Jeff Teague

I found this interesting. Buried in a recent article called 'NCAA should allow players to leave when coaches bolt' were a couple of quotes from Jeff Teague regarding Skip Prosser's death and him wanting to reopen his recruitment.


Jeff Teague got an idea of just how high the cards are stacked against the athletes during his college days at Wake Forest, under much more tragic circumstances.

Before he ever played a game for the Demon Deacons, his coach, Skip Prosser, died of a heart attack in the summer of 2007. Teague headed home to Indiana, a broken-hearted 19-year-old who wasn't sure if he still wanted to play for the Atlantic Coach Conference school.

Prosser, after all, was the primary lure.

We'll let Teague, who now plays for the NBA's Atlanta Hawks, take it from there:

"That's the only guy who recruited me, the only guy I knew. So I went through that process of trying to go back home. But they told me they may not grant me a release to play right away. So I stuck it out."

"If a coach leaves, the players should have an opportunity to pick another school," Teague said. "Most of the time, the kids go there to play for that coach."


http://www.newsday.com/sports/column-ncaa-should-allow-players-to-leave-when-coaches-bolt-1.11696793

I'll be on the lookout for more of these stories in the future.

Wake and Teague's situation was extremely unusual, with the coach who recruited him dying, not getting fired. From what the article says, Wake didn't say they wouldn't grant him a release, they just asked him to wait. Don't know how long they asked him to wait, but that is not unreasonable, asking him to let the emotion of the summer death of Skip calm down a little and take a look at the situation at Wake after Dino was elevated to HC.

This is an area where the NCAA rules should be looked at for serious change. If a coach is fired, players who played for him should have the option to leave. If a coach leaves voluntarily, the school losing him should have the option of blocking players from following the departed coach. That should be part of a departing coach's issues if he goes on to greener pastures. Part of the penalty for the moving to greener pastures coach would be not being able to have his players follow. Part of the penalty for a school firing a coach should be the possibility of losing players, who should be able to move without the loss of eligibility.

I might also want to think about giving a student athlete an extra year. If he redshirted for non-medical (or really for any reason) and his head coach his fired, I would be OK with having him sit out a year if he transfers, but not lose a year of actual playing time.

Example: Player goes to school A, redshirts freshman year, plays as RFr and RSoph. Coach gets fired. He would be able to transfer to school B, sit a year and then still be able to play two more- "double redshirt" Jr and Sr seasons.

That, IMO would split the pain somewhat more evenly between the transferring athlete and the coach firing school. Schools would have a higher risk of losing student/athletes after a coach firing because transfer would be somewhat easier. New school would be more willing to pay for three years to get two than pay for two years to get one.

Whoa, hold your horses there dude. Do you know whose fault it is that a coach gets fired ? The players. Because they suck. They deserve to be punished.

BiffTannen said:

Whoa, hold your horses there dude. Do you know whose fault it is that a coach gets fired ? The players. Because they suck. They deserve to be punished.

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Schools hire coaches who have bad records because they recruit players who suck, or because they couldn't coach an NBA allstar team to a conference championship. There is some fault for all. Right now only the players suffer. The schools should too.

Yeah, the school is suffering from having a bad coach with shitty players. And they have to pay the coach's buyout too. Then they have scholarship costs for kids who should be in trade school.

BiffTannen said:

Yeah, the school is suffering from having a bad coach with shitty players. And they have to pay the coach's buyout too. Then they have scholarship costs for kids who should be in trade school.

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Schools who fire coaches should also have to deal with loss of services of student athletes in addition to their monetary issues. If the student athletes lose a year from transfer, schools should feel some of that lost time pain as well.

Poor Teague. His life was ruined. There's no way he didn't know the other coaches and I'm sure he and the players knew each other by that point.

DeaconCav06 said:

Poor Teague. His life was ruined. There's no way he didn't know the other coaches and I'm sure he and the players knew each other by that point.

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This may not have been as true as you think. Freshmen BB players didn't arrive on campus until beginning of second summer session. If Prosser was his recruiter and POC at Wake, he may have only met the other coaches on visits and via phone. As for other players, remember Teague was from Indiana, not from close to Wake where he could casually "stop by." So it's pretty believable he felt disconnected from Wake after Skip's passing.

Wasn't there also a story about how no one on the team thought Teague was even going to come because he barely spoke on his official? I think in the same story it mentioned how he was on his official BC visit and just stayed in his hotel room the entire weekend.

El Chupacabra said:

...and just stayed in his hotel room the entire weekend.

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Probably just getting a jump on refining his lookout skills.

Teague is a different kind of cat, thats for sure.

Who were the coaches who immediately called Wake recuits after Skip's death? I want to say the douchebag now at NC State was one, but I forget. I need a few cats to loathe so someone refresh my memory so I can refocus my loathing bad mambojambo.

jaybone said:

Who were the coaches who immediately called Wake recuits after Skip's death? I want to say the douchebag now at NC State was one, but I forget. I need a few cats to loathe so someone refresh my memory so I can refocus my loathing bad mambojambo.

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Yeah the word was Gottfried at Bama

Y'all snowflakes trifilin' again.

How bout this. Y'all keep my name outcha jock sniffin' puff pastry mouths, or else you betta LOOK THA FUCK OUT!

jaybone said:

Who were the coaches who immediately called Wake recuits after Skip's death? I want to say the douchebag now at NC State was one, but I forget. I need a few cats to loathe so someone refresh my memory so I can refocus my loathing bad mambojambo.

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IIRC Greenberg to his credit spoke out against that. Gottfried does sound right.

Teague had 23 points in a loss last night.
He's been playing really well the last few years.
Rumors that he may not be in Atlanta next season

Dekin said:

Teague had 23 points in a loss last night.
He's been playing really well the last few years.
Rumors that he may not be in Atlanta next season

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He also got lit up on D, as Thomas put up 42

MADeac said:

He also got lit up on D, as Thomas put up 42

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Watched the game; he wasn't lit up. Thomas is a volume scorer in the mold of AI and Melo. Thomas took 24 shots and made 12. A lot of those makes were contested 3s. Teague played pretty good perimeter D on Thomas and then they doubled on the drives, blocked 4 of Thomas' shots. Thomas would then pass to the 3 point line and the Hawks did a lot of scrambling. About half of Thomas' makes were 3s that came back to him after the Hawks were playing switch defense.

In comparison, most of Teague's makes came on drives right past Thomas. He is almost Harden-esque in his ole defense.

Shroeder went for 20 as Teague's backup. They did play some together but they of their 43 points combined, I'd say 75% came with Thomas guarding them.

I watched the game too, as did Zach Lowe, who tweeted that Thomas "roasted Teague." And no, I don't think Thomas is a good defender either