I’ve thought about this some, and I think there may be a building viewpoint that firing Mike, if nothing else, at least would be a signal to the fans that Hunter Yurachek is not going to tolerate losing and poor performances out of his athletic teams. Or, that his sort of hands off, “let me first see what’s going on here before I act” management style to date is coming to a screeching halt. At this point, given the horrific past few seasons in football – especially last year – I feel like many if not most Hog fans psychologically need that type of signal and assurance. They are sick and tired of the losing.
Yurachek can’t fire Chad Morris because he participated in the hiring of Chad and, besides, Chad is only in year 2 and has had a promising recruiting class. With Mike, there’s enough in my mind to justify firing him. Others disagree. It’s at least debatable. This season has been bad, but I tend to look at bigger picture – the mere 3 NCAATs and the lack of Sweet 16 appearances.
What I don’t know and can’t fully appreciate is the politics of firing Mike. Would it resurrect issues that arose in the context of Nolan’s firing? They did fire Heath, also an African American, but Mike has direct ties to Nolan. Would Nolan get PO’d and go after the university again, and would Yurachek want that to happen? 25 years after the title? And perhaps close in time to putting Nolan’s name on the BWA court? And, of course, what do the big boys want to do with Mike? I’m sure that’s an overarching influence.
wonder how much financially it would cost if he made a change. still paying wisconsin guy a ton of money. might be a factor. i certainly hope he doesn’t give anderson an extension. i expect anderson to be around another year.
Just firing someone doesn’t always send the assumed right signal as some fans may think. Nolan’s situation that many years ago was an entirely different situation & wont have squat to do with it one way or the other.
Hunter is a BB guy by trade and don’t expect him to be pulling any triggers as quick as some may think or would like.
Could be wrong, he could already have that top notch recruiter and X’s & O’s master lying in wait. (That can run a clean winning program). Any guesses there?
Look, fans have got to understand that just firing someone doesn’t mean anything, it could also go the wrong way and good coaches won’t want to work for an AD that fires them at the first season they struggle. I just heard multiple people on the radio talk about how our basketball team for 8 years finishes 8,9,10,11th in the league every year. That is completely false, but this is the pure ignorance that some fans have and they tend to be the loudest. Like I’ve stated before, at the time, a lot of Mizzou fans were happy to see Anderson go thinking they could do better. Three coaches later and they are way worse than we are(yes I know we lost to them last night, but still). You can’t just fire Anderson with the idea that anybody else would be better and too many fans think this way. If Yurachek is thinking about that, I hope he does some serious homework and serious discussions with Anderson. I saw Yurachek at the game, so he sees what’s going on. And if replacing Anderson is on the table, he BETTER have an elite guy ready to go because I guarantee you, and you can write this down in your mind, if he just gets a project coach to replace a proven winning coach(no matter how much some our foolish fans call him mediocre) he will lose more fans than gain the confidence of fans.
“I guarantee you, and you can write this down in your mind, if he just gets a project coach to replace a proven winning coach(no matter how much some our foolish fans call him mediocre) he will lose more fans than gain the confidence of fans.”
I do agree with this. 100% correct. Better off keeping Anderson if this is the alternative. He definitely would need to hire somebody big time that instills confidence.
No way on Rick Pitino, right? Too many warts I assume. And I won’t even ask about Billy Donovan.
The first season we’ve struggled? I beg to differ. Some might look at is they gave him 8 years there. Sounds good to me. I think if ANY new coach is hired the excitement will be through the roof. Let’s watch something else some say. I think folks are tiring of this. That being said, I think Anderson has 1 more year to right the ship. Do I agree with that, not sure at this point. Let the season play out however I’m not optimistic. Hope I’m wrong.
I will say if a new coach is hired, I hope he brings some marketing experience w him. Does Anderson go to Razorback clubs? I haven’t seen him here in Little Rock, might have missed it but it wasn’t marketed if he was. I never hear of him buying pizzas for the students, stuff like that. Maybe open a practice or 2 preseason to drum up some interest. I remember Nolan leading the band. Even neighbors played guitar with the pep band at a men’s game. Morris continually promotes the university of Arkansas. It’s a joy to hear him speak. Just one of my rants and gripes.
Nolan’s legal ship has sailed. He got his day in court. And I don’t see Mike filing a lawsuit if he is fired.
