Does Ben Johnson have any defenders left?

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Sane24 said:
I guess I am saying that it is easier to recruit local kids at WSU.
No competition really.
Idaho, Idaho State, Montana, Eastern Oregon are not competitive with WSU.
Other Pac12 schools are a long distance away.
Maybe I'm wrong.
Just my impression.
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You're wrong.
 

Sane24 said:
I guess I am saying that it is easier to recruit local kids at WSU.
No competition really.
Idaho, Idaho State, Montana, Eastern Oregon are not competitive with WSU.
Other Pac12 schools are a long distance away.
Maybe I'm wrong.
Just my impression.
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I will simply concede that WSU had a better basketball coach than the Gophers this year, but I still think that CBJ is better than whomever Minnesota could hire to replace him.
 

Sane24 said:
I will simply concede that WSU had a better basketball coach than the Gophers this year, but I still think that CBJ is better than whomever Minnesota could hire to replace him.
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Glorious titwillow!
 

Coach Johnson does not pay the players. Until we get this straight, we're never going to get anywhere.

Mentioning Fleck, women, Washington State, etc...is distraction. Coach Johnson does not pay the players.

The administration is in charge of all fundraising and expenditures. Johnson would face discipline if he did an end run around them on his own. Like if he set up his own phone bank, telethons, billboards...or if he just went to businesses and said he wanted $1.75M for Payne, Hawkins, & Christie.

He'd be fired if he did that.
 


Bobek said:
I’m willing to see how the next season goes before insisting that he be fired. Year three was a big improvement see let’s see how it goes.
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Yes I agree, he will have some very veteran players and need to see how this season goes. So if we move on from him, I'm not sure who we get? Yes I believe we should have had Dutcher, then Muss, but here we are and doubt we could get those two now. Not really sold on Niko like a lot of folks here are. So Ben was pressured to recruit MN, and we missed a lot of good MN players during Pitino era. Some MN recruits so far were, TT (overrated on all the rankings sites), Carrington (never stuck out much in high school games), and I'm not very high on Grove, but happy to have him here and will give him a fair shot. JOJ and Payne are B1G players, but stuff happens.
 

Spottedmuskie said:
Yes I agree, he will have some very veteran players and need to see how this season goes. So if we move on from him, I'm not sure who we get? Yes I believe we should have had Dutcher, then Muss, but here we are and doubt we could get those two now. Not really sold on Niko like a lot of folks here are. So Ben was pressured to recruit MN, and we missed a lot of good MN players during Pitino era. Some MN recruits so far were, TT (overrated on all the rankings sites), Carrington (never stuck out much in high school games), and I'm not very high on Grove, but happy to have him here and will give him a fair shot. JOJ and Payne are B1G players, but stuff happens.
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TT was a Pitino recruit. Asuma will be good. I have high hopes for Grove who stood out in AAU events last summer. But, to your point, so far the recruiting results are at best- mixed.
 

Why are you guys still talking about coaching?

The coach does NOT pay the players.
 






Sane24 said:
Do you realize that what you are yet to see may be due to poor eyesight and comprehension by gopherhole xxxholes?
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Eyesight is good. Product on the court not so much. Hopefully, that changes this year.
 

Gophers7633 said:
Do you realize it's possible to have both, a below avg to bad NIL setup and a below avg to bad coach? We've yet to see an actual good product on the court with this staff.
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Well the coach certainly put together a valuable team.

Rapidly improving with no seniors.

What's another coach going to do? Win big with scrubs?
 




howeda7 said:
Also, why is the football coach handling it fine? Why is the women's basketball coach handling it fine? Why is only poor Ben struggling this hard when they all have the same terrible bosses?
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There does seem to be a big difference between football and basketball when it comes to NIL. I could be way off here but my guess is Hawkins is getting just as much money or more than Taylor would have gotten if he transferred. With much fewer players in basketball, each individual is more important (other than maybe a handful of QBs). Other than Colorado, we aren't seeing half the rosters changing in the transfer portal in football like we are in basketball. Basketball does seem to be on another level when it comes to transfers and money.

