No, it was UNPRECEDENTED.socaltownie said:
There were moves last year that boggled the mind. The fiasco with the 2 guys we are trying to get off scholarship (but failing) is...well....a fiasco.
Basketball staff contacting Stone Gettings - Graduate Transfer posiibility
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Last: 6 yr ago by SFCityBear
I did praise them. They played great when they went man against Furd. PLayed with more energy on both sides. We then, for "reasons" went back to playing Zone.GMP said:To expand a little - in fact you should be quick to praise positives. It gives you far more credibility when you criticize. If you only criticize and are silent when good things happen, people will not take your criticisms seriously.OaktownBear said:socaltownie -socaltownie said:Because it delays the inevitable. There is VERY little to suggest that Jones is the guy (or probably more precisely, the guy at this stage in his career). There were moves last year that boggled the mind. The fiasco with the 2 guys we are trying to get off scholarship (but failing) is...well....a fiasco. We missed on supposedly our program changing target (which isn't that unusual....we have been talking about Bay Area program changing guys at LEAST since Gordon). We had the worst season in Cal basketball in modern history and in several games looked so bad (and uncompetitive) I simply switched the game off and did other things - something I NEVER did before.Big C said:Every regular on this board knows that socaltownie is a true Cal Basketball fan, not an actual troll, but the fact that Civil Bear even used the term just shows how cynical socal's posts have been lately.parentswerebears said:
Nope. He was the guy who got that petition going a couple of years back. He's a good guy, just upset about the direction he thinks the program is going (or not going). One of the most passionate Cal fans here.
Seriously, we have a chance to get a guy who could help us for a year (and only take up a schollie for that one year). How can that not be a good thing? Because it's not an even better thing?
And it gives people unrealistic hope and clouds their clearer vision. Yes, this is the AD's decision. But as fans we simply deserve better.
As someone who was early and loud on the Fire Dykes train, I'm going to give you some advice. Feel free to take it or leave it.
1. Lay off recruits. It is never a good look. They are not to blame for coaching failures. Calling a 17/7 guy a middling player in his league is not reasonable. He may very well be a middling Pac-12 player, but he wasn't a middling Ivy player.
2. Do not obsess on every potential positive and try to turn them into negatives. It doesn't look reasonable. Signing this guy would be a nice addition. It isn't going to turn the program around. Nobody thinks it will. No one is saying to keep Jones because we might get an Ivy grad transfer. Best move is to just stay silent on this.
3. The "positives delay the inevitable" argument is always a loser. Positives are positives. When you have a negative view of a coach, always root to be wrong.
4. On the one hand, saying "fire him now" when he clearly won't be starts to fall on deaf ears. On the other hand, stick to your guns but I'd say retool your argument to how unacceptable the performance is. The conclusion to draw from that is obvious, but it stays away from the unrealistic argument to fire a guy when he won't be fired.
5. Criticize the stuff that deserves to be criticized. There is plenty of that. Edit the rest.
Honestly, I checked out this year. Once Rooks and Moore were gone, and you've clearly hired a coach that wasn't ready, the results were obviously going to be horrid. I had no intent to waste my time watching it. I might be angrier if I had.
Oaktown,OaktownBear said:socaltownie -socaltownie said:Because it delays the inevitable. There is VERY little to suggest that Jones is the guy (or probably more precisely, the guy at this stage in his career). There were moves last year that boggled the mind. The fiasco with the 2 guys we are trying to get off scholarship (but failing) is...well....a fiasco. We missed on supposedly our program changing target (which isn't that unusual....we have been talking about Bay Area program changing guys at LEAST since Gordon). We had the worst season in Cal basketball in modern history and in several games looked so bad (and uncompetitive) I simply switched the game off and did other things - something I NEVER did before.Big C said:Every regular on this board knows that socaltownie is a true Cal Basketball fan, not an actual troll, but the fact that Civil Bear even used the term just shows how cynical socal's posts have been lately.parentswerebears said:
Nope. He was the guy who got that petition going a couple of years back. He's a good guy, just upset about the direction he thinks the program is going (or not going). One of the most passionate Cal fans here.
Seriously, we have a chance to get a guy who could help us for a year (and only take up a schollie for that one year). How can that not be a good thing? Because it's not an even better thing?
And it gives people unrealistic hope and clouds their clearer vision. Yes, this is the AD's decision. But as fans we simply deserve better.
As someone who was early and loud on the Fire Dykes train, I'm going to give you some advice. Feel free to take it or leave it.
1. Lay off recruits. It is never a good look. They are not to blame for coaching failures. Calling a 17/7 guy a middling player in his league is not reasonable. He may very well be a middling Pac-12 player, but he wasn't a middling Ivy player.
2. Do not obsess on every potential positive and try to turn them into negatives. It doesn't look reasonable. Signing this guy would be a nice addition. It isn't going to turn the program around. Nobody thinks it will. No one is saying to keep Jones because we might get an Ivy grad transfer. Best move is to just stay silent on this.
3. The "positives delay the inevitable" argument is always a loser. Positives are positives. When you have a negative view of a coach, always root to be wrong.
4. On the one hand, saying "fire him now" when he clearly won't be starts to fall on deaf ears. On the other hand, stick to your guns but I'd say retool your argument to how unacceptable the performance is. The conclusion to draw from that is obvious, but it stays away from the unrealistic argument to fire a guy when he won't be fired.
5. Criticize the stuff that deserves to be criticized. There is plenty of that. Edit the rest.
Honestly, I checked out this year. Once Rooks and Moore were gone, and you've clearly hired a coach that wasn't ready, the results were obviously going to be horrid. I had no intent to waste my time watching it. I might be angrier if I had.
This is a very thoughtful and reasonable post. And a good set of suggestions for all of us who become so much of a fan that when things go bad we get just as passionate with our cynicism and negativity as we did with our rooting when things were going better. That includes me.
Regarding suggestion number one: Players are only as good as the system in which they play and the coach they play for. He is the one who allows them the freedom to do what they do best, and controls their play to some extent. We should not be over-confident about their high school play translating to D1, nor should we be too hard on them if it is obvious they are not being put in positions on the floor to allow them to do well.
Regarding suggestion number three: Of course we should always root to be wrong about a negative view of the coach, but in this case we all need to cut this coach an appropriate amount of slack for his almost complete inexperience in the job he is in.
Wyking Jones has been basically an employee and a pupil of other experienced head coaches who had some success at the D1 level. He himself, to my knowledge, has never been the head man at any level, D1, D2, Women's basketball, high school, AAU, middle school, elementary school, or Epiphany Peanuts pee wee ball. We all knew his prospects for the first year at Cal, no matter who he recruited, were not rosy. He made far more questionable coaching decisions than we would have liked or expected. I never dreamed Jones would try and run full court presses with a largely freshman team, and a team with a very short bench. I never dreamed what I thought would be the strength of the team, the front court, would be ineffective much of the time. i never dreamed Jones would try man, help, and zone defenses, along with the press, and alternate them. I had grave reservations when Jones announced before the season, that he would run a full court press to generate easy buckets, or when he announced that Don Coleman would be the "go to" man for this team. Why tell this to opponents? Strategy was misguided, and tactics were few or missing. Still, I had to expect some of that for a first year coach who had never coached before.
The point I'm trying to make is that if we saw Martin, Montgomery, or Braun make those kind of mistakes, we'd have been correct to criticize them heavily for making them, considering their experience as head coaches. I guess the Administration and the AD had not read "The Peter Principle", where employees get promoted a step above their level of competence, and so everyone recently promoted starts out incompetent in their job, and everyone is at some state of learning a new job, which takes some time. Once you've learned your job, and become competent, you often get promoted to a new job and are learning all over again. Mike Montgomery was competent as a head coach in college, and moved to the NBA where he was not competent. He did not stay long enough to get competent. Maybe he never would have. But it takes time. So lets just criticize Jones when he makes an obvious mistake, if we must, but let's not go over the top negative and cynical about the guy. Let's see if he learned from his mistakes of last season and comes up with some kind of offensive plan other than a full court press or Cuonzo's half court offense. And let's see if his defense starts playing up to snuff. Cuonzo had a good defense, and Wyking should have learned from him. And let's see if any of Jones' players show any individual improvement over the summer and through next season. If we don't see improvement in all these areas, then we can start calling for his scalp, but let's not do it now.
