Make no mistake. The responsible party for this team circling the drain is ..

[Ewert86PC]

Apparently Lindsey took a $200K buyout rather than be Coyle's "fundraiser", even though it cost her $900K. I wonder if Ben will get the same offer.

Ben's buyout after year three will be a bit higher.

Sexism!

 

[short ornery norwegian]

Nils.

Nils Lofgren? I think he's too busy on tour with the E-Street Band.

 

[USAF]

I have no idea what your point is.

The Administration and Coyle hired Ben Johnson. That is on them not Johnson.

What Johnson has shown is he should have never been given the job. That part is on him.

It really is that simple.

You have no idea? ...that makes sense. You so seldom do.

His point: if you blame administration for CBJ, you must also logically blame administration for Brewster.

Which is logical and correct. Not that hard to discern his point.

 

[Bob_Loblaw]

I don't subscribe to this way of thinking at all. Are the people who hired/invested in Elizabeth Holmes to blame for her failure? Bernie Madoff?

People act like Johnson was hired off the street with zero credentials. He had several years as an assistant in big time college basketball and had local connections that would hopefully lead to better recruiting. Some people didn't like the hire because of holes in his resume (and other less savory reasons), but people with his level of experience and background do succeed. People with better resumes fail (e.g. Lickliter). You don't really know. Once you get the job, it's what YOU do with it.

He was hired for a CEO job with the credentials of a middle manager.

If a company hires a CEO and the company fails, YES, absolutely, you blame that CEO. In high-level, $2 million per year, positions. You absolutely, 100%, are to blame when things go sideways.

 

[Bob_Loblaw]

For those voting "the Administration", which is over half of the voters at the time of this writing, I'm curious as to why - not judging you, just seeking to understand. This is not a new phenomenon - "the Administration" has been cited as the problem for decades, not just for the recent hiring, so go beyond just Johnson. Also, what would it look like for "the Administration" to not be the problem?

It's hard to go beyond, just Johnson, there are various issues.

As far as Johnson, some people believe he was forced upon Coyle. Coyle was given a directive. If you believe that, you'd have to blame the admin. If you think Coyle was blown away and on his own decided to hire Ben Johnson, then you'd have to blame Coyle.

As far as the other things people blame the admin on, it would open up a giant can of worms that have nothing to do with Johnson but most of the gripes with how the U has handled athletics have been repeated on here (hiring terrible ADs, low pay for assistants, lack of commitment to athletics, Kaler missteps, etc.).

 

[USAF]

While it is obviously more nuanced than pointing at one person and one specific tenure - Boston and company is, perhaps, the best example of the weak leadership that has led the athletics program for decades.

Birdbrained fearful men (and women) making cowardly decisions separates the U from the top programs in the country (and our state in general these days).

So it wasn't the actual blatant cheating that was the problem...we dont hold the cheaters responsible?

No, we blame the administration for not doing more to sweep it under the rug, shift blame, scream "whataboutthem?", and/or just flat lie?

Are you by chance a Trump fan?

 

[CPTMidnight]

So it wasn't the actual blatant cheating that was the problem...we dont hold the cheaters responsible?

No, we blame the administration for not doing more to sweep it under the rug, shift blame, scream "whataboutthem?", and/or just flat lie?

Are you by chance a Trump fan?

Acknowledge the problem, fire the people, move on. Nobody working at the U or playing for the U the following year had anything to do with it (neither did the fans). Should have just moved on. For people like you they could have just handed out little whips so you could punish yourself for as many years as you felt necessary. Everybody happy!

More of a RFK jr. fan these days. Dude is solid.

 

[scools12]

You have no idea? ...that makes sense. You so seldom do.

His point: if you blame administration for CBJ, you must also logically blame administration for Brewster.

Which is logical and correct. Not that hard to discern his point.

Sidekick coming from you this is absolutely meaningless.

