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bga1 said:
Could be a player problem. Could be a management problem.
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In the players' minds, yes, it is a management problem. JOJ thought because he started 42 games he had a right to play. In management's eyes Fox worked harder in practice, brought a great attitude and team leadership, and performed better in games.

Carrington resented Mitchell being brought in and played over him. Management made the decision who could help the team most and the player thought it was a problem.

The one I respect the most is Ihnen who understands he is not going to play and moved on to open up a critical scholarship.
 

Dakota2 said:
I disagree. Today was a loss with Payne and a big win in opening up three other spots for a chance of big improvement.
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Dakota2 said:
According to published reports we offered it. He thinks he will get multiples more.
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Interesting. You sound convincing.

Questions:

Is he worth that?

Can that money be used for another post?

Is Minnesota capable of attracting someone else? Do the Gophers have a hole they can't fill? Nobody is on the roster now to step in, plus is Fox gone?

Is Fox coming back?
 

skiumah1 said:
To me, we're really a program that needs to find our guy. We're not going to get the best coach out there, we just need a coach that fits this job. Who is that guy is the question?

Medved has gotta be top of the list. Maybe look again at a guy like Craig Smith or Henderson from SDSU.

We're not going to pay huge money, but that doesn't mean we can't get a coach in here that can get us in the Dance 2/3 years or 3 out of every 4. That can be done here. We can make a Sweet 16 every 4th/5th year.

Once this program gets turned around a little bit, the following grows, the NIL grows, and there's potential here.

Shit, we won a couple of games this year and people were trying to get excited. It wasn't a good year but I feel like this city is ready to support a team that can get some momentum going.
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None of the coaches you mention move the NIL needle. You could resurrect Wooden and we still aren't in the same stratosphere as other teams with mega-fans willing to throw millions of NIL at the wall to poach players.
 

ecoperson said:
None of the coaches you mention move the NIL needle. You could resurrect Wooden and we still aren't in the same stratosphere as other teams with mega-fans willing to throw millions of NIL at the wall to poach players.
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I think that's part of my point though. These guys have established programs without NIL. They know how to coach. They know how to build cultures. Once you get the program headed the right direction, the program grows, the following grows, the NIL grows.

Ben is just out here flying by the seat of his pants.
 

bga1 said:
Well now I just don't know what to believe because Writer Gopher claims Payne was a Payne in Ben's backside and a cancer, but now you are telling me that we did offer him? Where are these published reports?
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Read the Payne thread. One of the local writers said Payne was offered a substantial, significant, good ... I don't remember the exact word ... offer but met with Ben and said it wasn't enough and he thought he could get a lot more. Someone floated the joke of $1.1 million.
 


skiumah1 said:
Good question. I don't have the knowledge there.

I thought we were willing to do something like that as Tubby had a decent salary I believe. And then Teague F'd up big time and we ended with up our 5th option in Pitino who didn't need to be paid highly. And then now Ben makes the lowest annual salary in the Big 10.

I won't let myself believe we don't care about the basketball program here, that would make no sense. There's money to be made with a good program here.

Fleck is middle of the road as far as Big 10 salaries for football.

For whatever reason, there's a belief out there that we shouldn't pay money to our basketball coach until that changes I guess.
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The whole landscape has changed since the advent of NIL. We care about the team but we need mega-fans to REALLY care about the team to move forward. We can't build an NIL package for a whole team of legit players using a bake sale. We need 6, 7, and 8 figure donations to compete.

Minnesotans aren't willing to pay for minor league players when we've got major league pro teams in town to follow. Why pay thousands of dollars to pay for lesser athletes when you can get front row seats to the best athletes in the world?
 

Dakota2 said:
Read the Payne thread. One of the local writers said Payne was offered a substantial, significant, good ... I don't remember the exact word ... offer but met with Ben and said it wasn't enough and he thought he could get a lot more. Someone floated the joke of $1.1 million.
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OK- so if true, then Payne wasn't a cancer. Thanks for clearing that up. If true and if he is being unrealistic- well maybe he comes back and grabs that offer. I hope so.
 

Dakota2 said:
Read the Payne thread. One of the local writers said Payne was offered a substantial, significant, good ... I don't remember the exact word ... offer but met with Ben and said it wasn't enough and he thought he could get a lot more. Someone floated the joke of $1.1 million.
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$450/wk is not exactly chump change my friend.
 




ecoperson said:
The whole landscape has changed since the advent of NIL. We care about the team but we need mega-fans to REALLY care about the team to move forward. We can't build an NIL package for a whole team of legit players using a bake sale. We need 6, 7, and 8 figure donations to compete.

Minnesotans aren't willing to pay for minor league players when we've got major league pro teams in town to follow. Why pay thousands of dollars to pay for lesser athletes when you can get front row seats to the best athletes in the world?
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I may be wrong here, but I still think there's a decent fanbase for this program that is just waiting to be woken up by a little life from the program. Get somebody in here who can get this moving in the right direction. If you can get an NCAA tournament level type team, there will be sellouts. People will care.