I agree with you in large part. I saw this coming a mile away. The issue was not that he was an assistant. He was an assistant who hadn't really sought out being a head coach. As you say, he hadn't done it at any level. Now he took the job and the bucks, so I'm not going to tell anyone not to criticize, but you make a great point comparing what our analysis should be vs. if we saw experienced coaches like Martin, Monty, or Braun do this.SFCityBear said:Oaktown,OaktownBear said:socaltownie -socaltownie said:Because it delays the inevitable. There is VERY little to suggest that Jones is the guy (or probably more precisely, the guy at this stage in his career). There were moves last year that boggled the mind. The fiasco with the 2 guys we are trying to get off scholarship (but failing) is...well....a fiasco. We missed on supposedly our program changing target (which isn't that unusual....we have been talking about Bay Area program changing guys at LEAST since Gordon). We had the worst season in Cal basketball in modern history and in several games looked so bad (and uncompetitive) I simply switched the game off and did other things - something I NEVER did before.Big C said:Every regular on this board knows that socaltownie is a true Cal Basketball fan, not an actual troll, but the fact that Civil Bear even used the term just shows how cynical socal's posts have been lately.parentswerebears said:
Nope. He was the guy who got that petition going a couple of years back. He's a good guy, just upset about the direction he thinks the program is going (or not going). One of the most passionate Cal fans here.
Seriously, we have a chance to get a guy who could help us for a year (and only take up a schollie for that one year). How can that not be a good thing? Because it's not an even better thing?
And it gives people unrealistic hope and clouds their clearer vision. Yes, this is the AD's decision. But as fans we simply deserve better.
As someone who was early and loud on the Fire Dykes train, I'm going to give you some advice. Feel free to take it or leave it.
1. Lay off recruits. It is never a good look. They are not to blame for coaching failures. Calling a 17/7 guy a middling player in his league is not reasonable. He may very well be a middling Pac-12 player, but he wasn't a middling Ivy player.
2. Do not obsess on every potential positive and try to turn them into negatives. It doesn't look reasonable. Signing this guy would be a nice addition. It isn't going to turn the program around. Nobody thinks it will. No one is saying to keep Jones because we might get an Ivy grad transfer. Best move is to just stay silent on this.
3. The "positives delay the inevitable" argument is always a loser. Positives are positives. When you have a negative view of a coach, always root to be wrong.
4. On the one hand, saying "fire him now" when he clearly won't be starts to fall on deaf ears. On the other hand, stick to your guns but I'd say retool your argument to how unacceptable the performance is. The conclusion to draw from that is obvious, but it stays away from the unrealistic argument to fire a guy when he won't be fired.
5. Criticize the stuff that deserves to be criticized. There is plenty of that. Edit the rest.
Honestly, I checked out this year. Once Rooks and Moore were gone, and you've clearly hired a coach that wasn't ready, the results were obviously going to be horrid. I had no intent to waste my time watching it. I might be angrier if I had.
This is a very thoughtful and reasonable post. And a good set of suggestions for all of us who become so much of a fan that when things go bad we get just as passionate with our cynicism and negativity as we did with our rooting when things were going better. That includes me.
Regarding suggestion number one: Players are only as good as the system in which they play and the coach they play for. He is the one who allows them the freedom to do what they do best, and controls their play to some extent. We should not be over-confident about their high school play translating to D1, nor should we be too hard on them if it is obvious they are not being put in positions on the floor to allow them to do well.
Regarding suggestion number three: Of course we should always root to be wrong about a negative view of the coach, but in this case we all need to cut this coach an appropriate amount of slack for his almost complete inexperience in the job he is in.
Wyking Jones has been basically an employee and a pupil of other experienced head coaches who had some success at the D1 level. He himself, to my knowledge, has never been the head man at any level, D1, D2, Women's basketball, high school, AAU, middle school, elementary school, or Epiphany Peanuts pee wee ball. We all knew his prospects for the first year at Cal, no matter who he recruited, were not rosy. He made far more questionable coaching decisions than we would have liked or expected. I never dreamed Jones would try and run full court presses with a largely freshman team, and a team with a very short bench. I never dreamed what I thought would be the strength of the team, the front court, would be ineffective much of the time. i never dreamed Jones would try man, help, and zone defenses, along with the press, and alternate them. I had grave reservations when Jones announced before the season, that he would run a full court press to generate easy buckets, or when he announced that Don Coleman would be the "go to" man for this team. Why tell this to opponents? Strategy was misguided, and tactics were few or missing. Still, I had to expect some of that for a first year coach who had never coached before.
The point I'm trying to make is that if we saw Martin, Montgomery, or Braun make those kind of mistakes, we'd have been correct to criticize them heavily for making them, considering their experience as head coaches. I guess the Administration and the AD had not read "The Peter Principle", where employees get promoted a step above their level of competence, and so everyone recently promoted starts out incompetent in their job, and everyone is at some state of learning a new job, which takes some time. Once you've learned your job, and become competent, you often get promoted to a new job and are learning all over again. Mike Montgomery was competent as a head coach in college, and moved to the NBA where he was not competent. He did not stay long enough to get competent. Maybe he never would have. But it takes time. So lets just criticize Jones when he makes an obvious mistake, if we must, but let's not go over the top negative and cynical about the guy. Let's see if he learned from his mistakes of last season and comes up with some kind of offensive plan other than a full court press or Cuonzo's half court offense. And let's see if his defense starts playing up to snuff. Cuonzo had a good defense, and Wyking should have learned from him. And let's see if any of Jones' players show any individual improvement over the summer and through next season. If we don't see improvement in all these areas, then we can start calling for his scalp, but let's not do it now.
I have been a head coach in youth sports. Prior to being a head coach I had been an assistant, so it wasn't like I didn't see how it worked. How hard can it be to coach a bunch of 10 year olds? I'll tell you, really hard. For anyone, I'd recommend trying to be a head coach at any level and see how hard it is. (Also would recommend being an umpire or referee). I made a million mistakes my first year that I just had to learn from. I was a lot better my second year because of it. Man, I saw a lot of that first year in Jones. He was definitely flailing at times. He did not have a lot of conviction in his strategies. He changed course a lot, which is not necessarily the wrong thing when you are learning on the job.
I also had grave reservations about what he announced pre-season. He didn't have the personnel for it. Personally, with his personnel, I would have stuck King and Lee in the middle and played a zone with players on the perimeter guarding the 3 point line and letting King and Lee take on anyone that drove past them. I would have slowed down, played ugly and tried to win every game 48-46. I think he decided that long term it would be better to implement his system and I can understand that. However, I think long term it is better not to have a 2 win season. Ultimately he seemed to question his own approach as well and I think that made things worse.
I expect him to figure out a lot of stupid stuff this off season that you expect your head coach to already know. Because of this, I expect dramatic improvement. Not saying it will be enough, he has a looooooong way to go. That said, I've said repeatedly that if Mike Williams had fired him, I'd be pretty ticked off because to expect any other result when you hired Jones would be ridiculous. The only justification would be that Williams expected to take his lumps and that he thought he had the stuff to get better. Now, with a new regime in the AD, if they essentially disagreed with Williams approach and reversed it by firing Jones, I would get that. Even agree with it.
But I am saying this in fairness to Jones. If you have ever coached before you would have expected him to make a ton of blunders this year. You can't judge him like you would Monty. Doesn't mean you shouldn't want him fired. It's just that it is more in the "It's not that he failed it's that he shouldn't have been hired in the first place" manner. This was like playing a true freshman at QB. You expect him to get crushed and learn from it. That probably should never be the strategy for hiring a major college coach, but that is the strategy Cal employed.
SF City Bear and Oaktown are easily two of the best posters on this site. They are both fair and understanding . Rare traits, indeed.
Stone Gettings would be a very good 'get" for the program. He would be a valuable contributor in his only year at Cal and then we would be free to use his scholarship right away. Wilt Chamberlain???of course not. but, he plays thge four and CAN SHOOT from the outside. Be grateful for positives . its also very healthy.
Rebounding tends to translate better when you move up a level than other things, so one could argue for better results.SFCityBear said:Mullins was from Columbia. Tarwater was the guy from Cornell.helltopay1 said:
OTOH, we do have a Cornell connection. see grant Mullins. maybe mullins put in a good word. he would be a plug-and-play at the 4. Is Connor ready to play the 5??Jordan Brown didn't think so.
