Wednesday, June 11, 2008

I'm adding a blogger

It's not Beisner. It's an IU fan. Hopefully he'll have his name and account soon. Here's his first post:

"(Crawford's) departure leaves IU with one returning scholarship player,senior forward Kyle Taber, walk-on Brett Finkelmeier and freshman recruits."- Terry Hutchens, IndyStar.com

As an Indiana fan, this is a sad sentence to have to read. Seriously, one returning scholarship player on a Big Ten basketball team. Things have to be pretty bad for a coach as good as Tom Crean to have one returning player.Such is the sad state of affairs at Indiana University. A program whichused to be one of the nation's traditional powerhouses would have a hardtime competing next year in the IHSAA State Tournament.

Who is to blame for this mess? Kelvin Sampson, right? No. Dan Dakich, right?No. The players bailing on IU, right? Wrong. Indiana AD Rick Greenspan is toblame. Why the hell does he still have a job?

Let us run down the list of Greenspan's blunders:

1. Hiring Kelvin Sampson after he was cited for numerous NCAA recruitingviolations. It is Indiana, you do not have to take risks like this. Maybeat a mid-major you take that risk. Not at Indiana.

2. Following Fuck-up #1, maybe you should sit down and have a talk with yournew coach. Tell him he is under no circumstance allowed to use his phonelike a 16-year old girl. Maybe have your compliance people look after himand tell him to put the fucking phone down. OMG, I am surprised Sampsonhasn't been hired by AllTel yet to appear in a Fav 5 ad with D-Wade and SirCharles.

3. After he was caught again at Indiana, let him coach for awhile longer.Tell him to get his team into the top-10, make a run at the Big 10 title,and then, with less than 10 games left in the season, force him to resignand create a media frenzy, giving the most talented IU roster in the past decade Zero chance to salvage anything out of a promising season.

4. Hire Dan Dakich as interim coach even though every player would ratherhave Ray MacCullum on the bench. While this has mostly gone unnoticed, this may be Greenspan's biggest Fuck-up. Neither of these men were going to geta chance to stay on as coach for 2008-09, so why does this matter? Itproved to the IU players that Greenspan and the administration did not careabout them. So they stopped caring about Indiana Basketball: they boycotted Dakich's first practice, played the rest of the season with no heart, got bounced in the first round of the NCAA Tournament, and left the school.They all left.

But, for some reason Greenspan stays, telling his first-year coach, "Here you go Tom, prove how good of a coach you are, build the Indiana Hoosiers around Kyle Taber." Yeah, thanks for the job, Rick.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Welcome aboard unamed blogger.

IU/UK next year is going to be similar to a intra-squad grade school D team scrimmage,

So is there going to be a UL blogger coming soon? Maybe your old counterpart from the bass?

I am all about Fair and Balanced.

Regards,
Fox News

A-Train

Anonymous said...

I knew someone would finally give Greenspan his comeupins. Thanks for reading my numerous entries in the suggestion box requesting IU rants.

Can I rant a bit:

You know what really grinds my gears? New coaches that run off all of the old coach's players and then act like there is nothing wrong with them cleaning house like this and that it is ok that their team sucks for a while. Exhibits A&B: Kragthorpe and Crean. It's real easy to throw mud at the previous regimes of each school and say they didn't have "class" players but am I supposed to believe that UL's 20 or so JUCOs next year are model students and that anyone with a pulse in the state of Indiana that has seen a basketball is a better fit than Holman, Bassett, Ellis, etc.? It would have been real easy for Gillispie to come in last year, say that Crawford and Bradley were attitude problems, ship them off, and thus blame his two rebuilding years on Tubby. I think it is crap what is going on in Bloomington and has been so with UL football. Don't get me wrong though, I don't mind much that they're taking a tumble.

Peter Griffin
er...
Tdubs

Hoosier Gamecock said...

I am the writer of the "I'm adding a blogger" post, and just wanted to comment on the comment...

As far as cleaning house, I agree with you that new coaches have to be careful with doing this. I have seen this at the DII level where I work as well, the kids left behind have worked hard for their scholarships.

At the same time, a new coach has to have the ability to bring in his guys for his system. If a guy has an attitude problem or is going to make it hard for him to win, there is no reason to keep him around. If the kid is willing to work hard then he should be allowed to finish out his career.

I do not know the UL situation, but as far as Indiana goes remember that Bassett and Ellis were dismissed by Dakich, not Crean. Crawford and Thomas decided to leave on their own. So to say that Crean cleaned house is not entirely fair.

Bassett had numerous discipline problems under Sampson as well, and I have not heard good things about Ellis and Thomas' character based on a good source dealing with their next step, which is most likely DII ball so they do not have to sit out a year.

However, I do feel that if Greenspan had given the interim job to McCallum this would not be an issue and all four may still be at Indiana playing for Crean.