BobSaccamanno

If you’re interested in reading about Mr Ferguson, here is his bio. https://honorsandawards.iu.edu/awards/honoree/6129.html#:~:text=Stephen "Steve" Ferguson received his,Group Incorporated of Bloomington%2C Indiana. When Woody was hired, notice his special reference to Mr Ferguson. ”I’d like to thank the Ferguson family, Steve and his whole family because he’s been a major mentor in my life; the Cook family, Bill who is no longer with us, known him for many, many years, and he was one of my early mentors, he and Gale Cook and Carl, just a beautiful family.” https://www.insidethehall.com/2021/03/29/transcript-mike-woodson-introductory-press-conference/ When Knight was recently given his bench at the HOF recently, Mr Ferguson injected himself into it. Woody, May, Ferguson, Buckner with their cronyism. Which one doesn’t belong? Here is a photo.

It’s not just Quinn. Steve Ferguson is Chairman of the Board of Cook and a former chairman of the Board of IU. I believe he’s well into his 80s. He and Quinn have had a major hand in installing Woody. It’s cronyism and agendaism. There are fans whose philosophy is to be 100% behind the coach and that’s a valid viewpoint. We are all friends here and I respect the view and think it’s important that we hear that viewpoint. But even among that cohort, privately I’m sure most can see that they might support Woody but they’d be hard pressed to argue he’s the best coach for IU. Unfortunately, Ferguson has injected himself into basketball failure after failure after failure for decades but lacks self awareness. There’s a power imposition dynamic. This has been a cultural issue at IU for decades beyond just him but he’s a central figure. Dolson is a stud. He’s navigating some dysfunction above him with the people with the money and power who put their cronyism and agendas above the welfare of the school. Dolson is a very skilled guy with bright ideas. He’s organized and a good leader. He’s a sports guy and gets it from that point of view. That can be a rare trait. For example, compare him with Fred who was hardly any of that. Scott is not just a bureaucrat. We are lucky we have him to navigate some of these issues. He’s shown his wares. He tried to make the best of the Woody situation by installing guardrails. Regarding Cignetti, where Scott was left to his own devices, he made a brilliant hire. And go listen to what he said when he hired it. His reasoning was tremendous. This is the type of analysis we’d get from Dolson if he were allowed to run his own show.

I love how Cignetti scouts. Just as an example, look at our RBs. Not electric athletes. You can see they aren’t pulling away from the defense. Cignetti didn’t care. He’s focused on their vision, ability to shift, and their solid frames. Done. Apply that to all positions.

Omg yes

Yes. The tune changes when the staff turns over. This staff has no idea at many levels how to recruit in high school. It’s not even debatable.

Unfortunately the NCAA has no pulse. They’ve been a bleep up for decades. Their lack of proactiveness caused them to always lose court cases. Now they are invisible on all the chaos. Here are a few ideas. 1. They are academic institutions. They can leverage academic standards to improve the rules. Players want to get paid but they have to navigate academics. The NCAA is not properly using this to their advantage. 2. College sports involve competition by their nature. No sport in the world can function without rules of competition. They just have to avoid restraining economics for the players unreasonably. 3. I would use the academic standards and rules of competition to get on top of the current chaos. 4. No transfer portal mid semester. It’s easy because you can point out that it’s in the academic interest. 5. Form highly restrictive academic rules on transfers. It’s not like a regular student majoring in chemistry can just switch schools without a high degree of complexity. Adopt strict rules. This isn’t the G league. These kids are student athletes. Bring the student part back into it. Regular students don’t just transfer like they’re changing their shirt the way athletes do. 6. Regarding contracts instead of the NLI, create a written body of guidelines. Maybe multi-year deals. Maybe some obligations on the part of students. If not in compliance, you can’t transfer. You have to give money back if you leave early. Create contractual incentives to curtail crazy decommitments. 7. For example, let’s say you sign an agreement with a school. You can’t leave for a year unless something gets triggered like the coach leaves. You can only leave if certain academic standards are met and you can’t hit the portal mid-semester. 8. No four game grace period on a redshirt unless you are a freshman or you get an injury waiver. Or do away with the rule because it’s been abused. That abuse greatly outweighs the tiny benefit of the player getting some benefit of getting game action. 9. The four game rule should be made consistent in basketball. If you keep the rule, let basketball players play in 25% of the games the same way. Luke Goode would be an example of a kid who would have benefited. 10. I did this off the top of my head in ten minutes. Imagine what a large organization could do after years of living through it and having time to focus on it and develop a plan. It’s absurd how they have allowed this morass to be created without any pushback.

I had no idea. I thought you were from Kentucky for some reason.

Cignetti is probably telling him to only recommit if he’s sure. How flighty would a guy be to commit and then decommit twice? When he commits, he’s got to lock in.

Would love to see Goode get that extra year. He’s oozing leadership. He’s the classic guy where the game gets easier for him as he develops and gets older. No matter what level you played, just remember how much easier it was as a senior as compared with as a freshman. If you’re 22-23 years old and you’re playing an 18 year old, that can be huge. You will also be naturally more confident and assertive. The difference between 23 and 18 is massive.

We need Tayven to avoid getting hurt. Too much at stake and then we are looking at one of the freshmen, unless Roarke can be the emergency backup.

I agree with your premise. I just don’t like the rule that incentivizes and allows guys to leave en masse mid season. It makes a mockery of education too. The NCAA is pathetic to begin with and it’s exacerbated by their fear of the courts. But they don’t play their ace in the hole which is their vested interest in maintaining student-athletes and that it’s a competition that by its nature has to have rules. The NCAA lacks any kind of ability to navigate all this and set up sustainable rules that are coherent. As for the players, it’s comical how many of them think they are NFL bound. “I am the sixth receiver in the rotation in college but I have to protect my pro rankings.” You know, if five receivers are ahead of you, you might want a reality check.

Yes but now we are down another guy for this season and EJ brought some size. EJ and DMac were bigger guys and you lose that diversity and depth.

They should limit the four game redshirt rule to freshmen and injury waivers. Unintended consequence to let every dufus who isn’t playing to leave before they play four games so they don’t burn a year. This is not healthy.

Playing as a true freshman at this level is a tall task anyway. Even Arch Manning doesn’t start yet.

I watched Texas vs Georgia. If you took the hype and Texas bias out of it, who is the better QB, Ewers or Rourke? Like if an alien came down and watched them without any predisposition?

Player development, elite staff. Great job by Tayven today. He played it perfectly the way a backup should approach it. Held the fort down and held his own.

McAfee is awesome. He’s way too good for ESPN

The fan base and stadium optics were excellent. I’ve said this for many years. There is no way that Indiana is the only state in Middle America that won’t support football at its flagship school. It was always a ludicrous idea. It was a lack of trust. Build it and they will come.

💯. Bob Bostad has done a whale of a job. And credit Cignetti for keeping him on board.

“It wasn’t perfect” lol

The local businesses are going to kill tonight. All time revenues

56-7 against a 5-1 team with very strong defensive metrics. Many of the teams ranked ahead of IU didn’t do anything to deserve it. Time to bypass a bunch of teams. A bunch.

We should be ranked 6 or so based on our body of work. You annihilate a quality opponent and you’ve got to bring them way up.

What set Ruhle off? Literally nothing was at issue.

Is it the right or left thumb?