I don't get the Howard bashing
Working so had to listen to listen on the radio while checking in on the game thread. I can't get over the level of Juwan hatred. I understand this is real-time message board reaction to a team that was heavily shitting the bed in the first half, and not necessarily representative of the general consensus feeling toward Howard as a coach. But the number of folks calling for him to be fired, or "evaluated" Harbaugh style at the end of the season, or implying that Martelli's (who coached 4 of his 5 games at home) performance was superior, etc. was maddening.
John Beilein is one of the greatest college basketball coaches of all time. Forget about the fact that its 'unfair' to expect his successor to come right in and smoothly pick up that torch, its completely unrealistic. Yet Howard, who'd never coached in college or been an HC at any level, has basically pulled that off. There's more than enough upside from an X and O's, game management, and roster construction standpoint for Howard left to reach that its a pretty small leap of faith to believe that he's going to keep this program damn close to the lofty standards established under JB. Juwan won the conference championship in a loaded Big 10 and was one active Livers or Franz going 2-11 away from the Final 4 in his first ever NCAA tourney. He brought Franz from an outside the top 100 recruit to a lottery pick, and Dickenson from #43 to freshman AA. Hand picked Mike Smith and Chaundee Brown. Brought in a top 3 recruiting class in his second class. To say nothing of the excellent work he did with the 2019-20 squad which was had to replace Matthews, Poole and Iggy.
And don't sleep on the intangibles. Aside from one short circuited pawing at the Troll Center, its been 3 years of uninterrupted praise from the media, administration, players, and parents. There are no guarantees when it comes to head coaches jumping to greener pastures (see Beilien, John), but Juwan has already foregone pro opportunities to be here. He bleeds Maize and Blue. And if he gives two shits about having to play second fiddle to the football team or at that mausoleum of a home court, he hides it extremely well.
Does the team's performance this season put a few chinks in that armor? Sure. Does the current composition of his next 2 recruiting classes give me pause? Yes. Is anyone who thinks we're going to fire Howard and somehow dig a superior coaching option out of the couch cushions totally fucking brain dead? They are.
I don't think it's unusual for a fan base of a successful program to be a little annoyed that a guy that brought in the number 1 class in the country sqeeeked into the tournament then had a really bad first half against a pretty ho hum opponent. As you even said Howard has never been a head coach, so there's no real track record to go back on. Is he a good coach? Probably. He is he great? Eh we will see.
#1 recruiting class in the country isn't as impactfull when you have 5-10% of the players this year being 5th and 6th(!) year players that otherwise wouldn't be playing due to the COVID-shirt they received. It's a young team that didn't actually bring in an NBA ready player in that class. They had some COVID issues mid season and growing pains in the beginning and never quite put it together for lots of reasons that have to do with roster construction (HC's responsibility) and players just not playing well (out of his control to a certain extent). Some substituion disagreements/min distrubution aguments are reasonable. Auto bench is an industry wise issue.
But the problemm I have is with the people who always come out of the wood work when the team struggles and has nothing to say except, "do we really think JH is a good coach?" They are telling on themselves b/c the default assumption with some people is that a guy like Juwan isn't that good of a coach until he proves it beyond a shadow of a doubt whereas other coaches get waaaaay longer leashes and 3rd chances by default
March 17th, 2022 at 11:39 PM ^
Most of what you said is legit, but everyone on this board expected far more with the top class. Anyone saying otherwise is frankly lying.
After seeing what Houstan and Diabate brought to the court over the course of the season do you still really think it was THE top recruiting class??
While I somewhat understand what you’re saying, as a resident of Lexington, KY, I can say that I have seen John Calipari bring in higher rated recruiting classes on at least one occasion and not even make the tournament, and then lose in the 1st round of the NIT. I believe that was the year after they won the title, and then of course last year UK sucked with great recruits.
I do think Howard has shown some growing pains as a head coach. And maybe his first time with all of his own recruits, and trying to get a bunch of guys who are used to always being “the guy” on their team to gel together as a unit was a big challenge for him. I believe each year at Michigan he will get a little more seasoned as a head man and learn how to better build team chemistry, and pull his team out of a funk quicker than he did this season.
Let’s hope some of that seasoning has already happened in this rough year and they can make a deep run and pull off a couple real upsets.
March 17th, 2022 at 10:06 PM ^
This 👆 and down goes Kentucky to St Peter's! Freshman are high variance.
March 18th, 2022 at 10:35 AM ^
Something that gets lost in a lot of the hype around recruiting class rankings is the level of the recruiting class itself, and then also the separation within each class.
Yes we got a top 3 class but this year's overall crop of recruits just isn't that great.
Also, in lots of years Cal or Duke are going to have a class with 3 top 10 guys, and likely one of them is the top overall or second rated players. UM headlined with the number #9 and #12 guys (far from slam dunk one-and-done territory), and their overall rating was boosted by having 6 recruits in the class.
