Prophetic Tubby Article?

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I remember reading that article at the time. That last line is haunting...
 

need to add to the last line strictly for MN purposes-- "if the AD has the guts."
 

I was literally waiting for this article to pop up sometime soon. I recall it, and I knew as the team was struggling, it would come up again. There's nothing to really be said, right now it looks more likely that this article is on point than the opposite. Of course, a whole lotta crap was involved in turning this situation into what it is, but in the end, right now Tubby is struggling mightily. I doubt he's fired this year, but boy, if he doesn't make some changes to his staff or something, it could get ugly.
 

It is tough making chicken salad out of chicken stuff. Players leaving, injuries, poor recruiting I could go on. Come on Tubby, many of us want you to do well and win!!!
 


It's a famous hit piece, and it comes back periodically. Overly harsh, although there are some nuggets in there worth pondering. The one that rings true is part about the assistant coaches. Similar to Monson's early mistake here, this is not the best assistant coaching staff he could have come up with. I remember Rick Pitino saying once that he doesn't hire assistant coaches - he hires future head coaches. I think of those words often, especially when making staffing decisions at work. Smith definitely has a group of assistant coaches. (Jirsa is a past head coach - a failed one.)
 



GoGophers2005 said:
Spot on? Come on now........the article says Tubby is a good X's and O's guy. Complete lies. ;)
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I take it you are being sarcastic with this one...the article was highlighting what Tubby sees as his strength of coaching.
 



Haugy#33 said:
It is tough making chicken salad out of chicken stuff. Players leaving, injuries, poor recruiting I could go on. Come on Tubby, many of us want you to do well and win!!!
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I am all for him doing well and winning. Let's see a season changing win against the Hoosiers!
 

Can anybody think of a case where one school "ran off" their coach and he went on to do a great job somewhere else?

I am guessing there are examples, but I don't know enough college sports history to know for sure.
 

Tubby's biggest enemy is Tubby.

In spite of adversity and a game that has changed in the past few years he absolutely refuses to change his style in any way.
He will not try to add more offensive schemes to fit his players. No matter how many games his teams lose he will still come back
the next game with the same type of game plan and truly believes that any loss can be explained by his players not doing what
he said. In his mind it can't be him not having a good plan. Everyone, and I mean everyone from top executives on down need to
self evaluate sometimes and see if the things they are doing are working. If not, it may be time to make adjustments.
That is where Tubby lacks. He is totally convinced that if things are done his way it will be successful. He has said several
times through the years when questioned about trying something different that he is the expert. Well the "expert" has now
lot 14 out of 15 Big Ten games. The team is in a nosedive and I sure losing confidence by the minute. Yet you can believe that Tubby's plan for Indiana is the same thing he has done the last 15 games.
I know that he has had a run of terrible luck but no coach of his stature should have a team on the floor that loses like that.
If he doesn't have enough quality players that is his fault. I don't recall any players on this team that were recruited by the likes
of UNC, Duke, Uconn, Kentucky, or anyone of that stature.

Finally, has anyone one here heard Tubby Smith say that ANY of this is his fault and he takes responsibility for it?
Most coaches in this situation would at least say that they take some, if not all of the blame. Even if its just lip service they are
at least willing to tell the fans that much. Not Tubby. Last year as it went south he did say that he had " done all he could and it was up to the players now "
Yep, that's Tubby Take credit when its good and deflect the blame when its bad.

If this season continues on this path I would expect that Tubby will be allowed to retire and save face.
Then a new AD can say that he is hiring a new coach and the athletics department is looking forward
to a new birth and direction of the b-ball program.
Tubby will go down in history as a coach that has some who believe has was one of the best and others
who will believe he was in the right place at the right time.
 

Did one of Doyel's pieces finally stick to the wall?
 



I'd love for Doyel to be wrong because the Minnesota specific stuff in that article is pure garbage and he certainly thinks highly of his own opinions. That said, the Tubby specific stuff seems very accurate which is disappointing because we all want to see Tubby be the coach we thought we were getting. I really hope we won't be needing to give this d-bag credit sometime in 2012 or 2013, he certainly doesn't need an ego boost.
 

The Minnesota stuff was painful to read, but it was spot on. It was the eighth or so best job in the conference.
 

jamiche said:
The Minnesota stuff was painful to read, but it was spot on. It was the eighth or so best job in the conference.
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You are exactly right Jamiche- now the question is why, and how do we fix it long term- irrespective of the coach?

