but is it one season? Woody has clearly done some good things, but at the end of the day it comes down to winning. What season would you point to where we clearly exceeded expectations? I think his high water mark so far is meeting expectations. I'm not saying he should've been fired, but I also don't think he's banked a season or 2 because of his performance. He's done better than his predecessor for sure, but I don't think that's enough to keep this job. I can't lie, I have to wonder if we wouldn't have been better as a program if we'd hired Dusty May this year. Hope CMW proves me wrong, but that to me would look like a B10 championship and 2nd weekend or F4 run, which I think this roster is capable. A top 4 finish and making the tournament is underperforming to me.
Woodson: I've learned you win with good guard play and I'm trying to build IU to play like my Knicks teams
- Thread starter BradStevens
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Moving the goal posts I see. Typical, but expected.
He's been here 3 years for crying out loud. Year 4 he has his best roster to date, by far. If he underachieves this year, with this roster, then yeah it's probably time to have that conversation. But talks of firing Woodson after 3 years considering where the program was when he was hired is absolute nonsense.
You keep stating Woodson facts, which is great. But you use hyperbole on the other side. Your facts aren't correct on Pop, obviously. And the Kerr comparison is absurd. In 10 seasons as HC of the warriors, they've won the NBA title 4 times, they've been to the Western Conference finals 6 times, they've made the playoffs 7 times, they've had a winning record 9 times. Curry was an emerging star...but coincidence that Curry became MVP in Kerr's first season? Draymond Green barely played his first two seasons under Jackson. Enter Kerr, Defensive player of the year first year, all star 2nd year. I'd say Klay was probably the least impacted by Kerr's presence, and the changes he brought to the Warriors. But even his scoring and efficiency improved when Kerr arrived. Those 3 and Kerr are the only constants through all of that. They have had other good players, KD notably, and Iggy when he was younger, Harrison Barnes. But most of the others, Bogut, Looney, Mid range Livingston...all solid players that became much better by playing in the Warriors system.
Comparing Woodson to Kerr and Pop does more to hurt your argument than help. I get your point, he wasn't a "bad" coach for the Knicks. And when you dig in, like you have, he was actually a pretty good NBA coach. But those two are historically good, both hall of famers.
And then the crux of all this, his mediocre coaching efforts at IU thus far are most likely the primary driver behind posters mistakenly characterizing his NBA coaching efforts. Not too dissimilar to what you're doing with Kerr and Pop. NBA/NFL coaches rarely being successful in college, and vice versa, is a widely talked about "thing". I really only care that he hasn't bee good at IU. So the job he did with the Knicks, a decade ago, doesn't mean much of anything to me. In fact, knowing that some of the things he's tried at IU are most likely a direct result of the successes he did have with the Knicks...that haven't worked, at all, at IU...for the very obvious reason that the current college game is vastly different than his Carmelo Knicks days... in the end, his NBA experiences are as much a negative for me than anything.
Not absolute nonsense.
He's had ample talent, and more than ample resources, to be quite a lot better than he has been since he arrived in Bloomington. He should have taken the task of modernizing, and reshaping his roster more seriously from day 1. It took an influx of NIL resources, and serious smoke and talks of him getting fired for him to "realize its a guards game" or whatever the OP article mentioned.
Obviously I have no idea specifically what led him to coach how he did, run the specific stuff he did...but however he got to it, it was the wrong approach and philosophy...when the right approach and philosophy were obvious. He deserves severe scrutiny for that.
Jesus dude, Kerr inherited a team with a young, emerging core that won 47 and 51 games respectively the two years prior to him being hired. Steph Curry and Klay Thompson finished 1 and 2 in 3 pointers made and attempted the year prior to Kerr being hired and 1 and 3 two years prior. Stop trying to reinvent some history here. He was essentially hired on 3rd base with a young core intact with many of those guys already well on their way to stardom. He's not a bad coach, I never said that, but he gets way too much credit. There aren't many guys who would f*** up with a roster of Steph, Klay, Draymond, and KD if hired into that situation. As for Pop, he has a losing record in 9 seasons without Duncan. It's a superstar league, it's not hard to understand. He's not some miracle worker, he simply had two of the best big men in the history of the game for the majority of his career, simultaneously for a decent portion. But he's been a pedestrian coach the majority of the last 10 years and it ain't hard to figure out why.
ha Whoa, it's not just been one season. You do realize IU has underperformed preseason expectations in every season Woodson has been coach, right? TJD's last year IU was predicted to win the B1G. The end result of that season should be the low-end, not the top end. He has had multiple chances and has failed each of them based upon the resources that are available to him. Again, this isn't a situation of rebuilding from the ground up like Crean or even Archie had to do.
