Ok, been watching the Sopranos again... But I did get up feeling a bit depressed. I hate this time in a program's cycle. What would it be like to have a coach retire when we are chanting "One more year! One more year!"? We always have this depressing end you our bball coaches tenured and, quite frankly, I have serious doubts we will get our Billy Donovan this go round, either.
We know ADGM had a "football whisperer" in Cavan, who sat with Greg every football game and taught Greg the nuances of the game, the importance of quantitative data to evaluate players, and to hire Kirby and give him every resource in the world.
But we've never heard of a "basketball whisperer" for ADGM. He has a great candidate on staff in Slonaker, but for whatever reason, ADGM moved Slon away from more basketball and into fundraising (in which he has excelled, btw) but anyone who knows Slon knows he coulda/shoulda been the basketball version of Cavan. Bit my fear is, like how ADGM has let IMG keep Chuck Doodle around for so long with ZERO basketball intelligence, that Chuck Doodle is ADGM's secret basketball source. I hope I'm wrong on that.
I also think last year there was a much better crop of candidates than this year. And there will be other schools, ones with better reputations, looking in this depleted pool for a salmon in a school of mudtrout.
Lastly, and this is my woe is me feeling, but because of all the toilet paper rolls I helped throw on the court in 86,or all the tennis balls I smuggled in to throw at Dwayne Shintzius, as part of Hugh's Zoo Crew, that Karma has bit me on my a$$ and UGA will never get over the hump in basketball, and I will be forced to live each March Madness in a "who cares about college basketball, anyway" denial of one of the greatest specticles in all of sport, like I have done 8 out of every 10 years on average since Alec Kessler's heyday.
I know, I know, there are lots of modern coaches who will use technology and demand a staff and resources like Kirby did with football, but I don't have a good feeling that we will get one of those. The endless debates about Crean or the out of left field Sam Mitchell yesterday just leave me uneasy. Maybe we find the needle in the haystack. I sure hope so. Its been 35 years since that wonderful Final Four run that got me, as a teenager, to love UGA basketball. I don't want to die never seeing another one (quick note, I'm only 51,I have at least another good 10years or so left!... Nothing imminent!)
We know ADGM had a "football whisperer" in Cavan, who sat with Greg every football game and taught Greg the nuances of the game, the importance of quantitative data to evaluate players, and to hire Kirby and give him every resource in the world.
But we've never heard of a "basketball whisperer" for ADGM. He has a great candidate on staff in Slonaker, but for whatever reason, ADGM moved Slon away from more basketball and into fundraising (in which he has excelled, btw) but anyone who knows Slon knows he coulda/shoulda been the basketball version of Cavan. Bit my fear is, like how ADGM has let IMG keep Chuck Doodle around for so long with ZERO basketball intelligence, that Chuck Doodle is ADGM's secret basketball source. I hope I'm wrong on that.
I also think last year there was a much better crop of candidates than this year. And there will be other schools, ones with better reputations, looking in this depleted pool for a salmon in a school of mudtrout.
Lastly, and this is my woe is me feeling, but because of all the toilet paper rolls I helped throw on the court in 86,or all the tennis balls I smuggled in to throw at Dwayne Shintzius, as part of Hugh's Zoo Crew, that Karma has bit me on my a$$ and UGA will never get over the hump in basketball, and I will be forced to live each March Madness in a "who cares about college basketball, anyway" denial of one of the greatest specticles in all of sport, like I have done 8 out of every 10 years on average since Alec Kessler's heyday.
I know, I know, there are lots of modern coaches who will use technology and demand a staff and resources like Kirby did with football, but I don't have a good feeling that we will get one of those. The endless debates about Crean or the out of left field Sam Mitchell yesterday just leave me uneasy. Maybe we find the needle in the haystack. I sure hope so. Its been 35 years since that wonderful Final Four run that got me, as a teenager, to love UGA basketball. I don't want to die never seeing another one (quick note, I'm only 51,I have at least another good 10years or so left!... Nothing imminent!)