Once again, I could be wrong, but I don't think you need huge NIL to be an NCAA Tour. level type team.

We aren't as bad of a program as Northwestern / Penn St. / Rutgers. We actually have a following.

*Side Note* What Collins has done at NW is ridiculous. That job sucks and there is no NIL.
 

GopherMarroon said:
Interesting. You sound convincing.

Questions:

Is he worth that?

Can that money be used for another post?

Is Minnesota capable of attracting someone else? Do the Gophers have a hole they can't fill? Nobody is on the roster now to step in, plus is Fox gone?

Is Fox coming back?
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Is he worth what? Nobody knows what Minnesota offered or what others might. If Minnesota offered something, he is worth that amount.

Of course money that doesn't go to Payne can go to someone else.

The Gophers have no players who could not be replaced by one or a combination of new players. We just don't want to be in the position of trying to replace Garcia, Hawkins, Christie or even Mitchell. That would be fighting to stay even. The four spots open right now are a chance to improve.

Fox has made no announcement of his intentions. Only he, Ben, and maybe Hawkins knows. Fox is not transferring and not going pro. He is under no obligation to announce his plans to anyone but his coach up until he wants to.
Fox is all about what is best for the team so he has told Ben what he plans to do, allowing the coach to plan and move accordingly.
 

bga1 said:
OK- so if true, then Payne wasn't a cancer. Thanks for clearing that up. If true and if he is being unrealistic- well maybe he comes back and grabs that offer. I hope so.
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The two aren't mutually exclusive. It's possible Payne was pouting and unhappy and that we offered him NIL and were willing to try and salvage things.
 

skiumah1 said:
I think that's part of my point though. These guys have established programs without NIL. They know how to coach. They know how to build cultures. Once you get the program headed the right direction, the program grows, the following grows, the NIL grows.

Ben is just out here flying by the seat of his pants.
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To be successful, NIL has to be grown exponentially not 5% this year and 5% the next. Little donations from Ma and Pa Kettle in Mora aren't going to get the job done. Numerous players have talked about the great culture that Johnson has established here.

Coyle hired Johnson with the idea that he could slowly build the program into relevance by developing student athletes. Coyle failed at predicating how the NIL and free transfer landscape would change so dramatically that nearly half of NCAA players switch schools every year. It is nearly impossible to build a program brick by brick when half of the bricks are looking to greener pastures.
 



bga1 said:
OK- so if true, then Payne wasn't a cancer. Thanks for clearing that up. If true and if he is being unrealistic- well maybe he comes back and grabs that offer. I hope so.
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According to the other site, pp, Carrington, joj, and ihnen were very problematic for some time.

Not happy with cbj and being shitty teammates.
 

ecoperson said:
Numerous players have talked about the great culture that Johnson has established here
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They may have said that but truthfully I don't believe it. That is where we may just disagree at this point.

Ben seems like a nice guy and players may like him, but what culture are we talking about here? I don't feel like a culture has even been established.
 

bga1 said:
OK- so if true, then Payne wasn't a cancer. Thanks for clearing that up. If true and if he is being unrealistic- well maybe he comes back and grabs that offer. I hope so.
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No, I did not clear that up because I have no idea what Payne's attitude was in the locker room.
 


GoodasGold said:
$450/wk is not exactly chump change my friend.
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$450 a week is $23,400 a year. Whether it's chump change or a fortune, where did you hear that? Are you saying that is what Payne was offered here?
 

WriterGoph said:
The two aren't mutually exclusive. It's possible Payne was pouting and unhappy and that we offered him NIL and were willing to try and salvage things.
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I hope they keep trying. It's also possible that Payne was dead right. The way Ben handled his time was a complete head scratcher. Yeah I know, he's the coach. Let's put it this way, based on his career so far- I don't trust his instincts. He is one stubborn dude. In a lot of ways I like Ben and have said so. But then he does things that just are whacked - like never letting kids like Betts or Keinys see the floor in a blowout....
 

Dakota2 said:
Is he worth what? Nobody knows what Minnesota offered or what others might. If Minnesota offered something, he is worth that amount.

Of course money that doesn't go to Payne can go to someone else.

The Gophers have no players who could not be replaced by one or a combination of new players. We just don't want to be in the position of trying to replace Garcia, Hawkins, Christie or even Mitchell. That would be fighting to stay even. The four spots open right now are a chance to improve.

Fox has made no announcement of his intentions. Only he, Ben, and maybe Hawkins knows. Fox is not transferring and not going pro. He is under no obligation to announce his plans to anyone but his coach up until he wants to.
Fox is all about what is best for the team so he has told Ben what he plans to do, allowing the coach to plan and move accordingly.
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If I offer you a dollar for your car- that might not be what its worth.
 

skiumah1 said:
They may have said that but truthfully I don't believe it. That is where we may just disagree at this point.

