Knowlton haters will be happy if he gets the job

Would be nice to have someone with established coaching connections or a background in winning football.

71Bear said:

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philbert said:

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Knowlton haters will be happy if he gets the job

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This could turn the "worst year" into one of the best. Knowlton has been a disaster from the day he took the job. Cal desperately needs a person who clearly understands the culture of the university.

While I never advocate that Cal hire an alum to coach one of the teams, I think hiring an alum for the role of AD would address a lot of the issues within the department and its relationship to the rest of the campus.

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Dave Maggard was a Cal alum and Cal athlete and was the Athletic Director from 1972 to 1991. I don't recall that he was particularly outstanding as AD, and he certainly didn't improve "a lot of the issues within the department and its relationship to the rest of the campus". What we need is an experienced Athletic Director with a proven track record. The question is whether anyone with those qualifications would want to come to Cal.

71Bear said:

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philbert said:

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Knowlton haters will be happy if he gets the job

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This could turn the "worst year" into one of the best. Knowlton has been a disaster from the day he took the job. Cal desperately needs a person who clearly understands the culture of the university.

While I never advocate that Cal hire an alum to coach one of the teams, I think hiring an alum for the role of AD would address a lot of the issues within the department and its relationship to the rest of the campus.

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Williams II!

Golden One said:

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71Bear said:

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philbert said:

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Knowlton haters will be happy if he gets the job

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This could turn the "worst year" into one of the best. Knowlton has been a disaster from the day he took the job. Cal desperately needs a person who clearly understands the culture of the university.

While I never advocate that Cal hire an alum to coach one of the teams, I think hiring an alum for the role of AD would address a lot of the issues within the department and its relationship to the rest of the campus.

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Dave Maggard was a Cal alum and Cal athlete and was the Athletic Director from 1972 to 1991. I don't recall that he was particularly outstanding as AD, and he certainly didn't improve "a lot of the issues within the department and its relationship to the rest of the campus". What we need is an experienced Athletic Director with a proven track record. The question is whether anyone with those qualifications would want to come to Cal.

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I don't believe that I suggested Maggard for the job. Being 82, I think he is a bit old for the job.

I did suggest an alum who has a clear understanding of the culture of the school. Obviously, the individual would need a strong background in administration, fund raising, athletics, etc. etc.

There are people out there with that kind of experience. This trick is recruiting them back to Berkeley.

I am tired of people like Bockrath, Barbour and Knowlton who come in with zero knowledge of Cal and gaffe their way through the introductory press conference and then screw things up from that point forward.

Northwestern would be a great AD job to get, so it's no surprise that many other ADs would want it. The last AD did a great job running the department and raising mountains of money, the Big Ten gives them more annual revenue than any other conference gives its schools, and they have a lot of new facilities, and solid coaches in place in football and basketball.

The only thing the new Northwestern AD will have to do to be a success is to not screw up what was put in place before he got there.

Jeff said:

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He has done a great job. Very tight with Wilcox. Close to Christ. Greats great support from coaches. Spends time with Academic Senate. Has the right values. It would be terrible if he leaves.

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Yeah, take away the basketball hire (and perhaps most importantly the process he used) and I don't feel like he's been a bad AD. Important to note as well that not a lot of flawless candidates were clamoring to be our basketball coach.

Open question: Might this be a situation in which paying top dollar for a good AD might provide a good return on investment?

Big C said:

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Jeff said:

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He has done a great job. Very tight with Wilcox. Close to Christ. Greats great support from coaches. Spends time with Academic Senate. Has the right values. It would be terrible if he leaves.

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Yeah, take away the basketball hire (and perhaps most importantly the process he used) and I don't feel like he's been a bad AD. Important to note as well that not a lot of flawless candidates were clamoring to be our basketball coach.

Open question: Might this be a situation in which paying top dollar for a good AD might provide a good return on investment?

