Bacari Alexander fired

Submitted by Bambi on

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Disappointing for the former Beilein assistant but not surprising. Only won 16 games in 2 years and had that weird suspension earlier this year. Interesting to see the difference between his career trajectory and Lavall Jordan. Hope he lands on his feet somehwere.

MaizeAndBlueWahoo

March 26th, 2018 at 4:33 PM ^

I also follow UDM hoops since that's my grad school - and was awfully disappointed.  That team has talent.  Bacari couldn't seem to coach it to save his life.  At the end of the season he said something about how he was all about defense but players don't want to play it because of some generational thing.  I don't remember exactly what he said but "generational thing" was definitely part of the blame game.  Bullshit, dude.

jmblue

March 26th, 2018 at 4:44 PM ^

Yaklich is probably in the mix.  

Jordan would certainly seem like a candidate if he fares well, but it's possible he'll decide to just stay put at Butler, it being his alma mater.  

Patrick Beilein would be an interesting darkhorse if he can climb the ladder enough by the time of his father's retirement.

 

VAWolverine

March 26th, 2018 at 3:21 PM ^

Announced he was going to apply for the NBA draft but not hire an agent. Bacari may need a new agent though. Disappointing two years at Calihan Hall. Genitalia references to players often lead to the unemployment line.

Alumnus93

March 26th, 2018 at 4:10 PM ^

Chatman was absolutely terrible for us....haven't seen him since... is he really a NBA-level prospect ?

HireWayne

March 26th, 2018 at 4:31 PM ^

Saw the team play a few times on WADL.  Team seaemed to play engaged and competitve.  I would've given him another year.

Wonder what Kam Chatman does.

JamieH

March 26th, 2018 at 5:38 PM ^

Reading up-therad aobut screaming football coaches, my high school football coach won a crap ton of games.  He's still coaching actually, going on about 30 years now.  Our high school routinely wins our conference and has advanced as far as the Michigan title came, though they fell short when they got there.

He also happens to be about the most awesome person you can imagine.  I didn't play football for him but he was also the baseball coach, and I played baseball under him.  I'm not saying he never yelled at anyone, because duh.  But he never did any of this crazy shit you hear about coaches doing.  he treated everyone like men, and made it clear that he expected the same out of you, and that if you f***ed up, your ass was going on the bench.  No screaming, no yelling, just sit your ass down and think about it. 

When I hear people say the only way to coach is to scream at kids, I think back to this guy.  He took a bunch of farm kids at a public school every year and turned them into a championship football team, year after year after year, and he did it with respect and a crap-ton of hard work.  I never heard a single kid or parent say a bad word about him in the several decades he's been our high school's coach. 

So it CAN be done. You don't have to be the coach that yells and intimidates all the time.   Maybe his way was more difficult but I've seen that it is very possible. 

cincygoblue

March 26th, 2018 at 5:43 PM ^

However, those coaches usually employ coaches that do the yelling for them. Getting yelled at as a young adult is not a bad thing. I don’t think I’d be the successful millennial that I am, had I not been yelled at a little bit.

MGoBender

March 26th, 2018 at 6:38 PM ^

I'd say I'm a pretty successful millenial.  And a varsity head coach.  The best coaches I've had and worked with have not been swearers or screamers.  I have a no swearing rule. And I have no trouble getting kids to understand when mistakes are made or effort is lacking.  It's all about building mutual respect.  

JamieH

March 26th, 2018 at 8:42 PM ^

Again, I'm not saying no one yelled.  Of course, there was yelling.  And I was on the baseball team, and there is a ton less yelling in baseball than football.  But a lot of kids played both sports. 

He didn't need to yell to get his point across.  Dude lost several fingers in a metal press when he was younger.  He would hold up his hand and tell us, you think whatever has happened to you is bad?  Look at my hand!  Look what happened to me!  Did I sit around and bitch and moan and cry about it?  No, I got my shit together and figured out how to move on and still be successful despite the bad stuff that happened to me.

I mean, how do you argue with a guy like that?  You don't.  You do what he says, or you shut up and sit your ass on the bench.
 

 

JHendo

March 26th, 2018 at 8:16 PM ^

My favorite and most respected coach I ever played for was the revered Chuck Lori (RIP). I'm sure there are quite a few of us here who had the honor of playing for him at Pioneer and Huron. He would scream at us at the top of his high pitched lungs, telling us that we suck, calling some of us "amenic little geeks" and even at one point breaking his clipboard over the (helmeted) head of a teammate during a particularly passionate pregame speech. But he also routinely told us he loved us. And he was always there for us, on and off the field (hell, he was even my computer teacher in middle school and kept my paperboy of the month article up on his wall and called me up on the phone to congratulate me whennhe first saw it in the paper). Some of the best coaches yell and they scream, and they're lewd and they are passionate. As long as they're doing it with purpose and not maliciously as they lose control of a situation, it just works and oddly enough means something in the end.

bacon1431

March 26th, 2018 at 7:19 PM ^

I find it interesting that this blog generally respects the hell out of JB and how he runs things. He would never even think about saying something similar to “suck my dick”. And that’s part of the reason he is so revered nearly universally. But a lot of people act like what BA did was not a big deal at all. I would never approach a coach and complain about my kid’s playing time. But if a coach said this to my kid, I’d be taking it up with him immediately. If you can’t think of a different way to motivate or criticize a player, that says much more about you than it does any parent or player that would complain about it IMO. We wouldn’t tolerate this sort of behavior from any teacher or school admin, so why from coaches? They’re teachers and supposedly leaders too.

bacon1431

March 26th, 2018 at 8:43 PM ^

Nah, when the coach is immature enough to do such a thing in the first place, what makes you think he’s going to listen to the player? He obviously had no respect for him. No problem to get backup from your parents in this. A coach-player relationship is not an egalitarian one. The coach has most of the power.

sum1valiant

March 26th, 2018 at 11:06 PM ^

What can Mom/Dad do that the player cannot? These are real world problems that adults deal with on a daily basis. Teaching an adult that mom or dad will step in every time things go sideways isn't going to teach the player anything about how to handle similar situations going forward. Certainly the parents should be there to provide guidance/support, but the onus is on the player to find a resolution.