No matter which board you post on you will always be an ass clown and nothing is going to change that.

 

[Gophers_4life]

Nils Lofgren? I think he's too busy on tour with the E-Street Band.

I assumed it was Nils Hasselmo!

 

[Gophers_4life]

Hoiberg had zero head coaching or assistant coaching experience before taking the ISU head coaching job.

People mocked Indiana for hiring Woodson on this board because he had never coached college.

You think Matt Painter learned how to run a B1G program after 1 year of being a head coach at Southern IL, and 1 year as a P6 assistant? Ben Johnson had 10 years of P6 assistant experience.

Shrewsberry's only head coaching experience was being 32-63 at a NAIA school 13 years prior.

Chris Collins had zero head coaching experience before taking the NW job and won more at a much more difficult place to win.

Jerome Tang, zero college head coaching experience before K-State

Jamie Dixon, one year as a head coach at a secondary school in New Zealand, zero head coaching experience in the USA before landing at Pitt

Greg Gard, zero head coaching experience before Wisconsin

Brian Dutcher, zero head coaching experience before San Diego State

Tommy Lloyd, zero head coaching experience before Arizona

There are many more examples and none of them are even close to as bad as Ben Johnson

1, 2, 3, .... 10 examples. Kudos! Also, "many more". Yeah, sure, there may indeed be 100 examples. And I do indeed grant you examples like Painter. Sure, one year at Southern Illinois (in a very solid mid-major MVC) probably isn't "good enough".

How many people have won Powerball/Mega Millions jackpot? Thousands?

Each of these has a likelihood of success or failure.


- Hiring a guy who has zero, or practically zero, head coaching experience is one way you can go.
- Hiring a guy who not only has a few (or more) years of head coaching experience, but just did the job at the immediately previous (lower conference) school, is another way to go. (Fleck)


I will assert that the former is higher risk of failure than the latter.

An AD who does it, is taking a bigger risk. And thus, if it does fail -- particularly if it fails spectacularly -- they absolutely must share in the blame, for taking that risk.

Especially when he could have taken the 2nd path, with a proven successful guy who wanted to come to Minnesota. (Craig Smith)



Fleck and Motzko are Coyle's two biggest successes. That they also are in the two biggest revenue and two biggest identity sports for the U, obviously helps him out big time. They are exactly examples of the second path.

So I just don't get why he did such a big deviation from that -- what he knows has a chance to work here -- for the basketball hires.

Whalen I get it more, super star, hometown legend.

Ben Johnson .... still don't get it.

 

[bleedsmaroonandgold]

this is off-topic, but didn't want to start a new thread.

speaking of the Gopher AD:

remember how he said Lindsey Whalen's departure from the Women's Head Basketball job was a
"mutual decision?" and how Whalen was going to be a 'special assistant to the AD' to work on fundraising for NIL?

well, today the story broke that Whalen received a "termination settlement" of $215,000, based on (according to the Strib)

section 3.2 of her contract, the University's right to terminate without cause.

it would be interesting to hear Mark Coyle explain how a mutual decision suddenly became a termination without cause.

If we heard him explain it, we still wouldn't understand whatever he said.

 

[Bob_Loblaw]

You have no idea? ...that makes sense. You so seldom do.

His point: if you blame administration for CBJ, you must also logically blame administration for Brewster.

Which is logical and correct. Not that hard to discern his point.

The circumstances surrounding different hires are never identical.

This is not true if you believe the admin insisted on one hire and not another.

 

[bonin21]

Ben is going to be our John Wooden.

 

[USAF]

Sidekick coming from you this is absolutely meaningless.

No matter which board you post on you will always be an ass clown and nothing is going to change that.

Lol. From the assclown that can't follow 1+1=2 logic.

 

[USAF]

Acknowledge the problem, fire the people, move on. Nobody working at the U or playing for the U the following year had anything to do with it (neither did the fans). Should have just moved on. For people like you they could have just handed out little whips so you could punish yourself for as many years as you felt necessary. Everybody happy!