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Unfortunately, for most of us, we only judge what an AD does based on hiring and/or retaining coaches. We really don't know the extent of the financial issues, Title IX issues, or academic/athletic challenges that he has had to deal with. Nor do we really know how successful he has been in shoring up these issues, especially the financial side of things. We hear tidbits, but not the whole picture. I'd love to see an in-depth article from BI that goes over this kind of stuff. But that probably wouldn't be of interest to the general fan.

Big C said:

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Jeff said:

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He has done a great job. Very tight with Wilcox. Close to Christ. Greats great support from coaches. Spends time with Academic Senate. Has the right values. It would be terrible if he leaves.

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Yeah, take away the basketball hire (and perhaps most importantly the process he used) and I don't feel like he's been a bad AD. Important to note as well that not a lot of flawless candidates were clamoring to be our basketball coach.

Open question: Might this be a situation in which paying top dollar for a good AD might provide a good return on investment?

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Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln...

We could put together a great list of Cal sports alums who perform well at administration - Sean Marks, Shareef Abdur Rahim, Kevin Johnson, etc. KJ would be great - he managed to get that new downtown arena for Sac. Heck lets get AR! It would be great to have him sit down with his old instructor and explain why they need to inspire students!

hanky1 said:

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71Bear said:

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philbert said:

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Knowlton haters will be happy if he gets the job

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This could turn the "worst year" into one of the best. Knowlton has been a disaster from the day he took the job. Cal desperately needs a person who clearly understands the culture of the university.

While I never advocate that Cal hire an alum to coach one of the teams, I think hiring an alum for the role of AD would address a lot of the issues within the department and its relationship to the rest of the campus.

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The guy Knowlton replaced was an alum and he is probably the worst AD in Cal history. I can't even say his name...

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Williams was a caretaker AD. I do not include him on any lists because he never intended to be a long term guy. If Cal is fortunate enough to have NW take the carpetbagger off Cal's hands, the next person (hopefully) will be interested enough in the job to stay for a while and not shop around for his/her next job at the first opportunity.

I think before we all rush to judgement (gee, who says athletics aren't like society?), we should all take a deep breath and find out a lot more stuff before we jump on the "good riddance" or "this is a disaster" bandwagon. The one thing that can be said is, now, with his interest in another position, regardless of whether he stays or goes, Cal is in a bad situation just based on perceptions.

MilleniaBear said:

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We could put together a great list of Cal sports alums who perform well at administration - Sean Marks, Shareef Abdur Rahim, Kevin Johnson, etc. KJ would be great - he managed to get that new downtown arena for Sac. Heck lets get AR! It would be great to have him sit down with his old instructor and explain why they need to inspire students!

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KJ is an interesting thought and I think a great candidate. Two-term mayor of Sacramento during the Great Recession when the city's finances were really in the toilet and did a good job albeit with some controversy. Started the St Hope Development Corp to redevelop parts of the Oak Park neighborhood in Sac and the St Hope charter school. As mentioned above, shepherded the change in ownership of the Sac Kings and building of the downtown arena. It appears that the guy got a lot done and additionally demonstrated the ability to bring in outside funds for many of his projects. And not a bad guy to help close the deal on a 5* basketball prospect.

The fly in the ointment is a sexual assault/harassment charge from 1996 when he was in Phoenix that, from what I read, the authorities there elected not to pursue. While that would prevent the SF Board of Ed from naming a school after him, would it render him persona non grata by the Cal administration and faculty?

And of course the other question, would he want to do it?

TomBear said:

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I think before we all rush to judgement (gee, who says athletics aren't like society?), we should all take a deep breath and find out a lot more stuff before we jump on the "good riddance" or "this is a disaster" bandwagon. The one thing that can be said is, now, with his interest in another position, regardless of whether he stays or goes, Cal is in a bad situation just based on perceptions.

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"Perceptions"?

Don't know if he has the administrative chops, but would someone like Troy Taylor be a good fit?

