Cal8285 said:

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socaltownie said:

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Cal8285 said:

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oski003 said:

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I appreciate your analysis on coaching hires. However, can we please stop calling him the guy Mike Williams hired? It is insulting. How about Wyking or Coach Jones?

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Not only that, but when someone refers to "the guy that Mike Williams hired," I'm not sure if we're talking about Wyking Jones or Justin Wilcox.

As much as I am pretty much resigned to this year being a worse trainwreck than last year, and as much as the effort in games like USF or Fresno St. convince me that Wyking will never be the answer, I just tune out anyone who has to call Wyking "the guy mike Williams hired."

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Let me explain why. I DO NOT blame Coach Jones. He is CLEARLY over his head - which makes a ton of sense. VERY few guys go from where he was to a P5 HC so quickly and with so little background and training and experience. It is a VERY difficult job to excel at. Maybe 1 in 100 are guys that make this kind of jump well. A lot of them struggle. Hell, look at what is going on at SDSU - - and that guy was GROOMED for the job for 15 years and still is not Fischer. Given coach Jone's resume I think that what we are seeing is directly attributable to ONE guy.

And that is Mike Williams. He BUTCHERED the hiring process (and the pre-work because you should ALWAYS figure a revenue coach could be gone EVERY season and thus you need your rolodex ready). I am happy to call him "Mike Williams Hire, Wyking Jones" but it is imperative that we point at whom the guilty party is in this debacle.

And given how badly he managed his job I am not convinced Williams should be given much (any?) credit on the Wilcox hire. Time will tell whether or not WIlliams did the right thing there or if connected alums and friends of the program where the ones that got cal to the right place with Justin. The idea that Williams selected him from a short list and got him on board feels, well, kinda a stretch given the rest of his horrific tenure.

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Assuming all of what you say is right, then it makes NO sense that you do not blame Jones. Jones took the job. If he is CLEARLY over his head and doesn't know that, then yeah, it IS on him for not seeing what is clear. If he does know that, then it is on him for accepting a job when he was CLEARLY over his head. "You want a job that will pay good money with a multi-year commitment?" "Um sure, I know I'm not remotely qualified for this job, but my ego and my wallet say 'go for it!' so I'm taking it!!" If your ego and wallet say go for it, then when you struggle, when you are crap at the job, YOU should take the blame for the crappy job you're doing.

And sure, the guy who hired you should also take blame, and guess what, MW was forced out (and forced out in part because of how the basketball hire was conducted). But blame only MW, and you're living in the past and focusing on your resentment of the hiring process, and not the job the coach is doing.

From what I saw, the process in hiring Jones wasn't as bad as the process when Holmoe got hired (ignoring the issue of how big donors were treated in the process). Williams was looking at other guys, even if he didn't hire them (and in some cases wasn't able). Kasser didn't look at anybody besides Holmoe, who was CLEARLY over his head as HC. But Holmoe was Holmoe, and once hired, he was responsible for what happened. Nobody ever called Holmoe "the guy that John Kasser hired," instead of calling him by his name, even though Holmoe was just as in over his head and had a hiring process where, unlike Jones, nobody else was even considered.

Consider the optics if nothing else. Call him "the guy Mike Williams hired," and you look like you're biased by your feelings about Williams, as opposed to focusing on the good and bad of Jones, and therefore, people like me ignore you. Clearly, you have strong negative feelings about Williams, but when it comes to Wilcox, you seem to feel the hire was fine, just that you don't know if Williams should get credit. For Jones, get over his damned hiring if you want to evaluate his coaching. The hiring was a mistake, but it was a mistake in the past by our former AD who got the boot, the Cal employee whose performance matters is named Wyking Jones (and at some point, Knowlton). Focus on the good and bad of Jones (and perhaps it is mostly bad), and people can think that you are actually evaluating the job Jones is doing (or not doing) instead of ignoring you because your feelings about MW are so strong it seems you can't see straight.

When you say you don't blame Jones, you prove you really aren't being objective. Jones is here, MW is not, Jones took the job, he has the job, he is the primary party right now who deserves whatever blame there is for the performance of the Cal MBB HC. If Jones should be fired by the end of the Pac-12 tourney and Knowlton doesn't do it, then Jones will be "the guy that Jim Knowlton didn't fire." But still, if you want people to take the analysis of Jones seriously, don't do that.

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+1

Dominic McGuire, Shantay Legans, and Tremaine Fowlkes all pipelined from the Bears to the Bulldogs. Anyone know the historical back story?

bearister said:

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Dominic McGuire, Shantay Legans, and Tremaine Fowlkes all pipelined from the Bears to the Bulldogs. Anyone know the historical back story?

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Well Fresno lives off of transfers (like Nevada)
Half of their team this year are transfers

oskidunker said:

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Was that the guy that wore Grigsby,s Jersey?

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One and the same. Gary Franklin, who didn't have enough character or basketball ability to carry Al Grigsby's gym bag.

Bisonbob said:

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Agree completely about building a team takes 2/3 yrs. I'd say next year they will have to make a big jump, and will do so only if they get an impact player who can contribute right away. The current team is full of complementary players.

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Well, if we continue playing one-on-one, we do need more impact players. I think right now we have players who were impact players in high school trying to learn how to be complementary players at least 50% of the time. This team is so young, and it does not have enough talented big players. We lose largely because of a porous defense, giving up 80 points a game. Against good defenses. our offense playing one-on-one struggles to score 60. We get out rebounded every night. You are right about the big jump next year, but we do have players who have the potential to be the impact players we need. I'm thinking of Kelly, to begin with. Vanover could be really good as a junior, on both ends. You put Bradley in the right spots on the floor, and he can become very good. Anticevich has improved. Sueing already knows haow to score, and McNeill knows how to shoot. Austin has to trust his teammates, and they have to trust him to get them the ball if they move to get open. I takes 2-3 years as you said, maybe 3-4 years for some teams. If we see more individual improvement over the season and some more unselfish team play, not just against weak teams, then I'd keep Wyking around for another year. A troublesome thing is the lack of effort in several games, but that is an emotional thing. If you get a lead, and can hold it, if you see some baskets, then it is easier to give more effort. Unfortunately, they need to give effort on defense early, or games get out of control fast.