Ben Johnson is a Disaster

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Spaulding!No! said:
Just imagine the AAU relationship when Ben is tossed. Ben will make the AAU rounds with complimentary things to say about the U. Your gonna need to hire a flamethrower to beat back all the negativity.
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all your trolling aside.....who is a realistic option that you want as coach?
 

Gophs24 said:
all your trolling aside.....who is a realistic option that you want as coach?
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I got in this argument with a buddy. I have no idea who a realistic option is but I know the option we have isn't working.

The problem with keeping Johnson at this point is that he is going to drive the casual fan completely away and turn more and more diehards into casual fans. It isn't outlandish to think that next year during non-conference play there will be much less than 5,000 people at the games.
 

MNfootballfan said:
I got in this argument with a buddy. I have no idea who a realistic option is but I know the option we have isn't working.

The problem with keeping Johnson at this point is that he is going to drive the casual fan completely away and turn more and more diehards into casual fans. It isn't outlandish to think that next year during non-conference play there will be much less than 5,000 people at the games.
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oh i agree 100%.....that needs to be taken into account.....i went to 4 home games this year. went to 8 last year......and if the product doesnt get better and there isnt more reason to believe i know it will be less than 4 next year for me.....
 

MNfootballfan said:
I got in this argument with a buddy. I have no idea who a realistic option is but I know the option we have isn't working.

The problem with keeping Johnson at this point is that he is going to drive the casual fan completely away and turn more and more diehards into casual fans. It isn't outlandish to think that next year during non-conference play there will be much less than 5,000 people at the games.
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There are no more casual fans. Only people who sympathize with us hard cores who aren't giving up. They don't care about the Gophers, but they care about us.
 

Bad Gopher said:
The thing I'd disagree with is that any player in the top 150 and with Mr. Basketball honors is a stud, and his loss would be a blow.
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Agreed.

From last year's NBA draft alone, you could put together a damn fine team with players who were ranked below Christie coming out of high school.

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The 247 numbers are national ranking orders. I don't think ESPN ranks overall outside of the Top 100 so the rankings are by position if the player was ranked at all. ESPN has Christie ranked as the #32 shooting guard.

The most diplomatic thing I can say is that some people on this board "lack perspective."
 
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Gophs24 said:
all your trolling aside.....who is a realistic option that you want as coach?
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As of now, pretty much anyone with head coaching experience at the NCAA D1 level who has strung together winning conference seasons in any conference with any degree of regularity. Don't know who is "realistic" (though I would imagine the bulk of the almost 300 non-P6 head coaches would jump at any P6 opportunity). If you or I had coached this season, we would not have finished any lower in the B1G standings and, at most, would have won 2 fewer B1G games. So we almost couldn't be worse.
 







cjbfbp said:
Agreed.

From last year's NBA draft alone, you could put together a damn fine team with players who were ranked below Christie coming out of high school.

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The 247 numbers are national ranking orders. I don't think ESPN ranks overall outside of the Top 100 so the rankings are by position if the player was ranked at all. ESPN has Christie ranked as the #32 shooting guard.

The most diplomatic thing I can say is that some people on this board "lack perspective."
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Or better a perspective is that these rankings sites don't really mean that much. The list you put out means that there are outliers out there that with hard work, the proper genetics (underlying athleticism), and dedication, you can outplay these baseline projections and make it.

Will Christie outplay his projection...hopefully. But should the gophers not fire Johnson just because of losing Christie...absolutely not. We could use this argument to say, let's go find someone ranked 400th and he may make the NBA...look at this list
 





Wet_Blanket_Guy said:
Or better a perspective is that these rankings sites don't really mean that much. The list you put out means that there are outliers out there that with hard work, the proper genetics (underlying athleticism), and dedication, you can outplay these baseline projections and make it.

Will Christie outplay his projection...hopefully. But should the gophers not fire Johnson just because of losing Christie...absolutely not. We could use this argument to say, let's go find someone ranked 400th and he may make the NBA...look at this list
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Someone said that losing someone ranked in the 120s is no big loss. Bad Gopher disagreed with that statement and I provided additional perspective to support that disagreement.