Ben does need to be better though.
 



GophersInIowa said:
There does seem to be a big difference between football and basketball when it comes to NIL. I could be way off here but my guess is Hawkins is getting just as much money or more than Taylor would have gotten if he transferred. With much fewer players in basketball, each individual is more important (other than maybe a handful of QBs). Other than Colorado, we aren't seeing half the rosters changing in the transfer portal in football like we are in basketball. Basketball does seem to be on another level when it comes to transfers and money.

Ben does need to be better though.
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I think there is a massive difference between the Men's college basketball portal and the one on the women's side or football. I had to dig a little and it looks like there are 1300 women's players in the portal so they are seeing high roster churn but I would bet the pay for play money needed to secure a transfer on the women's side is significantly lower than what we are seeing on the men's side.

Have said before that after seeing what things are like on the basketball side it makes the football portal/pay for play look like nothing. Not that there isn't a lot of roster churn but you don't hear the same ridiculous pay for play figures being tossed around in football outside of maybe some of the top players.
 

Sane24 said:
How do they adapt?
Tell their wife and kids to get jobs?
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Maybe discuss how to adapt with Coyle, the person who offered/hired CBJ for the job. Coyle hired CBJ and both are "earning" 1+MM / year salary. Excuses for lack of success for either of these people is laughable. They are paid high salaries to return success. These jobs and high salaries are not for OJT (on the job training). Recruit players, secure NIL for players we need to get wins and get wins with the players. Every other P5 athletic director and coach is facing the same challenge.
 

dbmn said:
Maybe discuss how to adapt with Coyle, the person who offered/hired CBJ for the job. Coyle hired CBJ and both are "earning" 1+MM / year salary. Excuses for lack of success for either of these people is laughable. They are paid high salaries to return success. These jobs and high salaries are not for OJT (on the job training). Recruit players, secure NIL for players we need to get wins and get wins with the players. Every other P5 athletic director and coach is facing the same challenge.
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It is just so simple right.....nothing to it.....

You are right, every other P5 program is dealing with the same challenges, some are finding success, a lot of them are stuck in the same meat grinder we are where it is really hard to retain players. 14 teams in the Big Ten currently have at least 3 players transferring in and like us a majority of the conference had multiple guys transfer out, some of whom were starters for them the previous season.

The timing for hiring a first time head coach probably couldn't have ended up being worse with the way things have exploded over the past few seasons. But it isn't like we are the only program struggling to adapt to this new and constantly shifting college basketball landscape. It is a massive clusterfu&% all over the country.
 

and round and round we go.

there are valid questions being raised, but they are also very difficult to answer, because they rely on hypothetical situations.

If you removed Ben Johnson and brought in a different coach - but with the same roster and same NIL situation, would that make a change in the team's performance? Fun to discuss, but in reality, if Johnson leaves, the roster would change, so it's still not an apples-to-apples situation.

If the Gophers had Coach X instead of Johnson, would Coach X have been able to keep Payne, Hawkins or Christie from leaving? again, no way to prove the question - it's based on hypotheticals.
If you replace Ben Johnson with Coach X, would that - by itself - lead to more NIL $$? or are NIL donations dependent on the team's performance? also hard to answer in the abstract.

my point - you may very well believe that if MN fired Johnson and hired Coach X, that it would result in a better team, more NIL, whatever. But the only way to prove or disprove your theory is to make the change. until that happens, it's all hypothetical. It's like me saying I would be happier if I won the lottery. easy to say - harder to prove.
 

short ornery norwegian said:
and round and round we go.

there are valid questions being raised, but they are also very difficult to answer, because they rely on hypothetical situations.