Gettings averaged 17 pts, 7 boards, 3 assists, 37% (3s), 49% FGs, 83% FTs last season at Cornell.
Tarwater averaged 7 pts, 6 boards, 1 assist, 32% (3s), 37% FGs, 83% FTs, in his last season at Cornell.
Tarwater averaged 3 pts, 3 boards, 0.5 assists at Cal, half his output at Cornell.
I'd predict a similar reduction in numbers for Gettings in the PAC12, maybe 8-9 pts, 3-4 rebs, 1-2 assists.
Mullins averaged 13 pts, 4 boards, 3 assists, 44% (3s), 47% FGs, 83% FTs in his last season at Columbia.
Mullins averaged 10 pts, 3 boards, 2 assists, 43% (3s), 42% FGs, 80% FTs at Cal.
A little lower numbers in the PAC12. Mullins was an adequate replacement at SG, when Cal really had no one else when Mathews left early. Tarwater did make one nice three to win a game. I say, take Gettings, by all means. He would likely be a step up from Roman Davis, and coach doesn't yet trust Anticevich to give him many minutes. And those Ivy League boys sure do make their free throws, which is nice to see, and can be crucial in close games.
I hope you are right. Lots of players get better in one or more ways when they move up a level. We've only had two Ivy League transfers that I remember, so it is a small sample. Jeremy Lin sure got better when he moved to the NBA level. Gettings seems to have drawn interest from several schools, so it may be a challenge to sign him.bluesaxe said:Rebounding tends to translate better when you move up a level than other things, so one could argue for better results.SFCityBear said:Mullins was from Columbia. Tarwater was the guy from Cornell.helltopay1 said:
OTOH, we do have a Cornell connection. see grant Mullins. maybe mullins put in a good word. he would be a plug-and-play at the 4. Is Connor ready to play the 5??Jordan Brown didn't think so.
Gettings averaged 17 pts, 7 boards, 3 assists, 37% (3s), 49% FGs, 83% FTs last season at Cornell.
Tarwater averaged 7 pts, 6 boards, 1 assist, 32% (3s), 37% FGs, 83% FTs, in his last season at Cornell.
Tarwater averaged 3 pts, 3 boards, 0.5 assists at Cal, half his output at Cornell.
I'd predict a similar reduction in numbers for Gettings in the PAC12, maybe 8-9 pts, 3-4 rebs, 1-2 assists.
Mullins averaged 13 pts, 4 boards, 3 assists, 44% (3s), 47% FGs, 83% FTs in his last season at Columbia.
Mullins averaged 10 pts, 3 boards, 2 assists, 43% (3s), 42% FGs, 80% FTs at Cal.
A little lower numbers in the PAC12. Mullins was an adequate replacement at SG, when Cal really had no one else when Mathews left early. Tarwater did make one nice three to win a game. I say, take Gettings, by all means. He would likely be a step up from Roman Davis, and coach doesn't yet trust Anticevich to give him many minutes. And those Ivy League boys sure do make their free throws, which is nice to see, and can be crucial in close games.
Stay strong Socal!! You aren't alone!socaltownie said:Because it delays the inevitable. There is VERY little to suggest that Jones is the guy (or probably more precisely, the guy at this stage in his career). There were moves last year that boggled the mind. The fiasco with the 2 guys we are trying to get off scholarship (but failing) is...well....a fiasco. We missed on supposedly our program changing target (which isn't that unusual....we have been talking about Bay Area program changing guys at LEAST since Gordon). We had the worst season in Cal basketball in modern history and in several games looked so bad (and uncompetitive) I simply switched the game off and did other things - something I NEVER did before.Big C said:Every regular on this board knows that socaltownie is a true Cal Basketball fan, not an actual troll, but the fact that Civil Bear even used the term just shows how cynical socal's posts have been lately.parentswerebears said:
Nope. He was the guy who got that petition going a couple of years back. He's a good guy, just upset about the direction he thinks the program is going (or not going). One of the most passionate Cal fans here.
Seriously, we have a chance to get a guy who could help us for a year (and only take up a schollie for that one year). How can that not be a good thing? Because it's not an even better thing?
And it gives people unrealistic hope and clouds their clearer vision. Yes, this is the AD's decision. But as fans we simply deserve better.
Dear Minot: Contact me too. my desire to help is limitless.
Me too was an invalid user name. I do hope your desire to help that person really does some good.helltopay1 said:
Dear Minot: Contact me too. my desire to help is limitless.
Careful Minot: you're not authorized to use humor on this board. The State board of Humor located in sacramento must issue a license. Never get ahead of your skis.
OaktownBear said:socaltownie -socaltownie said:Because it delays the inevitable. There is VERY little to suggest that Jones is the guy (or probably more precisely, the guy at this stage in his career). There were moves last year that boggled the mind. The fiasco with the 2 guys we are trying to get off scholarship (but failing) is...well....a fiasco. We missed on supposedly our program changing target (which isn't that unusual....we have been talking about Bay Area program changing guys at LEAST since Gordon). We had the worst season in Cal basketball in modern history and in several games looked so bad (and uncompetitive) I simply switched the game off and did other things - something I NEVER did before.Big C said:Every regular on this board knows that socaltownie is a true Cal Basketball fan, not an actual troll, but the fact that Civil Bear even used the term just shows how cynical socal's posts have been lately.parentswerebears said:
Nope. He was the guy who got that petition going a couple of years back. He's a good guy, just upset about the direction he thinks the program is going (or not going). One of the most passionate Cal fans here.
Seriously, we have a chance to get a guy who could help us for a year (and only take up a schollie for that one year). How can that not be a good thing? Because it's not an even better thing?
And it gives people unrealistic hope and clouds their clearer vision. Yes, this is the AD's decision. But as fans we simply deserve better.
As someone who was early and loud on the Fire Dykes train, I'm going to give you some advice. Feel free to take it or leave it.
1. Lay off recruits. It is never a good look. They are not to blame for coaching failures. Calling a 17/7 guy a middling player in his league is not reasonable. He may very well be a middling Pac-12 player, but he wasn't a middling Ivy player.
2. Do not obsess on every potential positive and try to turn them into negatives. It doesn't look reasonable. Signing this guy would be a nice addition. It isn't going to turn the program around. Nobody thinks it will. No one is saying to keep Jones because we might get an Ivy grad transfer. Best move is to just stay silent on this.
3. The "positives delay the inevitable" argument is always a loser. Positives are positives. When you have a negative view of a coach, always root to be wrong.
4. On the one hand, saying "fire him now" when he clearly won't be starts to fall on deaf ears. On the other hand, stick to your guns but I'd say retool your argument to how unacceptable the performance is. The conclusion to draw from that is obvious, but it stays away from the unrealistic argument to fire a guy when he won't be fired.
5. Criticize the stuff that deserves to be criticized. There is plenty of that. Edit the rest.
Honestly, I checked out this year. Once Rooks and Moore were gone, and you've clearly hired a coach that wasn't ready, the results were obviously going to be horrid. I had no intent to waste my time watching it. I might be angrier if I had.
Good postexcept the Rooks partdon't see how he adds much to last year's team at all.
Oaktown,OaktownBear said:I agree with you in large part. I saw this coming a mile away. The issue was not that he was an assistant. He was an assistant who hadn't really sought out being a head coach. As you say, he hadn't done it at any level. Now he took the job and the bucks, so I'm not going to tell anyone not to criticize, but you make a great point comparing what our analysis should be vs. if we saw experienced coaches like Martin, Monty, or Braun do this.SFCityBear said:Oaktown,OaktownBear said:socaltownie -socaltownie said:Because it delays the inevitable. There is VERY little to suggest that Jones is the guy (or probably more precisely, the guy at this stage in his career). There were moves last year that boggled the mind. The fiasco with the 2 guys we are trying to get off scholarship (but failing) is...well....a fiasco. We missed on supposedly our program changing target (which isn't that unusual....we have been talking about Bay Area program changing guys at LEAST since Gordon). We had the worst season in Cal basketball in modern history and in several games looked so bad (and uncompetitive) I simply switched the game off and did other things - something I NEVER did before.Big C said:Every regular on this board knows that socaltownie is a true Cal Basketball fan, not an actual troll, but the fact that Civil Bear even used the term just shows how cynical socal's posts have been lately.parentswerebears said:
Nope. He was the guy who got that petition going a couple of years back. He's a good guy, just upset about the direction he thinks the program is going (or not going). One of the most passionate Cal fans here.