It's not about getting a new coach every year, its merely common sense at this point that there are no more excuses at IU to not be successful right away. The appeal to coach at IU is vastly higher than it was in the past as well because the administration is providing the coaching staff more than most schools. Your mindset is off.
I agree overall. But, I said I thought it would've been understandable last year if as AD, you 1) have become convinced that CMW isn't the guy to get you where you want to go, AND 2) that you identified the guy you believe was a program changer. I'm OK with keeping him if 2 didn't exist, but if CMW was "the guy" ala RMK, Coach K, etc.. I think he'd have done more with one of these first few teams. I think this roster is really exceptional, and can't help but think one of the reasons the pundits aren't picking us higher is they aren't sold on CMW. I think we have the best roster in the B10. How many folks are picking us as the best B10 team?
I don't consider finishing 2nd (instead of 1st) as an underperforming season, especially considering the injuries to two starters throughout the majority of the conference season. But to each their own.
NBA GMs disagree. Per the annual GM survey, they ranked Pop the best coach in the league 10 times, more than any other coach since the survey started in 2002. Kerr is usually ranked in the top-5, with a few 2nds. NBA GMs know NBA coaches.
What is hard to understand about this? Coaches with the best collection of talent win more times than not. Pop's record without a HoF player on his roster reflects as such, it's terrible.
From Rabjohns and the Hysterics? LOL
Let me know when those guys are in charge of making administrative decisions.
NBA GMs don’t agree with your NBA coach takes. They know a lot more than you.
Dude...on one hand you're showing great depth of knowledge on Woody's career. On the other hand, showing incredibly shallow depth of knowledge on Kerr and Pop. Kerr COMPLETELY CHANGED THE ENTIRE STYLE they played. And he did it despite the team already being good, and despite Steph and Klay already putting up big numbers. If you think Curry was just going to magically become MVP under Jackson, Draymond was just gonna explode, Klays numbers were gonna go up, the team was gonna break through and win a title...all in that very next year... well, that's not reality...and its the reason Kerr rightfully gets so much credit.
No one wins without talent. No one. That's a faulty argument for judging a coach's greatness. Does a coach elevate the talent they have? That's the judgement. Woodson did it fairly well for the Knicks, as you've pointed out. He hasn't done it at IU. Kerr and Pop aren't relevant to this convo.
For the record, I've never called Pop or Kerr a bad coach, simply stating facts in regards to their records without a stacked deck in their favor. They don't lie either.
No clue what those guys takes were. Former players, Dolson himself...hell why else would Woody have flipped his narrative, demonstrated in the OP article? He had been adamant, from the beginning, that he knew what he was doing...playing through bigs was the way to go... Now, all of a sudden, he's gonna change that philosophy despite having one of the best front courts in the nation again?
You're being dumb to try to prove a point you've already proven. Woody was a pretty good NBA coach.
They're not facts. They're interpretations of stats and accomplishments. They lack any sort depth of knowledge. And they discount the impact those two guys coaching had on the talent. And...they go against WIDELY accepted, already hashed out, beliefs...from a lot smarter people than we are, on both those guys impacts on those franchises, and the game itself.
Pop and Kerr are relevant in this discussion because every NBA coach is only as good as his roster. There are no underdogs in the NBA. This whole discussion started because somebody cited Woodson's overall record in the NBA and called him an abysmal coach because of it. Give Pop or Kerr the roster Woodson had through his first couple seasons in Atlanta and their record would look as such. Look at Pop's record the last 9 seasons post Duncan and Kawahi, it looks exactly how you would expect to look given the talent level. Same with Kerr this last season.
Pop hasn't made the playoffs in 5 seasons. Is it because he forgot how to coach or is it because his roster doesn't translate to a winning team? Monty Williams went from winning 60 games in Phoenix to 14 in Detroit and subsequently out of a job. Again, these guys aren't miracle workers. Joe Mazulla, a 36 year coach with no prior head coaching experience, just ran roughshod through the NBA playoffs en route to a championship. That guy is only a head coach because his old boss had an affair with a low level staffer.
NBA GMs are very aware of roster/talent. Their actions show how they view Woody (wouldn’t hire him as HC post ‘14) and Pop/Kerr (survey results).
