Why do our donors only pay big bucks to buy out coaches but not hire coaches?
Quit whining, he’s gone and will never be back, remember he started this downfall at Pitt
It’s like the wpial, a 4 - 16 overall record or a 2 - 8 conference record gets you in the playoffs
I might be wrong , but I think he really thought he could be successful here . No doubt he didn’t feel that way for long !
I don't even think he thought about it. He was entering retirement and someone offered him a few million to delay it a couple years. What's to think about?
I know everyone here believes that nobody makes decisions for money but for a lot of people, even rich people, if they are about to be fired into retirement and some other company comes along and says "if you delay retirement for 4 years, I'll give you $12 million," a whole lot of people would say yes to that.
Did you really just say Jamie, who has won, what, 1 NCAAT game in like 11 years would have been as successful as Cronin at UCLA? Based on what?
Money is always a consideration and it’s hard to turn down 2+ million a yr , but there’s a time everyone walks away . He’d have never taken the job if he was burnt out .
Even if he was burned out, Stallings could have slept through the job (and did) for a few years and netted millions. It could very well been a money thing to him.
He was the wrong coach at the wrong time , but I doubt he took the job with the intentions of sleep walking ( ha ha ) through the job .
Yea, Dixon would have, at minimum maintained Dixon II level in this ACC. He was trending towards some bad years (as he left with only 2 ACC-level Underclassmen in the program in Cam and Luther) but he would have eventually righted the ship.
Yeah all he left was 4 starters
He would have gotten that team to the NCAAT. It may have killed him but he would have. But the next year, they would have been like 4-16 in the ACC as just Cam and Luther were left. He would have had 2, maybe 3 years without a bid while he built the program back up. There was nothing left beyond Cam and Luther.
No one knows who else they bring in? You are saying there would be no transfers or recruits?
Jamie knew talent , but SMF is 100% correct , behind that senior class Pitt had nothing other than Cam and Luther and this is coming from a big JD supporter . For several yrs Jamie had struggled recruiting and Cam and Luther were only offered out of necessity when his main targets went elsewhere . Jamie searched everywhere for grad transfers to fill out his roster , but wasn’t getting any of the better players available . Recruiting has been a Pitt problem not just a JC problem for some time now .
Of course he would have brought in players but Jamie rarely brought in impact freshman. Sure there was Blair, Adams, etc, but his program wasnt built to rely on freshmen to save the day. And this was an era before the mass transfers. It is completely unlikely that Jamie would have brought in new players to make that team much better.
But some posters on here and they know who they are wanted Jamie gone. Coaches have down years but Barnes and some boosters thought otherwise.
Pitt has become pre-Jamie TCU and TCU has become Dixon II. College basketball is 98% the HC.
That Lumpkin kid, 6'11 beefy freshman. Ranked #321 by 247. Why couldn't he hit on those lottery tickets at Pitt?
He hit on quite a few lottery tickets. Even late in his run here I would certainly call Cam and Luther hits - Chris Jones etc. But I know what you are saying, although the problem for Dixon late was that some of the more highly ranked kids (Damon Wilson etc) didn’t pan out. Also, we sort of built our team around Young, Artis, Robinson - and those guys are good but not good enough to get to like the second weekend of the NCAAs (or with the wrong coach, even the NIT)