If you removed Ben Johnson and brought in a different coach - but with the same roster and same NIL situation, would that make a change in the team's performance? Fun to discuss, but in reality, if Johnson leaves, the roster would change, so it's still not an apples-to-apples situation.

If the Gophers had Coach X instead of Johnson, would Coach X have been able to keep Payne, Hawkins or Christie from leaving? again, no way to prove the question - it's based on hypotheticals.
If you replace Ben Johnson with Coach X, would that - by itself - lead to more NIL $$? or are NIL donations dependent on the team's performance? also hard to answer in the abstract.

my point - you may very well believe that if MN fired Johnson and hired Coach X, that it would result in a better team, more NIL, whatever. But the only way to prove or disprove your theory is to make the change. until that happens, it's all hypothetical. It's like me saying I would be happier if I won the lottery. easy to say - harder to prove.
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My thinking is that hiring Mark Cuban as coach would solve many of the issues mentioned.
 

MNVCGUY said:
It is just so simple right.....nothing to it.....

You are right, every other P5 program is dealing with the same challenges, some are finding success, a lot of them are stuck in the same meat grinder we are where it is really hard to retain players. 14 teams in the Big Ten currently have at least 3 players transferring in and like us a majority of the conference had multiple guys transfer out, some of whom were starters for them the previous season.

The timing for hiring a first time head coach probably couldn't have ended up being worse with the way things have exploded over the past few seasons. But it isn't like we are the only program struggling to adapt to this new and constantly shifting college basketball landscape. It is a massive clusterfu&% all over the country.
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MNVCGUY said:
It is just so simple right.....nothing to it.....

You are right, every other P5 program is dealing with the same challenges, some are finding success, a lot of them are stuck in the same meat grinder we are where it is really hard to retain players. 14 teams in the Big Ten currently have at least 3 players transferring in and like us a majority of the conference had multiple guys transfer out, some of whom were starters for them the previous season.

The timing for hiring a first time head coach probably couldn't have ended up being worse with the way things have exploded over the past few seasons. But it isn't like we are the only program struggling to adapt to this new and constantly shifting college basketball landscape. It is a massive clusterfu&% all over the country.
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Never said it was simple...what teams ended first 2 seasons for new coach last in a 14-team league like the gophers and then ended bottom 3rd in year 3 and then lost all but 2 players to transfer after their so-called break-out season? Coyle hired CBJ and CBJ accepted the position for multiple millions in compensation. This year's team was fun to watch compared to the first 2 years and was looking forward to next seasons with more experience. Unless there's multiple hidden gems in the transfers to UofM next year will be more like year 1 and 2. Meanwhile look around the b10 at transfers in vs out. MN's at the bottom in number and quality of the transfers in.
 

dbmn said:
MN's at the bottom in number and quality of the transfers in.
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We certainly are not getting the high profile transfers but right now it is all on paper as to how good our transfers are in relation to other teams. Until we see all the reshaped teams in action we have no way of knowing for certain how our guys are going to stack up.

The roster churn over the past few years has definitely sucked. But some of you act like this is just a Johnson or Minnesota thing when in fact we have teams in the conference and all over the country getting decimated by the portal and having to essentially start over. Some of those teams have far more established coaches and they still are not immune to what is going on right now in college basketball.

All that said the general consensus among basically everyone here is that this is a make or break year for Johnson. There is no more honeymoon period (if there every was one) or leeway for having roster management issues. If he can't build a successful team for 24/25 it will be very surprising if he is back again the following season.
 

dbmn said:
Maybe discuss how to adapt with Coyle, the person who offered/hired CBJ for the job. Coyle hired CBJ and both are "earning" 1+MM / year salary. Excuses for lack of success for either of these people is laughable. They are paid high salaries to return success. These jobs and high salaries are not for OJT (on the job training). Recruit players, secure NIL for players we need to get wins and get wins with the players. Every other P5 athletic director and coach is facing the same challenge.
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Agreed.

