Fran, stop the bleeding...

LunchBocks said:
No thank you. I'd rather lose 20 games every year than brings in some thugs from the ghetto who grow up with a basketball in their hand but can't figure out how to pass high school level courses.
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It's remarkable how similar this post is to flat-out saying you want nothing but smart white kids who grew up on Iowa farms.
 
GravyJones said:
It's remarkable how similar this post is to flat-out saying you want nothing but smart white kids who grew up on Iowa farms.
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It's remarkable how close this post is to flat-out saying you want 13 Pierre Pierce's on scholarship.

I'm with the other guy. I'd rather not risk taking a thug player like that. The program can't afford another Pierce-like black eye at this point. Once Fran gets us respectable again, maybe. But not when we're in a position where something like that could sink us for good.
 
tm3308 said:
Didn't Alford try that, the "taking chances" thing. Ask him how he feels Pierre Pierce turned out for him.

I'm fine with thinking long-term. I want a stable program, not one that is totally dependent on a lights out recruiting class every year. Because just think if Memphis went just a year without getting those dominant freshman under Calipari. All of the sudden they would have had a big drop-off. Coach K has been passed by, as well. He refuses to go after the one-and-dones, he wants guys that are committed. It took 9 years, but he finally got his latest title, and now they seem primed to make another run.

Short term success is like a caffiene high for energy. It's great while you have it, and it's a b*tch when you inevitably crash. Where as consistent sleep is a better way to gain energy. Slower process, but a much higher success rate.
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I know this will get jumped on but one of my favorite questions is this, "why not do things the easy way instead of the hard way when the end result will be the same?" Some people might say satisfaction in knowing you did it the hard way, or the hard way means you did hard work and all that garbage. We need to work smarter right now rather than harder. Is there really anything to lose at this point by trying to bumrush this and try as hard as possible to make good as fast as possible? I personally feel time is wasting away and programs can wither away and not come back for a LONG TIME. Like 20 years a long time. If we can splash quickly we buy ourselves more time to go back and do things the hard way if we want to, unless of course we come to find out that we don't need to do this the hard way at all...
 
GravyJones said:
My post wasn't racist.
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I wasn't trying to say that. The other guy's comment made me think he was referring to Pierce-like players with his "ghetto, thug" reference. I've got no problem with urban kids, I just don't want guys like Pierce. Big difference there.
 
tm3308 said:
I wasn't trying to say that. The other guy's comment made me think he was referring to Pierce-like players with his "ghetto, thug" reference. I've got no problem with urban kids, I just don't want guys like Pierce. Big difference there.
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Couldn't have said it better myself. There are lots of players out there who are morally responsible, and not academically challeneged that are good BB players. I don't think we're THAT far in the hole that we need to dip into that well yet, just to win 15+ games.
 
clicheusername3 said:
I know this will get jumped on but one of my favorite questions is this, "why not do things the easy way instead of the hard way when the end result will be the same?" Some people might say satisfaction in knowing you did it the hard way, or the hard way means you did hard work and all that garbage. We need to work smarter right now rather than harder. Is there really anything to lose at this point by trying to bumrush this and try as hard as possible to make good as fast as possible? I personally feel time is wasting away and programs can wither away and not come back for a LONG TIME. Like 20 years a long time. If we can splash quickly we buy ourselves more time to go back and do things the hard way if we want to, unless of course we come to find out that we don't need to do this the hard way at all...
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At this point, the entire future of the program is at stake. Taking those risks is not a good idea, because if it backfires, that's it. Forget about Iowa basketball, it's never coming back.

Think smart, cliche. If the result (assuming both scenarios worked) could be the same either way, why take the one that's such a high risk? If we plan long-term and it pans out (much more likely), that's better than risking losing it all for good by taking shortcuts.

At this point, it's about risk-management. One more fiasco like Pierce (or Tyler Smith at TN), and we're done. The success isn't any sweeter with one choice or the other, so why take the gamble over the stable choice?
 
tm3308 said:
I wasn't trying to say that. The other guy's comment made me think he was referring to Pierce-like players with his "ghetto, thug" reference. I've got no problem with urban kids, I just don't want guys like Pierce. Big difference there.
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There was nowhere where I advocated filling a roster with 13 Pierces or 13 white guys or 13 anythings. I was simply commenting on a post that came across as extremely racist. There are plenty of guys not from inner cities that get in trouble for being stupid and there are plenty of kids from inner cities who never get in trouble. There's absolutely no need to single anyone out. "Thug" is rarely ever used to describe anybody other than a black guy. Sometimes there are a lot of extenuating circumstances that prevent inner-city kids from getting a proper education. I think it's incredibly moronic to avoid kids like that just because they may or may not do something stupid when they get here.
 
tm3308 said:
At this point, the entire future of the program is at stake. Taking those risks is not a good idea, because if it backfires, that's it. Forget about Iowa basketball, it's never coming back.

Think smart, cliche. If the result (assuming both scenarios worked) could be the same either way, why take the one that's such a high risk? If we plan long-term and it pans out (much more likely), that's better than risking losing it all for good by taking shortcuts.

