akumanina

Since the 10 mil buyout is a guaranteed income for the next 3 years, if I were him, I'd take a year off to regroup. Not a good thing from IU's perspective, but I don't think it's anything IU admin didn't expect. I think there could be a clause in the contract that Miller should put a reasonable efforts to find the next job, but it's easy to do a subpar job on a job interview...deliberately.

This was hilarious.

Yeah we got too excited and overhyped this whole thing...out of desperation. So part of the wounds is self inflicted.

I think still some of us want to give Stevens the benefit of the doubt and to want to trust his former 'image' a bit too much. If he didn't want this job from the beginning, all he needed to say on Tuesday was "No I don't want the Indiana job. I'm not going to Indiana. Period." But he didn't for whatever reason, he dodged and gave a vague answer. Then came out on Friday basically saying "Didn't I tell you I don't want Indiana? Yeah I'm from Indiana, so I got some good memories from childhood , but I'm not a kid any more. I'm a grown man who loves Boston and Massachusetts. So piss off." It can't get any clearer than that. What I'm pissed off about is as a result (even if Stevens didn't mean it) IU and its fans became a pathetic bunch and a laughing stock. And for that, I don't think I'm going to root for this guy any more.

I don't think there's any smoke screen. Stevens made himself crystal clear and then some more. I was baffled when he said he made it clear in Tuesday's conference; well Brad, you didn't. He dodged the key word "NO" and said all the fancy words. My guess is after the Tuesday interview, something happened between him and the Celtics, and he came out on Friday and burnt the bridges with confidence.

I agree with you on everything except the part he would unite the fanbase. I don't think he's that type of person. But I still think he's a grand slam hire. It's just that his sense of loyalty to 'everything Indiana' was not what we thought it would be. Nonetheless he would do a terrific job because he's a great basketball mind and his players loved him (but seemingly not at Boston).

Just googled on Mike Woodson, and I didn't know he is an assistant at Knicks. Intriguing prospect, but I don't know anything about him as as a coach. Does anyone here know?

Chris Beard hands down but if he's not interested, I like Beilein as long as he'd help us on his successor. I can see Beilein possibly has 5-6 years in his tank; he hires one of IU former players (Fife, Lewis, or Cheaney) as his top assistant and groom him to become the next coach after him. That to me would be a pretty good mid term and long term plan. Seems like Oats is locked at Alabama at this point; I don't mean he's not going to move, but timing is just not right for him. For some reason, I don't feel comfortable with Drew. And hopefully Dolson is not considering any mid major coach this time.

Personally I don't like this kind of parade. We should just move on like it never happened. This kind of thing or Cleveland fans burning LBJ jerseys are to me pathetic.

Same for me. Even if he changes his mind, I don't think I want him any more. The very reason we loved and wanted him so bad was obviously he was (and is) a great coach, AND he is a homegrown Hoosier who we thought would proudly represent the Hoosier state. Fans in Indiana are the ones who would love and back him up through thick and thin. It's completely ok he says no, but after a vague pregame interview on Tuesday, the way he came out and rejected IU yesterday just didn't sit well with me. I don't think any big time IU booster would want to spend a dime on him in the future. Yes I get it he wants to be where he is now. Good for him. But he lost a lot yesterday....something money can't buy.

I wasn't from Indiana, but I went to IU, and after graduation I moved out of Indiana. But even I felt some of Stevens comments to be mildly insulting. Each of us has own heritage, roots, and culture that has made who we are. I know it could be a matter of personal preference; some say when in Rome, do as Romans do. But I have a different point of view. What I saw today was Stevens begging for love, desperately trying to fit into the Masshole culture instead of trying to be himself and do what he does best that is to coach basketball. Maybe he doesn't realize a lot of people in his home state have great pride in him. That's why I said in my previous post that he was just an individual trying to looking out for himself. As Stevens being a well known and respected figure in Indiana, I guess I wanted to see something better than that.

You made a difficult decision. I stayed.

oh i got it. Sources are better be protected.

Come on, please share. What more damage could you do at this point? I think a lot of us have cooled down.

You could be right. It might've been his plea to all Massholes out there to get their support. But I think our love for Stevens kind of got out of control because we kept trying to read between the lines. We already had 'THE BRAD STEVENS' in our minds the way we would want him to be, but in fact, he was just an individual trying his best looking out for himself, which is right and fair. We just thought he would be some sort of a selfless person, and we shouldn't have. Or maybe it was just my problem.

For a few hours, it wasn't easy to digest the whole situation. I can clearly see now that the Stevens camp approached the IU opportunity as 'just another job'. We thought and hoped that Stevens had certain level of emotional attachment to IU men's basketball, but it was our wishful thinking. I mean personally a similar thing happened to me so I understand; I got an offer and said yes to the prospective employer, but then my then current employer gave me a promotion and topped the other company's offer, so I stayed. But I did that because it was just a job; it wasn't a very difficult decision to me because I had no emotional attachment. It's ok that we don't land Stevens for whatever reason, but it left a bit of bitter taste in my mouth because I, we unnecessarily believed that Stevens would have deep affection towards the state of Indiana and IU men's basketball. In the end, he now calls himself a Masshole and cheers for Patriots.

He knows how to share. Such a generous guy.

You gonna change your avatar anytime soon?

Don't worry. You're not alone.

That was what shocked me the most. Indiana people had too high regard for him.

Would be VERY happy with either one.

So in the end, that was about money? Celtics matched our offer, and we were canned.

Hmm...that sounds like a very definite answer to me. If I heard this from other guys, I would've taken with a grain of salt, but Stevens is just not the type of guy to answer things one way and then to flip it to the other way.

Can we get the refund for the buyout? Wait...we haven't paid yet.

I'm gonna wait until I hear the firm statements from all parties.