Ben Johnson is a Disaster

Donate To GopherHole

mnsportsgeek said:
In the last 15 years, I have never found it as easy for me personally to ignore Gopher basketball as I have now.
Click to expand...

I never, ever thought things would get to this point, but here we are. Never in my wildest dreams (okay, nightmares) did I think you could turn on the TV and see the Barn with the kind of attendance we see today. I would have told you that you were absolutely f'ng nuts.
 


Ogee Oglethorpe said:
I never, ever thought things would get to this point, but here we are. Never in my wildest dreams (okay, nightmares) did I think you could turn on the TV and see the Barn with the kind of attendance we see today. I would have told you that you were absolutely f'ng nuts.
Click to expand...
Makes me thankful I went to school in prime Tubby years. No it wasn't the barn of old but it was a fun atmosphere. I hope we can get back there.
 

touchdownvikings said:
Someone else - apologies, I forget who right now - asked me a similar question within the last week. Something to the effect of: when would I start looking at W's and L's? My answer was toward the end of next season. Things should start to being to come together then. ...Until then, relax. Drink. Drink some more. And then more still. It'll be right in the end.
Click to expand...
“All will be even at the end of the day, and yet more even when all the days are ended.” Of course by then we’re all dead.
💁‍♂️
 
Last edited:


GopherWeatherGuy said:
This isn’t a youth issue, this is a coaching and roster construction issue. It’s not going to get much better next season.

When you hire someone who doesn’t have any credentials to be a B1G coach, this is what you get. This is the worst Gopher basketball team I’ve seen in my lifetime.
Click to expand...
Prior to the season, what were you expecting from Battle and Garcia? Many here projected both as all-conference players. Were you one of the few who knew better?
 

Dakota2 said:
Prior to the season, what were you expecting from Battle and Garcia? Many here projected both as all-conference players. Were you one of the few who knew better?
Click to expand...
At least one of them. Clearly saw scoring potential increase. Not seen on the court yet, though.
 

goldengophers said:
Both coaches he lead assisted under were fired in the last two years, any local columnist worth their salt would be digging into why exactly he was the hire. After Pitino struggled to learn on the job hiring a Ben Johnson made zero sense.
Click to expand...
It made plenty of sense. Coyle thought he would be able to recruit. That has already proved to be correct.

One thing that was probably overlooked in the interview was whether or not Ben could get two soft upper classmen to put down their press clippings long enough to carry a young team.
 

Dakota2 said:
It made plenty of sense. Coyle thought he would be able to recruit. That has already proved to be correct.

One thing that was probably overlooked in the interview was whether or not Ben could get two soft upper classmen to put down their press clippings long enough to carry a young team.
Click to expand...
If burning it down was the trade off for recruiting then both Coyle and Johnson deserve to be fired. This has been an unmitigated disaster.
 



touchdownvikings said:
Someone else - apologies, I forget who right now - asked me a similar question within the last week. Something to the effect of: when would I start looking at W's and L's? My answer was toward the end of next season. Things should start to being to come together then. ...Until then, relax. Drink. Drink some more. And then more still. It'll be right in the end.
Click to expand...
End of next season? So we should expect three years of historically bad basketball before we can peak at results?

I don't even think I can think of a single coach in major college basketball that started with three terrible seasons who had any success whatsoever.

Where did you come up with this timeline?
 

MNJay said:
I'm noticing the same guys here in this thread, commenting & liking comments....who before raved about Winter & Robison and how great Wisconsin is.
Click to expand...
LOL. I know, what idiots! Can you imagine people being so dumb to think that a team that wins over 60% of their Big 10 games is good while also having the audacity to complain about a team that wins less than 20% of their Big 10 games?

Another killer take!
 

Bob_Loblaw said:
End of next season? So we should expect three years of historically bad basketball before we can peak at results?

I don't even think I can think of a single coach in major college basketball that started with three terrible seasons who had any success whatsoever.

Where did you come up with this timeline?
Click to expand...
Coach K at Duke had 3 horrible seasons.
 

MonikerSchmoniker45 said:
I get it. It's ugly... but far from a disaster. Giving up on next year already is retarded. If there's a mass exodus at the end of the year, I say cut ties.
And I thought Thorson was supposed to be this defensive guru who would help Johnson. Seems to me that he's just a product of $$$ buying better athletes at the hs level.
Click to expand...
Which better athletes do you think he bought?

I watched him build players for years. He’s also the guy that left the U and told anyone within shouting distance that Clem’s program was dirty.

When Gabe showed up at The U, where do you think his Defense came from? You think he was just a better athlete? Paid for? How does that even work?
 



atsgopher said:
Coach K at Duke had 3 horrible seasons.
Click to expand...
Oranges to pomegranates comparison. True but a really long time ago in a really different environment with far fewer risks of roster turnover. It’s the keeping the team together in the middle of disaster that is the most significant risk now. K didn’t have that problem.
 

atsgopher said:
Which better athletes do you think he bought?

