FIRE DEREK KELLOGG

[MikeUMA]

I hate this thread and question why I'm choosing to recycle it, but it really is the best place to put the following...

Malone listened to a podcast that Bamford did recently. One of Malone's take-aways:

Bamford would have a list of high-level coaching candidates for a similar situation in basketball, if necessary.

Bamford naturally approached this purely as a hypothetical, but said that, if needed, he would have a running list of high-level replacements for a basketball coaching vacancy. Names, he said, that some people would assume to be out of UMass' league.

"If Derek Kellogg were to leave me tomorrow and go take another job or I had to make a move in men's hoop on a new coach, yeah, I've got a list of a handful of candidates that are probably high-level," he said."People would probably say 'Well, I don't know that you can get him at UMass.' And I would say 'Shoot, I'm going to try.'"

[InnervisionsUMASS]

^

That's why I put the article with the quote in the Season thread... was trying to avoid bringing this one up again

[TruBluMaroon]

^^ I have no idea what the purpose of Bamford's comments are. I would expect any perceived quality AD would have a list for every head coaching position. Does he think he needs to convince people he knows what he's doing ?

[InnervisionsUMASS]

I'm sure he felt the need to appease a few of our fellow members here to show that he really does have a set of balls. I mean, why else???

[Marty Peretz]

Bamford has been very good but I've had a hunch from day one that his achilles heel could be staying on message. I frankly love his candor and openness and desperately hope he doesn't fall into perpetual PR-speak, but it's a slippery slope and ya gotta be careful too. I also think Ryan understands that the biggest move he can make at UMass (for both his own career and the athletics department more generally) is hiring a new hoops coach.

[eldonabe]

Bamford has been very good but I've had a hunch from day one that his achilles heel could be staying on message. I frankly love his candor and openness and desperately hope he doesn't fall into perpetual PR-speak, but it's a slippery slope and ya gotta be careful too. I also think Ryan understands that the biggest move he can make at UMass (for both his own career and the athletics department more generally) is hiring a new hoops coach.

In the near term you are probably right, but the bigger picture for his career and legacy here is football. If they stay independent and make no progress on that stadium in his tenure here - he will have failed.

Basketball success has little to nothing to do with football success at this point - just ask UConn. The P5 would not piss on them even if their hair was on fire. Don't get me wrong, he needs to do Hoops correctly as well, but football has to be able to carry their own water around here sooner than later.

[LS71]

Another reason to like Bamford.

No entity, be it business academic, can let itself become too dependent on any one perspon. A good leader makes contingency plans.

So, if DK, or any key employee leaves UMass, Bamford needs to have an idea of what he'd do.

[eldonabe]

Not sure where to put this and it was not worthy of its own thread - But you gotta love this - MassLive has the 5 highest paid employees at a number of colleges in the great State of Massachusetts.

http://www.masslive.com/news/index.ssf/ ... s_a.html#0


Of course the highest paid at Umass is our own beloved basketball coach ..... however what I did find funny was that 3 of BC's 5 highest paid were all coaches and 2 of them are not even working there any more!!!!!!!!

[rayers]

It is basically true that most D1 college football and basketball coaches are the highest paid public employees at large flagship public institutions. UMass coaches are paid pretty low by comparison. People that bitch annd go crazy about Kellogg just don't understand the reality of the market forces.

[UMass87]

... People that bitch annd go crazy about Kellogg just don't understand the reality of the market forces.

I think quite a few understand this perfectly well. They just don't like the way "market forces" are operating in an aspect of college life that is very ancillary to the educational missions of the universities and colleges.

[njumass08]

^
What people don't seem to understand is that head coaches are the face of the university for most people. I'm sure that has played a factor in the increased salaries over the past 3 or 4 decades.

How many school presidents can you name and how many head coaches can you name? See what I'm saying?

[InnervisionsUMASS]

Kentucky should absolutely cut Calipari's salary.

[UMass87]

...
What people don't seem to understand is that head coaches are the face of the university for most people. I'm sure that has played a factor in the increased salaries over the past 3 or 4 decades.

How many school presidents can you name and how many head coaches can you name? See what I'm saying?

Ya but I'm (nor really many here) not who we are talking about. I'm an avid college sports fan. I don't like the money aspect of college sports but I get it. Sometimes people need to get out of their bubble. In New England, as we all know, relatively few people care at all about college sports. You can dream about the day that they do but the political reality (and in the case of public universities politics matters a lot) is that the voting citizens in New England do not see value in college athletics the same way that people in other regions do.

I'll go one step further: the evidence suggests that the current students at UMass don't particularly care about college sports.

[eldonabe]

I'll go one step further: the evidence suggests that the current students at UMass don't particularly care about college sports.

I would suggest that your suggestion is spot on.... What is unfortunate about that statement is that the alumni support in the future will dwindle as well. If you don't give a shit while you are there, you certainly are not going to once you get your life under way.

Student attendance figures suck and while some of it can be attributed to the product (w/l) on the field, too much of it is indifference towards sport. The worst of the three main connective emotions is indifference (love and hate being the other two). When you cannot solicit a response good or bad - you simply do not care....

[baseline47]

^ Granted UMass isn't Moo U out in the middle of the country where the only thing to do is go to the big game and/or get drunk.

There's lots to do on campus, NYC and Boston are only 2-3 hours away, or they can always party/get drunk.

If UMass had a top flight football or basketball program, the students would show up.