Cuonzo Feeling Unwanted

#127
#127
Well, the fact is his family did receive racial threats. Some believe what they want. Was it the "whole fan base?" No. It was by a few ignorant people that have issues. And because the threats DID HAPPEN, the petition and the fall out seemed to add to/highlight the fact that racial threats occurred.
 
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#128
#128
ajvol01 said:
Revisionist history.

He made 2 NITs prior to his final year.

If he didn't have the personality of an empty shoebox he'd probably still be coaching here.
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I think he showed his true colors as well by waiting until Pearl was hired by Auburn, then quitting the NEXT DAY. Any chance he didn't know that hire was happening, and chose to screw UT as much as he could? They tried to save face by saying they wouldn't have rehired Pearl, but surely nobody believes that. Auburn has been a basketball wasteland since Charles Barkley left there. Who here will be surprised when they make their Sweet 16 run?

Martin was a below average hire to start with, Pearl had us at the top and we could have done better. Maybe we have this time, I am far from convinced at this time. No doubt he feels more at home in Berkeley, with all the "progressive" enablers that reside there. I'm glad he's happy to be gone, I'm also happy.
 
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#129
#129
k-town_king said:
Its not bs when its true. His family received racist threats.

Also a lot of the personality, fit, and can't understand him criticisms are coded racist bs.



Where were the teams picked preseason? Did Maymon not miss the second year? Most people thought we got snubbed. Maymon had been our best player the year prior.



So you count players as professionals even before they develop? Stokes had to mature. He came in early. Richardson was a unheralded recruit that Martin developed. McRae averaged 1.8 ppg before Martin. They weren't great players from day 1 like UK players. Its called developing a program. He would have won more than Tyndall last year with Thompson at pg and Richardson at his natural spot.



Tyndall is a horrible offensive coach. Martin is Steve Kerr in comparison.
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How can you claim racism behind people's complaints of Zo when they behave the exact same way with Butch Jones....Its about winning and nothing else. My main complaint with Zo was recruiting bc in year four it was still barely top 50. I felt he had earned another year with his run but he chose to run away.....good bye....I have no love for him at all and hope he loses every game he coaches. Of course I feel the same about Pearl and he actually meant something to UT basketball.
 
#130
#130
Cuonzo Martin had a petition started while he was here because he was underachieving and was set to miss the tourney for a third year. He had taken a team with three NBA draft picks and had beaten virtually no one all season.

Cuonzo probably received racist threats if he says he did. Butch Jones has received threats as well I'm sure. As has our kicker I would bet. Crazy fan bases have crazy fans.

The petition had zero to do with race. The Tennessee fans supported Cuonzo. I went to the games. I sat in the stands. He had fan support. TBA was rocking many times while he was our coach.

This article paints our fanbase in a bad light and there's a couple of factors at play. 1) Cuonzo enables this crap. He loves to whine about it for some reason. 2) because his team went on that miracle run AFTER the petition, writers fail to acknowledge the sequence of events because it makes for a good story. The petition came when we were on the outside looking in and we were losing to bad basketball teams and playing with zero urgency.

As a fan I really wish Cuonzo would quit whining and move on.
 
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#132
#132
If he wanted to move on then this article would have never been posted. The fanbase wasn't the only problem. The problem was an NCAA tourney team going to two NITs and without Duke losing to Mercer then UT doesn't even make it to the sweet 16, IMO.

Godspeed Cuonzo but people might not feel so bad for you if your team underachieves this year. Good luck
 
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#134
#134
Thunder Good-Oil said:
He had three guys on the roster that were getting NBA contracts and TN flamed out twice in the NIT and was an NCAAT bubble team that had to win a play-in game. Then in the NCAAT, drew a mediocre opponent and Duke to make the S16. But Duke folded against a mid-major giving TN an easy draw and all of a sudden CCM is a great coach? Then CCM uses planes supplied by UT for recruiting purposes to shop around for another job. His 4th team at UT was going to struggle to get more than 10 wins and then he pretends to be a victim. Well played Zo, well played.
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This
 
#135
#135
iKrager said:
Read the full article (free). Cal Golden Bears coach Cuonzo Martin has put Tennessee behind him and found a comfortable home

Whether you think he was going to be successful here or not, the way we treated Cuonzo was misguided and irrational. He talks about how he honestly felt like his family was in danger, and how he had to hire a security firm to make sure his house was protected. Don't be shocked if you see Cal make a run in the NCAA tournament this year.
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This is probably just a recruiting tool! Sure they may have been treats and some yahoos saying dumb stuff. He was just a bad rebound that we picked up at a bar after losing the love of our lives. Rebounds always talk crap about the people that never wanted anything more!
 
#137
#137
The one thing I'll say that irks me about this article is that the petition was started and picked up steam mid season when we were looking like we were going to the NIT for the 3rd year straight.

It wasn't because he was a recluse (although that didn't buy him any time), it was because prior to the last 10 games we had dropped more than we expected. It took a major turnaround by the players, one that I think might've been spurred by the petition itself, to get them to a play-in birth.