Seriously, we have a chance to get a guy who could help us for a year (and only take up a schollie for that one year). How can that not be a good thing? Because it's not an even better thing?
And it gives people unrealistic hope and clouds their clearer vision. Yes, this is the AD's decision. But as fans we simply deserve better.
As someone who was early and loud on the Fire Dykes train, I'm going to give you some advice. Feel free to take it or leave it.
1. Lay off recruits. It is never a good look. They are not to blame for coaching failures. Calling a 17/7 guy a middling player in his league is not reasonable. He may very well be a middling Pac-12 player, but he wasn't a middling Ivy player.
2. Do not obsess on every potential positive and try to turn them into negatives. It doesn't look reasonable. Signing this guy would be a nice addition. It isn't going to turn the program around. Nobody thinks it will. No one is saying to keep Jones because we might get an Ivy grad transfer. Best move is to just stay silent on this.
3. The "positives delay the inevitable" argument is always a loser. Positives are positives. When you have a negative view of a coach, always root to be wrong.
4. On the one hand, saying "fire him now" when he clearly won't be starts to fall on deaf ears. On the other hand, stick to your guns but I'd say retool your argument to how unacceptable the performance is. The conclusion to draw from that is obvious, but it stays away from the unrealistic argument to fire a guy when he won't be fired.
5. Criticize the stuff that deserves to be criticized. There is plenty of that. Edit the rest.
Honestly, I checked out this year. Once Rooks and Moore were gone, and you've clearly hired a coach that wasn't ready, the results were obviously going to be horrid. I had no intent to waste my time watching it. I might be angrier if I had.
This is a very thoughtful and reasonable post. And a good set of suggestions for all of us who become so much of a fan that when things go bad we get just as passionate with our cynicism and negativity as we did with our rooting when things were going better. That includes me.
Regarding suggestion number one: Players are only as good as the system in which they play and the coach they play for. He is the one who allows them the freedom to do what they do best, and controls their play to some extent. We should not be over-confident about their high school play translating to D1, nor should we be too hard on them if it is obvious they are not being put in positions on the floor to allow them to do well.
Regarding suggestion number three: Of course we should always root to be wrong about a negative view of the coach, but in this case we all need to cut this coach an appropriate amount of slack for his almost complete inexperience in the job he is in.
Wyking Jones has been basically an employee and a pupil of other experienced head coaches who had some success at the D1 level. He himself, to my knowledge, has never been the head man at any level, D1, D2, Women's basketball, high school, AAU, middle school, elementary school, or Epiphany Peanuts pee wee ball. We all knew his prospects for the first year at Cal, no matter who he recruited, were not rosy. He made far more questionable coaching decisions than we would have liked or expected. I never dreamed Jones would try and run full court presses with a largely freshman team, and a team with a very short bench. I never dreamed what I thought would be the strength of the team, the front court, would be ineffective much of the time. i never dreamed Jones would try man, help, and zone defenses, along with the press, and alternate them. I had grave reservations when Jones announced before the season, that he would run a full court press to generate easy buckets, or when he announced that Don Coleman would be the "go to" man for this team. Why tell this to opponents? Strategy was misguided, and tactics were few or missing. Still, I had to expect some of that for a first year coach who had never coached before.
The point I'm trying to make is that if we saw Martin, Montgomery, or Braun make those kind of mistakes, we'd have been correct to criticize them heavily for making them, considering their experience as head coaches. I guess the Administration and the AD had not read "The Peter Principle", where employees get promoted a step above their level of competence, and so everyone recently promoted starts out incompetent in their job, and everyone is at some state of learning a new job, which takes some time. Once you've learned your job, and become competent, you often get promoted to a new job and are learning all over again. Mike Montgomery was competent as a head coach in college, and moved to the NBA where he was not competent. He did not stay long enough to get competent. Maybe he never would have. But it takes time. So lets just criticize Jones when he makes an obvious mistake, if we must, but let's not go over the top negative and cynical about the guy. Let's see if he learned from his mistakes of last season and comes up with some kind of offensive plan other than a full court press or Cuonzo's half court offense. And let's see if his defense starts playing up to snuff. Cuonzo had a good defense, and Wyking should have learned from him. And let's see if any of Jones' players show any individual improvement over the summer and through next season. If we don't see improvement in all these areas, then we can start calling for his scalp, but let's not do it now.
I have been a head coach in youth sports. Prior to being a head coach I had been an assistant, so it wasn't like I didn't see how it worked. How hard can it be to coach a bunch of 10 year olds? I'll tell you, really hard. For anyone, I'd recommend trying to be a head coach at any level and see how hard it is. (Also would recommend being an umpire or referee). I made a million mistakes my first year that I just had to learn from. I was a lot better my second year because of it. Man, I saw a lot of that first year in Jones. He was definitely flailing at times. He did not have a lot of conviction in his strategies. He changed course a lot, which is not necessarily the wrong thing when you are learning on the job.
I also had grave reservations about what he announced pre-season. He didn't have the personnel for it. Personally, with his personnel, I would have stuck King and Lee in the middle and played a zone with players on the perimeter guarding the 3 point line and letting King and Lee take on anyone that drove past them. I would have slowed down, played ugly and tried to win every game 48-46. I think he decided that long term it would be better to implement his system and I can understand that. However, I think long term it is better not to have a 2 win season. Ultimately he seemed to question his own approach as well and I think that made things worse.
I expect him to figure out a lot of stupid stuff this off season that you expect your head coach to already know. Because of this, I expect dramatic improvement. Not saying it will be enough, he has a looooooong way to go. That said, I've said repeatedly that if Mike Williams had fired him, I'd be pretty ticked off because to expect any other result when you hired Jones would be ridiculous. The only justification would be that Williams expected to take his lumps and that he thought he had the stuff to get better. Now, with a new regime in the AD, if they essentially disagreed with Williams approach and reversed it by firing Jones, I would get that. Even agree with it.
But I am saying this in fairness to Jones. If you have ever coached before you would have expected him to make a ton of blunders this year. You can't judge him like you would Monty. Doesn't mean you shouldn't want him fired. It's just that it is more in the "It's not that he failed it's that he shouldn't have been hired in the first place" manner. This was like playing a true freshman at QB. You expect him to get crushed and learn from it. That probably should never be the strategy for hiring a major college coach, but that is the strategy Cal employed.
Another good post. And thanks for the honesty in describing your own coaching experience to us. I have never coached, mainly because I never felt I was a good enough player to try doing it. I have tutored young players in shooting, which I felt comfortable doing, because shooting was the only thing I did really well on a basketball court. I am thinking that Wyking Jones may have felt comfortable being an assistant coach tutoring young players, especially in post play, because he did that very well in college. Along with his seemingly outgoing personality, he has been successful at recruiting as well. The big jump for him would have been to pursue a head coaching position, and I, too wonder if he had ever pursued a head coaching career, or if any schools had approached him to work for them as a head coach. To start his career as a head coach in the lions' den of Berkeley of the PAC12 is no small order.
The only comment I'd have is that I would also have started both KO and Lee in the middle, and they would defend against anyone who drove inside, but I would have played man-to-man and not zone. It is usually more effective to guard perimeter shooters with that defense than with a zone. If the opponents' perimeter players were primarily drivers and not outside shooters, then a zone might be more appropriate. I'd rather start with man to man with that team, because the veterans were accustomed to it, and the freshman needed to learn man fundamentals. I've heard good coaches say that you need good man fundamentals to be able to play zone defense well. Starting with a man to man defense, you quickly find out how good each individual player's defense is, and which players need to learn the most. It probably would have meant more losses in the pre-conference season than we had, but if the players improved over the season, then we might have gotten a few more wins in the conference. In year two, if the incoming freshman were not very skilled defenders, I'd probably stick with man defense, and perhaps start experimenting with some zone, depending on matchups. I sure would not use a full court press before year two or year three, when I had a deeper roster, except in emergencies, like falling too far behind in a game.
Jones' task was not easy. Okoroh was playing injured some of the time, and both he and Lee were often in early foul trouble. Anticevich and Davis were pretty raw and inexperienced.
