The first statement is false. His best debut class was Lynch, Coffey, Akeem Springs, and Curry (it also included Hurt but 4 hits and 1 miss is pretty good). On the current team, only Oturu is in the class of those first two players and Springs is better than most of this team. Curry's health situation was just unfortunate. Since that group, we have seen one well above average Big Ten player recruited (Oturu), one-to-three average conference players (Gabe and maybe Carr and Willis), and one decent role player (Matz). The rest have been projects who didn't work out or may or may not work out. It's too early to tell about the current freshmen.
As far as the statements about Coffey and Curry, well, good players often go pro early and injuries, even chronic ones, happen. You have to recruit to compensate for those contingencies.
The last statement is nauseatingly defeatist. I'm glad the administration decided to be more aspirational in thinking when they fired Claeys and hired Fleck. Those kinds of moves won't always work out but you won't know unless you try.
After this season, Pitino will have been here 7 years. We will know what we have just like Nebraska knew what they had when they fired Tim Miles. They decided to hire a star coach to upgrade their program. They are starting out in a worse position than us (virtually an all new team assembled from whatever was available when Fred was hired) and it showed in their first two games but we'll see how much they improve relative to us this season.
I don't think saying his recruiting has gotten steadily better is false. He hasn't recruited more than one/two below average players in the 18, 19, and 20 classes except Freeman and MAYBE Jarvis Omersa, and he can give solid minutes off the bench as an energizer.
Omersa, Oturu, Kalscheur - great shooter/ 3&D player in Kalscheur, all B1G 1st team Center in Oturu, above average bench player in Omersa / maybe a starter his senior year.
Williams, Greenlee, Ihnen, Freeman - Williams will be a solid player next year after some more development, very good athlete, Greenlee hasn't looked bad, Ihnen has all the potential in the world, Freeman will take some time but could be solid
Mitchell, Mashburn Jr. , ? - Mitchell another lengthy athlete with lots of potential, Mashburn Jr. looks tough, can finish around the rim with decent range. Maybe add Garcia to this list in 5 days.
Even if you don't think all these players are great, which they aren't, it's at least getting much more CONSISTENT.
Firing Pitino after this season would be a disaster for the program. It'd set us back another 2-3 years instead of giving Pitino the benefit of the doubt to develop this young team and making a run next year. Say we lose Mashburn Jr. or Martice Mitchell, or both? We wouldn't HAVE a 2020 class, much less two 4* and maybe Dawson Garcia. On top of it, Oturu would likely leave for the NBA after his head coach gets fired - why stay on a volatile team when you can go get paid? If Pitino stays, Oturu maybe stays.
At some point you can't keep blaming Pitino for stuff out of his control. Players leaving early happens all the time, but Coffey didn't give Pitino enough time to get a replacement. He left AT THE DEADLINE. And then Curry tears his knee again to compound the problem.
Using Nebraska as a marker for success is nauseatingly defeatist. I want to see 2-3 years of sustained success from them before deeming their program on an upwards trajectory, not "one year of a winning record".