I enjoyed talking with Knowlton and thought he was doing a fairly good job but the fact that he has interviewed for a lateral position elsewhere says to me he is not committed here. Doesn't mean he has one foot out the door but I won't feel the same way about him if he doesn't get the job and stays.

Oski87 said:

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TilWeWobble said:

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I enjoyed talking with Knowlton and thought he was doing a fairly good job but the fact that he has interviewed for a lateral position elsewhere says to me he is not committed here. Doesn't mean he has one foot out the door but I won't feel the same way about him if he doesn't get the job and stays.

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Current NW AD makes about twice his current salary. I think that is all the incentive one needs generally to change jobs.

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Indeed. Many people change jobs why not him? Perhaps he is fishing for more salary. I hope he stays but agree it is not a good look...

HearstMining said:

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MilleniaBear said:

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We could put together a great list of Cal sports alums who perform well at administration - Sean Marks, Shareef Abdur Rahim, Kevin Johnson, etc. KJ would be great - he managed to get that new downtown arena for Sac. Heck lets get AR! It would be great to have him sit down with his old instructor and explain why they need to inspire students!

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KJ is an interesting thought and I think a great candidate. Two-term mayor of Sacramento during the Great Recession when the city's finances were really in the toilet and did a good job albeit with some controversy. Started the St Hope Development Corp to redevelop parts of the Oak Park neighborhood in Sac and the St Hope charter school. As mentioned above, shepherded the change in ownership of the Sac Kings and building of the downtown arena. It appears that the guy got a lot done and additionally demonstrated the ability to bring in outside funds for many of his projects. And not a bad guy to help close the deal on a 5* basketball prospect.

The fly in the ointment is a sexual assault/harassment charge from 1996 when he was in Phoenix that, from what I read, the authorities there elected not to pursue. While that would prevent the SF Board of Ed from naming a school after him, would it render him persona non grata by the Cal administration and faculty?

And of course the other question, would he want to do it?

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Coincidentally enough, I was re-reading the thread on DJ Rodgers last night. Some very good points about why his offer may have been rescinded despite no formal charges being leveled against him were made. Those arguments were made regarding a potential student-athlete, they would likely hold up even more so for a potential employee who would be placed in charge of Cal's Athletics Department.

For the record, I'm a KJ fan. I was a kid when I saw him play in the NBA (I wasn't a Cal fan as a kid). He became my second favorite point guard in the NBA after Magic Johnson, until Jason Kidd came along. I also had the privilege of briefly meeting him at an event about ten years ago. If anything, I'm biased in his favor.

That said, given the past allegations against him, it would likely not be an intelligent decision to hand him the reins to the Athletic Department, even assuming he was interested enough to take them.

TomBear said:

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I think before we all rush to judgement (gee, who says athletics aren't like society?), we should all take a deep breath and find out a lot more stuff before we jump on the "good riddance" or "this is a disaster" bandwagon. The one thing that can be said is, now, with his interest in another position, regardless of whether he stays or goes, Cal is in a bad situation just based on perceptions.

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Rush to judgment? Well, some of us have been off the bandwagon from Day One. His introductory press was a cluckup. Following that, he made a complete mess of the men's hoops hire by outsourcing the decision to the OBN (old boys network) agency. He has done nothing to inspire confidence. He is just another guy who has zero creativity and imagination. The idea of him in charge if Wilcox moves on is enough to leave one feeling rather nauseous.

A lot of churning of the waters by Negative Nancys and worry worts lately.

Amy Trask

01Bear said:

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HearstMining said:

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MilleniaBear said:

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We could put together a great list of Cal sports alums who perform well at administration - Sean Marks, Shareef Abdur Rahim, Kevin Johnson, etc. KJ would be great - he managed to get that new downtown arena for Sac. Heck lets get AR! It would be great to have him sit down with his old instructor and explain why they need to inspire students!

