Honestly, I don't see how anyone can publicly support Greg McDermott as the basketball coach at Iowa State. In what has been an embarrassing 4 year tenure at Iowa State, it has gotten significantly worse.
As discussed yesterday, Daniyal Robinson decided to leave ISU for Houston. I don't care what anybody says, no one goes from being an assistant in one of the best conferences, to a conference that isn't as good, and is in a pro-town. Not unless they are trying to salvage their career.
Robinson recruited Colvin and Dendy to campus and was in on some of the bigger recruits for 2011 (Chasson Randle, Andre Henely, and others).
Well, now word is out that Chris Colvin is planning on leaving the program as well, which Chris Williams (Cyclonefanatic Publisher) has confirmed is true, according to a Tweet he put out earlier this evening.
Honestly, if someone asked me a year ago to pen a story about Iowa State Basketball undergoing a bad year, I couldn't have come up with half of this stuff. If you put this stuff out and shared it with a tragedy writer (who was also a basketball fan) they would say that I was being too negative.
What upsets me the most about the McDermott era, is that the warning signs have been evident for about 2 years or so. I tried to tell people about it, but they just didn't want to hear it. It was an unpopular position then, but really I was just a bit ahead of some of my fellow Cyclone fans.
Cyclone fans are great, and something about being a Cyclone fan is having this sense of optimism. It's incredible where that comes from because this fanbase has gone through so much across Football and Men's Basketball over the years, but they continue to believe that better days are ahead. The only problem is that they are sometimes loyal to a fault
Conversations we should've been having 2 years ago, we're having now. Thing is that 10 years from now, I'm a Cyclone fan. Who knows who the coach will be and all of that? Over the past seven years we've had three football coaches. I'm not going to get emotionally attached to someone who is in a profession that involves changing jobs on an increasing basis. Anyone think the Butler coach is going to stay there all 12 years on his new contract? What about Ben Jacobson? Does anyone out there really think he will stay in Cedar Falls for all 10 years of his deal?
My point is that coaches do the best they can, but the fact is that as fans we should be emotionally attached to our players, and to our institution. We should be demanding the most (realistic) success from our programs possible, and not sticking by someone because they are a nice person, or that they are from the state.
Some of this reminds me of one of my favorite books, Moneyball, where we learn about some of the methods the Oakland A's (and other teams) used to objectivley judge their team and make the best management decisions based on that objective view. The book talks about the old school thinkers who would fall in love with how a guy looked, or performed in a drlll, and less about what their actual performance in a game.
With McDermott, many ISU fans did the same thing. He said the things people wanted to hear. He looked the part the fanbase wanted. If this guy could've put together one or two winning seasons, he would probably be able to stay here as long as he wanted to. Outside of the Ws-Ls, he's everything the fanbase wanted. Just like the old-school baseball scouts.
But guess what?
It isn't working, and you don't need to use any complex mathematical formulas to come to that conclusion. All you have to do is to use your mind instead of your heart. The guy's a great guy. I've been hearing that for years, so I have to believe that it is true. He's also going to have millions when it's all said and done, and will be living a life that most (including myself) could only dream of. On one hand, it's easy to feel bad for the guy who we like, but on the other hand there is a job to be done and he isn't doing it. If you lose your job, it isn't like McDermott is going to be there for you.
Jamie Pollard needs to do the right thing here. Why not make the change? We only have 9 guys on the team, assuming that our 2010 guys don't back out (Railey) or try to get released (Phillips, Ejim), and Colvin does indeed transfer. We technically have two Assistant Coaching Vacancies as well (although NBADL Iowa Energy Coach Nick Nurse is rumored to have one of the open sports). Hell, much of the clearing out has already been done.
I know Pollard came out to stand by his guy, but that was before we had two significant contributors leave, and our best recruiter leave as well, just before the spring signing period. Circumstances have changed, so it isn't like he would be flip-flopping here.
I hope something happens this week, so we can go from being the laughing stock in the Big 12 to having a team we can all be proud of. 2010 is a lost cause at this point anyways. We have to put the people in place now, so we can get things turned around in 2011 and beyond. The guys on the team like DG and Boozer, who've been loyal to ISU deserve better than this, and ISU fans deserve better than this. Don't worry about McDermott. He's going to be fine.
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