Fire Lavin!
- Thread starter Ilzion
- Start date
NYCRedmen
Well-known member
He has been spot on so far with everything that he's told me. He is not just a fan, he is a also a donor to the University. I am hard pressed to think of anything like this ever happening at a major college basketball program. Oh wait, didn't it happen to us once before? :yell:
It's funny when I read the UCLA board when Lavin was first hired, I thought they were just spoiled blue bloods. But now they seem clairvoyant. They said in the beginning Lavin will recruit well because he is a good talker. But after a few years the truth will come out that he can't coach and then he won't even be able to recruit.
Sound familiar?
http://blogs.mercurynews.com/kawakami/2010/03/30/steve-lavin-to-st-johns-well-he-wont-be-boring/
Steve Lavin to St. John’s: Well, he won’t be boring
Posted on March 30, 2010 by Tim Kawakami
In the two years I knew him before he inherited the UCLA job, I got along tremendously with Steve Lavin.
That’s when he was a funny, gabby, self-deprecating Bay Area-bred assistant coach under Jim Harrick and I was the LA Times beat writer covering UCLA hoops.
-Then in the two years I covered UCLA while Lavin was the coach, we basically hated each other. Maybe it was silly little me, but I don’t think it was all me.
In my estimation, something flipped inside of Lavin, turning him into one of the more self-aggrandizing, neurotic, over-matched coaches I’ve ever been around.
I’ve never seen a high-profile coach who sought out and gathered more sychophants, or seemed to need them as much as Lavin did. Never a good sign from a first-time head coach.
-Then in the two or three times I’ve seen Lav since UCLA fired him in 2003, he and I got along swimmingly once again while he was working for ESPN.
Funny, self-deprecating, charming, same ol’ Lav from the old days. Sychophant-free.
Summary: A good guy as an assistant; a holy terror (if you ask me and many others, including several of his former players) as head coach; right back into solid good-guy territory as a TV guy.
So I’m quite curious to see that Lavin just landed the St. John’s job–a prestigious program that has become a difficult situation for anybody, proven over many recent years.
But Lavin’s not just any other St. John’s coach. Certainly not a proven teacher or strategist, no New York recruiting ties, been out of the coaching for 7 years.
It’s a weird hire. It’s also a potentially good hire–if Lavin approaches it correctly, St. John’s, at this juncture, might be strangely appropriate for his unique skill-set.
First, I think he has matured.
If I had to single out a root cause of his coaching nervous breakdown at UCLA, it was that he got the job way out of turn and never made up the difference.
Harrick was fired on the eve of the 1996-’97 season for rules-breaking, top assistant Lorenzo Romar had just departed, and Lavin got the job because there was simply nobody else to give it to.
He had charisma. He had energy. He could talk, talk, talk. He hit the recruiting trail hard. Some fans loved him immediately, just because of all that.
What Lavin didn’t have was focus or the ability to get his talented players to play cohesively or run any semblance of a fluid offense. He couldn’t run practice. He couldn’t settle on a system.
I once asked one of his better-known UCLA players what Lavin really told them during timeouts late in tight games.
Wait, I said, I know: “Play harder!”
The player laughed for a long time, nodding his head the whole time, then added: “One other thing. He’d also say, ‘Run faster!’”
Even though UCLA recuited like a monster, and won many games, and got to a lot Sweet 16s, the other Pac-10 coaches loved having Lavin in Westwood. He was always good for a few ridiculous losses and the general wasting of prime talent like Baron Davis, Earl Watson, Dan Gadzuric, Jason Kapono, JaRon Rush, Matt Barnes…
Still, Lavin landed all that talent. And he had accumulated all those sychophants.
The paranoia was natural, at that point: He read everything ever written about him, he heard everything ever said about him, and much of it was not nice. (That’s me!)
Eventually, it was too much. By the time he was fired in 2003 (I was off the beat by 1998 and gone from the LAT by 2000), I thought Lavin was relieved–he had this job too early, he gave it a run, and it was time to re-calibrate.
He was a TV natural, but he wasn’t going to be at ESPN forever. Lav’s not Dick Vitale and I don’t think he wanted to be–though the money’s pretty good.
Lavin wanted another shot. Dreamed of it being at USF, where his father, Cap, is a legend. But that’s another Lav irony–the small school that knew him best was the one that most obviously was not going to hire him.
So it’s at St. John’s, a mega-challenge.
If Lavin starts gathering the sychophants again, and making enemies lists, then I’ll know something has gone wrong again.
But I think this time he won’t come in with a coaching inferiority complex. He’s a grown-up coach now, I hope.
He can pour his soul into this, he can find some assistants with deep NY ties, recruit like hell, and maybe find a way to win some games in the Big East against Syracuse, West Virginia, Villanova, Pittsburgh, UConn & the rest.
