State of the Buzz, Preseason

[deacvision7]

DV7.. I'll assume you were on the Buzz-Wait and See

Stop making an Ass out of U and Me.

 

[deacfreke2]

hopefully we won't lose our exhibition on Friday...

I'm Buzz-in, the recruiting brought me around (naive optimism) and I am curious to see offseason growth and production from our boys, however, I'm sure losses will quickly push me back into Buzz-waiting culminating in Buzz-out

Ferrum is no Guilford. Boys better strap it up Friday.

 

[Deacsfan27]

High Point beat Ferrum last year 90-57. Ferrum went 23-5 last year and their best player graduated. I don't think this will be a close game.

 

[Marietta Deac]

John Wooden, Bob Knight and K together could not have done better with our team last year. We were weak everywhere, and grossly weak in what I consider the most important position: PG. We could barely get the ball in the front court and get into an offense. PG is like the QB position. Look at the Colts. They lose Manning and they go from Super Bowl contenders to worst team in the NFL by far. It ain't bad coaching..... I still can't believe people cast any blame on Buzz for last year. He needed to come up with a strong 2012 class, and damn if he didn't deliver. In a very big way. We are going to struggle this year, but whether we end up with 8-12 wins, or 12-16 mostly depends on the PG play. With what we have anything close .500 ball will be a VERY good season. Then we'll be loaded with upperclassmen and with a strong group of freshmen, some of whom you'd expect could contribute tosome extent as backups, and some maybe more. Things are definitely looking up. That Buzz recruited the 2012 class despite our delusional fan base who bitched and moaned all last year calling for his head was nothing short of spectacular. It has to get easier after that. But we will struggle this year. No doub. So I expect much more of the same.

K would have faked a back injury and thrown one of his assistants under the bus.

 

[myDeaconmyhand]

High Point beat Ferrum last year 90-57. Ferrum went 23-5 last year and their best player graduated. I don't think this will be a close game.

Wake is no High Point. We better come ready to play on Friday.

 

[CreamyGoodness]

I'm part of the wait and see crew although it's nauseating at times. As fans the healthiest approach. Prepare for the worst(which i believe is behind us) and wish for some success. Enjoy the ride and GO DEACS

 

[CreamyGoodness]

As fans it's* the healthiest approach.

 

[ArlingtonDeac]

I mean he could have lost all of the games he coached.

I don't think we could have lost more games than we did, given the nature of the teams we actually beat. Our players could have coached themselves to those wins, since they were purely the result of having an overwhelming talent advantage. They were "roll the ball out and watch" type wins.

Note: we lost several games where we had the same overwhelming talent advatnage, but we didn't beat anyone with more talent than us.

 

[Jroc25]

DV7 has more than doubled down on his argument that Coach [Redacted] is terrible. I'll be interested to see if he ever will own up to the fact that he was wrong should things turn around. Judging by the amount of effort he's put in to "convince" others that [Redacted] is so terrible, I'm guessing he'd never own up to it.

 

[vtwhat etc]

Why don't you address the insulting double talk from Ron Wellman, instead of just saying "fuck it, what can I do?"

October 15, 2009 Ron Wellman said:

"We certainly talked about postseason and the importance of it and how that has evolved into the most important part of the season, and the regular season has been diminished somewhat over the last decade or so," Wellman said. "Dino has good thoughts about how we need to improve in that area, and obviously that has been a weakness the last couple of years.
"But it wasn't such a concern that I didn't want to go forward with the commitment to him because, again, overall I just feel he has done a superb job in a very difficult situation. And I see a very bright future for our program with him at the helm."


Then after the same season in which Ron Wellman said those words and Wake Forest went the furthest they did under Dino Gaudio's reign as the men's basketball coach here he said this...

On April 7, 2010 (not even a full 26 weeks later *one day short of that mark, in fact*) after Wake Forest reached the 2nd round of the NCAA tournament, after previously crashing out of the same tournament in the 1st round the previous season, and not even making it the season before that...
Ron Wellman had this to say about why he was letting Dino Gaudio go http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/news/story?id=5064441 :

During a hastily drawn news conference, athletic director Ron Wellman said "the basis for the decision was our late-season and postseason performances."