Ho hum, we weren't the high seed. We didn't have our starting PG. And how many times did Beilein have a mediocre first round game?
The only way to greatness @ Michigan is to bash a coach and yell from the rooftop of the interwebs for that coach to be fired. Only then, will s/he find greatness.
People are always going to hate Michigan. Welcome to the club.
thanks for refuting arguments that barely exist.
Those arguments are all I've seen around here since the Wisconsin game and they got even louder after the IU game.
fire beilein, dummies.
Sweet 16 and he'll be king again.
Justified krispies mayonnaise being idiot jellyfish
I was wondering what to make for dinner, now just need to thaw out the jellyfish.
I've got a recipe here somewhere for peanut butter and jellyfish.
We started 3 freshmen (and lost our Senior PG!). We were playing a team of juniors and seniors who had won something like 7 of their last 8. Once our team calmed down we completely dominated. Howard did a great job today and all season.
Many of our loudest fans online are front runners who absolutely cannot handle adversity.
Yes they struggle with diversity....wait what? 😆
What does an old, old, wooden ship have to do with anything?
In this country today, you can't trumpet your racism openly. I lived in Ann Arbor, and remember the ugliness that came with the Fab V. A lot of it came from UM fans.
I confess that today I was rooting more for Coach Howard than for Michigan. I thought that in the B1G tournament he looked a little tentative, which might have been expected in a first game back. When the time came to show a little fire, or anger, he held back. Today he called a masterful game in the second half.
Things are better in a lot of ways, but people definitely trumpet their racism blatantly quite a bit still. Many of my high school students get called racist slurs or have racist comments said to them from peers/teachers/administrators/etc. and they've had that happen in other schools all around the country.
Of course it’s racism, why wouldn’t it be? We root for the black athletes that make up the majority of the basketball and football programs, but we hate black coaches. Makes perfect sense to me.
What a shmuck.
Yes, a lot of the animus is racist. Take a trip over to RCMB and have a look at the tenor of a lot of the posts about Coach Howard. And if the idea that racism exists in American sports prompts you to call someone a schmuck. . . ? You're either living under a rock or. . .
When a random black poster is a critical of a white coach do you instantly construed it as racism? Trying understand your logic here.
You're reaching here in order to create some narrative.
March 17th, 2022 at 11:30 PM ^
It’s okay for fans to question aspects of Howard’s coaching. No different than fans questioning Beilein’s coaching, which happened plenty during his time at Michigan.
It’s also true there are fans who are racists and question Howard’s coaching because of the color of his skin. This is something Beilein didn’t really have to deal with.
It’s important to recognize all of those statements are true because that is reality and it will cause different emotions and responses from people based on their personal experiences.
If you struggle with that, it’s probably worthwhile asking yourself why.
C'mon man, we were having literally the same conversations about Harbaugh in 2020 (and 2019, and the Rutgers game this year, and every time he didn't beat State), and he hadn't just come off a suspension for hitting an opposing coach.
Do you really think there wouldn't have been plenty loud angry fans in the first half today if Howard were white? Go read literally any football game thread from a game that isn't a blowout win.
"Some people are racist" doesn't mean that everyone who thinks the team looked poor out of the gate, or that this season has been kind of disappointing overall, is dogwhistling their hatred for Coach Howard because of his skin color.
I mean, people need to cool it on the internet in general, but that ain't new.
True. But generally, leaving sports out of it, anyone who doesn’t sincerely believe this is still a racist country in many respects, must love the color orange. And before you ask, I do not approve of the “squad” either. Middle of the road here. Not politics, just obvious. Or should be.
And, lest we forget, there was a growing insistence that Beilein had topped out and should perhaps be fired around 7-8 years ago. We forget it now, but it's true -- there was a lot of frustration at him before the Villanova-championship-game year.
I don't know so much if it's that our expectations are unreasonably high -- Michigan wasn't ranked pre-season #4 this year based on MGoBlog advocacy -- but certainly any time the expectations aren't met, the wolves start howling.
(And yes, the United States, like every other country in the world, is racist -- still not sure that's the only basis for the finger-pointing at Howard).
So EVERY criticism of a non-white athlete or coach is default prejudicial based on color?
Wow. That view in and of itself is prejudicial. And a good way to deflect legitimate criticism.
For the record, I fully support Howard, and despise people who freak out over a bad spell in a season. That being said, I’m also mature enough to not read every criticism as being a racism boogeyman behind every tree and every wall.
March 17th, 2022 at 11:08 PM ^
Nobody said that.
March 17th, 2022 at 10:09 PM ^
stupid fucking post.
was it racism when people viciously wanted beilein fired? harbaugh?
To a hammer, everything looks like a nail.