Negatives:
Losing history and past scandals
Facilities- practice facility + barn
Lousy weather (but not that much worse than other Big Ten schools)
Shallow pool of Big Ten talent in Minnesota
No vision to win big here

Positives:
Only D1 school in the state- we should dominate the recruiting of the talent we have
Great university for academics - has almost everything
Very good business climate to graduate into- lots of good sized corps HQ here.

There are two things we can fix:
Starting with the new President and next AD-develop a big time vision that people can buy into
New facilities- this part sounds greedy per Dr Don - but the reality is that we have the oldest arena in the Big Ten and it isn't close and we don't have a practice facility.

Can't fix the weather or the local talent. But we can partly repair the talent situation by getting young kids to start dreaming earlier of being Gopher basketball players. That has to start now to work in ten years.
 

bga1 said:
You are exactly right Jamiche- now the question is why, and how do we fix it long term- irrespective of the coach?

Negatives:
Losing history and past scandals
Facilities- practice facility + barn
Lousy weather (but not that much worse than other Big Ten schools)
Shallow pool of Big Ten talent in Minnesota No vision to win big here

Positives:
Only D1 school in the state- we should dominate the recruiting of the talent we have
Great university for academics - has almost everything
Very good business climate to graduate into- lots of good sized corps HQ here.

There are two things we can fix:
Starting with the new President and next AD-develop a big time vision that people can buy into
New facilities- this part sounds greedy per Dr Don - but the reality is that we have the oldest arena in the Big Ten and it isn't close and we don't have a practice facility.

Can't fix the weather or the local talent. But we can partly repair the talent situation by getting young kids to start dreaming earlier of being Gopher basketball players. That has to start now to work in ten years.
Click to expand...


shallow?
just take local 2009 guys:
the 2009 Hopkins starters: white, broghammer, lockett, williams, cowles..
throw in rodney ( cooper ) and dower ( osseo )

and we'd be in the top 2 in the big10.
 

dboy said:
shallow?
just take local 2009 guys:
the 2009 Hopkins starters: white, broghammer, lockett, williams, cowles..
throw in rodney ( cooper ) and dower ( osseo )

and we'd be in the top 2 in the big10.
Click to expand...

Tubby had 4 scholarships to give (Mbakwe, White, Williams, Cobbs) in 2009, and he's somehow supposed to sign 7 guys, none of whom were Mbakwe?

You're brilliant!
 

bga1 said:
You are exactly right Jamiche- now the question is why, and how do we fix it long term- irrespective of the coach?

Negatives:
Losing history and past scandals
Facilities- practice facility + barn
Lousy weather (but not that much worse than other Big Ten schools)
Shallow pool of Big Ten talent in Minnesota
No vision to win big here

Positives:
Only D1 school in the state- we should dominate the recruiting of the talent we have
Great university for academics - has almost everything
Very good business climate to graduate into- lots of good sized corps HQ here.

There are two things we can fix:
Starting with the new President and next AD-develop a big time vision that people can buy into
New facilities- this part sounds greedy per Dr Don - but the reality is that we have the oldest arena in the Big Ten and it isn't close and we don't have a practice facility.

Can't fix the weather or the local talent. But we can partly repair the talent situation by getting young kids to start dreaming earlier of being Gopher basketball players. That has to start now to work in ten years.
Click to expand...

To be honest, I don't think that 16-18 year olds give a rat's ass about jobs and/or the business climate. Never have, never will. They don't care all that much more about the academic credentials of the university. They are all going to the NBA or the NFL, so none of that stuff matters. Here's what matters:

1. Playing time
2. Girls.
3. Weather
4. A coach who has "cred" and who will let them play their way and get them to the NBA
5. Girls
6. Facilities
7. Girls
8. Family
9. Girls
10. Friends
11. Classes
12. Girls

I might move girls up on the list, but you get my drift.:)

You can see why it's not exactly sexy to play for Tubby or the U.
 

jamiche said:
To be honest, I don't think that 16-18 year olds give a rat's ass about jobs and/or the business climate. Never have, never will. They don't care all that much more about the academic credentials of the university. They are all going to the NBA or the NFL, so none of that stuff matters. Here's what matters:

1. Playing time
2. Girls.
3. Weather
4. A coach who has "cred" and who will let them play their way and get them to the NBA
5. Girls
6. Facilities
7. Girls
8. Family
9. Girls
10. Friends
11. Classes
12. Girls

I might move girls up on the list, but you get my drift.:)

You can see why it's not exactly sexy to play for Tubby or the U.
Click to expand...