I literally don't care about anonymous survey results lol. Kerr winning multiple titles with 3-4 future HoF players doesn't change my mind. Guy was hired into a dream come true scenario and capitalized on it. Good for him. Now that his core is gone/againg, his results will reflect as such. Already saw it happen this year. Guessing he gets out sooner than later, no reason not too.
One could argue that, but I take exception with “for sure”.
Imho there is little difference between the last three miller years and the first three Woodson years. To me, the biggest difference is in tournament appearances. That score should read 2 for MW and 1 for Miller, had there been that one cancelled tournament.
Final Ken Pom ratings look very similar, aside from last years season which looks terrible when comparing to almost any season (except those first 2 for Crean).
One other consideration is Woody benefitted from having good, now great NIL to pay players. Archie didn't have the advantage of strong NIL for recruiting.
No doubt. Tough to compare college basketball to the NIL/booster/transfer free for all we now have.
on paper I'd agree, but there's a huge difference between making the tournament and not making it. It's a crucible line. But, you have to credit Miller for most of the players that CMW made the tourney with. I think you do have to give him credit for convincing those guys to come back, for TJD's improvement, and for the improvement in the team morale (whatever you say about CMW, the players seem to love playing for him).
Why would you credit Miller? Woodson took Miller's players and made back to back tournaments, something Archie failed to do in 4 years here.
just saying he left him a great base in one of the best players in the country. I do think CMW helped TJD, but he was already a great player. As Gerdis said, I Miller would've made the tourney in the covid year, so if you don't want to give him credit for that, you can't really say he didn't make it for 4 years, when no team did that year.
The tournament didn't happen TJD's freshman year, we'll never know if they made it or not as it simply didn't happen. Bottom line, Archie Miller was booed off the floor in Indy after a losing season and fired days later. Woodson took the majority of those kids and made the tournament the following year, something Archie never did.
It is when they were predicted to finish first. Secondarily, that season there were about 10 teams within a game of each other. IU had the same record as Northwestern and MSU that year, we just happened to have the right tiebreakers. Lastly, we were 1 game out of finishing in 9th place.
I don't look at that season as a year of achieving much success, especially considering what we lost our 2nd game in the BTT and promptly got smoked by Miami the first weekend of the tournament. That is far from achieving high success, is it not?
and Woodson was promptly booed off the court last year....the point is he too should've been fired. This is his last chance, no matter how much sunshine you want to pump.
Achieving high success and underperforming are two different things and far apart on the spectrum. Yes I was disappointed in the outcome of the final game of the season, but no I didn't look at that season as underperforming given the context. 4 seed who finished 2nd in the B10 and swept the champs all while navigating several lengthy injuries sounds about right.
Not sunshine pumping in the least. Firing coaches without regard every single time something goes wrong is a death knell.
Maybe you don't understand the meaning of underperforming. Underperforming expectations is simply not meeting said expectations. When the expectation is you win the conference yet you fall 3 games short of doing that.....thats underperforming.
There is no firing without regard. There has only been retaining him without regard to his lack of performance. Big difference.
Here's another possibility...because when you look at the rosters they both inherited heading in to their first NBA seasons...from All Stars, various award winners, recent success...there's not a huge difference between what Kerr inherited and Woodson. The main difference being the Knicks roster was older.
Kerr, however, completely changed the entire style and culture of the Warriors franchise. They won an NBA title in his first year. Curry was MVP in his first year. Green's minutes, numbers, everything jumped by 50%. My educated guess is that Kerr saw what he was inheriting, and had the vision to see what they could become with some major changes to how they were utilized, and how they all played. He was absolutely fortunate to inherit the players he did, but you're making it out that he just rolled the ball out and reaped the rewards of the Splash Brothers, and that Green was always going to explode in that next season... Kerr took the risk of completely changing everything, elevating Draymond's role, taking the ball out of Curry's hands more than it had been and asking him to play off the ball more and become part of a larger movement based offense. The rest is history. KD referred to the style of play as a major factor in him choosing GS. It rejuvenated Iguadola's career, Livingston's career, Bogut's career...it made Green's career.
Woodson had a losing record his 2nd season, was out as their coach...he obviously didn't have anywhere near the impact that Kerr had. He didn't have Curry or Thompson...but he did have Carmelo, Chandler, Staudemire.
Woodson would have put the ball in Curry's hands for 36 minutes, ISO'd him, had him coming off ball screens, etc... That's largely how he was used under Jackson. He did fine in that environment, and would have continued to be a great NBA player, I'm sure. But it limited how great everyone else could become...and I wonder if Curry would have ever ascended to the level he has since Kerr arrived?
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