You honestly believe a grad transfer with this roster means potential NCAA Tourney? We would be hard pressed to say that even if we got Jordan Brown. We are looking at a bottom half of the PAC-12 finish this year. 15 wins will be our ceiling
It was clear to everybody that Jones was over his head last year. I was one of the people willing to give Jones another year to prove he is a capable D1 head coach until I read how he reacted when Gorcey reported some of the teams season stats.
Gorcey tweeted out the # of defeats Cal had by at least 20 points during the season. Jones told him that he was reporting negative things about the team for no good reason. And Jones told Gorcey he is keeping a list of all the reporters that published negative things, so they would be "on board" when things got good.
Those stats were not negative opinions, but rather factual results of how the team performed last year. I would expect a head coach to go our and "own" his teams performance. Denying or making excuses for how your team performs is not a recipe for future success. He is the face of the MBB program and he doesn't seem to understand that includes in both good times and bad.
Gorcey tweeted out the # of defeats Cal had by at least 20 points during the season. Jones told him that he was reporting negative things about the team for no good reason. And Jones told Gorcey he is keeping a list of all the reporters that published negative things, so they would be "on board" when things got good.
Those stats were not negative opinions, but rather factual results of how the team performed last year. I would expect a head coach to go our and "own" his teams performance. Denying or making excuses for how your team performs is not a recipe for future success. He is the face of the MBB program and he doesn't seem to understand that includes in both good times and bad.
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HKBear97! said:
You honestly believe a grad transfer with this roster means potential NCAA Tourney? We would be hard pressed to say that even if we got Jordan Brown. We are looking at a bottom half of the PAC-12 finish this year. 15 wins will be our ceiling
I wouldn't say it if I didn't believe it because if they get him and don't challenge to make the tourney, there will be no shortage of people reminding me of my prediction.
Perhaps we should start a thread called "Moraga's predictions".
Any time a prediction is made, we'll post it there.
And then we'll be able to go back and reference and call you out or give you credit.
That could be fun!
I'm sure you could have even more fun at my expense, however, should you choose to do so.
Any time a prediction is made, we'll post it there.
And then we'll be able to go back and reference and call you out or give you credit.
That could be fun!
I'm sure you could have even more fun at my expense, however, should you choose to do so.
Predictions are a lot of fun, but are usually a fool's errand. How can he predict a 15 win season when the schedule hasn't even been released, and probably no team's roster is set yet? He is obviously not a gambler, who makes a living at it.MoragaBear said:HKBear97! said:
You honestly believe a grad transfer with this roster means potential NCAA Tourney? We would be hard pressed to say that even if we got Jordan Brown. We are looking at a bottom half of the PAC-12 finish this year. 15 wins will be our ceiling
I wouldn't say it if I didn't believe it because if they get him and don't challenge to make the tourney, there will be no shortage of people reminding me of my prediction.
Your prediction could be more realistic, depending on who the mystery transfer is. For one thing, if he is a pretty good player, he will have three years experience and probably be of more value to a team, especially this young team, than a highly-ranked freshman recruit, who has not played a minute of D! basketball. Your prediction would have a decent chance back in the day when the PAC got 5 or 6 teams into the NCAA tournament. Last year the PAC12 got only one team, Arizona, directly into the first round, and UCLA and ASU into play-in first four games, which they lost. I wish you luck with yours.
Would you accept the reincarnation of Wilt Chamberlain?
How about Neville Chamberlain?
Owen Chamberlain?
Ethel Chamberlain? There lies salvation.
How about Neville Chamberlain?
Owen Chamberlain?
Ethel Chamberlain? There lies salvation.
"Those who say don't know, and those who know don't say." - LT
Predictions are tough, especially about the future.SFCityBear said:Predictions are a lot of fun, but are usually a fool's errand. How can he predict a 15 win season when the schedule hasn't even been released, and probably no team's roster is set yet? He is obviously not a gambler, who makes a living at it.MoragaBear said:HKBear97! said:
You honestly believe a grad transfer with this roster means potential NCAA Tourney? We would be hard pressed to say that even if we got Jordan Brown. We are looking at a bottom half of the PAC-12 finish this year. 15 wins will be our ceiling
I wouldn't say it if I didn't believe it because if they get him and don't challenge to make the tourney, there will be no shortage of people reminding me of my prediction.
Your prediction could be more realistic, depending on who the mystery transfer is. For one thing, if he is a pretty good player, he will have three years experience and probably be of more value to a team, especially this young team, than a highly-ranked freshman recruit, who has not played a minute of D! basketball. Your prediction would have a decent chance back in the day when the PAC got 5 or 6 teams into the NCAA tournament. Last year the PAC12 got only one team, Arizona, directly into the first round, and UCLA and ASU into play-in first four games, which they lost. I wish you luck with yours.
I am 100% at accurately predicting the past.
parentswerebears said:
Just a thought, how's his d?
That's a personal question isn't it?
If the grad transfer was that much of a difference maker, he wouldn't be going to another school - he'd be headed to the draft.MoragaBear said:HKBear97! said:
You honestly believe a grad transfer with this roster means potential NCAA Tourney? We would be hard pressed to say that even if we got Jordan Brown. We are looking at a bottom half of the PAC-12 finish this year. 15 wins will be our ceiling
I wouldn't say it if I didn't believe it because if they get him and don't challenge to make the tourney, there will be no shortage of people reminding me of my prediction.
This roster is severely challenged. The front court is a non-factor. Kelly looks impressive, but he'll be a freshman. Vanover is two to three years away from making a meaningful contribution. Anticevich and Davis would have to make unbelievably tremendous strides this off-season to be impact players. Overall, that suggests we play small ball and for small-ball, you need shooters - at least three or four of them. Who exactly are our shooters? We have, what, perhaps two? None of this factors in injuries, which sadly, are part of the game.
Would love to believe we'll make that huge of a turnaround, but it's not a plausible scenario. If we actually have a chance for the post season this year, then I'd change my tune on Wyking.
Cal will be interesting and exciting this year but this team is one year away. if we land Bassey, Smith a good PG and one more big, think of the talent on thge team for 19-20. rotation will be terrific. Hard to get minutes even for good players. would love to see the spirited practices. Lots of good players. Only one basketball.
Getting Bassey would be a game changer. Period. It would be definitive proof that we have a good recruiting staff. I'm giving Jones time and I think he can do this, but no mgt would give me pause. What I really hope for is improvement by our current guys and some good decision making on the bench during games. If you give me 3 of the above 4, id be really happy. 2 would keep me interested, 1 would drag me further toward where SCT is.
PWB:
Bring chips, salsa, and beers when you come. SCT and I will be wearing blue and gold.
Thx.
Bring chips, salsa, and beers when you come. SCT and I will be wearing blue and gold.
Thx.
Staff has already lost out on Onyeka Okongwu and Isaiah Mobley to $C. I'm not sure if they've really been on them in the past few months, but if so, it does reflect poorly on our recruiting, especially given that they both played for Compton Magic, where Grace supposedly has connections.parentswerebears said:
Getting Bassey would be a game changer. Period. It would be definitive proof that we have a good recruiting staff. I'm giving Jones time and I think he can do this, but no mgt would give me pause. What I really hope for is improvement by our current guys and some good decision making on the bench during games. If you give me 3 of the above 4, id be really happy. 2 would keep me interested, 1 would drag me further toward where SCT is.
It's hard to beat the team that has the father of one of them as an assistant coach. It's also hard to beat the fact that said assistant is a father figure to the other and is much closer than Grace. This was the expected outcome of hiring Mobley from the moment it was announced. This is not a "David Grace can't recruit thing" or a problem with Jones.
Right. My bad.parentswerebears said:
It's hard to beat the team that has the father of one of them as an assistant coach. It's also hard to beat the fact that said assistant is a father figure to the other and is much closer than Grace. This was the expected outcome of hiring Mobley from the moment it was announced. This is not a "David Grace can't recruit thing" or a problem with Jones.
Short of adding a couple 5 stars, next year's roster next year will fight for the CBI. That's technically the post season. Not only is the roster still flawed, but even the most optimistic outlooks for next year assume that coaching itself will improve. I suppose it could...HKBear97! said:If the grad transfer was that much of a difference maker, he wouldn't be going to another school - he'd be headed to the draft.MoragaBear said:HKBear97! said:
You honestly believe a grad transfer with this roster means potential NCAA Tourney? We would be hard pressed to say that even if we got Jordan Brown. We are looking at a bottom half of the PAC-12 finish this year. 15 wins will be our ceiling
I wouldn't say it if I didn't believe it because if they get him and don't challenge to make the tourney, there will be no shortage of people reminding me of my prediction.
