Ben Johnson is a Disaster

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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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👏
 

The coaching last night reflects the title of this thread, a DISASTER.

1) Keep letting Crowl and Wahl go 1 on 1 for the ENTIRE game for layup after layup. Zero adjustments made, maybe once or twice we showed a double and they turned it over. Other than that you can't let them go for 46 pts in the paint or whatever it was and do whatever they want inside.

2) 10 seconds left down 3. Ben puts Samuels in for Ola-Joseph, which I'm fine with as Samuels is the better 3 point shooter. But you have to know there is a decent chance they are going to foul us given we are the worst free throw shooting team in the nation. So for the love of God you don't put the ball in Samuels' hands to bring up the court who is an awful free throw shooter and is ice cold having not played the entire game. Shocker, they foul him and he goes 1/2 at the line.

3) 4.8 seconds left (I believe), Battle makes the first free throw to cut it to 2. Then we decide to miss intentionally which in my opinion is ridiculous. Just make it, foul with 4-4.5 seconds left and that is enough time to get the ball up the court for some kind of chance that is more likely than an offensive rebound off a missed free thrown.

Wisconsin outclasses us year after year in the coaching department with minimal talent and it drives me nuts. Ben is especially in over his head.
 

To not play Samuels the whole game and then put him in the final 10 seconds is ridiculous. I don't care if you're trying to make a 3 or not.

If you're playing for the 3, you go Cooper / Henley / Carrington / Battle / Garcia. (Cooper may have fouled out at that point, IDK)

I really did not like Samuels being thrown in like that. Was he thinking a special senior send off there? Magical moment?
 

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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Home runs in the portal.
Just like this season.
 

The only hope for a home run would be MN kids trying to come back home like Garcia. And Garcia's case was really unique. Only way he'd be able to play right away was at MN.

I don't know who that would be at this point, but it's still going to be tough as most kids that are playing well won't want to play for this program at it's current level.
 


skiumah1 said:
The only hope for a home run would be MN kids trying to come back home like Garcia. And Garcia's case was really unique. Only way he'd be able to play right away was at MN.

I don't know who that would be at this point, but it's still going to be tough as most kids that are playing well won't want to play for this program at it's current level.
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and now they can go to UST...no more D1 monopoly in MN
 

Wet_Blanket_Guy said:
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.
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They were also prioritizing Battle/Cooper when they looked poorly earlier in the year. They got better. Regardless of where priority was they made progress. It will be tougher sledding as priorities shift absolutely, but that is just the way progress works for all guys. Garcia is still on the team as of now (and he still got his even with teams playing him as the #1).
To me, it's one more year for Ben and it's make or break. Team has to be an NCAA tourney team or at very least on the bubble with promising recruiting. Anything less and he's gone
 

upnorthkid said:
They were also prioritizing Battle/Cooper when they looked poorly earlier in the year. They got better. Regardless of where priority was they made progress. It will be tougher sledding as priorities shift absolutely, but that is just the way progress works for all guys. Garcia is still on the team as of now (and he still got his even with teams playing him as the #1).
To me, it's one more year for Ben and it's make or break. Team has to be an NCAA tourney team or at very least on the bubble with promising recruiting. Anything less and he's gone
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Garcia becomes massive now. If he decides to try to play professionally somewhere this offseason, there's just no words at that point.
 




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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A couple home runs takes it from two Big Ten regular season wins, to how many?

Assume whatever two home runs you want (within reason), and assume what you want about the health and returning status of anyone on the roster.

How many wins and why?
 

34Gopher said:
3) 4.8 seconds left (I believe), Battle makes the first free throw to cut it to 2. Then we decide to miss intentionally which in my opinion is ridiculous. Just make it, foul with 4-4.5 seconds left and that is enough time to get the ball up the court for some kind of chance that is more likely than an offensive rebound off a missed free thrown.
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Sorry for the bball newb question here:
let's say we do it your way, cut it to one, foul them, they make both, their lead is back to 3, as soon as we touch the ball they foul us. That means we can only make two points, can't even go for a three.

How do we get around that?
 

Gophers_4life said:
Sorry for the bball newb question here:
let's say we do it your way, cut it to one, foul them, they make both, their lead is back to 3, as soon as we touch the ball they foul us. That means we can only make two points, can't even go for a three.

How do we get around that?
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Nailed it. If Battle made the 2nd free throw. Badgers in-bound and we foul immediately, let’s say .3 comes off the clock and that leaves ~4.2 left.

Badgers make 2 and the games over. They would foul us before we shoot a 3…but after a second has come off the clock. So same situation with about 2.5 left. So in reality Battle did what’s best.

By not fouling you are only hoping badgers miss 1 of 2. Odds are OK, but same with you odds of getting the rebound
 

bleedsmaroonandgold said:
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.
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This is exactly what I’ve been thinking. If Coyle could blow us away with a Fleck/Motzko-type hire, great, but at this point I would take any current D1 coach who’s been at his school maybe 3-5 years with some semblance of upward trajectory and a .500 conference record.

That’s gotta be a fairly sizeable pool of candidates, I’d think.
 




Gophers_4life said:
No AD/Prez/Board of Directors in the country will accept that as a valid argument, even if most regular people can see that it will hold. Sorry
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Part of their job is to be pragmatic and think long-term. Not that they will.
 

Gophers_4life said:
A couple home runs takes it from two Big Ten regular season wins, to how many?

Assume whatever two home runs you want (within reason), and assume what you want about the health and returning status of anyone on the roster.

