str8baller

That’s the second quote from devries I’ve read that is kind of a passive aggressive quip about not knowing anything about Sokolov. It seems he’s not a huge fan of the signing. Otoh, I’ve been told it’s conspiracy theory thinking if you suggest that Carr is anything but a direct report to Devries, so obviously Devries signed Sokolov without knowing anything about him. He must’ve done like I do with Amazon and occasionally order stuff drunk and then get surprised when it shows up 2 days later.

The difference there and problem for Devries is we are spending similarly, relative to each sport and our peers, in football and basketball. I.e were a top 10-20 spend in both. I think 8 seed is kind of my floor of expectations for this IU squad. I’m not sure I see any personnel limitations to that kind of season.

I’m surprised people still get sucked in, but they do. I’ll say this about Burton: 1) I don’t think his defense is bad per se, but he’s played on bad/soft ND teams so who knows. He *shouldn’t* be bad in a scheme with two 7 footers behind him. He and Sherrell are our two most talented players and have legit question marks surrounding them. For me, for Burton it is if he can be more than a jitterbug bucket-getter and settle into a facilitator role both with dishes to the bigs and kickouts to shooters. What I have learned over the years is pre-season (and often in season) criticism isn’t received well on message boards. If I wanted to pick apart these summer basketball reports you usually look for the dog that isn’t barking and I’d start with: Mustaf - his fit was already a little suspect and it’s probably not great he isn’t standing out more in these practices give the athleticism he displayed on film Harris - Maybe he’s a diamond in the rough or maybe its not great sign for our overall talent level that Dukes 9/10th man has stood out as our 4/5th best player Sisley - I want to believe, but a 4* guy poised for a breakout season should probably be putting it on everybody not named Sherrell in some scrimmages. Instead it sounds like progress is a little slower and he’s a slightly improved version of last years end of the rotation player. Happy now? ….lol I do think that if Burton and Sherrell are their best versions of projected (and Yigi is solid) we’ll be able to compete up and down the B1G even given the above, especially with May gone.

“Markus Burton – Burton continues to show why he was such a productive player over the last three seasons at Notre Dame. He’s a willing distributor who gets where he wants with the ball ” I like to see that. He probably needs to be more of a facilitator than scorer on this team.

I feel bad for him. He is probably the most improved player I’ve ever seen come through IU. He was always athletic but his HS film was rough. Then his NBA career started off slow only to see him work his way into an All NBA player on a playoff team in his “adopted “ home state. Then it was all ripped away with a brutal freak injury. He’s an incredibly hard worker. His improvement track was truly impressive, imo.

I read that he deleted his instagram today. His fellow massholes must not be happy. At least he still has dunkn donuts.

Which Michigan kids want out? Dusty has quite the war chest assembled and most kids probably already signed a contract meaning Michigan can’t boot them, I think. So a kid would have to likely want to leave and find a place with an open spot and enough money to match Michigans offer.

Yes they were. You couldn’t see it. But their ADs did and that’s why they weren’t fired. But just because you can’t see the logic in something doesn’t mean more qualified people can’t. People bring up Dean Smith, Coach K, Hurley, whatever…but if you go back and look and read what their ADs had to say, they were never in danger of being fired. In fact, you would have to search far and wide to find a coach who was fired for performance at one school and then rebounded at another school and one a title. This nightmare/myth of firing a great coach too early only to enviously standby like chubby bridesmaid while he wins a championship at his next school just doesn’t exist. It only exists in the minds of scared fans. I’ve been reading IU fans fearfully cry about it online for 25 years and it never fails to amuse me. It’s like when someone claims they are afraid of the woods because their friend saw Bigfoot.

I think they understood. It was just a dumb fundamentally flawed scheme.

I was hoping you would say that. I have no doubt some luck is involved. Basic statistical analysis and game theory would say that the more luck that is involved the quicker you should fire coaches. If it’s pure luck as you state you should probably never let a non-championship caliber coach reach year 4, let alone year 5+. Why? More bites at the apple. If it’s luck you want to be hiring as many coaches as possible (and thus firing them quickly). So it is always funny to me when fans like you defend keeping poor coaches extra years praying your frog will turn into a prince. The winning strategy is firing coaches often and early. But that’s a hard concept for some—especially IU fans—to grasp.

He would. But I think I’d get on my knees and beg any billionaire booster that would listen for the money to bring back Wilkerson in a scenario where both were eligible. A Wilkerson / Burton back court with that front court would actually have me dreaming of an E8 or better showing.

It’s the difference between understanding a sport and thus the coach’s flaws versus just looking at results. As someone said above, process vs results. Fans look at results and make up post hoc rationalizations. Good AD can identify the process. btw, you never answered my question: how did IU hire Cig if they’re incapable of great hires?

How did IU hire him in the first place? You say it can’t be done, but they did it.

Would we? Tom Allen is basically the football version of Crean. Booting him was a great idea. And I have to admit I was skeptical on that one as I certainly didn’t have the vision for IU football that Cig/Dolson had. To bring the thread full circle, when you see what guys like Cig and May were able to do in 2 years what’s the impetus for hanging on to mediocre coaches for 4+ years? That is, of course, if you have desires for a championship program. What I have learned over the past 2 1/2 decades is that a lot of IU basketball fans are fine with Crean-like results. So maybe I’m in the minority here.

I already conceded the fact that you were enamored with Crean…and Woody. Nobody else thinks they are good coaches. But you are welcome to your opinion.