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Danny Manning Credibility Watch

My gut tells me DM will recruit well and underachieve on game day. I think he improves the program and is off to another place in four years. We'll rise to a middle of the conference team under his tenure. Wellman will call it a success and then we'll hire a mid-major coach with lots of promise and the experiment starts again.

The more I think about Dino, the more I miss the guy. He bought into Skip's philosophy and he never really had a shot at growing into a head coaching slot. And we'll never know if he could have. I was the first to say he should have been given interim status and make a proper search, but I'm rethinking that after all these years. When you watch him break down a game it is crystal clear the guy understands basketball like few other people. He just had no experience at dealing with future NBA stars coasting in the spring. Well, that's not the worst problem to have as a new head coach. I think he could have figured it out.

But that's just me. Wake sports are just too depressing to lose sleep over these days. It would be nice to get back to a place where we were, say, 10-1 before hitting the ACC and going .500 and scratching out a bid.

Done.


Don't really disagree with anything in this post with the exception that if Wellman is still hiring and firing in four years, we'll be beyond fucked as an athletic program. We're damn near on life support now.
 
Don't really disagree with anything in this post with the exception that if Wellman is still hiring and firing in four years, we'll be beyond fucked as an athletic program. We're damn near on life support now.

Hard to disagree with that. I think the search for a new AD is long overdue. I just moved to Florida from the WS area and it's good to be away from the daily news. I don't have to feel guilty about giving up my season tickets this year, which is a bonus. It just was too depressing. I think the die hard ticket holders are amazing.
 
My gut tells me DM will recruit well and underachieve on game day. I think he improves the program and is off to another place in four years. We'll rise to a middle of the conference team under his tenure. Wellman will call it a success and then we'll hire a mid-major coach with lots of promise and the experiment starts again.

The more I think about Dino, the more I miss the guy. He bought into Skip's philosophy and he never really had a shot at growing into a head coaching slot. And we'll never know if he could have. I was the first to say he should have been given interim status and make a proper search, but I'm rethinking that after all these years. When you watch him break down a game it is crystal clear the guy understands basketball like few other people. He just had no experience at dealing with future NBA stars coasting in the spring. Well, that's not the worst problem to have as a new head coach. I think he could have figured it out.

But that's just me. Wake sports are just too depressing to lose sleep over these days. It would be nice to get back to a place where we were, say, 10-1 before hitting the ACC and going .500 and scratching out a bid.

Done.

I agree 100% with this analysis. We have a major talent issue but we are making up for it now. The problem is that I don't think DM is as great of a coach as we want to believe he is. I called his credibility into question over coaching, not recruiting. The previous was a shit stain on the whole conference and some in the media were saying that the 2010 team could have been the worse in ACC history. It isn't like Dino let no talent, it was just we had a guy that was more concerned about his socks and tie matching than winning fucking games.

I hope that DM turns out to be the next Odom or can at least become Tacy because if he fails, we are on the verge of a lost decade. If you want to see what a lost decade in basketball looks like, then look to Raleigh. State had close to a decade of losing after V and it has taken them 20+ years to rebuild.
 
DM will have to do more than that to be a target to move on after 4 years. I don't see him leaving except for a major job.
 
Re DM as bench coach: 1) he can grow into that role; he's young 2) an assistant that is good in X and O's can perform that role (see Bobby Cremins at GT)

Either way, "patience, grasshopper."
 
Re DM as bench coach: 1) he can grow into that role; he's young 2) an assistant that is good in X and O's can perform that role (see Bobby Cremins at GT)

Either way, "patience, grasshopper."

Yes, he can, and I hope that he does, but Wellman shouldn't have ever put somebody into this job in this situation that had to learn on the job. That was just so reckless.
 
I totally agree. I think Wellman had to hire DM after promising a "big name" and getting rejected by these "big names" again (he's poison in coaching fraternity after Dino). I think DM was the last big name on his list. I hope DM realized this and got mega bucks from Wellman. But yes, Wellman should not have been around to make this hire.
 
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Dino, really? That deer in the headlights look was never going to go away. Dino may have had more overall talent on his team than any coach in Wake history and still got couldn't win a ACCT game gets bounced in the 1st round of the NCAAT with the same talent. Talent that was recruited under Skip. Most could see the big drop off coming in his 3rd year. McKie was the peak for that class, the rest became supporting cast at where ever they wound up.

The problem never has been the firing of Dino. There were probably a 100 coaches or more ahead of the guy we brought in that would have had more success here. Wellman didn't get his big name coaches so he stopped looking. Would all of those coaches made us a contender, probably not, but they would not have tanked the entire program either.

As for DM, the jury is out on how good of a coach he'll be. If he continues to bring in the talent he'll have plenty of time to refine his craft. Right now we need talent more than anything else. I'm not saying we should just stick our heads in the sand, but so far I see a lot more that I like about him than I don't like.
 
