2007 Recruits

[thebluehatman]

Re: 2007 Recruits

i have to agree with RLV that our player conduct out of the arena sucks, and it was kind of what i was referring to in my previous post.  accountabilty is lacking in the program and  character is kind of lacking.  the quality of the athletes is good but they have a lack of accountability. marquis and the other basketballer caught with pot are prime examples.  i don't know the pasts of these athletes but i do know there are problems with drug use for some of the athletes here.

[89rabbit]

Re: 2007 Recruits

i have to agree with RLV that our player conduct out of the arena sucks, and it was kind of what i was referring to in my previous post.  accountabilty is lacking in the program and  character is kind of lacking.  the quality of the athletes is good but they have a lack of accountability. marquis and the other basketballer caught with pot are prime examples.  i don't know the pasts of these athletes but i do know there are problems with drug use for all of the athletes here.

Wow, that is a mighty BIG brush you just painted "all the athletes" at our University with.    Are you sure you don't want to rethink that last post?  :-?  

[thebluehatman]

Re: 2007 Recruits

well technically alcohol is a drug and i know i have seen athletes that are underage drinking at the bars here in town on a weekly basis even during the season.  i have seen athletes smoking it up during the season too. my bad on generalizing all the athletes because i know there are some like Micheal Loney who keep their nose in the books in studying, so i apologize to those athletes. but i probably shouldn't have generalized that all the athletes here have a drug problem.

[MilwaukeeJacksAlum]

Re: 2007 Recruits

I know I'm an old fart now who hasn't played college athletics for almost 8 years now, but I ran primarily with athletes while in college. That included basketball, baseball and primarily football players. Sure, most of them (me included) drank alot of beer, but show me a college person who doesn't. Hell, I still drink too much beer when I get together with my college buddies. However, there are those students out there who don't drink and there are athletes (Luke Smith and Noel Bouche come to mind from my era) who would give the most straight laced student a run for their money. Maybe all of a sudden drugs have crept into the scene. Again, I'm out of the loop. But, I find it hard to believe that 2 classes have passed through SDSU and all of a sudden the athletic's program is drug infested.

I'll say one thing for certain, and that's that I NEVER witnessed one athlete take any drug stronger than Barley Soda in my 4 1/2 years at school. Now, I'm not naive enough to think there weren't some out there smoking pot or worse, because I know it happened. It's always going to happen. And maybe because my views on that activity was well-known it wasn't done in my presence, but I never saw it happening with athletes.

I guess my point is, I sincerely doubt our athletes are all walking around setting up their next bong hit and X hit. Collegiate athletes in general don't get to where they are by taking drugs. Not the good ones.

[89rabbit]

Re: 2007 Recruits

89, I have no problem with your post.  And I hope I didn't come off as complaining.  I'm also a guy who hates when people complain about a problem rather than offer solutions.  I'm not sure what the appropriate questions or solutions should be.  People closer to the program will have to answer that.  But I'll give it a shot:  1) Transfers.  Why so many?  2)  Off the court conduct of players.  We've had some pretty ugly run-in's with the law and these sort of things don't just happen overnight and it's rarely "my first time smoking pot, burglarizing, etc."  

These are just a couple of topics I would like discussed.  I'm not asking for anyone's head.  All I'm asking is that the athletic department take a look at what's happened to the program over the last 3 years.  We went from one of the top programs in Division 2 to what we are now.  Which is a losing program that can't retain players.

RLV,

No I really do want to discuss this.  Point 1) transfers:  We have had two kids transfer in the last three seasons.  One because he was recruited as a D-II player and wanted one last shot at a D-II Championship.  The other (today) is transferring to Illinois, his home town school that is also a member of the Big Ten.  I am not sure that there is anything that the coaches could have done in either case.

Point 2) Off court behavior:  This of course by its very nature implies that the coaching staff has little control because it is "off the court behavior".  There is no doubt that some of our athletes have behaved badly and or have been accused of behaving badly and they are no longer or may no longer be with the program.  This seems an appropriate response by the coaching staff.  The problem with kids is they are kids and you don't know how they are going to act when they get away from home for the first time.  The coaching staff (like their parents) can't be with them 24/7.  If they make bad choices they will pay the consequences.  

