The value of an education

Signing day... My day started off great with the announcement that Sean Parker, one of the nation's top safeties, and more importantly a top recruit of the University of Southern California, would forgo his offer from USC and instead spend the next four years of his playing career at UW. Not only is this huge as it rounds out UW's recruiting class with a great defensive player, but it further goes to show that the City of Seattle has collectively decided to screw USC in the backside (pardon my French). That now makes it USC's top three coaches (Carroll, Sark, Holt), pretty much their entire conditioning staff, and NOW there recruits?! What a turnaround a year can make.

Because UW was on the national media's radar today, I tuned in intently to ESPN and the most interesting thing I heard honestly had little to do with football or sports. Today on SportsNation, Marcus Wiley, a huge well-spoken black dude and former NFL player who is often a regular on ESPN, commented on players' like Parker's choice to attend a school for the value of its education over the prominence of it's athletic program. Wiley, was fielding a heckling fan's wise-crack email about him choosing to attend Columbia to play football. His response was that he could have gone to a big program like an Alabama or a Florida, but he choose to go to the place where he would get the best education. His point was that today's players will get covered no matter where they go if they are good. We live in the age of YouTube and multiple scouting sites that cover every area of the globe, so why sacrifice your education to be the third running back in USC stable or Florida's 4th option at your position. Today's society encourages our young people to sacrifice their education at the expense of money and fame and as a result you see young people with money making stupid decisions that could have been avoided.

Now USC is actually a great school, but the same cannot be said for many of the other school's who dominate the football landscape that recruits often see as better opportunities for them. It makes me value my education and appreciate the few athlete's who choose to enhance more than just their draft stock when they pick a university. It also bodes well for UW's turnaround as it has both history rich in football and academics; sorry WSU you just suck at both. Good day to you all.

My Woeful Huskies

In regards to an article on the Seattle Times about former guard Eldridge Recasner's comments that: "Overton should start," I have this to say:

I watched this segment on comcast today and Eldridge is dead wrong in regards to Overton. Overton is wild and out of control on offense and can't shoot to save his life. He's missed more lay-ups at the rim than any other D1 point guard I've ever seen. He's an AMAZING defender but his offense just does not make him a starter, and when he starts he is more of a detriment than a help to the Huskies.

This is the one call that Romar has gotten correct and it's just about the only one. Romar is a great recruiter but a terrible coach who struggles mightily with ambiguity - meaning if he does not have a lineup where players' play dictates that they be at a center position, he is hopeless. I.e. last year Brockman demanded the 4 spot, Q-Pon the 3, Dentmon the 2, Thomas the point. This was similar to when they were at their best with Roy, Nate Rob, Conroy, (Cough)Jensen etc. Now with no one stepping up he has a plethora of different lineups to choose from. Unfortunately, he has neither the insightfulness nor the X's and O's to create a good lineup.

First and foremost this team can not shoot the ball and that kills them. We all knew inside presence would be an issue and it is, but shooting is really what killed them. Did anyone notice they went scoreless for the first 4 minutes against AZ? They cannot stretch the D because they can't shoot from anywhere, let alone beyond the arc and yet Romar thinks that this is a good year to sit the team's best shooter, C.J. Wilcox. Romar should be getting slammed for this by the media but unfortunately no one seems to have the desire to criticize his decisions. Personally, I think Seattle has just become accustomed to sub-mediocrity and goes with the flow when this type of disappointment occurs. Premier programs (as UW tries to project itself as) would be calling for his job to light some sort of fire under the head coach.

This year is exactly like the year when Romar tried to play Appleby at the point. That team had no identity or any idea what they were doing. The Huskies have only won games in the early season against weak competition based on athleticism and talent. Romar again has failed to use the preseason to prepare his team to the point where when things go wrong, only minor tweaks and adjustments are needed. Instead, he needs to blow up the whole line-up and start from scratch.

Recommendations: Thomas needs to play the 1 where is has had success and Gaddy should be an important reserve. Elston Turner needs to be a more aggressive two who with Suggs and (Take the red shirt off NOW) CJ Wilcox rotating at that position. Overton will rotate in for defensive help, but let's admit to ourselves that he is not the offensive force at the point that we thought we were getting out of Franklin High. Pondexter is the only sure thing this team has and will continue to hold down the three with the four and five spots being filled in by committee. However, I think as long as MBA continues his dismally soft play at the rim he needs to be benched and do some soul searching. Right now he too is more of a hinderance than a help. Gant and Tyrese will round out the lineup (in reality their is no good solution at the center spot - shame on you for booting Wolfinger with no replacement; at least he could shoot).

Let's hope that Romar gets the message soon; otherwise history will repeat itself and UW will lose to another horrible team in the CBI, ala Valporaiso.