I’m sure St. John’s mainly hired Lavin to wrestle up some TV exposure and magazine stories and make St. John’s relevant again, and Lavin can certainly do that.
I wish him well. I wish St. John’s well. Lavin deserves another big-time shot. He got it.
And I know it’s only a matter of hours before we hear Lav chattering away about the deep affection he’s always held for Louie Carnesecca, the borough of Queens, Walter Berry, Louie’s sweaters, Nathan’s hot dogs, Madison Square Garden, Bill Wennington, the New York Daily News, Brian Kenny, Mario Cuomo, the Big East tournament, Rich Aurilia, and, yes, of course, Chris Mullin.
If Lav doesn’t say all this, or a close version of this, I’ll be very, very disappointed.
http://blogs.mercurynews.com/kawakami/2010/03/30/steve-lavin-to-st-johns-well-he-wont-be-boring/
Steve Lavin to St. John’s: Well, he won’t be boring
Posted on March 30, 2010 by Tim Kawakami
In the two years I knew him before he inherited the UCLA job, I got along tremendously with Steve Lavin.
That’s when he was a funny, gabby, self-deprecating Bay Area-bred assistant coach under Jim Harrick and I was the LA Times beat writer covering UCLA hoops.
-Then in the two years I covered UCLA while Lavin was the coach, we basically hated each other. Maybe it was silly little me, but I don’t think it was all me.
In my estimation, something flipped inside of Lavin, turning him into one of the more self-aggrandizing, neurotic, over-matched coaches I’ve ever been around.
I’ve never seen a high-profile coach who sought out and gathered more sychophants, or seemed to need them as much as Lavin did. Never a good sign from a first-time head coach.
-Then in the two or three times I’ve seen Lav since UCLA fired him in 2003, he and I got along swimmingly once again while he was working for ESPN.
Funny, self-deprecating, charming, same ol’ Lav from the old days. Sychophant-free.
Summary: A good guy as an assistant; a holy terror (if you ask me and many others, including several of his former players) as head coach; right back into solid good-guy territory as a TV guy.
So I’m quite curious to see that Lavin just landed the St. John’s job–a prestigious program that has become a difficult situation for anybody, proven over many recent years.
But Lavin’s not just any other St. John’s coach. Certainly not a proven teacher or strategist, no New York recruiting ties, been out of the coaching for 7 years.
It’s a weird hire. It’s also a potentially good hire–if Lavin approaches it correctly, St. John’s, at this juncture, might be strangely appropriate for his unique skill-set.
First, I think he has matured.
If I had to single out a root cause of his coaching nervous breakdown at UCLA, it was that he got the job way out of turn and never made up the difference.
Harrick was fired on the eve of the 1996-’97 season for rules-breaking, top assistant Lorenzo Romar had just departed, and Lavin got the job because there was simply nobody else to give it to.
He had charisma. He had energy. He could talk, talk, talk. He hit the recruiting trail hard. Some fans loved him immediately, just because of all that.
What Lavin didn’t have was focus or the ability to get his talented players to play cohesively or run any semblance of a fluid offense. He couldn’t run practice. He couldn’t settle on a system.
I once asked one of his better-known UCLA players what Lavin really told them during timeouts late in tight games.
Wait, I said, I know: “Play harder!”
The player laughed for a long time, nodding his head the whole time, then added: “One other thing. He’d also say, ‘Run faster!’”
Even though UCLA recuited like a monster, and won many games, and got to a lot Sweet 16s, the other Pac-10 coaches loved having Lavin in Westwood. He was always good for a few ridiculous losses and the general wasting of prime talent like Baron Davis, Earl Watson, Dan Gadzuric, Jason Kapono, JaRon Rush, Matt Barnes…
Still, Lavin landed all that talent. And he had accumulated all those sychophants.
The paranoia was natural, at that point: He read everything ever written about him, he heard everything ever said about him, and much of it was not nice. (That’s me!)
Eventually, it was too much. By the time he was fired in 2003 (I was off the beat by 1998 and gone from the LAT by 2000), I thought Lavin was relieved–he had this job too early, he gave it a run, and it was time to re-calibrate.
He was a TV natural, but he wasn’t going to be at ESPN forever. Lav’s not Dick Vitale and I don’t think he wanted to be–though the money’s pretty good.
Lavin wanted another shot. Dreamed of it being at USF, where his father, Cap, is a legend. But that’s another Lav irony–the small school that knew him best was the one that most obviously was not going to hire him.
So it’s at St. John’s, a mega-challenge.
If Lavin starts gathering the sychophants again, and making enemies lists, then I’ll know something has gone wrong again.
But I think this time he won’t come in with a coaching inferiority complex. He’s a grown-up coach now, I hope.
He can pour his soul into this, he can find some assistants with deep NY ties, recruit like hell, and maybe find a way to win some games in the Big East against Syracuse, West Virginia, Villanova, Pittsburgh, UConn & the rest.