He continued:
"This was not a snap decision. It was not a snap judgment," said Wellman, who served on the NCAA Division I men's basketball committee this season and was in Indianapolis earlier this week for the Final Four.
"This was not a decision based upon a one-year performance," he added. "We can put up with a disappointment. We have disappointments all the time. But there is a pattern here that needed to be addressed, a 3-year pattern that needed to be addressed."


Ron Wellman then proceeds to hire somebody with this career late season and post season record:

2005/06 Air Force: Loss to 12-17 Wyoming in the First Round of the WAC Conference Tournament. Loss to Illinois in the First Round of the NCAA Tournament.
2006/07 Air Force: 3 losses to close the regular season to UNLV, TCU (11-15 at time of game, coming off 11 straight losses *I guess they were "due"), and BYU. Air Force then lost in the First Round of the WAC Conference Tournament AGAIN to Wyoming (16-14), and their end of the season was so bad to knock them out of a NCAA Tournament berth.
2007/08 Colorado: Lost 14 of the final 16 games of the season. Won a first round matchup in the Big XII tournament tho.
2008/09 Colorado: From the turn of the calender year into 2009 Colorado lost 17 of 19 games, including the final 12. Needless to say, they did not win a post season game.
2009/10 Colorado: From the turn of the calender year into 2010 Colorado lost 12 of 19 games, including a first round loss in the Big XII Tournament this year.


So I wonder how the decision to let Gaudio go because of "the basis for the decision was our late-season and postseason performances", led to the hiring of Jeff [Redacted] when he produced such results.

Maybe, just maybe, Ron Wellman has been attempting to spoon feed up complete bullshit?

Anybody want to gather up the buzz-in'ers into a room and force them to read this post and then take a polygraph on their real Buzz-stance?

 

[deacvision7]

That would require Buzz to not be a completely shitastic coach first.


Mountains of evidence point to him not being a good head coach. He knows basketball, he doesn't know how to teach it or lead a program.

 

[Deacsfan27]

DV7 has more than doubled down on his argument that Coach [Redacted] is terrible. I'll be interested to see if he ever will own up to the fact that he was wrong should things turn around. Judging by the amount of effort he's put in to "convince" others that [Redacted] is so terrible, I'm guessing he'd never own up to it.

It is without a doubt the easier argument to get behind right now. I certainly understand that, and it can be done without re-hashing the same things over and over again. Everybody gets it and everybody knows what has been said.

I think it is time to just sit back and watch what unfolds over the next couple of years and stop yelling about things in the past.

Just my $.02.

 

[myDeaconmyhand]

I don't think we could have lost more games than we did, given the nature of the teams we actually beat. Our players could have coached themselves to those wins, since they were purely the result of having an overwhelming talent advantage. They were "roll the ball out and watch" type wins.

Note: we lost several games where we had the same overwhelming talent advatnage, but we didn't beat anyone with more talent than us.

It would have been easy to lose 3 more games: We needed 32 points and a last second shot to beat Iowa, we needed late free throws to beat UNC-G, we needed late free throws from CJ Harris in the last 2 minutes to beat Virginia.

 

[Stan Gable]

I've been against this hire since day one. Buzz's first year was an absolute failure on the court as well as on the recruiting trail. We needed immediate help with the 2011 class and got none.

The 2011-12 season by Wake standards "should" be a failure as well. I cannot see this team winning more than 13 games against a weak schedule. Not getting blown out is an unacceptable goal for a school with our bball history.

Now, recruiting has picked up but the class 2012 is far from a sure thing. Sadly, I think the promise of talent will buy him another year. Unfortunately, A couple of talented seniors and a bunch of freshman is not a recipie for getting to the tourney. That leaves us out of the tourney 3 years in a row.

How are we going to recruit the class of 2013 with [Redacted] as our coach in limbo? That class is crucial to adding a couple of Very talented players to compliment our base. Oh, I forgot, we only have one scholarship for that class...

 

[wfumike02]

The idea that the bad situation Bzz inherited somehow negates the reality that he did as badly as possible with that bad situation makes no sense. Bzz was a healthy part of why we weren't just bad, but were "crap the bed twice" bad. He was just as big a contributor to our failure as anyone else.

But he's righted the recruiting ship, and gets a chance with a new set of "his" guys. But let's not kid ourselves. A good portion of why we were so incredibly, terribly, record-setting bad last year had to do with poor coaching. We were just as awful in our last game as our first, and played the whole year with little hustle, imagination, pride, direction, or emotion. Bzz took a bad situation and bottomed out with it. I don't think anyone could have done worse, and that's the best you can say for it.