If we are going to engage in fault allocation, I'm going to allocate most of the fault to Coyle. It's his job to provide the necessary resources for CBJ to find and keep the necessary players to operate a successful program. Coyle's mantra from the first day of NIL of doing it the "right way" was code for we are going to look like we are doing something without actually doing anything. He's a bureaucrat. About a year ago Fleck lit a fire under him and now he's doing something, but he's a year or two behind most schools and ten years behind the big boys.

CBJ is definitely not blameless. As dysfunctional as Pitino's locker room was, CBJ should have been able to convince more than one guy to stay. It's really hard to build anything when that guy was marginal--and hurt. He took some guys that first year who absolutely couldn't play (Thiam and one of the big guys) and he's still doing it (Wilson). It gives the program a bad look and reputation. I do think he's a good coach and he gets along well with his players. I think it's 90% money that so many are leaving. However, there's obviously some dysfunction going on too. That's on him.

CBJ is getting a fourth year and he should. No NCAA, no fifth year. I'd say the same for Coyle.
 

jamiche said:
Agreed.

If we are going to engage in fault allocation, I'm going to allocate most of the fault to Coyle. It's his job to provide the necessary resources for CBJ to find and keep the necessary players to operate a successful program. Coyle's mantra from the first day of NIL of doing it the "right way" was code for we are going to look like we are doing something without actually doing anything. He's a bureaucrat. About a year ago Fleck lit a fire under him and now he's doing something, but he's a year or two behind most schools and ten years behind the big boys.

CBJ is definitely not blameless. As dysfunctional as Pitino's locker room was, CBJ should have been able to convince more than one guy to stay. It's really hard to build anything when that guy was marginal--and hurt. He took some guys that first year who absolutely couldn't play (Thiam and one of the big guys) and he's still doing it (Wilson). It gives the program a bad look and reputation. I do think he's a good coach and he gets along well with his players. I think it's 90% money that so many are leaving. However, there's obviously some dysfunction going on too. That's on him.

CBJ is getting a fourth year and he should. No NCAA, no fifth year. I'd say the same for Coyle.
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Yep. Coyle interview about anything: bla, bla, bla, we love their attitude, we're building for the future, silence, studder, bla, bla, bla...
 


Gophers7633 said:
Another coach? Maybe coach better. You keep saying we had such a valuable roster, but yet that accomplished nothing.
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We had no seniors. We had guys showing the start of their high potential.

Until we get theses basic facts and common-sense down...no wonder we can't agree on anything in here.
 

MNVCGUY said:
I think there is a massive difference between the Men's college basketball portal and the one on the women's side or football. I had to dig a little and it looks like there are 1300 women's players in the portal so they are seeing high roster churn but I would bet the pay for play money needed to secure a transfer on the women's side is significantly lower than what we are seeing on the men's side.

Have said before that after seeing what things are like on the basketball side it makes the football portal/pay for play look like nothing. Not that there isn't a lot of roster churn but you don't hear the same ridiculous pay for play figures being tossed around in football outside of maybe some of the top players.
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Yes. And we shouldn't have to keep explaining stuff like this. That basketball isn't like football, women...why did such-and-such team make the NCAA last year?...etc., etc.

Until we get theses basic facts and common-sense down...no wonder we can't agree on anything in here.
 

dbmn said:
Maybe discuss how to adapt with Coyle, the person who offered/hired CBJ for the job. Coyle hired CBJ and both are "earning" 1+MM / year salary. Excuses for lack of success for either of these people is laughable. They are paid high salaries to return success. These jobs and high salaries are not for OJT (on the job training). Recruit players, secure NIL for players we need to get wins and get wins with the players. Every other P5 athletic director and coach is facing the same challenge.
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The coaches at the big-paying schools are facing the same challenges as CBJ ??

That's like saying The Kardashians are facing the same challenges as Helen Keller.

Until we get theses basic facts and common-sense down...no wonder we can't agree on anything in here.
 

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