I’m sure St. John’s mainly hired Lavin to wrestle up some TV exposure and magazine stories and make St. John’s relevant again, and Lavin can certainly do that.
I wish him well. I wish St. John’s well. Lavin deserves another big-time shot. He got it.
And I know it’s only a matter of hours before we hear Lav chattering away about the deep affection he’s always held for Louie Carnesecca, the borough of Queens, Walter Berry, Louie’s sweaters, Nathan’s hot dogs, Madison Square Garden, Bill Wennington, the New York Daily News, Brian Kenny, Mario Cuomo, the Big East tournament, Rich Aurilia, and, yes, of course, Chris Mullin.
If Lav doesn’t say all this, or a close version of this, I’ll be very, very disappointed.
boo haarvey
Active member
What a disaster. Even those like me who were skeptical of Lavin early on never forsaw how disasterous this would end. I hope there is an article in the Post and/or News tomorrow chronicling the chaos. We just can't seem to catch a break.
You bet. Who do you think is behind the Kim Jong-il approach to Twitter the program has just adopted today?
The other line that resonates:
"What Lavin didn’t have was focus or the ability to get his talented players to play cohesively or run any semblance of a fluid offense. He couldn’t run practice. He couldn’t settle on a system."
I think worse than how accurate this article is, is that over the years it seems like Lavin hasn't learned anything or grown as a head coach. And we are the recipients of that. That's what makes me so sad and angry.
Class of 72
Active member
The Steve Lavin Postscript:
Sadly, the silence surrounding the future of Steve Lavin at St. John's is deafening. In a short span of 2 weeks he has gone from trying to negotiate a contract extension to a coach even his media friends cannot seem to locate today. What went so wrong so fast? Well it was not really that fast since it seems to have started in 2011 when in April of that year he announced he was diagnosed with early stage treatable prostate cancer. At the time I thought, well, that is great! Just get it done over the summer and be back for the Fall season. Inexplicably, Lavin waited another six months before having radical surgery in early October, 2011. Just as inexplicably, he returned to coaching six weeks later and suffered a set back in his recovery. That level of personal irresponsibility cost him a full season and he supposedly dedicated himself to traveling across the country recruiting. The result of that recruiting effort was losing his prized recruit Rico Gathers and signing basically local metropolitan NY talent that since has proven to be a bust.
Fast forward to 2013 and we see some recruiting efforts of a local Prima Donna and big love to some other recruits for 2015. Skip the mediocre season with a bunch of malcontent and overhyped players to the recent charade surrounding Jakarr Sampson being "celebrated" for entering his fantasy NBA dream draft and we get a glimpse of a program, staff and players out of touch with reality. That reality now is a team decimated and with no chance of escaping the Big East cellar for 2014-15. To make matters worse, the disarray will cause any future recruits to question the stability of the program and look elsewhere. The media will soon demand answers and the donors will be calling the AD for reassurances. One donor in particular will demand a report card and business plan. You can fool the fans but business is business.
Sadly, the silence surrounding the future of Steve Lavin at St. John's is deafening. In a short span of 2 weeks he has gone from trying to negotiate a contract extension to a coach even his media friends cannot seem to locate today. What went so wrong so fast? Well it was not really that fast since it seems to have started in 2011 when in April of that year he announced he was diagnosed with early stage treatable prostate cancer. At the time I thought, well, that is great! Just get it done over the summer and be back for the Fall season. Inexplicably, Lavin waited another six months before having radical surgery in early October, 2011. Just as inexplicably, he returned to coaching six weeks later and suffered a set back in his recovery. That level of personal irresponsibility cost him a full season and he supposedly dedicated himself to traveling across the country recruiting. The result of that recruiting effort was losing his prized recruit Rico Gathers and signing basically local metropolitan NY talent that since has proven to be a bust.
Fast forward to 2013 and we see some recruiting efforts of a local Prima Donna and big love to some other recruits for 2015. Skip the mediocre season with a bunch of malcontent and overhyped players to the recent charade surrounding Jakarr Sampson being "celebrated" for entering his fantasy NBA dream draft and we get a glimpse of a program, staff and players out of touch with reality. That reality now is a team decimated and with no chance of escaping the Big East cellar for 2014-15. To make matters worse, the disarray will cause any future recruits to question the stability of the program and look elsewhere. The media will soon demand answers and the donors will be calling the AD for reassurances. One donor in particular will demand a report card and business plan. You can fool the fans but business is business.
If his ego is as large as the article purports it to be and he is not offered any type of extension whatsoever---do you think he'll stay and endure the ridicule he's bound to face next season? I think it depends on his next best offer.
Edit: just reread your post--think that's what you meant, too. lol
If Obekpa goes to Cuse I will throw up