How do you explain Wisconsin?

reasons # 1,2,3,4,5,7,9,and 12 are out the door in that case.
 

dboy said:
shallow?
just take local 2009 guys:
the 2009 Hopkins starters: white, broghammer, lockett, williams, cowles..
throw in rodney ( cooper ) and dower ( osseo )

and we'd be in the top 2 in the big10.
Click to expand...

Yes - shallow. White has issues and it was known but we had to take him based on talent. Lockett turned us down. Williams is a football player and you are cherrypicking the best Minnesota crop in 10 years.

The pond is shallow. Look at the next two years. Or previous ones. Forget Aldrich - he didn't want to play here. That's why the depth of the pool matters- you don't get to shackle up all the guys you want and drag them to the U of M.
 


bga1 said:
How do you explain Wisconsin?

reasons # 1,2,3,4,5,7,9,and 12 are out the door in that case.
Click to expand...

I can't explain Wisconsin other than to state the obvious: It's an anomaly. Bo takes mostly upper midwest guys who aren't that athletic and coaches the hell out of them. The other contributing factor may be that Madison is reputed to be a very, very fun place to go to school and I don't think that the U has that reputation.
 

jamiche said:
To be honest, I don't think that 16-18 year olds give a rat's ass about jobs and/or the business climate. Never have, never will. They don't care all that much more about the academic credentials of the university. They are all going to the NBA or the NFL, so none of that stuff matters. Here's what matters:

1. Playing time
2. Girls.
3. Weather
4. A coach who has "cred" and who will let them play their way and get them to the NBA
5. Girls
6. Facilities
7. Girls
8. Family
9. Girls
10. Friends
11. Classes
12. Girls

I might move girls up on the list, but you get my drift.:)

You can see why it's not exactly sexy to play for Tubby or the U.
Click to expand...

At least you're not letting girls come between Friends and Classes.:)
 

jamiche said:
I can't explain Wisconsin other than to state the obvious: It's an anomaly. Bo takes mostly upper midwest guys who aren't that athletic and coaches the hell out of them. The other contributing factor may be that Madison is reputed to be a very, very fun place to go to school and I don't think that the U has that reputation.
Click to expand...

I don't think Wisconsin's recruits are any better, they are just better coached.
 

bleedsmaroonandgold said:
I don't think Wisconsin's recruits are any better, they are just better coached.
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They WERE getting better recruits, through the mid-late 2000s, they were netting plenty of 4 and 5 star type guys. I notice they've kinda taken a little step back though, more 3 than 4 or 5 guys, it'll be interesting to see where that program is in the coming years, this year is already showing signs of cracks, with the home losses.

If we had kept all of our top recruits we had gotten over the last four years, we would not be having this discussion at all. It only takes a couple top line players falling out to weaken a program like ours, which doesn't have easy access to all the talent we want like the elite schools. They lose recruits all the time, but it's a heck of a lot easier to replace them there than it is here.
 

dpodoll68 said:
Tubby had 4 scholarships to give (Mbakwe, White, Williams, Cobbs) in 2009, and he's somehow supposed to sign 7 guys, none of whom were Mbakwe?

You're brilliant!
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sigh.... so little time...


it wasn't a question of how many open scholarships were open.. but on the depth of the local talent.
also: Mbakwe wasn't a '2009 kid'.
also: Cobb wasn't a 'local kid'.

READ before commenting.

btw: when is your recruiting trip to Wolf Point?
 


bga1 said:
Yes - shallow. White has issues and it was known but we had to take him based on talent. Lockett turned us down. Williams is a football player and you are cherrypicking the best Minnesota crop in 10 years.

The pond is shallow. Look at the next two years. Or previous ones. Forget Aldrich - he didn't want to play here. That's why the depth of the pool matters- you don't get to shackle up all the guys you want and drag them to the U of M.
Click to expand...

not to split hairs..
'shallow' implies quality... width implies quantity... we lack width

also, almost no location in the US produces a bumper crop each year.. you just need one every 3 or 4 years... and then enough in the 'bust' years to fill your bench.
 

jamiche said:
I can't explain Wisconsin other than to state the obvious: It's an anomaly. Bo takes mostly upper midwest guys who aren't that athletic and coaches the hell out of them. The other contributing factor may be that Madison is reputed to be a very, very fun place to go to school and I don't think that the U has that reputation.
Click to expand...

I wonder how long it will take Sam Dekker, who is a 5-star senior committed to Wisconsin, to get a reputation as a 2/3-star guy who Bo 'coached the hell out of.'
 

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