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KJ is an interesting thought and I think a great candidate. Two-term mayor of Sacramento during the Great Recession when the city's finances were really in the toilet and did a good job albeit with some controversy. Started the St Hope Development Corp to redevelop parts of the Oak Park neighborhood in Sac and the St Hope charter school. As mentioned above, shepherded the change in ownership of the Sac Kings and building of the downtown arena. It appears that the guy got a lot done and additionally demonstrated the ability to bring in outside funds for many of his projects. And not a bad guy to help close the deal on a 5* basketball prospect.

The fly in the ointment is a sexual assault/harassment charge from 1996 when he was in Phoenix that, from what I read, the authorities there elected not to pursue. While that would prevent the SF Board of Ed from naming a school after him, would it render him persona non grata by the Cal administration and faculty?

And of course the other question, would he want to do it?

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Coincidentally enough, I was re-reading the thread on DJ Rodgers last night. Some very good points about why his offer may have been rescinded despite no formal charges being leveled against him were made.

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You only think those points were good because you don't know the law, which is why the threads keep getting locked and the topic is forbidden.

71Bear said:

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hanky1 said:

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71Bear said:

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philbert said:

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Knowlton haters will be happy if he gets the job

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This could turn the "worst year" into one of the best. Knowlton has been a disaster from the day he took the job. Cal desperately needs a person who clearly understands the culture of the university.

While I never advocate that Cal hire an alum to coach one of the teams, I think hiring an alum for the role of AD would address a lot of the issues within the department and its relationship to the rest of the campus.

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The guy Knowlton replaced was an alum and he is probably the worst AD in Cal history. I can't even say his name...

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Williams was a caretaker AD. I do not include him on any lists because he never intended to be a long term guy. If Cal is fortunate enough to have NW take the carpetbagger off Cal's hands, the next person (hopefully) will be interested enough in the job to stay for a while and not shop around for his/her next job at the first opportunity.

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This is just laughable. Your chief complaint/requirement is that Knowlton understand the Cal culture. Then you conveniently disregard the one Cal AD (Williams) who - FAR AND AWAY - had the best understanding of Cal's culture. Williams was an abject failure and if you didn't like Knowlton's hoops hire, how do you feel about Williams hoops hire (Wyking Jones)? Even if Knowlton botched the Fox hiring process (by accounts he did), it was a direct result of the position he was placed in by Williams and he had no good options given budget. Remember - Wyking was going to come back for another year until the player revolt.

Every AD and coach will shop their services - welcome to 2021. By your standards, Wilcox is a carpetbagger.

The only reason an AD needs to understand Cal's AD culture is so that they can change it. The current culture doesn't work. Hiring a Cal alum may well have the opposite effect - you could end up with a person who's unwilling to make the hard decisions that are inevitable.

Cal needs someone to change the culture surrounding the AD. To me that is the only real criticism of Knowlton - he hasn't made enough change. Knowlton and Christ seem to be on the path toward doing so. My guess is Christ is plotting the path given her knowledge of the Cal culture/obstacles. I don't see how Knowlton leaving helps in that regard.

There's not enough data to say whether JK is a good AD or not. Obviously, his most high profile hire was a disaster, a big L. In contrast to what appear to be his W's; successful fundraising benchmarks and campus relationship. However, the ultimate goals of a major D1 athletic department are not to be a good bureaucratic entity, but rather to win sports games and provide the university with the larger benefits of those wins. So far, Cal athletics has mostly regressed the last 3 years. The question is, are these the results of the Mike Williams era, or the new norm under JK.

Being really good at running a losing athletics program is not a good thing. There's no reason to spend 100 million dollars every year for these results, even if you do a good job at getting to those results.

socaliganbear said:

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There's not enough data to say whether JK is a good AD or not. Obviously, his most high profile hire was a disaster, a big L. In contrast to what appear to be his W's; successful fundraising benchmarks and campus relationship. However, the ultimate goals of a major D1 athletic department are not to be a good bureaucratic entity, but rather to win sports games and provide the university with the larger benefits of those wins. So far, Cal athletics has mostly regressed the last 3 years. The question is, are these the results of the Mike Williams era, or the new norm under JK.