He's batting with an 0-2 count, but he's not out.

This is dead on. You simply can't excuse Bz for last year because it was a bad situation while ignoring the fact that the players we had did not measurably improve.

I'm BzzWait right now. I was BzzWait last year until the GT game, which sent me over the edge into BzzOut territory. The recruiting he did in the offseason has me back to BzzWait for the time being. We shall see what happens on the court this season. I'm not expecting us to be good, but I do expect the guys we have to improve.

 

[vtwhat etc]

It is without a doubt the easier argument to get behind right now. I certainly understand that, and it can be done without re-hashing the same things over and over again. Everybody gets it and everybody knows what has been said.

I think it is time to just sit back and watch what unfolds over the next couple of years and stop yelling about things in the past.

Just my $.02.

I mean... I know this might be a stretch, but if complacency with ineptitude was acceptable; I think we'd still be posting on another board right now.

I am speaking for myself, but maybe others will agree... I believe that shedding more (and the same) light on Bz's past might expedite the process of moving the program in a new direction.

 

[ArlingtonDeac]

It would have been easy to lose 3 more games: We needed 32 points and a last second shot to beat Iowa, we needed late free throws to beat UNC-G, we needed late free throws from CJ Harris in the last 2 minutes to beat Virginia.

I failed to see Bzz's coaching making an impact in any of those wins you mention. I know we had a few close wins, but, IMO, it wasn't anything I saw from the sidelines from Bzz that made the difference. We won by great individual performances (Iowa - JTT just flat went off), or by simply having too much raw ability to manage to lose to a crap opponent on that particular night (UNCG, UVA). Which is unlike the string of ghastly defeats where we did lose to glorified high school teams, despite have an overwhelming talent advantage.

In the games where we weren't the best team on the floor, we weren't even remotely competitive. In games were we probably were the more talented team, we still lost more than we won. Not good.

Point being, we didn't win those tight games because of Bzz or not Bzz, IMO. We won a few because, of the 15 garbage teams we played, it was inevitable that we'd beat 4-5 of them, even without a coach, purely based on rosters.

 

[Deacsfan27]

I mean... I know this might be a stretch, but if complacency with ineptitude was acceptable; I think we'd still be posting on another board right now.

I am speaking for myself, but maybe others will agree... I believe that shedding more (and the same) light on Bz's past might expedite the process in moving the program in a new direction.

To do so once is sufficient then. To do so on every single thread and derail it to the point where the only topic is fans lamenting about how bad Wake Forest basketball is and how terrible of a coach and human Jeff [Redacted] is, is overkill to me don't you think?

 

[ArlingtonDeac]

This is dead on. You simply can't excuse Bz for last year because it was a bad situation while ignoring the fact that the players we had did not measurably improve.

I'm BzzWait right now. I was BzzWait last year until the GT game, which sent me over the edge into BzzOut territory. The recruiting he did in the offseason has me back to BzzWait for the time being. We shall see what happens on the court this season. I'm not expecting us to be good, but I do expect the guys we have to improve.

And this mirrors my thoughts exactly.

 

[Deacsfan27]

I failed to see Bzz's coaching making an impact in any of those wins you mention. I know we had a few close wins, but, IMO, it wasn't anything I saw from the sidelines from Bzz that made the difference. We won by great individual performances (Iowa - JTT just flat went off), or by simply having too much raw ability to manage to lose to a crap opponent on that particular night (UNCG, UVA). Which is unlike the string of ghastly defeats where we did lose to glorified high school teams, despite have an overwhelming talent advantage.

In the games where we weren't the best team on the floor, we weren't even remotely competitive. In games were we probably were the more talented team, we still lost more than we won. Not good.

Point being, we didn't win those tight games because of Bzz or not Bzz, IMO. We won a few because, of the 15 garbage teams we played, it was inevitable that we'd beat 4-5 of them, even without a coach, purely based on rosters.

So when we lost it was Coach [Redacted]'s fault, but when we won, he gets no credit because it was "inevitable that we'd beat 4-5 of them." Seems fairly inconsistent to me.

I have no problem with blaming Coach [Redacted] for the losses last year, but to discredit him when he gets wins is bizarre to me.