Ben seems like a nice guy and players may like him, but what culture are we talking about here? I don't feel like a culture has even been established.
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What's the culture? A tenacious defense? No. A crisp, well-run offense? No. "Grit"?
 


Dakota2 said:
We are not going to know how much he gets. Any numbers floated are worth a Urals Mountains commie post. But I think you can safely speculate it will be a fairly small fraction of $1.1 million.
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WriterGoph said:
RJ just confirmed that as far back as the Nebraska debacle he knew from team sources that Payne, Carrington, JOJ and Ihnen were causing issues in the locker room and pouting. Also said Dawson was growing increasingly frustrated with these guys as the year went on.

Also when Carrington and Payne gave quotes a couple weeks back about the importance of keeping the team together, they 100% knew they were already leaving.
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This sounds more like pro management spin than we see in political world. I suppose it could be true but it sounds like trying to save face for the administration.
 

Dakota2 said:
$450 a week is $23,400 a year. Whether it's chump change or a fortune, where did you hear that? Are you saying that is what Payne was offered here?
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No, I’m just guessing. He is known, after all, for missing bunnies and free throws.
 

WriterGoph said:
RJ just confirmed that as far back as the Nebraska debacle he knew from team sources that Payne, Carrington, JOJ and Ihnen were causing issues in the locker room and pouting. Also said Dawson was growing increasingly frustrated with these guys as the year went on.

Also when Carrington and Payne gave quotes a couple weeks back about the importance of keeping the team together, they 100% knew they were already leaving.
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Makes sense. Pretty immature coming from Ihnen. Also, I can see why Dawson would be frustrated, but was he not the same pouty player just a few short years ago in two different jerseys?
 

Spottedmuskie said:
Makes sense. Pretty immature coming from Ihnen. Also, I can see why Dawson would be frustrated, but was he not the same pouty player just a few short years ago in two different jerseys?
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Ihnen on this list is quite surprising. He’s a grown up. And Ben was very loyal to him through injuries. And he was just not a good player when he was on the court. I’m not sure many other power 5s would have kept him on the roster through that.

I didn’t know Dawson had a reputation as being pouty. I thought earlier in his career he just thought he was better than he really was.

That having been said, this sounds like a placed story to help the staff save face and calumnize the offending players. Of course I don’t know for sure, but no whispers until they leave just seems suspicious.
 

SplitDecision said:
Clearly, a LOT of div.1 players are NOT going to selected universities to go to class.
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They never have. And never will. Not at D1, and especially not a power 5. The U has never figured this out, thus the position they find themselves in right now. Yes, it's ugly, yes, it's hard to swallow, and yes, you have to jump in the mud with the pigs if you want to win.
 

1. With Payne still in the fold, I didn't think MN would be able to attract a B10-starter quality big in the portal - there's just a limited supply of those guys to get more than one on a team these days. Frankly, even the ones that are B10-rotation quality are tough to come by. Now there's a real opportunity.
2. There's still 4 starter-quality players as of today, but opportunities to play big minutes/start at SF and C. That is good for the sales pitch to portalers. If Christie or Garcia leave, more opportunity. Given the NIL situation, it's the tier 2/3 guys that the deep-pocket programs aren't targeting that need to be mined for the diamonds in the rough (a la Hawkins).
3. Every college player at every level thinks they're going to the NBA. With NIL, that has been shifted to all of them thinking they're undercompensated. Payne will attract a suitor, IMO (again, supply and demand), but I doubt the others will. Perhaps they'll develop at a lower level and cash in when they transfer again - that's their best case scenario.
 


skiumah1 said:
They may have said that but truthfully I don't believe it. That is where we may just disagree at this point.

Ben seems like a nice guy and players may like him, but what culture are we talking about here? I don't feel like a culture has even been established.
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Why would a player talk about the positive culture of the team unless it were true? That's not something that young people readily whip out in conversation. The culture within an organization is not always visible to an outsider. A couple of two-hour games per week that we see is just a small part of the culture of a team. They spend their whole lives together.

As an undergrad in anthropology, we did ethnographies on numerous organizations or parts of organizations. They all have their own cultures. One would never see these on display unless one would be invited behind the scenes.

The culture within the MBB program could include such features as accountability, respect, truthfulness, academic integrity, support of teammates, growth in all aspects of life, etc., etc. Fleck has established a culture within the FB program that is very public. Johnson could have an even more impressive culture behind the scenes but he is not as much of a grandstander so we will never see it.

It is highly likely that the MBB players know a lot of FB players and the culture wihtin their program. If they tout the culture of the MBB program under Johnson, I am inclined to believe that they know what they're talking about and believe them.
howeda7 said:
What's the culture? A tenacious defense? No. A crisp, well-run offense? No. "Grit"?
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You're confusing culture with syle of play or some other term.
 

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