Shama: Coach Ben Johnson’s Job Safe for Now

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Bad Gopher said:
We're polite and meek to a fault.
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i fondly think of Minnesotans as having a pragmatic and balanced perspective: its just sport. elsewhere I've lived I've seen an over emphasis on sport, especially in SEC country.

polite yes. definitely not meek. Just an understanding that there are more important things in life than sport. and more patience than I to see progress in sport
 

bleedsmaroonandgold said:
I don't dispute that. I was responding to someone who said his success in football and hockey bought him a lot of equity, and I was pointing out that he really hasn't improved the hockey programs from where they were before he arrived. If you are going to do one right, football is definitely the one to do it in (and I say that as someone who is a bigger hockey fan than football one), but that doesn't establish a track record of turning multiple programs around, And he actually cut some sports entirely (I know COVID happened, but it happened to every college in the country).
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You didn’t reply to my response btw, so that means you concur, correct?

Also, how many other schools have cut programs recently. Due to COVID/budget constraints? I would be surprised if this is unique to the U.
 

Dupreefor3 said:
Ben's annual salary is last in the big ten. Truth of the matter is he's going to get four years unless something embarrassing happens off the court, than it won't really matter how good or bad any improvement is next year. Best case scenario Ben's big ten record will be 7-33, worse case 5-35. If we have another bad year next year and Ben's career record is 9-51 or something like that than maybe Coyle is forces to make a move.
I'll concede that there has been some bad luck with injuries this year, Carrington, Battle and Garcia have all missed time, others are playing hurt, obviously Fox and Ihnen are out all year, but what really sealed are fate this year was not bringing in another Loewe or Stephens type at guard, Battle just is not a wing and I can't see a scenario where we can keep all four of Battle, Garcia, Payne and Evans happy next year and see any improvement. The roster hos to be retooled, some tough convos will need to be have or it's going to be more of the same. The only guard that was playing the right amount of minutes and in the right spot was Carrington this year and he's been hurt. Cooper can't guard, he's good on offense, but if he comes back, he can slide over to the one in a secondary role for like 5-10 minutes but the bulk of his time needs to be at the two spot. Samuels and Henley should not be playing more than 4-8 minutes a night this year at this level. Think Ben has done well with high school recruiting and getting Asuma in 24 and Wilson in 25 would be huge. If I'm right about that side of things the wins will come as more guys come into the program and the current crop makes a leap in the off season. Just need to make sure the transfers this year fit.
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Nice post, but paragraphs are a friend and not a foe.
 


GopherWeatherGuy said:
It said position not salary. Pitino went from over 2 million per year to 775k at New Mexico.
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Ben doesn't seem petty, but I'd certainly take a year or three off and collect my checks. Especially if the only job I can get is assistant at St. Thomas.
 

bga1 said:
This is the kind of thing that subsidized institutions do. It's nuts. 8 million for appearance sake. If Ben were offered the job and they said- no buyout- you have never done this before but you get your 2 million per year...he takes it in a heartbeat.
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Jim Souhan would have written a mean column though....

In all seriousness, no buyout is not realistic. Just because he was a huge reach for a hire, doesn't mean he or his agent are going to take an unprecedented contract vastly different from any other B1G or Power 6 coach. But there's an ocean between no buyout at all and $8 million. I hope that figure is wrong.
 

bga1 said:
The next hire goes off what you offer him, not what you paid the previous guy. If there is a next hire and they don't go big time, then they are nuts. I HOPE there isn't a next hire for 20 years. This was a stupidly negotiated contract- done for optics for those who are light on financial acumen and heavy on equity issues.
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The next hire won't be a quality candidate if they don't think MN will pay. Looks are important.
 

cjbfbp said:
As someone who grew up in PA and a fan of Philadelphia sports teams, I would agree with the characterization of Minnesota fans being relatively meek. I once attended a Timberwolves game here against Philadelphia. The Wolves led the entire game, often by a big margin, until Philadelphia came back and put in the winning shot at the buzzer. The reaction of the crowd was a collective sigh and everyone pretty much exited quietly afterward. I chuckled a bit after thinking of the difference if the game had been at Philadelphia and the outcome reversed. You would have heard a thunderous cacophony of boos.

