govolsxtra.com Accounts

There is nothing more that needs to be said about Ariel's strengths and weaknesses. When she has her mind in the game, takes care of the ball, isn't seriously outquicked by the player she is trying to guard, and shoots a decent percentage from the field and from the line, she is as good as there is. That would seem to be the side she is showing to the WU staff. The best things she could learn from this summer are simply POISE and JUDGMENT. If she learns those things and gets herself in tip-top shape, she will be fine.

Davis is a skinny, 6'9" post player. Don't know if he will be strong enough to be much help next year, but he has good bloodlines--his father Antonio played a good, tough 10-12 years in the NBA--and like lots of young tall guys, his body hasn't quite caught up with his arms and legs.

It also isn't necessary that Thompson be a big contributor right away, but somebody DOES have to really step up as a PG this year. In order, I would guess that Lopez, Moore, Thompson, and Hubbs will all get a chance to see who can take the job.

I don't know what to think about the team's fast-break potential. Unless Stokes and Maymon come into the season ready to let 'er rip, they may not have the overall foot-speed to run a lot, though McRae, Richardson, and Moore can take it down pretty quick on occasion. Having both Stokes and Maymon is the Vols' best chance to dominate inside; if they do that well enough, they may not have to run to have an effective offense. If some guys like Thompson, Hubbs, and Moore can run effectively, play great defense, and show they can fast-break and drive, then they could force themselves into the lineup to the extent that the Vols might go with one post and have a pretty good up-tempo team. Lots of interesting pieces; the Vols could either look like a magnificent painting or a box full of mismatched pieces to a puzzle that won't fit together.

The Vols will have plenty of guys who can score. Moore is already probably the team leader in "rebounds and blocks per minute". If he becomes the secure ball-handler and distributor the team needs, he won't have to be more than an adequate scorer himself. He will certainly have to develop offensively to jump up to an all-star level, but for this year and for this team, I would rather Moore get better at ball-handling than shooting, if I had to choose one. I'd rather he did both, as I'm sure you'll agree.

Since the Vols have one more scholarship to give, according to the article, it is to be devoutly hoped that Martin can shake loose a serviceable JUCO PG. Nobody should get their hopes up that there is a 6'3"/190+ PG with a line of 15ppg, 8apg, 3spg, 50% FGM, 40% 3ptsM, and 85% FTM, who is also a defensive demon, just waiting for Martin's call. But just maybe he can get somebody better NOW than any of the incoming freshmen. This late in the recruiting cycle, if he can't find a REALLY strong candidate for a starting position, maybe he can pocket that scholarship if it can carry over to NEXT year, when he REALLY needs to land a young big man with some real promise.

BTW, Htown, I completely agree that Martin needs to land some young big guys who WILL be players fairly soon. All any of us can do is cross our fingers until we get some good news on that front.

You do know that all NFL prospects are drug tested before the draft, don't you? You do know that all NFL prospects are interviewed, quizzed, and subjected to extensive background checks, don't you? If they had an allegation that Bray had such a problem, they would be stupid not to check it out, but they aren't going to take ANYBODY'S unsupported word on something like this, ESPECIALLY from a former coach who might be suspected of having an ax to grind with a player. If they DID turn up evidence from their OWN sources that Bray MIGHT have had a drug problem, then it would hardly matter what Dooley had to say about it, would it? And if he DID have a drug problem, then that in itself would be enough reason not to take a chance on a guy with question marks to begin with, wouldn't it? You have accused Dooley of being everything besides a child of God on here, bashing his credibility and intellect repeatedly, so why on EARTH do you think he would have enough credibility with NFL executives that his word alone would override their own research? I admit I was wrong in thinking that Dooley might be the right guy to get UT back on track until I saw enough that even I was convinced that he wasn't. I have even seen enough to doubt some of his alleged non-football virtues. All of which makes it EVEN HARDER for me to believe that such a person could possibly have the influence you attribute to him.

If anybody has been paying attention to the NBA playoffs, Durant has become the "point forward" for the Thunder in the absence of all-pro PG Russell Westbrook. Durant has exactly the same build, though he is about 5-6" taller, as McRae. Even their games are strikingly similar. Anything McRae can learn from him will only be to the good. In particular, I would like for Durant to show McRae how he can weave between defenders out on the perimeter as tall and high as his dribble is without coughing it up.

