Fire Ben Johnson

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Bad Gopher said:
It's still shocking four years later that the U hired someone so unqualified for this job. I still have a hard time believing it. What's even harder to believe is that there are still people who think this bizarre experiment is about to somehow start working, or that it's the fans' fault for not supporting him, or some such shit.
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The thread from the day he was hired is a fun read. So much shock and horror. It was all correct.
 


Gopher_In_NYC said:
Last time I checked, Ben is a person and not an object🤦‍♂️

I don’t take joy in seeing people suffer, fail, or get fired, as I’ve learned for myself there are many more things in life than a ball, a win or a loss.

Sports is simply entertainment to me at this point in my life, not the end all be all it was, when I was a younger man.

So, please feel free to question whatever you want to my friend; I’ve been called worse by better 🤠. You won’t hurt my feelings, as I don’t give you that power.


Cheers🥳
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Literally none of what you said makes sense. Nobody wants Ben to fail or thinks he isn’t a person. He’s has the worst record of any gophers coach. He also is making millions so if he is fired for having a terrible record and being a bad coach nobody should really feel bad for him or feel bad for wanting the worst gophers coach to be replaced.
 

howeda7 said:
The thread from the day he was hired is a fun read. So much shock and horror. It was all correct.
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Yeah, I was super underwhelmed with the hire and really wanted Craig Smith. But it stings extra hard because with that first season, although rough, there was enough promise showed that I thought maybe hiring Johnson was a better move than I first thought...nope.
 



DarthGopher said:
If they miss the BTT, March 10, 2 pm press conference. Pull the plug. If they make the BTT, then March 17. Four years is more than enough time.
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Seems like a pretty safe bet that if a move is going to be made (and I feel confident it will be) that it will happen very quickly once the season is over. Can't see Coyle wasting time.
 

mplarson7 said:
Yeah, I was super underwhelmed with the hire and really wanted Craig Smith. But it stings extra hard because with that first season, although rough, there was enough promise showed that I thought maybe hiring Johnson was a better move than I first thought...nope.
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Does anyone think hiring Craig Smith now or 4 years ago would make the program different than it is now? If so why? He couldn't win at Utah why would he win here with worse or at best similar resources? Pay for a big time coach or fight for 15th for the rest of time.
 
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DarthGopher said:
If they miss the BTT, March 10, 2 pm press conference. Pull the plug. If they make the BTT, then March 17. Four years is more than enough time.
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If they lose to Northwestern on Tuesday they likely don't make the BTT.
 

Johnnyboy18 said:
Does anyone think hiring Craig Smith now or 4 years ago would make the program different than it is now? Is so why? He couldn't win at Utah why would he win here with worse or at best similar resources? Pay for a big time coach or fight for 15th for the rest of time.
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I was high on Smith when Ben was hired but yeah he's been really underwhelming at Utah. I'd like to see Coyle go after Chris Mack but I'm guessing it will be Medved.
 






Speaking of Craig Smith, who seemed to be better in the old college basketball world than the new one...

If there's a blessing surrounding the timing of this seemingly impending hire, we now know a lot more about who's proven to be adept at succeeding in this new world.
 



USAF said:
"Far better than Ben" is not a metric we should be using.
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Very true, but it would still be an upgrade.

Tubby and Pitino were both fired for performance, so we should not lose sight of the fact that performance that matches or is worse than Tubby's six year tenure should be a fireable offense.
 

bleedsmaroonandgold said:
Very true, but it would still be an upgrade.

Tubby and Pitino were both fired for performance, so we should not lose sight of the fact that performance that matches or is worse than Tubby's six year tenure should be a fireable offense.
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You might have missed the point.
 

Gopherbbdude said:
How many pages does it take to discuss this topic.....FFS
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It’s all we can do until the future decision is made.

Crazy part is that this season is better than last year at this point IMO. The B1G is also a cluster and it’s really about the game to game match ups. Wins over Michigan, Oregon and UCLA

Bottom 5 in conference have 26 wins in conference play.

On the women’s side the bottom 5 have 10.
 


howeda7 said:
The coaches make the schedule. Not that Coyle can't weigh in.
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I tried looking that up the other day and couldn't find a definitive answer. How do you know that is true? Curious.
 

WindyCityGopher said:
Medved would do absolutely zero to reignite my passion for this program. Coyle needs to aim higher.
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I only disagree because he’s built programs successfully before possibly coming here. He’s got 12 years HC experience and is close to a .600 coach in MWC. He would be able to take his knowledge at mid major and enhance with new resources. There would definitely be different levels of excitement.
 

MaxyJR1 said:
It’s all we can do until the future decision is made.
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That and vote with our pocketbooks, which many of our fellow fans have already done. Heck, I've NEVER been one to skip games, but I've skipped multiple games this year. That's that many fewer dollars I spent on parking and Kemps ice cream. Multiply that by thousands...

But yeah, besides whatever the power of expressed public opinion is (it's nonzero), it helps to talk about it. It sounds like a cliche, but it's true.
 