But I also don’t see Mike getting fired, as fervently as you and the Hogville mob want it. And if the mob needs the AD to pander to you by firing a coach just to appease you… We’re 14-10. It only takes winning three of the last 8 (counting SECT first round) to guarantee a winning season. They’re not going to fire a coach with a winning record AND the youngest roster in Division I. No matter how much you try to convince yourself otherwise.
Well said Swine, and I’m about to add some stuff and go on a little rant here. Because I’m honestly tired of seeing all of these guys start these threads and repeat the same old stuff after every single loss.
Like, some people are so far attached from reality, it’s almost unreal. These people want to fire a coach that’s had the 2nd best conference winning record during his tenure here, with no losing seasons. As you mentioned Swine, he has the 2nd youngest team in D1, and he’s still right in the mix and have been very competitive and had a chance to win the vast majority of the games. The guy just went to back-back NCAA tournament appearances.
What’s even more ironic is CMA didn’t need Arkansas… Arkansas needed him. The reason he got this job is because he was by far the most qualified candidate that wanted the job. People don’t talk about this enough, he left an absolute loaded Mizzou team behind, that Frank Haith won 30+ games with. And at the time CMA left, they were the leaders for landing Otto Porter Jr, it was a very high percentage chance he was going to Mizzou. That roster + Otto Porter Jr. would have by far been his best team and possibly got him his first final 4, that team was absolutely stacked at every position. His players were literally crying at a press conference after he left because they knew they had something special. He left that to come to Arkansas, a program that had a losing conference record the past 3 years, including two 14 win seasons. What I find funny about that is, you listen to the radio and read message boards and the same posters that will call Gus Malzahn a traitor for choosing to stay with Auburn instead of coming to the dumpster fire that is Arkansas football, will be the same people leading the charge talking about firing CMA, somebody that left everything behind to come back and be loyal to Arkansas that had a dumpster fire of a basketball program. Then those same people will be the one’s on all over social media and radio bashing Gafford and the players after a bad game, then get mad at in-state kids that don’t want to play for Arkansas.
And when I’m saying all this I’m not saying CMA is invincible and can never be fired. Ultimately he has to do more than what he’s done so far, CMA would tell you that himself that he’s not where he wants to be right now. However, he’s done enough for this program, and put us in a good enough position to be successful moving forward, to where I think he deserves to finish out this year (which he will) and see what happens next year before there has to be a multiple threads popping up about firing him after every game. You would think all these “loyalist” that post about how pro Arkansas they are and how bad Jeff Long and all these Yankees were would have more loyalty to one of their own that came back and help rebuild a broken program… Guess not, 14-10 with 2nd youngest team in the NCAA is apparently unacceptable to Arkansas loyalist standards.
Being dissatisfied with a coach’s performance does not necessarily mean you think he should be fired.
I am most definitely dissatisfied with his performance, but agree that we are not bad enough to warrant him losing his job. He needs to work at being a better coach. I think that the fight which is in him makes him too stubborn to adapt. Perhaps some of this is the Nolan influence, perhaps some from his own experiences as an African-American. The fight is great, but the stubbornness to adapt is his weakness, IMHO.
I’m not even going to list who I’d replace Anderson with, but the list that I think we could reasonably get that might be better is small. And no, Pitino and Donovan aren’t on the list.
I disagree with the highlighted part. I’ve gone to enough games, talked to enough people face to face and on social media to know that if you just pull some no name guy to coach our guys, fans will be extremely angry. Like I said, if replacing Anderson is on the table then Yurachek better have a top level guy ready to go or a big time assistant that can recruit.
As for Anderson’s marketing, I know Anderson and his wife help run a number of charities and do hospital visitations. Going to Razorback clubs, I don’t know.
Eddie Sutton came from Creighton and Nolan from Tulsa, not exactly destination jobs. Both were great coaches with extremely different backgrounds. Coach Broyles hit a grand slam with both guys.
I don’t think we have to have a big name to replace Coach Anderson if and when he leaves, but he needs to be a really quality coach. That is where Hunter Yurackek is going to earn his pay. He needs to bring in a stud, whether he is a known or unknown stud. The fans don’t really care. We want a winner.
He has a winner in Anderson, and honestly, why are we having this conversation, the job isn’t open yet, and most likely won’t be open this year anyway.
He has a winner in Anderson, and honestly, why are we having this conversation, the job isn’t open yet, and most likely won’t be open this year anyway.
