I get your drift but the HC is in a position to do so something if the roster is inadequate and the fans aren't, and the HC is responsible for the end product and the fans aren't- by definition the coach is therefore guaranteed to be even less patient than the fans. I can, however, understand the fans being highly critical for Stallng's ailure to bring in a better class last year and thereby minimizing future attrition except that it's also true that few programs not named Kentucky, Duke and Kansas could start from scratch like Stallings was forced to do and deliver instant result, and that's where I think some of the criticism of Stallngs is unfair.
Realistic Expectations
- Thread starter CCHS82
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But Dixon left of his own volition with 6-7 years left on his contract....Pitt didn't prevent him from staying to right the ship and escape thevdryspell.
The bottom was coming this season no matter who the coach was going to be.
Would the bottom be 8-24 or 10-22 or 12-20, I don't know. But that kind of season was ticketed for this year no matter what. Years of poor and less than intelligent recruiting have a way of catching up to a program.
I suppose one could argue that part of it is also about fit for scheme. I refuse to think that Kitchart and Manigault are as bad as people on this board believe, or as bad overall as they looked last year, so those two (as an example) may have talent, and be wrong for Pitt. My complaint with the overhaul is that there isn't a high enough talent level for a good number of them to feel promising about it as a whole.
If you agree with the earlier statement that even if the roster overhaul hadn't occurred that Pitt would be largely in the same place, I don't see the relevance of debating whether he was forced to do what he did.....the roster was a complete mess and he had the responsibility of fixing the mess. Had he not precipitated the roster overhaul, you can bet that the same people criticizing him for the makeup of he current team would have attacked him for not trying to upgrade the roster- like they criticized him for not recruiting a center of pg for last year's team. The guy was placed in a no win situation. No coach worth a lick would have assessed the mess Stallngs inherited and not tried yo overhaul that pathetic roster.
But what did Barnes do that drove him out exactly? Jamie could have easily said, ok, but I guess I will stay at my same contract terms. I am missing that smoking gun.
Why would anyone with as much success as Dixon want some new guy to come in and tell him what to do when he had other offers? Barnes telling Dixon how to schedule when Dixon had the perfect formula is the first example. Dixon asking for more money for assistants, and being told no would be another example.
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Then Jamie's skin is thinner than an old onion. You really think that Dixon is the first coach who was ever told by his AD that they would like a schedule change or they aren't paying more money to ACs.
You have an odd perspective of Barnes' role on driving Jamie out of here.
My boss comes into give me a performance review and even though I have 25 more years experience than him in my work area, does his telling me to work on improving in one or two areas cause me to toss my badge on the table and walk out the door. I don't think so for most people. And especially not for someone who is making millions of dollars per year.
The more you talk about this the more it really seems like the decision to leave was mostly on Dixon. Not on anyone else.
Then you are an idiot to stay at your current job. If a new, abrasive boss comes in and wants to tell me how to do my job after I’ve been successful, and there are other companies out there willing to increase my salary. Then I would not put up with it. Who you work for is a big component.
Barnes and the administration should have sat down and worked with Dixon, instead of what they did. That is how they opened the door for him to leave.
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My understanding is that there was also a reversal of promises, and investment in assistant and recruiting budget that did not happen. The actions of Barnes spoke to his lack of endorsement of Dixon.
If you had a job that you liked, but one where you were not allotted the resources, where your boss was removing responsibilities from you that you've had for 10 years, and suggesting you change your style even though he had never actually done that job, and despite you being the best person to have that job ever were losing the support of your bosses and their bosses, and a vocal fan base who thought that ANYONE could do better than you, then you'd probably take the sweet job that pays more, pays those who work for you more and increases your operating budget to do the same job.
Not to mention conducting meetings with customers (donors) who are actively petitioning to have you removed from your position.
"With as much success as he was experiencing"..quit pretending the last 6 years of Dixon's tenure were like the good old days in the BE. You're in denial. On attendance, the AD had every right to invoke himself in scheduling discussions because attendance/interest was CLEARLY decreasing...wake up...that's the AD's job. Dixon took scheduling cupcakes to the extreme. You don't have the foggiest idea if Dixon was squeezed on his asst. budget.....they hired Slice at a high price and Dixon fought it. The guy was. like you, in denial that Rome was burning around him.
On the first point I call clear nonsense...so Dixon fought Pedersen tooth and nail on making any changes to his staff and was allowed to make a high priced hire in Slice and then after Slice left, with Pedersen still at the helm, Dixon, of his own volition, hired that low cost bum, Smoke. And with this historical evidence you and your other fantasy thinkwrs want us now to believe that Dixon wanted to reassemble his own staff when Barnes was AD but wasn't given the budget to do so. Dixon was clueless in putting together his staff and at the end of the day, he obsessed on one thing: he wanted all decision authority.
Cam Johnson couldn't handle the pressure of being a leader on a team that no one cares about and which is under no real pressure at all to go to a school where he is starting in one of the most pressure packed environments in NCAA sports (not just basketball, all sports).
Yeah, sure, that makes sense.
Steve Adams couldn’t handle being a leader at Pitt so he left for the NBA
Do you even have a job? How many performance reviews have you ever received where your management didn't make suggestions because um well he is the freaking manager who signs your paycheck.