Johnnyboy18 said:
Does anyone think hiring Craig Smith now or 4 years ago would make the program different than it is now? If so why? He couldn't win at Utah why would he win here with worse or at best similar resources? Pay for a big time coach or fight for 15th for the rest of time.
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He did inherit a dumpster fire at Utah, but he hasn't done great there so far. But I'd still take a coach who won a lot at two previous stops over what we're dealing with right now.
 

MaxyJR1 said:
It’s all we can do until the future decision is made.

Crazy part is that this season is better than last year at this point IMO. The B1G is also a cluster and it’s really about the game to game match ups. Wins over Michigan, Oregon and UCLA

Bottom 5 in conference have 26 wins in conference play.

On the women’s side the bottom 5 have 10.
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Is that because the bottom is better or the top is worse? (on the men's side)

Maybe some of both.
 


MaxyJR1 said:
I only disagree because he’s built programs successfully before possibly coming here. He’s got 12 years HC experience and is close to a .600 coach in MWC. He would be able to take his knowledge at mid major and enhance with new resources. There would definitely be different levels of excitement.
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My thing is that Nikko Medved wouldn’t get a single second of attention as a potential head coach of the Gophers if he wasn’t from Minnesota. He is competent, I’ll give him that, which isn’t a negative because we need to have a competent coach after too many years of guys learning on the job. But this program is so beaten down that simple competence just won’t cut it; we need that plus so much more. I think competence gets us to a comfortable pattern of 9th place conference finishes, and if that happens the program will finally completely melt into irrelevance.
 

WindyCityGopher said:
My thing is that Nikko Medved wouldn’t get a single second of attention as a potential head coach of the Gophers if he wasn’t from Minnesota. He is competent, I’ll give him that, which isn’t a negative because we need to have a competent coach after too many years of guys learning on the job. But this program is so beaten down that simple competence just won’t cut it; we need that plus so much more. I think competence gets us to a comfortable pattern of 9th place conference finishes, and if that happens the program will finally completely melt into irrelevance.
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The problem is that, in the past, for example, people have said the same about guys like Brian Dutcher. Charley Walters pimped him and Eric Musselman for years to the sound of crickets around this town. Only once they became so successful as to become unattainable did they become the ones the fans thought were sexy enough.
 

WindyCityGopher said:
My thing is that Nikko Medved wouldn’t get a single second of attention as a potential head coach of the Gophers if he wasn’t from Minnesota. He is competent, I’ll give him that, which isn’t a negative because we need to have a competent coach after too many years of guys learning on the job. But this program is so beaten down that simple competence just won’t cut it; we need that plus so much more. I think competence gets us to a comfortable pattern of 9th place conference finishes, and if that happens the program will finally completely melt into irrelevance.
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9th place conference finishes put us in the tournament more often than not. And then you hope for a sweet 16 run every so often on top of it. I'd take that step forward in a heartbeat

EDIT: From where we are right now that is. If we get to that point, we can always reevaluate the situation
 

I'm not sure why people would pine for Medved. He's coaching in the Mountain West and his teams have been less accomplished than Richard Pitino's New Mexico teams and we fired Pitino.
 

Bad Gopher said:
It's still shocking four years later that the U hired someone so unqualified for this job. I still have a hard time believing it. What's even harder to believe is that there are still people who think this bizarre experiment is about to somehow start working, or that it's the fans' fault for not supporting him, or some such shit.
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One of the best posts on this site. The question of "how did Ben Johnson get this job?" comes up in my mind every week and it happened four years ago! He's failed in every way possible since he's gotten the job and some people still try to come up with bizarre hypothetical situations where he would/will actually be a success.

Mike Woodson has two better wins this season after being forced out at Indiana than Ben Johnson has in 4 years. Diebler at Ohio State had a better win as an interim coach than Ben Johnson has had in 4 years.
 

Not my info and it's 3rd hand at best. Someone who has a subscription to his discord says "insider" Trilly Donovan reported on his site that it's "50/50" on Ben today. I had no idea if that means it's literally 50/50 or Trilly doesn't have a good gauge of where things are.

I would hope a decision was made a month ago when it was clear we had no path to the NCAA tournament. It would concern me greatly if we haven't been making calls in the background gauging interest and hopefully getting someone locked up.
 

EG#9 said:
Not my info and it's 3rd hand at best. Someone who has a subscription to his discord says "insider" Trilly Donovan reported on his site that it's "50/50" on Ben today. I had no idea if that means it's literally 50/50 or Trilly doesn't have a good gauge of where things are.

I would hope a decision was made a month ago when it was clear we had no path to the NCAA tournament. It would concern me greatly if we haven't been making calls in the background gauging interest and hopefully getting someone locked up.
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Trilly (whoever he/she is) is incredibly entrenched and has a ton if correct info. I will say at this point I doubt anyone is leaking if the job will be open or not. Say they have decided he's out, we win out, then it looks bad. Or it gets out, guys get upset and we crater. So at this point just makes sense he says 50-50. Not like knowing it's open now does us much now. But we do need to move quick because guys like McCollum etc won't be out there long.
 

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