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Agreed. Just idle chatter. Idle chatter can turn into a symphony I guess, but Coach Anderson is doing what he can with what he has. I’m sure there will be a discussion between AD and Coach, but that’s all it will be, a conversation.
What in the world are you talking about… First off, the guy has been to an elite 8 within the last 10 years, he’s won 26 games and 27 games within the last 4 years at Arkansas (2 of the better years in Arkansas history) and he’s played in the SEC finals 2 of the past 4 years. Do you know how much you have to “adapt” to win multiple games against different teams on back-back days? You don’t just get lucky and beat teams despite what you read on here. He runs SEVERAL different defenses at teams every single game, mixes up lineups, and constantly putting pressure on the other teams defense by having multiple guys that can score. You may want to actually listen to a post game press conference from another coach one day to learn something instead of just spouting nonsense, because none of them have ever said anything about how his teams don’t adapt, but they sure have mentioned how hard his teams are to prepare for.
Also, your comment about him being African-American somehow makes him too stubborn to adapt, is offensive and just a plain ignorant statement. I’ve never heard CMA EVER say anything about his past as a black man. He’s been very clear about staying away from politics and racial issues, and just keeps it about basketball and not focusing on himself. Only time I’ve ever heard him ever mention something racial related is when they asked him about the kneeling when the girls basketball team did it, and he just said he understands what the girls are trying to bring attention to and respects that, but he and his players will stand, and he left it at that, and didn’t go into any more details. How you came up with he’s some stubborn African American man struggling to adapt because of his past is beyond me, all black people aren’t out here just sitting around struggling to deal with their past… you need to stop watching so much TV. Judging people and making stereotypical assumptions about them without knowing anything about them is a weakness, IMHO.
I have felt for some time that next year is the crucial season for Mike. I believe he needs to find a way to get that team into the NCAA Tournament, or he may be in some difficulty.
Notwithstanding anything said in your post, that will have been 9 years and I believe there is a reasonable expectation that this program should make the NCAAT 3 out of 4 years, and be in the Sweet Sixteen a couple of times a decade. We used to exceed those marks on a regular basis, so we know it can be done.
I want Mike to succeed. I was happy when he was hired, and I’d like to see him stay around and win championships here. That said, there has to come a point where we either are, or are not, getting it done. I’ve laid out the parameters by which I judge that subjective term, and so far - we have not met them during Mike’s stay. As you point out, there are reasons for that (given what he came into). But by years 8-9, we need to be tracking.
Personally, I think it is 50/50. I can see a scenario with Justice, Franklin and a big coming in - plus the maturation and continued growth of this year’s newcomers - leading to a top 4 finish in the SEC. And I hope that is the way it trends.
When I first started reading this thread I thought, oh no, another fire Anderson thread, but there are some intelligent points made, so I’ve kind of enjoyed it. I support Mike and want him to stay, and I think that will be what happens. I think the AD will give him more time for the same reasons many of you have explained. Some of you have touched on the politics of the issue and I believe that will weigh more heavily on a decision than many would like to admit. I find it hard to believe Yurachek would risk the blowback he would get by pulling the plug at this time, plus I feel he wants Mike to succeed, and will give him time. How much time remains to be seen. Just an opinion from an old Hawg…
Agree 100% Wizard. I believe it was Bakedhog, I was talking to in PM about this subject a little while ago. I like CMA as the coach here and want him to succeeded (as most can tell) but if he doesn’t make the tournament this year, and next year say they just barely make the tournament and get eliminated in the first game or don’t make it at all. I think it’s time for a change. I wouldn’t be mad at all for that, it would be completely fair and honestly would be time, because now he would be showing a consistent trend of treading downwards.
Only thing I would say would change those expectations, is what he does with the 2020 class. Let’s say they have Moses Moody, Chris Moore, Bryce Thompson, and Jaylin Williams committed. I think it’s an exception for one more year to see how he does with that talent alongside a senior/junior laden team. If that team isn’t sweet 16 or better, I don’t care who’s coming in 2021, you gotta cut ties then.
With all that said, I don’t ever count a winner out, CMA knows how to win, done it his entire career. I wouldn’t bank on him all of a sudden not being able to get things figured out and show a trend of losing. I fully expect him to get us to where we want to be, and I haven’t given up on this season yet, and I’m still very excited about the future, we have some very nice young talent that I think is going to make Hog Nation proud before it’s all said and done.