This roster is severely challenged. The front court is a non-factor. Kelly looks impressive, but he'll be a freshman. Vanover is two to three years away from making a meaningful contribution. Anticevich and Davis would have to make unbelievably tremendous strides this off-season to be impact players. Overall, that suggests we play small ball and for small-ball, you need shooters - at least three or four of them. Who exactly are our shooters? We have, what, perhaps two? None of this factors in injuries, which sadly, are part of the game.
Would love to believe we'll make that huge of a turnaround, but it's not a plausible scenario. If we actually have a chance for the post season this year, then I'd change my tune on Wyking.
I am enjoying these reasonable posts from you and OB, both of y'all I have enjoyed back and forths for a long time. One point, SFCity: I think you sold yourself way too short; because you are a student of the game, I believe you probably would have been an excellent coach (obviously, I don't know how you would relate to kids on a personal level, but have no reason to doubt your ability). In general, better players make worse coaches (obviously there are exceptions). Look at the NBA, for instance: were Greg Popovich or Brad Stephens NBA all-stars? OTOH, Jason Kidd was, and his coaching resume was at best meh. The reason is likely that it is harder for the Jason Kidds or the Barry Bonds, or the Jerry Rices to relate to average players who can't do easily what they could. Hey, SFCity: it's not too late. SFCityBear for Cal head coach!SFCityBear said:Oaktown,OaktownBear said:I agree with you in large part. I saw this coming a mile away. The issue was not that he was an assistant. He was an assistant who hadn't really sought out being a head coach. As you say, he hadn't done it at any level. Now he took the job and the bucks, so I'm not going to tell anyone not to criticize, but you make a great point comparing what our analysis should be vs. if we saw experienced coaches like Martin, Monty, or Braun do this.SFCityBear said:Oaktown,OaktownBear said:socaltownie -socaltownie said:Because it delays the inevitable. There is VERY little to suggest that Jones is the guy (or probably more precisely, the guy at this stage in his career). There were moves last year that boggled the mind. The fiasco with the 2 guys we are trying to get off scholarship (but failing) is...well....a fiasco. We missed on supposedly our program changing target (which isn't that unusual....we have been talking about Bay Area program changing guys at LEAST since Gordon). We had the worst season in Cal basketball in modern history and in several games looked so bad (and uncompetitive) I simply switched the game off and did other things - something I NEVER did before.Big C said:Every regular on this board knows that socaltownie is a true Cal Basketball fan, not an actual troll, but the fact that Civil Bear even used the term just shows how cynical socal's posts have been lately.parentswerebears said:
Nope. He was the guy who got that petition going a couple of years back. He's a good guy, just upset about the direction he thinks the program is going (or not going). One of the most passionate Cal fans here.
Seriously, we have a chance to get a guy who could help us for a year (and only take up a schollie for that one year). How can that not be a good thing? Because it's not an even better thing?
And it gives people unrealistic hope and clouds their clearer vision. Yes, this is the AD's decision. But as fans we simply deserve better.
As someone who was early and loud on the Fire Dykes train, I'm going to give you some advice. Feel free to take it or leave it.
1. Lay off recruits. It is never a good look. They are not to blame for coaching failures. Calling a 17/7 guy a middling player in his league is not reasonable. He may very well be a middling Pac-12 player, but he wasn't a middling Ivy player.
2. Do not obsess on every potential positive and try to turn them into negatives. It doesn't look reasonable. Signing this guy would be a nice addition. It isn't going to turn the program around. Nobody thinks it will. No one is saying to keep Jones because we might get an Ivy grad transfer. Best move is to just stay silent on this.
3. The "positives delay the inevitable" argument is always a loser. Positives are positives. When you have a negative view of a coach, always root to be wrong.
4. On the one hand, saying "fire him now" when he clearly won't be starts to fall on deaf ears. On the other hand, stick to your guns but I'd say retool your argument to how unacceptable the performance is. The conclusion to draw from that is obvious, but it stays away from the unrealistic argument to fire a guy when he won't be fired.
5. Criticize the stuff that deserves to be criticized. There is plenty of that. Edit the rest.
Honestly, I checked out this year. Once Rooks and Moore were gone, and you've clearly hired a coach that wasn't ready, the results were obviously going to be horrid. I had no intent to waste my time watching it. I might be angrier if I had.
This is a very thoughtful and reasonable post. And a good set of suggestions for all of us who become so much of a fan that when things go bad we get just as passionate with our cynicism and negativity as we did with our rooting when things were going better. That includes me.
Regarding suggestion number one: Players are only as good as the system in which they play and the coach they play for. He is the one who allows them the freedom to do what they do best, and controls their play to some extent. We should not be over-confident about their high school play translating to D1, nor should we be too hard on them if it is obvious they are not being put in positions on the floor to allow them to do well.
Regarding suggestion number three: Of course we should always root to be wrong about a negative view of the coach, but in this case we all need to cut this coach an appropriate amount of slack for his almost complete inexperience in the job he is in.
Wyking Jones has been basically an employee and a pupil of other experienced head coaches who had some success at the D1 level. He himself, to my knowledge, has never been the head man at any level, D1, D2, Women's basketball, high school, AAU, middle school, elementary school, or Epiphany Peanuts pee wee ball. We all knew his prospects for the first year at Cal, no matter who he recruited, were not rosy. He made far more questionable coaching decisions than we would have liked or expected. I never dreamed Jones would try and run full court presses with a largely freshman team, and a team with a very short bench. I never dreamed what I thought would be the strength of the team, the front court, would be ineffective much of the time. i never dreamed Jones would try man, help, and zone defenses, along with the press, and alternate them. I had grave reservations when Jones announced before the season, that he would run a full court press to generate easy buckets, or when he announced that Don Coleman would be the "go to" man for this team. Why tell this to opponents? Strategy was misguided, and tactics were few or missing. Still, I had to expect some of that for a first year coach who had never coached before.
The point I'm trying to make is that if we saw Martin, Montgomery, or Braun make those kind of mistakes, we'd have been correct to criticize them heavily for making them, considering their experience as head coaches. I guess the Administration and the AD had not read "The Peter Principle", where employees get promoted a step above their level of competence, and so everyone recently promoted starts out incompetent in their job, and everyone is at some state of learning a new job, which takes some time. Once you've learned your job, and become competent, you often get promoted to a new job and are learning all over again. Mike Montgomery was competent as a head coach in college, and moved to the NBA where he was not competent. He did not stay long enough to get competent. Maybe he never would have. But it takes time. So lets just criticize Jones when he makes an obvious mistake, if we must, but let's not go over the top negative and cynical about the guy. Let's see if he learned from his mistakes of last season and comes up with some kind of offensive plan other than a full court press or Cuonzo's half court offense. And let's see if his defense starts playing up to snuff. Cuonzo had a good defense, and Wyking should have learned from him. And let's see if any of Jones' players show any individual improvement over the summer and through next season. If we don't see improvement in all these areas, then we can start calling for his scalp, but let's not do it now.
I have been a head coach in youth sports. Prior to being a head coach I had been an assistant, so it wasn't like I didn't see how it worked. How hard can it be to coach a bunch of 10 year olds? I'll tell you, really hard. For anyone, I'd recommend trying to be a head coach at any level and see how hard it is. (Also would recommend being an umpire or referee). I made a million mistakes my first year that I just had to learn from. I was a lot better my second year because of it. Man, I saw a lot of that first year in Jones. He was definitely flailing at times. He did not have a lot of conviction in his strategies. He changed course a lot, which is not necessarily the wrong thing when you are learning on the job.
I also had grave reservations about what he announced pre-season. He didn't have the personnel for it. Personally, with his personnel, I would have stuck King and Lee in the middle and played a zone with players on the perimeter guarding the 3 point line and letting King and Lee take on anyone that drove past them. I would have slowed down, played ugly and tried to win every game 48-46. I think he decided that long term it would be better to implement his system and I can understand that. However, I think long term it is better not to have a 2 win season. Ultimately he seemed to question his own approach as well and I think that made things worse.