Being really good at running a losing athletics program is not a good thing. There's no reason to spend 100 million dollars every year for these results, even if you do a good job at getting to those results.

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I don't disagree with your statement that there's not enough data to make the call on whether JK is a good AD or not. However, I would like to know what data you base the statement, "So far, Cal athletics has mostly regressed the last 3 years."

My take, without looking into it more deeply is that we are about the same if not a little better simply because the football program is on the rise, fundraising seems to be building some momentum and some of the Title IX deficit is being addressed.

JK does not deserve 100% of the credit for the stadium debt, but it has happened on his watch and is #1 on the list of why the football program (and thus all of IA) is seen as stable as it has been in a decade or more.

Valid criticisms abound:

- Men's basketball is no longer in a free fall...similar to the Sonny hire, no one wanted to come to Cal and take on the dumpster fire WJ was allowed to build;
- Women's basketball literally had the bottom dropped, but general outlook is positive - the coach is well regarded and has strong recruiting results/pipeline building.
- Baseball seems stuck...many cite the coach, I don't know enough
- Volleyball appears to be in a shambles, but the pieces appear to be there...JK inherited a teetering program/coaching situation, but appears to have made a good hire...oh, and BVB beat Stanford!

And positives are out there as well:
- Gymnastics overall and the women in particular has been on the upswing
- Aquatics overall is chugging along and JK should get credit for securing Durden, MWP had its strongest season in a couple of years
- SB coaching hire is highly regarded...one of the rising stars in the coaching ranks. With the new facilities (thanks in particular to Riverboat Ron and his wife!), the recruiting should see the upswing (plus the revenue of hosting regional playoffs)

WalterSobchak said:

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01Bear said:

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HearstMining said:

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MilleniaBear said:

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We could put together a great list of Cal sports alums who perform well at administration - Sean Marks, Shareef Abdur Rahim, Kevin Johnson, etc. KJ would be great - he managed to get that new downtown arena for Sac. Heck lets get AR! It would be great to have him sit down with his old instructor and explain why they need to inspire students!

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KJ is an interesting thought and I think a great candidate. Two-term mayor of Sacramento during the Great Recession when the city's finances were really in the toilet and did a good job albeit with some controversy. Started the St Hope Development Corp to redevelop parts of the Oak Park neighborhood in Sac and the St Hope charter school. As mentioned above, shepherded the change in ownership of the Sac Kings and building of the downtown arena. It appears that the guy got a lot done and additionally demonstrated the ability to bring in outside funds for many of his projects. And not a bad guy to help close the deal on a 5* basketball prospect.

The fly in the ointment is a sexual assault/harassment charge from 1996 when he was in Phoenix that, from what I read, the authorities there elected not to pursue. While that would prevent the SF Board of Ed from naming a school after him, would it render him persona non grata by the Cal administration and faculty?

And of course the other question, would he want to do it?

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Coincidentally enough, I was re-reading the thread on DJ Rodgers last night. Some very good points about why his offer may have been rescinded despite no formal charges being leveled against him were made.

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You only think those points were good because you don't know the law, which is why the threads keep getting locked and the topic is forbidden.

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Oh? Are you a prosecutor? Or maybe a criminal defense attorney? Were you one before? Are/were you even a lawyer? If you are/were, you should know that the law has little bearing on the rescission of a scholarship offer, except insofar as it may be determined to be a breach of a contract. Frankly, it seems you are the one who is unfamiliar with the law, here.

Along those lines, what makes you think I'm unfamiliar with the law? You have no idea who I am, what I do, or what I've studied.

Additionally, do you know to which thread I alluded? Incidentally, it was not locked. This suggests the points to which I alluded are not the same ones you you have in mind.