3M a year plus another $2M in settlement and legal fees. Nice guy, though a liar on the stand and in deposition, but he's hardly advanced anything.
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He may be a liar in your eyes but in my eyes he's a great man.
 

ShowinGoldyLove said:
Interesting point...are the tides turning against Tubby lately? I sense people changing their attitude over the past 12 months :confused:
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He's 59 years old which means that nobody else is going to pay him $2.3M. Sorry, that's reality. He's taken players from previous coaches and improved them. He's had 1A and 1B tier success with his own players. He's better than Monson but the success he's had at the U has been with Monson's players. He delivers terrible home non conference schedules which is disrespectful to those of us who have written checks for a long time. (That one really irks me.) And now he's cost the state another couple of million.

All in all, I give him a C+/B-.
 

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