Questions won’t be answered on Juwan this year, it’ll be over the next 2-3 years. My criticisms would be some awkward game rotations, poor fundamentals and the up and down mood of the team. One game they all seem to want to run the other team out of the gym, the next game it looks like they don’t even want to be on the floor. His roster composition going forward doesn’t exactly give me the good feels. I feel like you have to always give them 4-5 years to get all of their people on the court and then see how they are doing. People wanting him fired are as far gone as those anointing him as the savior. Let’s see how the next 2-3 years go and we will see. I’ve been a lifetime fan of his too.
Let me add that Juwan is a great ambassador for all of Michigan athletics (one incident aside). Also, he runs some really good sets on offense.
Well he's certainly not the savior, because Michigan didn't need any saving. John Beilein did that part. Juwan just had to come in and keep it going. It hasn't been perfect but it's been mostly positive.
Juwan might have a higher ceiling if more of the top rated recruits he's in on actually turn out to be college difference makers. Beilein wasn't getting those guys at all. But they can't all be "very good but will only reach his potential in the NBA" (Diabate) or "kind of a bust" like Houstan. Need more Dickinson type guys that actually turn into college stars.
Xs and Os Howard seems to be able to hold his own with anybody.
Caleb Houstan is not "kind of a bust". His shot is inconsistent as a freshman. Twice now he's turned a bad shooting night around at halftime and he's improving his defense and finding ways to affect the game when his shot isn't falling. I'm betting he's going to be a very good player for a Michigan next year.
Which would be totally fine if he were a middling 4-star. But he was the #10 recruit in the country, which should be instant impact, not guy who can only shoot every other night and can't guard his position. "Bust" is I guess the wrong word since he seems like he will be good, but "pretty overrated" seems fair.
He's projected as the 24th pick in draft mocks. Some anonymous guys in their jammies on this board sure have high--and censorious--visions of what some of these players are supposed to do to meet their discerning standards.
Lots of highly regarded players do not contribute a lot their first year.
Did Houstan rate himself as the #10 player in country? Nope, recruiting services/websites did. Wonder how the 9 guys ranked above him did this year? How did he do compared to them? Interesting that a Google Search can’t seem to find the 2021/2022 season stats for these recruits presented by ESPN, Rivals, et al. You know, comparing their rankings to actual on Court performance. Anybody find a link so we can easily evaluate Houstan compared to these guys?
Your take has merit in a general sense but, specifically, Beilein left his successor with one mess of a roster. Beilein's success revolved around a quite unique formula that had a very high floor. The argument within the basketball community was about the limited ceiling-which John maxed out very nicely. Here, it was simply a matter of preference in style of play. I had/have great appreciation for John's coaching but, frankly, I have a slight preference for how Juwan's teams play...I wish the team was a blend of the these two excellent coaches.
This year, Juwan is stuck in roster hell-and it is not his fault. In two years-the roster will be HIS roster. The road he is choosing is the bumpier one-Hello Kentucky!!!
Otherwise, as I continue to say, basketball is a very heavily nuanced game. Few understand the realities in play here. Many players struggle with knowing this game...even talented ones are out there rather robotically performing prescribed tasks. And here, fans will be fans.
Wisconsin was not his only incident. His antics last year vs Maryland were completely out of line for a head coach as well. Let’s not pretend these incidents didn’t happen or weren’t serious and claim everyone who questions whether he should be our coach are only looking at his x’s and o’s coaching ability and recruiting.
March 18th, 2022 at 10:43 AM ^
His "antics" versus Maryland we're equally viewed as evidence of a fiery take-no-shit attitude that you love to see in a coach. I completely understand if you see it the other way, but I didn't include that in my point because I was talking about positive versus negative impressions, and I'd call that one a wash because at least as many people were fired up by the Turgeon run in as they were put off by it.
I think people don't appreciate how tough of a job this year was. UM had to replace 3 NBA-level players and Mike Smith. And that's in year three of his tenure. While Howard is not a God, any real criticism of his coaching acumen is premature at best.
Fans always know more than the coaches, always have, always will.🙄
Fans always THINK they know more than coaches. But fans don't really know what going on with coaches, players and administrators; they only know what gets reported.
I love when fans bitch about one games worth of substitutions with zero context provided. A lotof people here were so mad that Kobe wasn't playing in the IU game because he had been good the game before. Then he comes out today and is a net negative on both ends of the floor. He can't play defense and brings nothing on offense. It's almost like Juwan had a reason to not play him against IU but I'm sure we should just chalk it up to "is a dumb at subbing".
My friends and I used to love an old Marv Levy quote along the lines of, "you [fans] think you know what you're talking about, but you don't."
I remember an old Rose Bowl where Ty Wheatley wasn't used much in the fourth quarter, and we were outraged ... until we learned after the game he had been throwing up on the sidelines. Turns out ... we just don't know.