bigrod

Why are you so angry? Like, all the time. Lighten up dude. Most of us are just here talking about sports. No one dies at the end of the day if they don't "win" the argument.

Be the change you want to see in the world. How can you be the change if you really don't even know or have empathy for that change? You're right. Take the time and effort to get organized and make real change. Just picking up a sign and joining a protest? How many people have you ever seen change sides on a protest? Its usually just for show and benefits the very people you are protesting against.

Stu was making a valid point the other day that there are people on here that want Woodson to crash and burn just so they can say they were right. But it seems there are just as many people on the other extreme that want to say anyone with any expectations of him is being unreasonable.

In my opinion, it's hard to accept any comparison of Woodson and RMK. They are totally different in approach and results. Knight could be condescending, but I rarely felt it was directed at the fans. And, it was after tons of success. I also don't think the comments directed at the fans have been overblown. It's part of his MO. Instead of owning up to the disappointing season, his best course of action was to blame the fans for having expectations. By his own stated expectations of hanging another banner and winning conference championships, his team vastly underachieved. He took no responsibility (recurring theme). I think that is many fans' issue with Woodson. When things are going well, he takes full credit. But when the going gets tough, he starts pointing fingers (or gets himself an early exit). He could have gotten much more grace with many fans by just saying the season didn't meet his expectations and he was going to make sure it didn't happen again. Instead, he announced that he was doing his job and anyone who thought differently was wrong.

I will say that I have definitely seen more purpose in the roster construction this year. But that failure last year is still on him. He took zero accountability for it. Now, my fear is he is going to sit back and revel in his "work" and think he is done. This "I don't take the shots" and "it's not my job to get 'player X' shots" attitude is his downfall. It IS his job. If he doesn't understand that, he will underachieve no matter how much talent he has. IU is not just here to get players into the league. Other schools can win AND get players in the league. That is where he and his staff come in.

I'm not sure who you're referring to, but I'll give my two cents. I've said numerous times that I hope the staff prove me wrong, but we have 3 years of data to go on. The continual drop in numbers speak for themselves. Woody has given no indication at all that he sees any reason to adjust. In fact, quite the opposite. If that is the case, I don't see a ton of success when it comes to evenly matched, well-coached teams. I'd feel much better if, after the disappointing season, he had said something like, "We all need to be better," but what we got instead is, I'm doing my job and the fans are the problem. So, I hope like hell that he can produce a level of basketball commensurate to the talent, but I will believe it when I see it.

Yep. I didn't want to put this in the expectation thread, because I've seen others get scolded for being honest in other threads, but my expectation is that we will underachieve yet again. I sincerely hope the coaching staff proves me wrong, but unless something changes, that is my expectation.

I was totally sucked in until you said Armond Hill was wide awake. Just too unbelievable, Stu :D

Quality depth...

Woody, just needs to win. That's it. He needs to stop taking credit for minor victory (like winning the off season), and then stop acting like every failure has nothing to do with him. HE needs to put in the work instead of telling everyone else to work harder. Just win and make believers out of all of us faux fans.

Shooter, PG, shooter, center for me.

I'm not disagreeing with any of this, but this is the exact same staff that put together that poorly constructed roster last season. This is the same staff that rested on their laurels instead of trying to add another guard with the available scholarship. The square peg/round hole, in my eyes anyway, is the thought from Woody that his job as a coach is not to try to run plays to get his best shooters open. The thought that there is nothing wrong with his offense, defense, strategy, game planning, substitution patterns. My hope is that he has seen enough the last three years to clue him in that what he is doing needs to be adjusted to the college game. My fear is that, regardless of what the record shows, he doesn't see any issues and is willing to go down with the ship proving everyone wrong. He has said that he wants to win now and bring banner number 6. But, when things didn't go as planned, instead of looking at what is working well and what is not working well and trying to learn from it, his response was to lash out at the fans for expecting too much from him and letting everyone know that he is doing his job. Those two things do not line up. Are you happy with mediocrity or do you want to win championships? Are you trying to get better at your job or is your best course of action to tell everyone you are doing great? Are you results driven or narrative driven? We know Woody needs a lot of talent for even moderate success, so let's hope he gets it. I see nothing to show me next season will bring any kind of championship unless Woody is willing to put the work in to figure out how to make himself and his team better. If moderate success and getting players into the league every year is good enough, then so be it. I remember a long time ago, we had a coach who spent the whole summer putting together an offense. I wonder how much time Woody and his staff will spend analyzing and adjusting. The square peg/round hole is that nothing needs to change except work harder.