I expect him to figure out a lot of stupid stuff this off season that you expect your head coach to already know. Because of this, I expect dramatic improvement. Not saying it will be enough, he has a looooooong way to go. That said, I've said repeatedly that if Mike Williams had fired him, I'd be pretty ticked off because to expect any other result when you hired Jones would be ridiculous. The only justification would be that Williams expected to take his lumps and that he thought he had the stuff to get better. Now, with a new regime in the AD, if they essentially disagreed with Williams approach and reversed it by firing Jones, I would get that. Even agree with it.
But I am saying this in fairness to Jones. If you have ever coached before you would have expected him to make a ton of blunders this year. You can't judge him like you would Monty. Doesn't mean you shouldn't want him fired. It's just that it is more in the "It's not that he failed it's that he shouldn't have been hired in the first place" manner. This was like playing a true freshman at QB. You expect him to get crushed and learn from it. That probably should never be the strategy for hiring a major college coach, but that is the strategy Cal employed.
Another good post. And thanks for the honesty in describing your own coaching experience to us. I have never coached, mainly because I never felt I was a good enough player to try doing it. I have tutored young players in shooting, which I felt comfortable doing, because shooting was the only thing I did really well on a basketball court. I am thinking that Wyking Jones may have felt comfortable being an assistant coach tutoring young players, especially in post play, because he did that very well in college. Along with his seemingly outgoing personality, he has been successful at recruiting as well. The big jump for him would have been to pursue a head coaching position, and I, too wonder if he had ever pursued a head coaching career, or if any schools had approached him to work for them as a head coach. To start his career as a head coach in the lions' den of Berkeley of the PAC12 is no small order.
The only comment I'd have is that I would also have started both KO and Lee in the middle, and they would defend against anyone who drove inside, but I would have played man-to-man and not zone. It is usually more effective to guard perimeter shooters with that defense than with a zone. If the opponents' perimeter players were primarily drivers and not outside shooters, then a zone might be more appropriate. I'd rather start with man to man with that team, because the veterans were accustomed to it, and the freshman needed to learn man fundamentals. I've heard good coaches say that you need good man fundamentals to be able to play zone defense well. Starting with a man to man defense, you quickly find out how good each individual player's defense is, and which players need to learn the most. It probably would have meant more losses in the pre-conference season than we had, but if the players improved over the season, then we might have gotten a few more wins in the conference. In year two, if the incoming freshman were not very skilled defenders, I'd probably stick with man defense, and perhaps start experimenting with some zone, depending on matchups. I sure would not use a full court press before year two or year three, when I had a deeper roster, except in emergencies, like falling too far behind in a game.
Jones' task was not easy. Okoroh was playing injured some of the time, and both he and Lee were often in early foul trouble. Anticevich and Davis were pretty raw and inexperienced.
Given the roster as you describe it, could anyone coach this team into a chance for the post season?HKBear97! said:If the grad transfer was that much of a difference maker, he wouldn't be going to another school - he'd be headed to the draft.MoragaBear said:HKBear97! said:
You honestly believe a grad transfer with this roster means potential NCAA Tourney? We would be hard pressed to say that even if we got Jordan Brown. We are looking at a bottom half of the PAC-12 finish this year. 15 wins will be our ceiling
I wouldn't say it if I didn't believe it because if they get him and don't challenge to make the tourney, there will be no shortage of people reminding me of my prediction.
This roster is severely challenged. The front court is a non-factor. Kelly looks impressive, but he'll be a freshman. Vanover is two to three years away from making a meaningful contribution. Anticevich and Davis would have to make unbelievably tremendous strides this off-season to be impact players. Overall, that suggests we play small ball and for small-ball, you need shooters - at least three or four of them. Who exactly are our shooters? We have, what, perhaps two? None of this factors in injuries, which sadly, are part of the game.
Would love to believe we'll make that huge of a turnaround, but it's not a plausible scenario. If we actually have a chance for the post season this year, then I'd change my tune on Wyking.
Yes, a good coach makes all the difference in the world. For example, he could help Anticevich and Davis make those strides, create an offense to use the skills the team has and hide its flaws. (I.e. not deciding to do a full court pressing defense with a bunch of freshman and no real bench). This is Wyking's team - it's completely his and his alone, so let's see what he can do with it.mikecohen said:Given the roster as you describe it, could anyone coach this team into a chance for the post season?HKBear97! said:If the grad transfer was that much of a difference maker, he wouldn't be going to another school - he'd be headed to the draft.MoragaBear said:HKBear97! said:
You honestly believe a grad transfer with this roster means potential NCAA Tourney? We would be hard pressed to say that even if we got Jordan Brown. We are looking at a bottom half of the PAC-12 finish this year. 15 wins will be our ceiling
I wouldn't say it if I didn't believe it because if they get him and don't challenge to make the tourney, there will be no shortage of people reminding me of my prediction.
This roster is severely challenged. The front court is a non-factor. Kelly looks impressive, but he'll be a freshman. Vanover is two to three years away from making a meaningful contribution. Anticevich and Davis would have to make unbelievably tremendous strides this off-season to be impact players. Overall, that suggests we play small ball and for small-ball, you need shooters - at least three or four of them. Who exactly are our shooters? We have, what, perhaps two? None of this factors in injuries, which sadly, are part of the game.
Would love to believe we'll make that huge of a turnaround, but it's not a plausible scenario. If we actually have a chance for the post season this year, then I'd change my tune on Wyking.
Hah! Not on your life! They couldn't pay me enough. And I don't think I could handle the egos of maturing boys who think they are already men. And the only mentor I had was successful in his day, but he would not be successful today. He was a combination of Bobby Knight, Lou Campanelli, and Brad Duggan. Helltopay1 can tell you all about him. My old coach would not be able to suppress his instincts, and neither would I. I'd last a day or two on the job, before I'd run afoul of a kid, a parent, or the AD, or some demonstrative fan, and I'd be fired. I've been fired a few times, and it wasn't even in a job I was passionate about, like basketball. The worst part about sports for any coach is you can't play for the players, they have to go out there and do it themselves, and you can only sit there and watch, helpless, hoping they listened to you and can play well, but too often are left with gnawing at your hat like my coach, or on a towel like Pete Newell, while your stomach and nerves don't like any of it, and have no alternative other than make you feel so uncomfortable you'll quit coaching, before you get fired. You only hope you can win the big one first, and can retire to become a color man on TV or write a book. Thanks for the thoughts. I have a lot of respect for those who do try it, but it's not for me.UrsaMajor said:I am enjoying these reasonable posts from you and OB, both of y'all I have enjoyed back and forths for a long time. One point, SFCity: I think you sold yourself way too short; because you are a student of the game, I believe you probably would have been an excellent coach (obviously, I don't know how you would relate to kids on a personal level, but have no reason to doubt your ability). In general, better players make worse coaches (obviously there are exceptions). Look at the NBA, for instance: were Greg Popovich or Brad Stephens NBA all-stars? OTOH, Jason Kidd was, and his coaching resume was at best meh. The reason is likely that it is harder for the Jason Kidds or the Barry Bonds, or the Jerry Rices to relate to average players who can't do easily what they could. Hey, SFCity: it's not too late. SFCityBear for Cal head coach!SFCityBear said:Oaktown,OaktownBear said:I agree with you in large part. I saw this coming a mile away. The issue was not that he was an assistant. He was an assistant who hadn't really sought out being a head coach. As you say, he hadn't done it at any level. Now he took the job and the bucks, so I'm not going to tell anyone not to criticize, but you make a great point comparing what our analysis should be vs. if we saw experienced coaches like Martin, Monty, or Braun do this.SFCityBear said:Oaktown,OaktownBear said:socaltownie -socaltownie said:Because it delays the inevitable. There is VERY little to suggest that Jones is the guy (or probably more precisely, the guy at this stage in his career). There were moves last year that boggled the mind. The fiasco with the 2 guys we are trying to get off scholarship (but failing) is...well....a fiasco. We missed on supposedly our program changing target (which isn't that unusual....we have been talking about Bay Area program changing guys at LEAST since Gordon). We had the worst season in Cal basketball in modern history and in several games looked so bad (and uncompetitive) I simply switched the game off and did other things - something I NEVER did before.Big C said:Every regular on this board knows that socaltownie is a true Cal Basketball fan, not an actual troll, but the fact that Civil Bear even used the term just shows how cynical socal's posts have been lately.parentswerebears said:
Nope. He was the guy who got that petition going a couple of years back. He's a good guy, just upset about the direction he thinks the program is going (or not going). One of the most passionate Cal fans here.