Face it. Jamie walked. You can't accept that he left you behind and you will whine until Jamie takes his next job.
Its ridiculous the love affair some of you guys have with Dixon.
So what? Did Barnes fire Dixon? No. Would Jamie still have made a ton of dough if he stayed? Yes.
He is a big boy who had already handled the pressure of coaching in the NCAA. Jamie could have probably very easily turned everyone in power against Barnes and had Barnes pushed out.
Well you get your wish because now we have a coach that both the fans and administration want to push out but he refuses to go.
I actually think the disdain for Dixon is the ridiculous part, and it started well before he walked. He did leave, that part is true, I was upset about that. But facts remain that a lesser school (one that he also had a connection to) came in and made a great offer, with a greater commitment to win then our administration has. He didn't have the authority to make the changes he needed to make here. I'm grown up enough to recognize that an employee need not have blind loyalty to an institution that is not holding him in high regard.
I apologize if I inferred it otherwise, but I don't necessarily agree with this statement,
Your statement is just moronic . Leaving for life altering amount of money is quite a different thing than what Cam did .
Another moronic statement . Pitt can fire him any time they want to . You think he’s dumb enough to walk away from millions for nothing , but to make you and Heather happy ?
Cam missed several wide open looks and free throws in pressure situations last season that sealed Pitts fate , he must be a fool then to put himself in the most pressure packed enviorment in NCAA sports .
We went from having a few waves out at sea to the sinking of the Titanic. Congrats - the administration and the high powered boosters got their way. Just like the Pirates - if they want to go half ass, then I will do the same. Went from season tickets to attending only 1 game this year. It looks like an awfully lot of people did the same.
And yet there he is. For some reason he seems to not think that he has the limitations on his game that you seem to think that he has.
And for some reason Roy Williams appears to agree with Johnson and not you. How could he be so stupid?
He went somewhere where he doesn't have to be the man or take the big shot, yet will still have a chance to win big. Some men are beta, some are alpha. I will always remember Cam Johnson as being Josh Baskin.
He left somewhere where he likely would not have to take one big shot in two seasons for a place where he might be taking a shot to win an ACC or NCAA championship.
I don't know why you guys have such vitriol against Johnson, but it's making you guys argue some really, really stupid things.
As I've said on this board, my friend who works in an NBA front office says he would have likely been a 2nd rd pick if he came out last year. I can understand some upset that Cam left, but to suggest that he is not good is foolish. He worked hard in school and went to an opportunity to play in the post season and play in competitive games. I wish he didn't put I find it hard to blame him. If we are OK with a coach essentially running off a bunch of players that he didn't see as a fit, then we should be OK with a player moving on when he deems that it isn't a fit for him.
Dropped basketball because I am not going to support the college version of Bob Nutting. Kids and family take up a lot of time. Why buy season tickets, only get to half the games, and send the wrong message to the admin? I am watching the Titanic from a life boat. When they get serious, then so will I.
We have football season tickets, and I am just as big or more a fan of football. Less games and easier to get to. Post more on football board. Hence the name.
If I was Cam and I could play at Pitt or UNC I’d choose UNC too , who wouldn’t . For all the great recruits UNC gets they always seem to be a little light on shooters and offering a good shooter whose 6’7” a scholarship for a max of two yrs was a no brainer.
I had really high hopes for Cam last season and truly thought he’d have a breakout year in which he‘d emerge as a star and a potential NBA player. He showed that he’s a solid college ball player and he showed that when given the chance to hit that clutch shot he came up short more often than not . I wish he stayed at Pitt he didn’t and I can’t root for him or his team , but I hope his dream of getting a grad degree from UNC comes true !
Let me ask you this? How did you slip this agenda driven post, which had NOTHING to do with the OP's point in? And you guys wonder (DT hello) why people take shots at Jamie?
And no, it is not "almost on par with Sherrill", Sherrill left Pitt was one of the 2-3 best programs in the nation. Dixon left we were definitely the best program in Allegheny County.
Pitt basketball is a laughingstock. We exceeded “realistic expectations” under Dixon, but that wasn’t good enough for some.
There's no evidence TCU made a greater commitment to its BB program than Pitt. Dixon was resistant to all change(particularly to his staff) so your suggestion that he wanted to make changes but didn't have the authority to do so is your fictional BS- the guy refused to make any changes and that was what created the friction in the first place. Dixon went to TCU for 2 reasons: to escape the mess he created which he knew he would ultimately be held accountable for; and second, he was going to a garbage BB program at a school whose AD was his crony so that he knew that the expectations would be low and that he could do whatever he wanted with complete autonomy. The heat for him in the Pitt kitchen was too hot for him, a situation he created because of the deterioration of his team.
Pitt exceeded realistic expectations under Dixon. What the hell does that mean? And secondly, last time I checked Pitt NEVER in any NCAA tournament played up to its seed... never... not once... and the losses to Nova and Butler were just mind boggling ... Dixon deserved more heat from those losses than he got. At the end of the day though had Dixon continued to produce teams of the caliber he did up thru the Patterson/Zanna team, he'd still be at Pitt but he couldn't even sustain the recruiting to produce that caliber of squad. And yes, the garbage Dixon delivered his last several years wasn't good enough!
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