What’s The Rest of The Country Think of Larry Brown?
Yesterday, Chuck headed to SMU to attend Larry Brown’s introductory press event.
And here’s a Texas Monthly post that aggregates pretty much every major newspapers’ responses to the Brown hire. They range from the laudatory:
I’m writing about SMU basketball right this very minute. You’re reading about SMU basketball. That is a massive improvement over the recent state of the program — and by “recent” I mean “since 1993 or so” — in and of itself. (Eammon Brennan, ESPN)
to the doubtful:
I, Larry Brown, agree to coach the (insert team name) for the period of (does it matter?). I will remain in the position so long as I uphold standards and expectations of my administration (insert, or I get bored). This service will begin as soon as I relocate to (insert city), but not later than (don’t worry, I pack light). (Mike Lopresti, USA Today)
Worth a few minutes of your time.
I’m a little puzzled why everyone is so critical of this hire. It’s true that LB moves from job to job. But then, SMU hasn’t exactly had a 20 year coach in a LONG time. People have called Orsini’s search “botched” because he went after big names like Buzz Williams & Rick Majerus. Let’s face it–SMU is hardly a coveted position. I think Orsini’s objective to hire a “name” coach is a good one–it seems to be working in football. And again let’s face it, hiring “up and coming” coaches hasn’t panned out too well for SMU in the past 20 years (longer, really). So he had troubles finding a “name” coach who would take the job, but he did finally find one–one who I believe has more coaching victories in total than any coach ever. One who has taken every team but one and made them remarkably better. Amazingly better, actually.
Will he be gone in two to four years? Probably. At 71, he would probably be regardless of his past. But the objective here is for a quicker turnaround–heck, ANY turnaround. And nobody, nobody in the history of basketball, has a better track record at quick turnarounds than Larry Brown. I say if he wants the job, give him a shot at it. If he doesn’t fix things and is gone in two years, is that really any better than any of the so-called “smart” hires that have filled that position in our memory?
Biggest concern is recruiting. He hasn’t done that in a long time, and recently admitted that he doesn’t like to recruit. And of course, both of his college jobs included violations (although one of those was at UCLA where they had been cheating for 15 years or more, so he might have had little or nothing to do with that). Hopefully, his recruiting assistants can be successful at that.