I watched him build players for years. He’s also the guy that left the U and told anyone within shouting distance that Clem’s program was dirty.

When Gabe showed up at The U, where do you think his Defense came from? You think he was just a better athlete? Paid for? How does that even work?
Click to expand...
Word early on is that he got out of there because the system was rotten. The reference to being part of it is nuts.
 


Holy Man said:
Oranges to pomegranates comparison. True but a really long time ago in a really different environment with far fewer risks of roster turnover. It’s the keeping the team together in the middle of disaster that is the most significant risk now. K didn’t have that problem.
Click to expand...
It's also not true.

It's oranges to "made up pomengranete to build a narrative".
 

Dakota2 said:
Prior to the season, what were you expecting from Battle and Garcia? Many here projected both as all-conference players. Were you one of the few who knew better?
Click to expand...
Many here did project them high. More of us had realistic thoughts.
 

atsgopher said:
Which better athletes do you think he bought?

I watched him build players for years. He’s also the guy that left the U and told anyone within shouting distance that Clem’s program was dirty.

When Gabe showed up at The U, where do you think his Defense came from? You think he was just a better athlete? Paid for? How does that even work?
Click to expand...
Are you saying Thorson made statements that were negative about Clem? If this is true we’re screwed. Dude shoulda been dead to the U.
 


atsgopher said:
Oh you’re correct, he was 17-13 vs 13-17. Silly me.

He sub .400 years came in the next two.
Click to expand...
Seems like splitting hairs to me, but the issue is still the same. K was on what would later be known as the hot seat for underperforming and turned it around. The environment and circumstances now make any comparison between that and our unfortunate situation irrelevant.
 

Holy Man said:
Seems like splitting hairs to me, but the issue is still the same. K was on what would later be known as the hot seat for underperforming and turned it around. The environment and circumstances now make any comparison between that and our unfortunate situation irrelevant.
Click to expand...
Splitting hairs? I asked for someone to show me one example of someone who had three terrible seasons to start their career with a school that ever turned out to be successful. Pointing to someone whose first year was decent is not splitting hairs. Lol. By the way, there certainly could be people I'm not thinking of but Coach K is definitely not one of them.

I never said that no coach who has ever been on a hot seat has ever been a good coach.

His first three years were 2 bad and 1 decent year and then year 4 through year 39 he went to the NCAA tournament.
 

Holy Man said:
Seems like splitting hairs to me, but the issue is still the same. K was on what would later be known as the hot seat for underperforming and turned it around. The environment and circumstances now make any comparison between that and our unfortunate situation irrelevant.
Click to expand...
I’m not so convinced. I think the roster turnover risk is overblown. Sure there is risk, but disgruntled players are usually those that aren’t playing. NIL is a risk whether we win or lose.

I’ve already seen Thorson Develop players and I know when he says Ben can, he isn’t lying.

There certainly is room for criticism - that’s usually true. I understand folks don’t have the same contextual info as I do, but still there is some poor critiques being floated.
 

Bob_Loblaw said:
Splitting hairs? I asked for someone to show me one example of someone who had three terrible seasons to start their career with a school that ever turned out to be successful. Pointing to someone whose first year was decent is not splitting hairs. Lol. By the way, there certainly could be people I'm not thinking of but Coach K is definitely not one of them.

I never said that no coach who has ever been on a hot seat has ever been a good coach.

His first three years were 2 bad and 1 decent year and then year 4 through year 39 he went to the NCAA tournament.
Click to expand...
Calm down. The point is that someone is trying to compare our current situation to Ks and the analogy falls completely flat. You and I are in agreement on that.
 


atsgopher said:
I’m not so convinced. I think the roster turnover risk is overblown. Sure there is risk, but disgruntled players are usually those that aren’t playing. NIL is a risk whether we win or lose.

I’ve already seen Thorson Develop players and I know when he says Ben can, he isn’t lying.

There certainly is room for criticism - that’s usually true. I understand folks don’t have the same contextual info as I do, but still there is some poor critiques being floated.
Click to expand...
Fair enough response. Thanks for the explanation. We disagree on flight risk and the comparison of Ks situation to Ben’s. I’m going to assume we are both fans and are of goodwill in this. And most importantly would rather have the team succeed than be right in petty disagreements. Peace.
 

Dakota2 said:
Prior to the season, what were you expecting from Battle and Garcia? Many here projected both as all-conference players. Were you one of the few who knew better?
Click to expand...

I have always tempered expectations for Garcia. He is very skilled and talented, but there's a reason his last two teams got better after he left. Battle has been disappointing so far, and that's likely due to his foot injury.

Even if both had been playing better, this team is still losing by double digits. They're not even close right now.
 


Bob_Loblaw said:
LOL. I know, what idiots! Can you imagine people being so dumb to think that a team that wins over 60% of their Big 10 games is good while also having the audacity to complain about a team that wins less than 20% of their Big 10 games?

Another killer take!
Click to expand...
I love reading Jay's hot takes. I feel kinda bad for him being so sure he's right though.
 


You must log in or register to reply here.



Top Bottom