More of a RFK jr. fan these days. Dude is solid.

I'm not the one blaming McKinley Boston for the current dumpster fire.

Perhaps someone does need to "move on." You.

 

[Gopher Teeth]

Ben Johnson isn't an 8 year old kid trying to drive a car. When hired, he was a 40 year old grown man with 16 years of assistant coach experience, including 5 at the U, and allegedly had strong ties to local AAU programs.

... but yet most people knew that he shouldn't have been hired for the job, even Montana St. knew that they shouldn't hand over the keys to their Pacer, but somehow our admin couldn't figure it out. Even a large part of the apologists have said they thought it was the wrong hire, but are giving him a chance. So in my view the the admin were in a very small percentage of people who would have made the decision they made. The fact that they are supposed to be good at their job and they made such an obviously low percentage chance of success decision, well they deserve the lion's share of the blame.

 

[Off-GridTNgopher]

Woke Admin forcing the one of us diversity hire is 100% responsible
It will take several years to clean up this mess

agreed

 

[SelectionSunday]

For those voting "the Administration", which is over half of the voters at the time of this writing, I'm curious as to why - not judging you, just seeking to understand. This is not a new phenomenon - "the Administration" has been cited as the problem for decades, not just for the recent hiring, so go beyond just Johnson. Also, what would it look like for "the Administration" to not be the problem?

My reason for voting administration (though I put most of this on Ben) is because Gabel is administration. She's the lead dog, so to speak. I'm in the camp that for all intents and purposes, this was her hire.

 

[Spaulding!No!]

agreed

Well, a full community was marginalized and there is a cost to that. As a nation we must do better.

 

[Gophers_4life]

My reason for including administration (though I put most of this on Ben) is because Gabel is administration. She's the lead dog, so to speak. I'm in the camp that for all intents and purposes, this was her hire.

For all intents and purposes, Craig Smith = Fleck. They are even both bald!!

It's crazy to me that he didn't even get an on-campus interview. It's hard for me to believe that Ben Johnson is so crazy good at interviews that Coyle was just so blown away that he signed it right then and there.

There had to be foot stepping by the admin. It makes too much sense to discount.

 

[Dave H]

Sidekick coming from you this is absolutely meaningless.

No matter which board you post on you will always be an ass clown and nothing is going to change that.

Not to get in the middle of your little cat fight with that poster but let me just tell you what my point was...

The problem with blaming the Administration is that, for the most part, fans on boards such as this only blame and never give credit. Well, if the Administration is to blame for hiring BJS (and in case you don't know I definitely blame them in part) and deserve to be derided for it (they do) then we also must accept that they are responsible for the hire of PJ and Motzko and deserve to be praised for it. That is it, plain and simple.

I blame BJS for how bad the team is because he put them team together and he coaches them to their results. The Administration gets blamed for being stupid enough to hire him as well but ultimately he was given the chance and he is not just failing but he is failing at an epic level. That is why he gets more blame.

Now back to your cat fight

 

[Dave H]

The circumstances surrounding different hires are never identical.

This is not true if you believe the admin insisted on one hire and not another.

I personally don't, but since I think everyone gets some blame (some more than others) I dont really worry about that stuff anyways. This was a failure top to bottom.

 

[Dave H]

For all intents and purposes, Craig Smith = Fleck. They are even both bald!!

It's crazy to me that he didn't even get an on-campus interview. It's hard for me to believe that Ben Johnson is so crazy good at interviews that Coyle was just so blown away that he signed it right then and there.

There had to be foot stepping by the admin. It makes too much sense to discount.

You know just because you say things doesn't make them true right?

 

[Nomellini]

I vote for Russ Archambeau. Sucker-punching El-Amin at a practice ruined Clem's efforts to land him at Minnesota and we saw what he did at UConn.