If you want to hold the Coaches responsible for their players conduct off the court you are welcome to, however you can't really then condemn the coaching staff for turn over if some of those athletes, who's behavior has been less then exemplary, are no longer with the program.  

Again, let me stress I have no issue with you asking the questions RLV, just giving you my answers.


Go State!  


P.S. You ended your post by saying "We went from one of the top programs in Division 2 to what we are now . . . " and you are right. We went from being one of the top programs in D-II to what we are now a brand new D-I school in transition. We all said we were going to be patient when this whole move to D-I started, now is the time we need to exercise that virtue. This too shall pass.

[Rabbitlivinginverm]

Re: 2007 Recruits

I know I'm an old fart now who hasn't played college athletics for almost 8 years now, but I ran primarily with athletes while in college.  That included basketball, baseball and primarily football players.  Sure, most of them (me included) drank alot of beer, but show me a college person who doesn't.  Hell, I still drink too much beer when I get together with my college buddies.  However, there are those students out there who don't drink and there are athletes (Luke Smith and Noel Bouche come to mind from my era) who would give the most straight laced student a run for their money.  Maybe all of a sudden drugs have crept into the scene. Again, I'm out of the loop.  But, I find it hard to believe that 2 classes have passed through SDSU and all of a sudden the athletic's program is drug infested.  

I'll say one thing for certain, and that's that I NEVER witnessed one athlete take any drug stronger than Barley Soda in my 4 1/2 years at school.  Now, I'm not naive enough to think there weren't some out there smoking pot or worse, because I know it happened.  It's always going to happen.  And maybe because my views on that activity was well-known it wasn't done in my presence, but I never saw it happening with athletes.  

I guess my point is, I sincerely doubt our athletes are all walking around setting up their next bong hit and X hit.  Collegiate athletes in general don't get to where they are by taking drugs.  Not the good ones.

Like you said, it's hard not to find a college athlete or college student who doesn't or didn't drink beer. However, marijuana is everywhere; including college athlectics in Brookings. We had a football player get caught with 13 pounds of weed. Who do you think he was dealing to? My guess is his friends smoked a few times with him.

[89rabbit]

Re: 2007 Recruits

[quote author=MilwaukeeJacksAlum link=1131660049/75#78 date=1146521592]I know I'm an old fart now who hasn't played college athletics for almost 8 years now, but I ran primarily with athletes while in college.  That included basketball, baseball and primarily football players.  Sure, most of them (me included) drank alot of beer, but show me a college person who doesn't.  Hell, I still drink too much beer when I get together with my college buddies.  However, there are those students out there who don't drink and there are athletes (Luke Smith and Noel Bouche come to mind from my era) who would give the most straight laced student a run for their money.  Maybe all of a sudden drugs have crept into the scene. Again, I'm out of the loop.  But, I find it hard to believe that 2 classes have passed through SDSU and all of a sudden the athletic's program is drug infested.  

I'll say one thing for certain, and that's that I NEVER witnessed one athlete take any drug stronger than Barley Soda in my 4 1/2 years at school.  Now, I'm not naive enough to think there weren't some out there smoking pot or worse, because I know it happened.  It's always going to happen.  And maybe because my views on that activity was well-known it wasn't done in my presence, but I never saw it happening with athletes.  

I guess my point is, I sincerely doubt our athletes are all walking around setting up their next bong hit and X hit.  Collegiate athletes in general don't get to where they are by taking drugs.  Not the good ones.

Like you said, it's hard not to find a college athlete or college student who doesn't or didn't drink beer.  However, marijuana is everywhere; including college athlectics in Brookings.  We had a football player get caught with 13 pounds of weed.  Who do you think he was dealing to?  My guess is his friends smoked a few times with him.
[/quote]


Wow, it must have been BIG brush bargain days are Runnings.  Just because a football athlete (during our D-II days) was busted with marijuana doesn't mean that his friends or other athletes were involved.  That would be like saying Duke's Basketball team must (allegedly) assault strippers at team parties because the Lacrosse team (allededly) does it.