How many wins and why?
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6-14 and 13th place. Look out. I'm not sure ahead of who, but we won't finish last!
 

howeda7 said:
Part of their job is to be pragmatic and think long-term. Not that they will.
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How much total gameday revenue do Gopher men's basketball games produce per year?

I would genuinely like to know this answer. Unfortunately the current data in the Equity in Athletics database is for 2020-21, which is useless.
 

GFBfan said:
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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Well said. I don't get the outrage over his comments from a few but when you factor in that those getting the most upset probably bristle at everything Johnson says it makes more sense.

Coaching today's players is very different than it used to be, that isn't an excuse that is just the simple reality that every coach is dealing with. Fleck talks all the time about how players want to know Why now, they don't just blindly follow instructions from coaches.
 

Gophers_4life said:
How much total gameday revenue do Gopher men's basketball games produce per year?

I would genuinely like to know this answer. Unfortunately the current data in the Equity in Athletics database is for 2020-21, which is useless.
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They have ~7,000 season tickets not counting students. 17 games at $50/game is $850 x 7,000 ~$6 million. I assume $50/game is too low an average but I'm not sure by how much. Losing a couple thousand season tickets could easily lose them $2 million/year though. And conversely, hiring someone like Musselman could easily generate an extra $2-3 million/year, which is why breaking the bank for him is not that absurd an idea, if he's willing to listen.
 

howeda7 said:
They have ~7,000 season tickets not counting students. 17 games at $50/game is $850 x 7,000 ~$6 million. I assume $50/game is too low an average but I'm not sure by how much. Losing a couple thousand season tickets could easily lose them $2 million/year though.
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OK, that's 4 years at $8M.

I know, I know, your argument is that that $2M lost in next year's ticket sales will be about the decrease in BJ's buyout, because it won't be free to fire him after next year either.

I'm just saying, Presidents, Regents, CFO types ... getting them to part with that $8M is likely to elict "when you pry it from my cold, dead fingers" kinds of responses.
 

Gophers_4life said:
OK, that's 4 years at $8M.

I know, I know, your argument is that that $2M lost in next year's ticket sales will be about the decrease in BJ's buyout, because it won't be free to fire him after next year either.

I'm just saying, Presidents, Regents, CFO types ... getting them to part with that $8M is likely to elict "when you pry it from my cold, dead fingers" kinds of responses.
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That's why you name Ben and Lindsey "special assistants". No buyout, just very expensive fundraisers.
 

Wet_Blanket_Guy said:
Nailed it. If Battle made the 2nd free throw. Badgers in-bound and we foul immediately, let’s say .3 comes off the clock and that leaves ~4.2 left.

Badgers make 2 and the games over. They would foul us before we shoot a 3…but after a second has come off the clock. So same situation with about 2.5 left. So in reality Battle did what’s best.

By not fouling you are only hoping badgers miss 1 of 2. Odds are OK, but same with you odds of getting the rebound
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Yep, I am sure knowing the Badgers would foul as long as they were up 3 I'm sure played into the decision to have Battle try and miss the 2nd. Obviously you can make the second and then hope they miss at least 1 on the ensuing possession but even with all that you are only likely to have a couple seconds to throw up a desperation 3 to try and win.

Unlike Rutgers, Wisconsin was unlikely to let us advance the ball to half court with no resistance, they would be fouling in the backcourt right away as long as they were up 3. And heck, with our free throw shooting this year if you can foul the right guy it might make sense to foul even up 2.
 

howeda7 said:
That's why you name Ben and Lindsey "special assistants". No buyout, just very expensive fundraisers.
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Did Lindsey have a buyout still?? Here five years. Also it's Women's BB, so I imagine it was much less. I don't think there was any such "mutual agreement" there. I think she was fired, but they conjured this up to save face for a local legend. Hence why she "brokedown" in the elevator.

Maybe Ben would feel so much loyalty that he would just willingly give up his buyout, but I doubt it.
 

Gophers_4life said:
Did Lindsey have a buyout still?? Here five years. Also it's Women's BB, so I imagine it was much less. I don't think there was any such "mutual agreement" there. I think she was fired, but they conjured this up to save face for a local legend. Hence why she "brokedown" in the elevator.
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Yes. And she will still get her $$, but I guess she has to show up and get Mark his coffee or something. In reality, I assume she will take a job with the Lynx and negotiate some sort of reduced buyout rather than do that for two years.
Gophers_4life said:
Maybe Ben would feel so much loyalty that he would just willingly give up his buyout, but I doubt it.
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Of course he won't. Neither would you or I. But it might possibly get mitigated if he gets an assistant job somewhere, depending on how it's worded. Pretty much zero chance he will get another HC gig anytime soon.
 


Gophers_4life said:
A couple home runs takes it from two Big Ten regular season wins, to how many?

Assume whatever two home runs you want (within reason), and assume what you want about the health and returning status of anyone on the roster.

How many wins and why?
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Considering the way rosters evolve and that almost 60% of the league was around .500. Going 8-12 to 11-9 is reasonable.
 

Gophers_4life said:
Sorry for the bball newb question here:
let's say we do it your way, cut it to one, foul them, they make both, their lead is back to 3, as soon as we touch the ball they foul us. That means we can only make two points, can't even go for a three.

How do we get around that?
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Don't get down by 3
 

howeda7 said:
Let's subtract 40% of our starting line-up and give it one more year. It's guaranteed to improve!
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At this point, it is just throwing things at a wall and seeing what sticks. Very amateurish.
 


Gophers last in free throw shooting % at 61.5%.
Battle shot 80% and he's leaving.
 

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