Here's my early thanksgiving since I'm traveling out of country for the next few weeks. I want to give thanks to Painter, Ray, and AJ for being at the core of the turnaround. To Smotherman and Kendall for sticking it out. To the transformative 2014 recruits Vince, Haas, PJ, Mathias, Taylor, Octeus.....though you guys have only been with us since last year, I'd compare your class to the Baby Boilers in terms of how important you are to us.....to want to play for Purdue when it really looked like we were a dumpster fire. Swanigan, Cline, Weatherford, Hill for hopefully adding the final flourish to the completed rebuild.
May 2014 seems so far away, and just a bad dream.....
Our top PGs Bryson and Ronnie were transferring
The one potential star AJ looked like entering the draft
The player with the most upside - Jay Simpson - had a career ending heart condition
Terone graduated, after an ugly season when this solid Boilermaker had to go through the misery of conflicted loyalties between family and school
Many believed Painter had lost it, some attributed it to a difficult divorce. Painter was an alumni and we liked how clean he ran the program, so he wasn't exactly on the verge of being fired But his seat was getting warm and the majority of fans were making doom and gloom comments. Just rereading the threads from last spring summer, for every positive comment, there were 2 negative ones.
- Bottom tier team again next year. At this point it seems inevitable that Painter will lose his job unless he can work some serious miracles in the next year or two. 2007 is looking more and more like a flash in the pan. It’s too bad, all these issues are setting the program back years and maynot be fixed until serious changes are made.
- Hard to slide further than the bottom. Normally, I could tell myself that it can’t get any worse. Now with Maryland and Rutgers next year, it can and probably will
- Not sure it’s time to send him packing, but Painter is clearly part of the problem. If AJ leaves, I say fire him, but if we can get a PG to replace Ronnie and AJ stays I could be talked into letting him fight for his job for a year
- My thoughts
1. This sucks.
2. We live with the freshman/sophomore mistakes and hope that by the time a player gets to his junior year the light bulb turns on. We invest and get nothing in return.
3. At one point the Class of 2012 has five members: RJ, Hale, Simpson, AJH and RayD. If AJH leaves for professional bball, that leaves only RayD as our only junior. I hate to use the “young” card, but we will be young again.
4. Which means we’ll likely be an inexperienced team fighting with Rutgers for the 13th place. Oh so exciting!
5. Thompson/Bryson needs to learn to drive hard to the basket and then DISH to the dump man. They have 7 months to perfect this but I am not counting on it.
6. At least we are back to the good old days where we are picked to finish last in the conference again. No more expectation.
7. Painter should take the most responsibility in our perpetual “young” team.
- Man, I thought being a cubs fan was depressing...
Then I read this thread…it’s incredible how quickly views toward a coach can sour…I have nothing bad to say about Painter in this situation. People want to moan about Transfers and I get it but honestly were any of the players that left really that much of an asset to the SYSTEM? Barlow was the only player who I thought could have provided positive contribution to the team and he got kicked off because he was uncontrollable. Painter was completely right in doing that too. Perhaps chooch left cuz he couldn’t stand the “cancer” in the locker room for another year. Could RJ score? Hell yeah he could. But he could also turn the ball over, go 1 on 3, have extreme apathy on the defensive end, and apparently also piss painter off. None of the successful players we have had in the past 6 years have been as selfish as RJ seemed to be. Now I’m not trying to rag on Ronnie. I have no doubts he will be good at his next school but there is a big difference between being a good player and a good teammate. I really think Painter understands his recent recruiting downfalls. He has admitted he has to recruit a different kind of player and I am sure he will do that. Next year is a big year for the program but let’s see how the team plays before we declare this as the worst thing to happen to this team.
May 2014 seems so far away, and just a bad dream.....
Our top PGs Bryson and Ronnie were transferring
The one potential star AJ looked like entering the draft
The player with the most upside - Jay Simpson - had a career ending heart condition
Terone graduated, after an ugly season when this solid Boilermaker had to go through the misery of conflicted loyalties between family and school
Many believed Painter had lost it, some attributed it to a difficult divorce. Painter was an alumni and we liked how clean he ran the program, so he wasn't exactly on the verge of being fired But his seat was getting warm and the majority of fans were making doom and gloom comments. Just rereading the threads from last spring summer, for every positive comment, there were 2 negative ones.
- Bottom tier team again next year. At this point it seems inevitable that Painter will lose his job unless he can work some serious miracles in the next year or two. 2007 is looking more and more like a flash in the pan. It’s too bad, all these issues are setting the program back years and maynot be fixed until serious changes are made.
- Hard to slide further than the bottom. Normally, I could tell myself that it can’t get any worse. Now with Maryland and Rutgers next year, it can and probably will
- Not sure it’s time to send him packing, but Painter is clearly part of the problem. If AJ leaves, I say fire him, but if we can get a PG to replace Ronnie and AJ stays I could be talked into letting him fight for his job for a year
- My thoughts
1. This sucks.
2. We live with the freshman/sophomore mistakes and hope that by the time a player gets to his junior year the light bulb turns on. We invest and get nothing in return.
3. At one point the Class of 2012 has five members: RJ, Hale, Simpson, AJH and RayD. If AJH leaves for professional bball, that leaves only RayD as our only junior. I hate to use the “young” card, but we will be young again.
4. Which means we’ll likely be an inexperienced team fighting with Rutgers for the 13th place. Oh so exciting!
5. Thompson/Bryson needs to learn to drive hard to the basket and then DISH to the dump man. They have 7 months to perfect this but I am not counting on it.
6. At least we are back to the good old days where we are picked to finish last in the conference again. No more expectation.
7. Painter should take the most responsibility in our perpetual “young” team.
- Man, I thought being a cubs fan was depressing...
Then I read this thread…it’s incredible how quickly views toward a coach can sour…I have nothing bad to say about Painter in this situation. People want to moan about Transfers and I get it but honestly were any of the players that left really that much of an asset to the SYSTEM? Barlow was the only player who I thought could have provided positive contribution to the team and he got kicked off because he was uncontrollable. Painter was completely right in doing that too. Perhaps chooch left cuz he couldn’t stand the “cancer” in the locker room for another year. Could RJ score? Hell yeah he could. But he could also turn the ball over, go 1 on 3, have extreme apathy on the defensive end, and apparently also piss painter off. None of the successful players we have had in the past 6 years have been as selfish as RJ seemed to be. Now I’m not trying to rag on Ronnie. I have no doubts he will be good at his next school but there is a big difference between being a good player and a good teammate. I really think Painter understands his recent recruiting downfalls. He has admitted he has to recruit a different kind of player and I am sure he will do that. Next year is a big year for the program but let’s see how the team plays before we declare this as the worst thing to happen to this team.