Unless you know for a fact that he was selling and/or smoking weed with his freinds and fellow athletes, you are besmirching many people’s reputations without facts.  If you do know it for a fact the Brookings police would have liked to talk to you back a few years ago.

[RabbitinTea]

Re: 2007 Recruits

I know this takes the conversation in a different direction, but have we thought the Holdren situation all the way through? I'm just as frustrated as the next guy, however, there may be some positive implications in this matter. If we have an athlete transfer to a big-time program, is there not some good in terms of the outward appearance of the program's potential? I can't think it's the worst thing in the world to have prospective student-athletes look at our program and say "look, they just had a kid transfer to ILLINOIS". To lose a student-athlete to one of the best programs of the last 3 years can't be all bad. I hope for that reason that Steve makes the team and gets some PT. We wouldn't have lost a kid to the Illini, for any reason, 5 years ago.

[SiouxFallsJack]

Re: 2007 Recruits

I know this takes the conversation in a different direction, but have we thought the Holdren situation all the way through?  I'm just as frustrated as the next guy, however, there may be some positive implications in this matter.  If we have an athlete transfer to a big-time program, is there not some good in terms of the outward appearance of the program's potential?  I can't think it's the worst thing in the world to have prospective student-athletes look at our program and say "look, they just had a kid transfer to ILLINOIS".  To lose a student-athlete to one of the best programs of the last 3 years can't be all bad.  I hope for that reason that Steve makes the team and gets some PT.  We wouldn't have lost a kid to the Illini, for any reason, 5 years ago.

I like your point of view RabbitinTea.  I was pretty  > > when I first got home from work and heard the news but am cooling off now.  A part of me hopes the 28 Steve scored agianst Illinois will be more than he will score over the next couple of seasons playing for them.  Give me a day or two and I should be a little more positive.  

[thebluehatman]

Re: 2007 Recruits

heh does this latest news make me 2 for 2 in what i hear???

[JackTwice]

Re: 2007 Recruits

heh does this latest news make me 2 for 2 in what i hear???

I wasn't questioning or calling you out on the info you get. I was calling you out on your questioning of the coaching staff everytime something does happen.

In the case of the D-line coach, I would suspect that the problems with players leaving has more to do with the fact that Sarvis is the 3rd dline coach in three years (200?-2003 - Can't remember name but went to SWMSU w/ Eidsness , 2004 - Roberts, 2005 - Sarvis).

I would suspect that some of the basketball problems have to do with the transition and some of it is players own behavior (I have heard Wenig had some school problems along with injuries).

To call out coaches is reckless is all I was getting at.

[thebluehatman]

Re: 2007 Recruits

yah i was kind of calling out the assistants, because they do the most of recruiting. i know it is a tough job to do, but i just wish we weren't losing all this talent. however i do know with the d-line coach in regards to hank goff that there was a deep hatred there. i have heard that hank is trying to transfer to ndsu currently.

[JackTwice]

Re: 2007 Recruits

A dline coach that wasn't part of the staff when he was recruited and chose to come here. Plus there is something else there that both you and I know also interfered with his staying in school.

[thebluehatman]

Re: 2007 Recruits

that is true and it's still interferring in his campus activities especially in the 4th floor young hall quadrant from what my RA buddies are telling me :-X

[thebluehatman]

Re: 2007 Recruits

""I don't know how many it's been in the past three years, but it's been very difficult to keep guys, " Nagy said. "I think we're close to being through that - we're seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. But honestly, if you look at some of the guys, especially the last two we lost in Ben and Steve, I don't think it has anything to do with the stuff we're going through (moving to Division I)."  

Only five players now remain from the Jacks' end-of-season active roster: redshirt freshman guard Matt Cadwell, sophomore guard Mackenzie Casey, junior guards Andy Kleinjan and Jose Frias, and sophomore forward Michael Loney.

A high school friend of Illinois coach Bruce Weber's daughter, Holdren will be reunited with former Champaign Centennial High teammate Trent Meacham, who transferred to Illinois from Dayton before the 2005-06 season."

the experience factor is lacking, but we got proven leaders coming back in caddy, kleinjan, frias, loney and casey. lots of fresh getting experience next year i have a feeling.