I do wonder, though, if it's less about being "polite" and more about diversification of interests among the population and perhaps a cultural tendency to just not take sports so seriously. The fan base on this site is pretty rabid but I don't encounter much intensity (or even feeling) about Gopher sports outside of here.
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This Gopherhole is an indication that we are over achieving on the fan side. It does have a ton of traffic for a basketball team at the very bottom of the Big Ten.

Been all over the country to different NFL stadiums while working in that industry. There has been a crowd of people kicking a Vikings fan to unconsciousness in the men's room in Philly and had my life personally threatened at the Meadowlands with my wife sitting next to me. There are a lot of complete nutjobs out there who's life and happiness are tied up into how the team is doing - these are unhealthy people. Have no interest in that type of team worship. It is bizarre to think of the angst and pain carried around by people and its correlation with being a "good" fan.

Actually, that is the primary reason I stopped following any pro sports (along dealing with some of the people in that industry). My cynical take is these are just billionaires manipulating and extracting dollars from the little people. Wish college were not headed in the same direction.
 




bleedsmaroonandgold said:
Fleck was a great hire, but he hasn't exactly taken hockey to a new level. In the six completed mens hockey seasons since Coyle took over, we have one Frozen Four, one conference tournament championship, and two regular season conference championships. In the six seasons before he took over, we had two Frozen Fours (including one championship game appearance), 1 conference tournament championship, and 5 regular season conference championships (two of which were the old WCHA).

On the women's side, we have two Frozen Fours, one conference tournament championship, and two regular season conference titles in the six years since he arrived. In the six years before he arrived, we were in the Frozen Four five times with 4 national titles, won the conference tournament three times, and the regular season three times. For both mens and womens, we should remember one of Coyle's years had the NCAA tournament cancelled for COVID, and maybe we would have made a splash in those tournaments, but I don't think we had number 1 ranked teams at the end in either season that would lead us to believe we were robbed of the finish of our best season in either sport. That said, anything can happen.

So, since Coyle has been here, he has significantly improved football, both basketball teams are circling the drain, women's hockey has been worse, and men's hockey has been comparable but slightly worse than the six years before he arrived. No problem crediting him for the football improvement, but his complete body of work doesn't have me convinced he walks on water.
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Plus with hockey there's an understanding that you do what the community tells you to do. Not like you need to be a genius with a Blueblood program that has the easiest access to beat pipeline of talent in the country. Listen to the people who know the landscape best and out bid the directional schools
 


CPTMidnight said:
This Gopherhole is an indication that we are over achieving on the fan side. It does have a ton of traffic for a basketball team at the very bottom of the Big Ten.

Mainly because one jerk keeps posting short sentences and phrases that he thinks are really cutting and hilarious, but actually demonstrate that he has a pretty pathetic life.
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Bad Gopher said:
If you don't think decisions get made partly due to public opinion and pressure, I have the wreckage of a spy balloon to sell you.

I've said this before, and I'll say it again, we're our own worst enemy. We're polite and meek to a fault. There's a reason our major pro teams have gone 117 straight seasons without sniffing a title.
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The Twins (1987, 1991) aren't a major pro team? ; - )

I get what you're saying though, this state is passive-aggressive (mostly passive) to a fault!
 


howeda7 said:
Ben doesn't seem petty, but I'd certainly take a year or three off and collect my checks. Especially if the only job I can get is assistant at St. Thomas.
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I bet if Ben went to UST he would want to play the U 🤷🏾‍♂️…..
 


bga1 said:
When you fire a coach you hired after three years- you are going to get it coming at you from both ends. It is the admission of a major screw up, a historically bad hire on the one hand and on the other hand you are going to get slammed by people who will say he wasn't given enough time.
He's going to get a minimum of 4 years. I hope he proves to be successful by then (has his first NCAA bid in hand at a bare minimum).