Seriously, we have a chance to get a guy who could help us for a year (and only take up a schollie for that one year). How can that not be a good thing? Because it's not an even better thing?
And it gives people unrealistic hope and clouds their clearer vision. Yes, this is the AD's decision. But as fans we simply deserve better.
As someone who was early and loud on the Fire Dykes train, I'm going to give you some advice. Feel free to take it or leave it.
1. Lay off recruits. It is never a good look. They are not to blame for coaching failures. Calling a 17/7 guy a middling player in his league is not reasonable. He may very well be a middling Pac-12 player, but he wasn't a middling Ivy player.
2. Do not obsess on every potential positive and try to turn them into negatives. It doesn't look reasonable. Signing this guy would be a nice addition. It isn't going to turn the program around. Nobody thinks it will. No one is saying to keep Jones because we might get an Ivy grad transfer. Best move is to just stay silent on this.
3. The "positives delay the inevitable" argument is always a loser. Positives are positives. When you have a negative view of a coach, always root to be wrong.
4. On the one hand, saying "fire him now" when he clearly won't be starts to fall on deaf ears. On the other hand, stick to your guns but I'd say retool your argument to how unacceptable the performance is. The conclusion to draw from that is obvious, but it stays away from the unrealistic argument to fire a guy when he won't be fired.
5. Criticize the stuff that deserves to be criticized. There is plenty of that. Edit the rest.
Honestly, I checked out this year. Once Rooks and Moore were gone, and you've clearly hired a coach that wasn't ready, the results were obviously going to be horrid. I had no intent to waste my time watching it. I might be angrier if I had.
This is a very thoughtful and reasonable post. And a good set of suggestions for all of us who become so much of a fan that when things go bad we get just as passionate with our cynicism and negativity as we did with our rooting when things were going better. That includes me.
Regarding suggestion number one: Players are only as good as the system in which they play and the coach they play for. He is the one who allows them the freedom to do what they do best, and controls their play to some extent. We should not be over-confident about their high school play translating to D1, nor should we be too hard on them if it is obvious they are not being put in positions on the floor to allow them to do well.
Regarding suggestion number three: Of course we should always root to be wrong about a negative view of the coach, but in this case we all need to cut this coach an appropriate amount of slack for his almost complete inexperience in the job he is in.
Wyking Jones has been basically an employee and a pupil of other experienced head coaches who had some success at the D1 level. He himself, to my knowledge, has never been the head man at any level, D1, D2, Women's basketball, high school, AAU, middle school, elementary school, or Epiphany Peanuts pee wee ball. We all knew his prospects for the first year at Cal, no matter who he recruited, were not rosy. He made far more questionable coaching decisions than we would have liked or expected. I never dreamed Jones would try and run full court presses with a largely freshman team, and a team with a very short bench. I never dreamed what I thought would be the strength of the team, the front court, would be ineffective much of the time. i never dreamed Jones would try man, help, and zone defenses, along with the press, and alternate them. I had grave reservations when Jones announced before the season, that he would run a full court press to generate easy buckets, or when he announced that Don Coleman would be the "go to" man for this team. Why tell this to opponents? Strategy was misguided, and tactics were few or missing. Still, I had to expect some of that for a first year coach who had never coached before.
The point I'm trying to make is that if we saw Martin, Montgomery, or Braun make those kind of mistakes, we'd have been correct to criticize them heavily for making them, considering their experience as head coaches. I guess the Administration and the AD had not read "The Peter Principle", where employees get promoted a step above their level of competence, and so everyone recently promoted starts out incompetent in their job, and everyone is at some state of learning a new job, which takes some time. Once you've learned your job, and become competent, you often get promoted to a new job and are learning all over again. Mike Montgomery was competent as a head coach in college, and moved to the NBA where he was not competent. He did not stay long enough to get competent. Maybe he never would have. But it takes time. So lets just criticize Jones when he makes an obvious mistake, if we must, but let's not go over the top negative and cynical about the guy. Let's see if he learned from his mistakes of last season and comes up with some kind of offensive plan other than a full court press or Cuonzo's half court offense. And let's see if his defense starts playing up to snuff. Cuonzo had a good defense, and Wyking should have learned from him. And let's see if any of Jones' players show any individual improvement over the summer and through next season. If we don't see improvement in all these areas, then we can start calling for his scalp, but let's not do it now.
I have been a head coach in youth sports. Prior to being a head coach I had been an assistant, so it wasn't like I didn't see how it worked. How hard can it be to coach a bunch of 10 year olds? I'll tell you, really hard. For anyone, I'd recommend trying to be a head coach at any level and see how hard it is. (Also would recommend being an umpire or referee). I made a million mistakes my first year that I just had to learn from. I was a lot better my second year because of it. Man, I saw a lot of that first year in Jones. He was definitely flailing at times. He did not have a lot of conviction in his strategies. He changed course a lot, which is not necessarily the wrong thing when you are learning on the job.
I also had grave reservations about what he announced pre-season. He didn't have the personnel for it. Personally, with his personnel, I would have stuck King and Lee in the middle and played a zone with players on the perimeter guarding the 3 point line and letting King and Lee take on anyone that drove past them. I would have slowed down, played ugly and tried to win every game 48-46. I think he decided that long term it would be better to implement his system and I can understand that. However, I think long term it is better not to have a 2 win season. Ultimately he seemed to question his own approach as well and I think that made things worse.
I expect him to figure out a lot of stupid stuff this off season that you expect your head coach to already know. Because of this, I expect dramatic improvement. Not saying it will be enough, he has a looooooong way to go. That said, I've said repeatedly that if Mike Williams had fired him, I'd be pretty ticked off because to expect any other result when you hired Jones would be ridiculous. The only justification would be that Williams expected to take his lumps and that he thought he had the stuff to get better. Now, with a new regime in the AD, if they essentially disagreed with Williams approach and reversed it by firing Jones, I would get that. Even agree with it.
But I am saying this in fairness to Jones. If you have ever coached before you would have expected him to make a ton of blunders this year. You can't judge him like you would Monty. Doesn't mean you shouldn't want him fired. It's just that it is more in the "It's not that he failed it's that he shouldn't have been hired in the first place" manner. This was like playing a true freshman at QB. You expect him to get crushed and learn from it. That probably should never be the strategy for hiring a major college coach, but that is the strategy Cal employed.
Another good post. And thanks for the honesty in describing your own coaching experience to us. I have never coached, mainly because I never felt I was a good enough player to try doing it. I have tutored young players in shooting, which I felt comfortable doing, because shooting was the only thing I did really well on a basketball court. I am thinking that Wyking Jones may have felt comfortable being an assistant coach tutoring young players, especially in post play, because he did that very well in college. Along with his seemingly outgoing personality, he has been successful at recruiting as well. The big jump for him would have been to pursue a head coaching position, and I, too wonder if he had ever pursued a head coaching career, or if any schools had approached him to work for them as a head coach. To start his career as a head coach in the lions' den of Berkeley of the PAC12 is no small order.
The only comment I'd have is that I would also have started both KO and Lee in the middle, and they would defend against anyone who drove inside, but I would have played man-to-man and not zone. It is usually more effective to guard perimeter shooters with that defense than with a zone. If the opponents' perimeter players were primarily drivers and not outside shooters, then a zone might be more appropriate. I'd rather start with man to man with that team, because the veterans were accustomed to it, and the freshman needed to learn man fundamentals. I've heard good coaches say that you need good man fundamentals to be able to play zone defense well. Starting with a man to man defense, you quickly find out how good each individual player's defense is, and which players need to learn the most. It probably would have meant more losses in the pre-conference season than we had, but if the players improved over the season, then we might have gotten a few more wins in the conference. In year two, if the incoming freshman were not very skilled defenders, I'd probably stick with man defense, and perhaps start experimenting with some zone, depending on matchups. I sure would not use a full court press before year two or year three, when I had a deeper roster, except in emergencies, like falling too far behind in a game.
Jones' task was not easy. Okoroh was playing injured some of the time, and both he and Lee were often in early foul trouble. Anticevich and Davis were pretty raw and inexperienced.
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