It really is sad that IU basketball has devolved into this state. We are now the type of program where people gloat over winning the off-season. I'm pretty sure many of the same people were gloating last year because many thought we had also won that off-season. Call me a skeptic, but I'll believe it when to translates to wins. I'm happy we are getting some good players to come here, but I can't say I'm surprised by it, nor do or think that it makes Woodson a better coach. He has had talent every year he has been here. He is the same coach who decided to sit on a scholly last year because we didn't need another guard. The optimist in me thinks maybe this season has been enough to make Woody realize that his methods aren't working and he will change for next season. The realist thinks he is extremely bull-headed and/or tone deaf and will continue to pound the square peg into the round hole to prove to everyone his way is best, and then the excuses will ensue. I guess we will see...

But what if its the inconvenient truth?

Of course. We certainly aren't going to hear him take any blame.

Exactly, I don't want to hear and see all the backtracking when it doesn't happen.

Leaving an open scholly in the portal age IS malpractice.

I just envy them for having a coach who knew when to leave...

When in doubt, follow the money.

For me, its the culmination of all of it, and the fact that the people in charge choose to sit on their hands and close their eyes and act like everything is going to plan. There is no plan, that's probably the most disappointing part.

At a certain point, for me as a long-time fan, you have to start asking yourself about the definition of insanity and why you want to continue insanely rooting for the team where the people in charge are fat, dumb, and happy enough to continue with the current mediocrity, as long as people are filling Assembly Hall. If you are part of the "team" in charge of this s**tshow, in my opinion, it is a total dereliction of duty to roll with a coach who obviously has no plan at all. Think about it, the vast majority of his recruiting success has been 11th hour recruits that have more or less fallen in his lap. Now he plans to fill half the roster with portal players who are looking for a payday. Listen to successful college coaches talk about how to build a program: Recruit good players who are going to stick around for a while, develop and coach them up so that other talented players want to come to your program, and then use the portal to fill in specific needs. Does that sound at all familiar if you're an IU fan? No, not at all. For me, the more I see how successful programs are run, the less I want to put any resources into witnessing what my once beloved program has turned into. Unfortunately, I don't see the powers that be doing anything until the apathy translates into lack of attendance/$$. We have a coach who has a style that is so unappealing, we have to try to (over)pay portal players for one or two years. For some reason, no good players want to play in a style where the coach doesn't think his job is to get them shots. Wild! If anyone thinks Woodson has any desire to change, you are obviously not paying attention. I would have much more ability to stomach his mediocrity if he had any kind of awareness at all. After spending last summer talking about how he wanted to win now and hang another banner, he had what anyone listening would assume to be a disappointing season, by his own standards. But instead of coming out and saying the season didn't go as planned and he had to be better, he chose to double down and let everyone know that he is doing a great job and there is nothing wrong with what he is doing. He did after all, supposedly develop one player. Since no change has been made, one would assume he has the full support of the athletic department and administration. Or, our administration is compromised, broken, incompetent, inadequate, or possibly a combination of all of these. Either way, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. Well, I think I'm done expecting different results from this once proud program. As long as the status quo is the status quo, I don't think I'll be a part of the next 1000 pages of this thread.

Loyer actually played 2 years in Michigan, and 2 years at Homestead.

My only problem with this is that he seems to be depending largely on "back of the jersey" guys. While it may be true that not all the guys in the portal looking for a large payday are "back of the jersey" guys, it would seem a large percentage are.

Can someone let Woody know he doesn't need to know quantum physics to get players from the portal. Maybe that's where the disconnect is...

Doesn't surprise me at all. Learning a lesson would imply they admitted they did something wrong. I've seen no signs of that happening.