That is all.
 

Wet_Blanket_Guy said:
Or better a perspective is that these rankings sites don't really mean that much. The list you put out means that there are outliers out there that with hard work, the proper genetics (underlying athleticism), and dedication, you can outplay these baseline projections and make it.

Will Christie outplay his projection...hopefully. But should the gophers not fire Johnson just because of losing Christie...absolutely not. We could use this argument to say, let's go find someone ranked 400th and he may make the NBA...look at this list
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I doubt they are going to fire him. But after a likely loss on Wednesday we will find out on Thursday if they are going to fire him. If you fire him you better do it fast and have a plan to get a big time coach and keep the players this time around.
 

cjbfbp said:
Someone said that losing someone ranked in the 120s is no big loss. Bad Gopher disagreed with that statement and I provided additional perspective to support that disagreement.

That is all.
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Sometimes with the layout of Gopherhole and how you don't see the thread you are responding to (your response is always at the bottom and you only see the immediate comment you are responding you only), you never know who made the actual comment.

No idea who I was actually responding to...but in general, losing Christie would be bad, but he's not good enough to keep CBJ (if that is the only reason).
 

Wet_Blanket_Guy said:
Sometimes with the layout of Gopherhole and how you don't see the thread you are responding to (your response is always at the bottom and you only see the immediate comment you are responding you only), you never know who made the actual comment.

No idea who I was actually responding to...but in general, losing Christie would be bad, but he's not good enough to keep CBJ (if that is the only reason).
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There will always be a recruit or two you'd rather not lose in a coaching change. Unless it's a Fab 4 coming in, you can't let it factor into the long-term decision. Certainly Lindsey had far more on the line in that regard than Ben does with Evans already gone.
 

JimmyJamesMD said:
I really liked the gophers freshman this year. Ben did them a dis-service by not getting better transfer guards
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I do agree. And in all honesty, they all got better as the year progressed. I'm pessimistic on Ben overall, but JOJ, Carrington, Payne, and Henley all look better now versus at the start of the year. Those 4 plus Garcia back is a team that can fringe the NCAA/NIT if they can land a reasonable PG who can defend. Add in Christie and Betts and it has to happen or Ben is done.
 

GopherWeatherGuy said:
More excuses. There’s just no reason to continue with someone with this mentality.

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What in the actual F'K?

Good players want to be coached, good players, talented players want to be coached hard. This comment is just plain unacceptable from someone in his position. Good grief, are we running a day care?
 

kg21 said:
the new guy, assuming we finally hire someone with a track record, would bring in some of his recruits and bring a few players from his own team.

Win/Win
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I think there is a better chance of Ben becoming a winning coach than this administration making a home run basketball hire.
 

I say fire him on Monday after the Big Ten Tourney, but, two things need to be lined up first:

- You need to send a Gopher contingent to Christie's house (Jordan Murphy, Nate Mason, Bobby Jackson, Willie Burton)

- Simultaneously send a contingent to Cherry for Asuma: McHale, Coyle, Quincy Lewis, Kris Humphries (he may not have had a long Gopher career, but he played in the NBA for like 12 years and has name recognition), Rickert - a northern MN guy

These guys need to be brought in and bring the message of we are going to right the ship and we need you to keep your commitment. We need your help turning this around. It's been fucked up before, but trust us this time.

Edit:

Get a key contingency for the following players: Payne, JOJ, Garcia, Betts, Henley (I want to see him before showing him the door) -

TT, Fox, Ihnen, Carrington, Ramberg (he could go back to walk-on), *Battle and Cooper (I assume are leaving due to yesterday's news)
 
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Ogee Ogilthorpe said:
What in the actual F'K?

Good players want to be coached, good players, talented players want to be coached hard. This comment is just plain unacceptable from someone in his position. Good grief, are we running a day care?
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No. The vast majority of day cares are able to keep the kids from running away.
 

