I have heard rumors ... but that means he may have to make a men's BB hire in March or April. He could deep six the program for a decade if he makes a bad hire. Would they keep Martin another year just to keep RT from making the hire?
what would define a Bad hire? Getting someone who is not qualified for the job perhaps? Hiring someone because they are a “bargain”, who doesn’t have a big name or tons of experience?
i ask because of the past 4 hires in MBB, only one was truly a “bad hire”. Nobody can tell the future, you hire a coach based off resume and past success and their likelihood of succeeding at your program right? Or do you people believe an AD should be able to tell the future? Maybe we should hire DR Strange to be our next AD...
Was Fogler a bad hire? He was National coach of the year I believe the year before we hired him. Well respected as a fantastic coach nationally, had some ties to the area, a history of recruiting well. He was a FANTASTIC hire! He had success here but failed to bring post season success and eventually, once the “new” wore off and we struggled a bit, recruiting fell apart and the program sank back to where we have always been- save a brief stint with Mcguire 50 years ago= a really really bad basketball team. Does not mean he was a “bad hire”, just did not work out here due to the challenges any coach will face as a coach of the Gamecocks.
How about Odom? Bad Hire? He was tremendously successful at Wake prior to coming here. “Well he had Tim Duncan”- yeah he RECRUITED and convince Duncan to play there, then developed him from a raw talent to one of the best bigs to play the game. He was a GREAT HIRE! By any measurable- success, recruiting prowess, had success in the toughest conference, was from NC just a state away- recruiting ties in place... There is not a thing about that hire- from the AD perspective of “what do I know going into it” that indicated it was a poor hire. He failed here, miserably.
Frank Martin- a KNOCK IT OUT THE PARK HIRE! One of (to this day, still) the most respected and better known names in college basketball on a national level. Was a disciple of a legend, had big time success- regular season and playoff- at his last job... and we convinced him to switch here from another, more successful college program to be our coach which is an absolute boss move that almost never happens in college athletics! The single best hire in our recent past for the basketball team. We are all aware of the one final four season and our dissatisfaction with results beyond that.
So, what is my point? My point is... Blaming poor results on an AD and acting like “well he made a bad hire because the results haven’t been what we hoped” is IGNORANT! You have no better ability to tell the future than any AD, when they hire a new coach they get the best guy of their available candidates (or in the case of Martin even UNAVAILABLE candidates) and hope for the best. 3 the past 4 hires I feel the AD in place did that EXACTLY, so it is not the cause of “bad hires” that we are in this spot, and there is not guarantee or even much hope in my eyes at this point that any other AD may make a different hire that is more likely to be successful than the three coaches mentioned above when you take into account that they were GREAT hires at the tine their respective ADs made them.
IOW- something is missing besides “hiring the right guy” here. Don’t give me the “facilities” BS or that the practice facility is not nice enough or has to be shared with the women- BS. We have a fantastic are a for them to play, gorgeous student housing for athletes, tutoring and entertainment options on par with just about any other school... We are bot substantially lacking in facilities to out us substantially behind our competition. So, if we make a change in basketball... What is our move? Given that three our of the last four were great coaches who still failed here ultimately... Do people think Coach K is just biting his lip, hoping we will call? Perhaps.. Rick Pitino will want to try to rebuild his disgraced rep at a struggling school in a big conference? Who do you think we will get that is more of a slam dunk than those guys who already failed here?
The real question is- do we have more inherent problems at hand than just who is coaching these guys that are keeping us from being good? I think people are just plain wrong in their assessment if they think “making the right hire” will fix everything. It is going to take a culture change within all of our major teams to turn things around and one hire is not likely to provide that.