Dino, really? That deer in the headlights look was never going to go away. Dino may have had more overall talent on his team than any coach in Wake history and still got couldn't win a ACCT game gets bounced in the 1st round of the NCAAT with the same talent. Talent that was recruited under Skip. Most could see the big drop off coming in his 3rd year. McKie was the peak for that class, the rest became supporting cast at where ever they wound up.

The problem never has been the firing of Dino. There were probably a 100 coaches or more ahead of the guy we brought in that would have had more success here. Wellman didn't get his big name coaches so he stopped looking. Would all of those coaches made us a contender, probably not, but they would not have tanked the entire program either.

As for DM, the jury is out on how good of a coach he'll be. If he continues to bring in the talent he'll have plenty of time to refine his craft. Right now we need talent more than anything else. I'm not saying we should just stick our heads in the sand, but so far I see a lot more that I like about him than I don't like.

Dino was an idiot and any coach who couldn't understand why we fired him isn't someone we wanted! Right on, brother!
 
Dino, really? That deer in the headlights look was never going to go away. Dino may have had more overall talent on his team than any coach in Wake history and still got couldn't win a ACCT game gets bounced in the 1st round of the NCAAT with the same talent. Talent that was recruited under Skip. Most could see the big drop off coming in his 3rd year. McKie was the peak for that class, the rest became supporting cast at where ever they wound up.

The problem never has been the firing of Dino. There were probably a 100 coaches or more ahead of the guy we brought in that would have had more success here. Wellman didn't get his big name coaches so he stopped looking. Would all of those coaches made us a contender, probably not, but they would not have tanked the entire program either.

As for DM, the jury is out on how good of a coach he'll be. If he continues to bring in the talent he'll have plenty of time to refine his craft. Right now we need talent more than anything else. I'm not saying we should just stick our heads in the sand, but so far I see a lot more that I like about him than I don't like.
Agree
 
Yes, he can, and I hope that he does, but Wellman shouldn't have ever put somebody into this job in this situation that had to learn on the job. That was just so reckless.

I disagree. Most programs hire mid major head coaches with a few years experience. Marquette hired a career assistant.

The alternative was hiring a Howland that obviously has some baggage that kept all of the programs away. This is a risk too.
 
Firing Dino when we did was just idiotic. Unless you hit a home run with the subsequent hire, then you have somebody coming into a rebuilding job when you fired the former coach for supposed performance reasons after making the NCAA tournament two years in a row.
 
Yes, he can, and I hope that he does, but Wellman shouldn't have ever put somebody into this job in this situation that had to learn on the job. That was just so reckless.

a word like reckless assumes that a lot is on the line right now.
 
Deac 83 - I think the Kenny Green fallout also had something to do with the fight between him and Tony Karasic as I recall.
 
Firing Dino when we did was just idiotic. Unless you hit a home run with the subsequent hire, then you have somebody coming into a rebuilding job when you fired the former coach for supposed performance reasons after making the NCAA tournament two years in a row.

Dino took over a horrible situation and made chicken salad from chicken shit. He had some epic flame outs in March but I was more embarrassed with Wellman deciding to fiddle fart with the coaching search just to hire his friend.

When Dino got fired, Brad Stevens should have walked through the door instead of Shit Stain. When Shit Stain was fired, I was really hoping Archie Miller would have been walking through the door. DM is an upgrade but he is still learning on the job and the ACC is not a good place for young coaches.
 
Deac 83 - I think the Kenny Green fallout also had something to do with the fight between him and Tony Karasic as I recall.

Wasn't that the butter knife incident?
 
Firing Dino when we did was just idiotic. Unless you hit a home run with the subsequent hire, then you have somebody coming into a rebuilding job when you fired the former coach for supposed performance reasons after making the NCAA tournament two years in a row.

There is more outrage over Dino's firing today in the fan base than there was when he was canned. It seemed the fan base was fairly evenly split over the firing.

Dino is going on his 5th year out of coaching. I could have missed it but I don't recall him showing up in coaching searches at any level, if so there haven't been many. Maybe he's taken to the analyst role and doesn't want to coach anymore, but the guys that take you to the top could never sit there for this long without getting back in the game.

Wake must have put some serious restrictions in his buy out. Even Grobe has made a few comments that were perceived as negative after he left.
 
Which still doesn't change the fact that you are putting the next coach you hire in the position of having an all-freshman team after your fired the last coach for what was claimed to be performance factors after going to 2 straight NCAA tournaments. No-win situation unless he is a big name. If you are so sure the program is going down hill, why not let Dino bottom out a year. Expectations are changed for the new coach.

Terrible timing.
 
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