Just for a moment, let's stipulate that Dooley did in fact "blackball" Bray. Even if he did, why on EARTH would any NFL executive give his putative badmouthing ANY credence at all? Don't you think they just MIGHT suspect that anything bad he had to say was in fact part of an attempt to excuse his own failures? Even if some front office had been so inclined, that is no reason why ALL of them would be. They are competing against each other after all. I asked you on another thread just why you thought any hard-nosed, steely-eyed NFL exec would take ANYBODY else's opinion over their own judgment, but of course you never responded. People who make a really nice living judging college and pro talent don't have time for gossip, they watch games, they watch tape, they watch workouts, they interview prospects, and they get opinions from everywhere they can. Why would Dooley's self-serving opinion outweigh ANY of that, let alone ALL of it? Looking to see if you bother to respond this time.

Are you assuming this guy can't shoot? I did a little bit of internet sleuthing and, while I didn't find any FG% number, I did see several scout comments that said he had both driving ability and a nice touch from the 3-point line. He is a career 69% FT shooter, which isn't outstanding but probably about what most pretty good HS players average these days. As you say, no substitute for putting in the practice time.

While I agree that Tyler is not your typical 22-year-old with one year of experience as an assistant, I would be amazed if UTC hired him now. I see this as little more than another opportunity to get his name out there and perfect the interview process. I think he has every chance of being a great coach someday, but I don't think that day is now, not at a place like UTC.

Pure speculation. What advantage is it to Martin to push Golden out? All Martin HAS said is what you say he SHOULD have said. I seriously doubt he is the "unnamed source". There are only a few people on here, mostly the "usual suspects", who blame Martin for Yemi's departure and Landry's rerouting. I don't at all get how Martin would or could or needs to use Golden as a "scapegoat". Please be more specific.

Women as a group have higher GPAs than men as a group, both for college students generally and for athletes particularly. The motivations for female athletes to attend college and GRADUATE are vastly stronger than they are for elite male athletes. Males are far too prone to go into top-level college sports dreaming of those NBA or NFL riches while female athletes know that is an impossible dream for them. There are high-level athletic programs which graduate very high percentages of their players, and we all know who some of them are, but there is a far lower percentage of male athletes who combine elite-level athletic ability with honor-roll-caliber academic ability or interest than is the case with females who combine those attributes.

Dang! I miss the board for a couple of days and then THIS happens! If nothing else, the Golden haters on here should be happy. From what I have read so far, the UTAD hasn't said anything officially except that he is transferring. The academic story comes from an unnamed "source". I know that the laws about student privacy and what may be published legally about academic and conduct matters have gotten more complicated and strict over the last several years, but it is clear that no one except those directly involved know what the true situation is right now. Except that he really is gone, I guess.

With all that has been going on lately--Yemi, Landry, and now Golden--one must wonder what the general morale is like in the basketball program right now. My impression is that Golden was popular with the rest of the squad, but what do I know? Whether he jumped or was pushed, so to speak, everybody concerned needs to come to terms with it ASAP.

If everything is still OK with the rest of the squad, or becomes so soon, the on-court implications need not be dire, though it is hard for me to imagine that Golden's contributions won't be missed. The ball-handling situation will be helped a bit by Maymon's return, since he is by far the best ball-handler among the front-court players. In any case, it looks like Thompson needs to get up to speed ASAP. His less-than-spectacular stats notwithstanding, the fact that Landry was told to go elsewhere before this happened would seem to indicate that the Golden situation was something that came more or less out of the blue, but I'm as mystified as anybody else right now.

OK, I get it that nothing will change your mind on this. As I said, you will adopt any argument that makes the Vols look bad, in your eyes at least. Here is my last attempt to tilt at this particular windmill.

When a guy has ALREADY been at a school for a couple of years, he has a place to live, he has a group of friends, and he may even have a girlfriend. He may be registered to vote and actually know something about local candidates and issues. He knows where his favorite restaurants and bars--and even churches!--are. Then because his coach signs guys specifically to beat him out, he has to uproot a significant part of his whole life. He has to negotiate a whole different academic setup--course requirements, professors, and administration. He has to get used to a new coach and a whole new roster of teammates, not to mention a whole new slate of opponents.

By contrast, a recruit who hasn't enrolled likely still lives at home. Wherever he goes he will have to make those kinds of adjustments, but he would have to do that almost no matter WHERE he went; he would be starting over at a natural break in his life, not after he has already become comfortable in a place.

Now if you can't see a qualitative difference between those two situations, I just can't help you. Of course, I have no doubt whatsoever that if the situations were reversed, you would still find a way to try to rationalize why WHATEVER UT did in a situation would be worse than what UK did in a similar one.

He canceled the scholarships of guys who were already there even before HE was actually there! He is getting ready to do the same thing this year. How is this any better than what Martin did? Landry doesn't even have to move his stuff; Calapari's exiles might wind up having to take courses over in order to graduate as transfers.

We can always hope!