That Clem Haskins comparison people are making gets really real in a hurry next year as Clem made it to the Sweet 16 that 3rd year....
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He did but it took him until the last game of that year to win a road game in conference to finish 9-9 in the league. I don't mean to take anything away from the 89 or 90 teams but both were fortunate to play a 14 seed in the round of 32. Comeback to that would be in 89 they knocked off sixth seeded Kansas State and in 90 they did beat second seeded Syracuse in the sweet 16, so they did beat some of the legit teams in front of them
 

Bad Gopher said:
The people in this town used to be more rabid, and also to a fault. Obviously we're the town that participated in a brawl at Williams Arena and threw a whiskey bottle at an NFL official, both in the 1970s. In the 80s, the Dome was almost incredibly loud for the '87 World Series, with obnoxious fans blowing whistles, for pete's sake. When Mike Lynn fired Les Steckel after one season, he cited fan anger in his press conference. Going back to the great Gopher football teams in the 30s and 40s, I've read that the fan base practically ran Fritz Crisler out of town, even though he had the team on the upswing. Not to mention them hanging Murray Warmath in effigy in 1959.

Things have changed around here, and I can only speculate, but it's definitely cultural. It could go hand in hand with the loss of hope caused by being beaten down so many times by so many circumstances. I think there's a majority sector of the fan base who feels in their hearts that it's impossible to compete or even that we're undeserving. How many times have you heard it asked here about Gopher or pro sports, "Why would a free agent/recruit want to come here?" We never had that inferiority complex when I was growing up.
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Fan anger and fan apathy will get the same result
 

GopherTheJugular said:
The Twins (1987, 1991) aren't a major pro team? ; - )

I get what you're saying though, this state is passive-aggressive (mostly passive) to a fault!
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I think he's adding the streaks of non-championship years of all teams to get that large number.
 



Bad Gopher said:
The people in this town used to be more rabid, and also to a fault. Obviously we're the town that participated in a brawl at Williams Arena and threw a whiskey bottle at an NFL official, both in the 1970s. In the 80s, the Dome was almost incredibly loud for the '87 World Series, with obnoxious fans blowing whistles, for pete's sake. When Mike Lynn fired Les Steckel after one season, he cited fan anger in his press conference. Going back to the great Gopher football teams in the 30s and 40s, I've read that the fan base practically ran Fritz Crisler out of town, even though he had the team on the upswing. Not to mention them hanging Murray Warmath in effigy in 1959.

Things have changed around here, and I can only speculate...
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Another thought to consider is the out-of-towners. MSP is an area with plenty of jobs. How many of us know someone who grew up elsewhere but now lives here because of work, or lives in WI but works here. That dilutes the fans that grew up here.

Green Bay is probably mostly WI residents. Obviously NYC and Chicago are going to have transplants, but they also have a massive amount of locals compared to us.

So maybe that's part of it to?
 


cjbfbp said:
I think he's adding the streaks of non-championship years of all teams to get that large number.
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Oh. I never thought of calculating like that. For me, if the Twins and Vikings and Twolves don't win a championship in 2023, I consider that one year, not 3.
 



Bad Gopher said:
If you don't think decisions get made partly due to public opinion and pressure, I have the wreckage of a spy balloon to sell you.

I've said this before, and I'll say it again, we're our own worst enemy. We're polite and meek to a fault. There's a reason our major pro teams have gone 117 straight seasons without sniffing a title.
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How fans act has nothing to do with wins and losses. Players, Coaches, GMs don't care what fans think because most fans have no clue what their talking about along with the media. Maybe our pro sports teams haven't won a title because it's really hard! And Minnesota isn't the most attractive free agent destination and teams like the twins don't spend as much as others. But saying the fans have a part is a joke because they don't
 


Dupreefor3 said:
He did but it took him until the last game of that year to win a road game in conference to finish 9-9 in the league. I don't mean to take anything away from the 89 or 90 teams but both were fortunate to play a 14 seed in the round of 32. Comeback to that would be in 89 they knocked off sixth seeded Kansas State and in 90 they did beat second seeded Syracuse in the sweet 16, so they did beat some of the legit teams in front of them
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Well you must have really loved Tubby then!! :) (8-10,9-9 and 9-9 were his three appearances)

If Ben goes 10-10 in conference next year- he will be hear for a minimum of 7 years.
That would be an amazing leap from this year.
 

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