At this point, it's about risk-management. One more fiasco like Pierce (or Tyler Smith at TN), and we're done. The success isn't any sweeter with one choice or the other, so why take the gamble over the stable choice?
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I just think that the way CBB is going (if it's not already there), that players getting in trouble and that kind of thing is just going to become the norm and people will care less (or just come to accept that it will happen and evolve with it and not make a big deal out of it). I think it's the opposite, if we don't take risks now and a long term approach does not pan out you not only might have missed a golden opportunity but you've also aged another few years of being an also-ran. If we jump in fast we will know if its not working fast and we can regroup again. If we prolong this then the agony could be long and painful, and everyone's 4 or 5 years + of hard work has suckeded the life out of them and there is no regrouping...

look at it this way, if you take on a project and work on it for 10 minutes and it succeeds your like, "great, I took 10 minutes and looked what happened I won", if it fails your like, "oh well i took 10 minutes and lost it was only 10 minutes I'll just try again because now I can learn and improve it even more if I work for 20 minutes".

If you work on something for a year and it succeeds your like, "thank god this worked because if it hadn't I wasted an entire year" and if you worked for a year and it didn't work out your like, "im devastated, look at all the time I took on this and some guy that probably took 10 minutes on this succeeded, I can't come back from this now I've wasted a whole year on this and I can't improve it because it would take 2 more years to make it better"...
 
GravyJones said:
There was nowhere where I advocated filling a roster with 13 Pierces or 13 white guys or 13 anythings. I was simply commenting on a post that came across as extremely racist. There are plenty of guys not from inner cities that get in trouble for being stupid and there are plenty of kids from inner cities who never get in trouble. There's absolutely no need to single anyone out. "Thug" is rarely ever used to describe anybody other than a black guy. Sometimes there are a lot of extenuating circumstances that prevent inner-city kids from getting a proper education. I think it's incredibly moronic to avoid kids like that just because they may or may not do something stupid when they get here.
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I'm not saying avoid black kids from the inner city, and neither was the poster that you originally quoted. He was advocating, as was I, that we steer clear of the kids with questionable character, aka "thugs". Maybe it was a little misguided phrasing, but I understood what he meant.
 
clicheusername3 said:
I just think that the way CBB is going (if it's not already there), that players getting in trouble and that kind of thing is just going to become the norm and people will care less (or just come to accept that it will happen and evolve with it and not make a big deal out of it). I think it's the opposite, if we don't take risks now and a long term approach does not pan out you not only might have missed a golden opportunity but you've also aged another few years of being an also-ran. If we jump in fast we will know if its not working fast and we can regroup again. If we prolong this then the agony could be long and painful, and everyone's 4 or 5 years + of hard work has suckeded the life out of them and there is no regrouping...

look at it this way, if you take on a project and work on it for 10 minutes and it succeeds your like, "great, I took 10 minutes and looked what happened I won", if it fails your like, "oh well i took 10 minutes and lost it was only 10 minutes I'll just try again because now I can learn and improve it even more if I work for 20 minutes".

If you work on something for a year and it succeeds your like, "thank god this worked because if it hadn't I wasted an entire year" and if you worked for a year and it didn't work out your like, "im devastated, look at all the time I took on this and some guy that probably took 10 minutes on this succeeded, I can't come back from this now I've wasted a whole year on this and I can't improve it because it would take 2 more years to make it better"...
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I definitely understand that point. The thing that gets me is that if we have that major fiasco (and by adding 3 or 4 kids with those kinds of character issues, it's nearly certain to happen), it goes kind of like this: for some reason, your books have a considerable surplus, and it's not been reported to the IRS. The quick fix, rather than trying to explain it all, is to just take it all out, and hope no one finds out. Didn't take much effort, didn't take much time. Now what happens if you get caught doing that? You end up in prison.

If Iowa were to suffer that kind of setback, that's the end. We can't risk that happening, and as I said, if we dip into that well deeply, it will almost certainly happen.
 
tm3308 said:
It's remarkable how close this post is to flat-out saying you want 13 Pierre Pierce's on scholarship.

I'm with the other guy. I'd rather not risk taking a thug player like that. The program can't afford another Pierce-like black eye at this point. Once Fran gets us respectable again, maybe. But not when we're in a position where something like that could sink us for good.
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Was Pierce really considered a risk? I don't remember him ever having any problems with being eligible. And he had no criminal record before he got to Iowa.
 
I don't think Pierce was a risk at all going in. He was a good student from a good family who had never been in trouble and from the suburbs, not from the Getto.
 
joemc1 said:
I don't think Pierce was a risk at all going in. He was a good student from a good family who had never been in trouble and from the suburbs, not from the Getto.
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But would you at least agree that bringing on kids who already have character/grade issues should be the LAST thing we should try to do?
 
tm3308 said:
But would you at least agree that bringing on kids who already have character/grade issues should be the LAST thing we should try to do?
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I don't think anybody is advocating bringing in criminals to play, but kids who have been in trouble (academically or legally) in the past shouldn't be automatically ignored. Kids do stupid things all the time; some get caught and others don't. They're at least worth giving a look at, and I'm sure there are plenty who are worthy of more than that.
 
tm3308 said:
But would you at least agree that bringing on kids who already have character/grade issues should be the LAST thing we should try to do?
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I would agree with that. I just think bringing Pierce's name up was a mistake. As he didn't fit that criteria.

I think the "risky" recruits have to be evaluated on a case by case basis. If you automatically dismiss a kid without analyzing the entire situation, you could miss out on some good kids who were just in bad situations earlier but have turned things around.
 
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