Connect with us

Daily Bullets

Daily Bullets (March 20)

Published

7 years ago

on

All about the Benjamins

The root of all recent instability in OSU basketball:

Some in the basketball office already were questioning Holder’s commitment to the sport, saying he wanted a Big 12 caliber program on a Missouri Valley Conference budget.

Of course, spending someone else’s money is easy. Spending the money for which you’re responsible is more difficult. Holder knows that money is tight around OSU hoops. An OSU source said basketball revenues are roughly half of what they were the previous decade. [NewsOK]

The tension of the two can’t be more apparent. Spend money to make money: 44 percent increased attendance with Underwood is clearly making money. Or risk following up, what was likely a fireable offense most places, a heinous ten year contract with a rational (four, five years?) longer deal that could go south if progress stalls out.

Holder had to evaluate which was the most likely worst case scenario: pay Underwood and he Ford’s (stalls out in the Big Dance perpetually) or find there’s no more Underwood’s growing on trees and stall out the momentum of the program. I think OSU’s short to intermediate-term basketball fate rests on Holder’s ability to find that Underwood tree.

 

Over Correcting

I liked a thought here that Bobby A. had on recency bias.

Travis Ford had a great first season and here came other schools calling. This time Holder had to be convinced he had a firm grip on his coach. Underwood’s contract had a buyout, a serious buyout. It would cost a Big 12 team $6-million to come in before March of 2018 and steal Underwood. For Illinois the price was $3-million and apparently, they felt Underwood was worth it.

Holder was victim of an over steer, an over correction, after being burned by a contract with Ford that caused the school to keep the coach that most fans showed they didn’t care for (by their absence) for at least two years more than they would have liked. [GoPokes]

We all got drunk on Underwood after an atrociously long period of irrelevance. Competitiveness was intoxicating even if he went 1-9 against the top third of the league.

But when Ford nearly took down Dajuan Blair and Jamie Dixon’s Pitt Panthers, how did we feel? Frustrated that we didn’t go to a Sweet 16? We were disappointed but supremely hopefully after a first round exit as a ten seed this year.

This all matters as it’s shaping our perspective on what we feel Underwood was worth – and what somebody should or shouldn’t have paid him.

Please show this to a high school student, as they haven’t seen Oklahoma State win in the tourney since they were in elementary.

OSU and NCAA Notes

Springs ball fires back up on Tuesday….Chief (OSU football equipment head guy) is moving up in the athletic department….Bests and Worsts of the Big Dance first weekend…Gregg Marshall’s wife has no chill in the loss to Kentucky….CRFF gives some more names for Underwood replacement

 

Swept Northwestern State on the diamond this weekend.

 

Your middle of the road thought of the day (and most likely the truth):

TCU’s hanging in the NIT, defending our honor beating Big Ten teams.

 

What You Missed on PFB
Other Stuff I’m Reading

These thoughts by the Warriors (via ESPN) are ridiculous….Three steps from Seth Godin….Things that healthy (Christian) couples should do when life gets busy

 

 

Related Topics:

Most Read

Copyright © 2011- 2023 White Maple Media