Wet_Blanket_Guy said:
I say fire him on Monday after the Big Ten Tourney, but, two things need to be lined up first:

- You need to send a Gopher contingent to Christie's house (Jordan Murphy, Nate Mason, Bobby Jackson, Willie Burton)

- Simultaneously send a contingent to Cherry for Asuma: McHale, Coyle, Quincy Lewis, Kris Humphries (he may not have had a long Gopher career, but he played in the NBA for like 12 years and has name recognition), Rickert - a northern MN guy

These guys need to be brought in and bring the message of we are going to right the ship and we need you to keep your commitment. We need your help turning this around. It's been fucked up before, but trust us this time.
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There's little to no chance Christie would stay committed if there's a coaching change. But that's a small thing in the grand scheme. There's a pretty high chance Assuma will. That's on the new coach.
 

cjbfbp said:
Someone said that losing someone ranked in the 120s is no big loss. Bad Gopher disagreed with that statement and I provided additional perspective to support that disagreement.

That is all.
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I obviously don't want to lose him. But if we are keeping CBJ in part because of Christie, that's a huge mistake IMO.
 

Ogee Ogilthorpe said:
What in the actual F'K?

Good players want to be coached, good players, talented players want to be coached hard. This comment is just plain unacceptable from someone in his position. Good grief, are we running a day care?
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Yikes! It is one of the reasons I don't mind seeing Battle leave. Ben let him do whatever he wanted. Other players got sat down and taught.
 

upnorthkid said:
I do agree. And in all honesty, they all got better as the year progressed. I'm pessimistic on Ben overall, but JOJ, Carrington, Payne, and Henley all look better now versus at the start of the year. Those 4 plus Garcia back is a team that can fringe the NCAA/NIT if they can land a reasonable PG who can defend. Add in Christie and Betts and it has to happen or Ben is done.
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I challenge this thinking and here is my argument:

The freshmen look better as our opponents circle two names on the scouting reports (Battle and Garcia). By making Battle and Garcia priority 1a and 1b, they focus all of their defensive energies / shifts towards those players. They always know where on the court they are. So, when our freshmen have good games, it is usually when Garcia and Battle do not have good games. Teams will say, if we shoot Garcia and Battle down (and take Cooper's wide-open 3 pointer away), the Gopher's can't win. The freshmen may look good, but that is the plan.

Next year, with Battle and Cooper gone (in this hypothetical there is no transfer guards), teams will start to prioritize Payne and JoJ's (8 foot and in game) & Henley's drive (if still on the team). These things were not high on the scouting report this year. It was like Battle in year 1 of the B10. He was a new shiny object and caught a lot of teams by surprise. But in year 2, they adapted, and the results were not good.
 

bga1 said:
I think there is a better chance of Ben becoming a winning coach than this administration making a home run basketball hire.
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I'm going with the fact that he has embarrassed himself with the Whalen/Johnson combo and the only way to save face is hire an actual coach.
 

upnorthkid said:
I do agree. And in all honesty, they all got better as the year progressed. I'm pessimistic on Ben overall, but JOJ, Carrington, Payne, and Henley all look better now versus at the start of the year. Those 4 plus Garcia back is a team that can fringe the NCAA/NIT if they can land a reasonable PG who can defend. Add in Christie and Betts and it has to happen or Ben is done.
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If you didn't see the improvement in the Freshmen you weren't paying attention. Garcia also improved. Johnson needs a couple home runs in the portal and they will be just fine.
 

MaxyJR1 said:
If you didn't see the improvement in the Freshmen you weren't paying attention. Garcia also improved. Johnson needs a couple home runs in the portal and they will be just fine.
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Easier said than done, my friend. As always, you are more optimistic and confident than I am. I'm grateful for that.
 

GopherWeatherGuy said:
More excuses. There’s just no reason to continue with someone with this mentality.

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What part of the answer he provided was him making an excuse?
I get that you don’t want him as our coach, but his answer to the question was pretty honest and most all coaches would answer in a similar way with statements of:
Can’t coach kids the same way as before
Players want to feel appreciated and feel good about the atmosphere around the program, both in terms of day to day things and winning - which is one thing that hasn’t happened with the Gophers Team…yet,
Players transfer for a multitude of reasons
All coaches are trying to understand the new landscape and make their situation better.
Focus on the guys you have and work to keep building a positive relationship and their basketball skills.
 

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