The reference was to the quality of the Red Army. At one of the conferences of the Allied powers, one of the Western allies made a disparaging remark about the fact that the only way the Soviets could win was by drowning the opponents in blood. Stalin said that luckily for him he had the troops to spare for that tactic. Hence, the quality of quantity.

BTW, ironcity, Darius Thompson IS a PG, is more than 4" taller than Landry, had more recruiting attention coming out of HS, and had better stats than Landry had before he transferred to Huntington. I hate it for Landry that his dream didn't work out, but everything I have read about the guy tells me that his reach exceeded his grasp. There is no shame in that, and there is no shame in Martin helping him to realize that. IMHO.

If that is your opinion, you are certainly entitled to it. I pretty much doubt Martin enjoyed telling the kid he couldn't come. I am also dead solid certain that a certain minority of posters would look forever more at actually bringing Landry on campus as prima-facie evidence that Martin has no business coaching at this level. Sometimes you have to make tough decisions in a tough business. I wish Landry well, but I am somewhat relieved that he will not be part of the squad. I couldn't see him playing ahead of any member of the Vol squad that will take the court next season. If it were me, I think I could read the writing on the wall and look forward to going somewhere where I might have a chance to play. And I would surely rededicate myself to showing UT what a mistake they made in letting me go. With that kind of spur, who knows what kind of player Landry may eventually be.

As the former Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin said, "Quantity has a quality all its own." Of course you want the best players you can get, but it hurts a team not to have enough players to practice with and for reserves in the games. The Vols have had less than their full authorized complement of scholarship players for several years now. Who knows how much better they might have been with a full squad even if the ones who made up those numbers weren't all-star types.

Any club will do for the anti-Martin faction to use to beat him up with. Almost everybody saw the recruitment of the Landry kid as a gamble, but perhaps one Martin had to take at the time. In retrospect, it would have undoubtedly been better not to have offered him so soon.

Landry also took a gamble by leaving his public high school to enroll at a "basketball factory". The idea was surely to hone his skills at a higher level to be better prepared for SEC play. The trouble was that he found himself buried on the depth chart and wound up playing so little his game deteriorated along with his confidence and his attractiveness to a high-level program.

He probably would have been better off getting playing time and production where he was before, even if at a slightly lower level of competition. If he averaged 18 ppg, 8 apg, 3 spg, and a 3:1 assist-to-turnover ratio, while shooting 45% from the field and 80% from the line, this would have been a WAY tougher call all around. Those stats are a pretty close approximation to those of the Thompson kid who UT signed basically in Landry's place, and Thompson is about 4 to 5 inches taller than Landry.

I hope Landry finds a good place to land. I'm pretty sure CCM is helping him find such a place. I have nothing against him. He would have appeared to be a long-shot prospect at the SEC level; this particular long-shot didn't pay off.

I did not say that it was a GOOD thing that this happened, I just said that it happens in the normal course of just about every basketball program on a regular basis. It is the logic of the situation that you do whatever is legal and, if possible, moral to get ahead or you get left behind.

Lots of things in life cause temporary pain but turn out better for all concerned in the long run. Surgery, dental procedures, and some broken engagements come to mind. Just look at how some fans react to any kid who makes a verbal committment to their school but then turns out going elsewhere. That is perhaps the flip side of what is happening here, though if the kid was smart, he might have begun to have his own doubts about how much PT he might have gotten here. I am as big a believer in openness and honesty as anybody, but those two terms are perhaps somewhat elastic in the world of big-time sports.

As for your last jab, I have never actually been in a position to do what you suggest, but I have had it done TO me on occasion. I would like to think that if I were in such a position, I would make the decision that morality dictates, but I'm not sure the current situation is perfect in its moral clarity. My reaction then, and my advice to Landry now, is that things happen in life that we don't always like; suck it up, learn from it, and move on.

No life is ever wasted. One can always be a bad example!

I defer to your knowledge of Mr. Bray, but your comment reminds me of a cautionary tale from an earlier generation. There was a QB out of California named Todd Marinovich, who was groomed for football stardom by his father from an early age. In fact, there were articles about the incredibly demanding regimen to which the father subjected young Todd. He was perhaps the #1 recruit in the country when he finished high school, signing with Southern Cal as I recall. Who is Todd Marinovich, one might ask? Exactly.

Look, I get why some people might see this as a distasteful situation. It IS distasteful, though none of us know ALL the facts, but it also one aspect of how the big-time sports business is conducted. There is no kind of business in which no one ever makes a mistake in linking an employee with a job. If you have a bad fit, somebody has to make a decision. No conscientious coach can possibly enjoy that part of the job. I have always wondered what happened to the last guy on the bench at the big-time HS programs like Oak Hill Academy, Word of God Prep in Raleigh, and Huntington Prep--now we know.