With no prior background knowledge this article reads as if the petition was started after our NCAA run which is completely false.
 
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#138
#138
BigZiti09 said:
Cuonzo Martin had a petition started while he was here because he was underachieving and was set to miss the tourney for a third year. He had taken a team with three NBA draft picks and had beaten virtually no one all season.

Cuonzo probably received racist threats if he says he did. Butch Jones has received threats as well I'm sure. As has our kicker I would bet. Crazy fan bases have crazy fans.

The petition had zero to do with race. The Tennessee fans supported Cuonzo. I went to the games. I sat in the stands. He had fan support. TBA was rocking many times while he was our coach.

This article paints our fanbase in a bad light and there's a couple of factors at play. 1) Cuonzo enables this crap. He loves to whine about it for some reason. 2) because his team went on that miracle run AFTER the petition, writers fail to acknowledge the sequence of events because it makes for a good story. The petition came when we were on the outside looking in and we were losing to bad basketball teams and playing with zero urgency.

As a fan I really wish Cuonzo would quit whining and move on.
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And close the book with this post. Well written and a great closing to a book not worth reading again
 
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#140
#140
iKrager said:
Why would a man feel the need to hire security? Because he feels like his family or himself are endangered. You don't randomly wake up one day and say "man, let's blow $40,000 on a security firm and cameras". If he felt like his family wasn't safe, then thus, he felt a need to hire security.

and I'm sure Mark Richt has allegedly received them as well.

My only answer to you is:

Can't beat a more reliable source than a player. I do agree the media did make it seem like race was the bigger issue to him getting fired, but I believe race definitely factored into his liking around the fanbase and administration. That's an opinion you can neither prove nor disprove, so arguing further on it is a mute point.
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Last I checked he wasn't fired he chose to leave - I guess we were prejudiced against pasty chubby little white guys and we did fire the next coach not because he cheated at Southern Miss but because he was pasty and chubby.

I met Martin once shook hands with him, he would look you in the eyes - was a straight up guy. Having said that his interviews were awful, awful - very dry and boring, I really could't listen to them, his offense was as boring as his interviews, I felt his recruiting here was subpar and based on his subpar recruiting it appeared he was headed no where fast. There was no indication that he was going to land any blue chippers much less a haul like he has landed at Cal. The UT fan base for the most part is very astute and knowledgable - if you are doing a great job - you are loved - if you are doing a fair to poor job we are sharpening our pitchforks. It's that simple. This fan base has loved Condridge Holloway to Ernie and Bernie to whomever you want to choose who is black, Jewish, Arab, Asian, female, or some combination. If you don the Orange and give your all for Tennessee you are largely loved and respected.

If you put a poor product on the field or court and take our beloved programs and tarnish them -- we are going to burn a few mattresses. Martin was average -so he got the mehhhh average treatment - he didn't earn the full Kiffin or Dooley because he wasn't that bad. I am sure no doubt that Mason at Vanderbilt feels like he is being picked on because he is black or not supported because he is black or racial profiled because he is black, but the reality is you typically get an extra year or two to prove yourself if you are black - whereas if you sucked and you were caucasion - you are just terminated and replaced.

Make a mental note, If Barnes sucks, doesn't do well, recruits at an average or below average level - we will not be enthused about him either - not because he is Old and white -- but because we don't enjoy going to the games and he is not putting a good product on the floor. If a director continually makes bad movies - people don't want to go see his movies - has nothing to do with racism. It really is that simple.

Now I want nothing but the best for Martin, like I said - he was great with the players and well respected, he appeared to be learning on the job, has done a great job recruiting one year in California - the other year not so much - but he was replacing a popular coach - and he was very average when he was here.
 
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#141
#141
Once again it shows how little some of you know about basketball and or a bias.

The Sweet 16 year we were never in danger of missing the tourney. I told yall calm down because we had a winning record and were on pace to make the tourney which was what mattered. Yall and the guy Sparty,who was clueless just wanted to bash Martin. I was right. We made a run and had a great season. Basketball is judged by the body of work and more importantly postseason. Not individual games. Even Pearl lost a headscratcher here and there. Every school and coach has.

The same ones claiming Martin underachieved claimed Tyndall did a good job. Tyndall and Martin had the same expectations on them year one. Martin surpassed him and made an NIT. Tyndall nothing but the same people claim it was a great coaching job. Yall ignored the numbers when Tyndall was hired. I told yall he was worse on o than Martin. Yall made a million excuses and claimed the numbers lied and he would be better. As soon as Tyndall was proving me right and it was clear all I said was true the main Martin basher disappeared after seeing everything he said was wrong. Tyndall then set a scoring low for a season. He was horrible in every facet. Yet still some say he did better than Martin.

The second year Maymon was the best player and we had a young team still. McRae and Stokes hadn't grown into the leaders yet. It took some time to adjust to the losss of Maymon. We still finished about where projected with Maymon and he didn't play the whole year. Most people felt we were snubbed for a bid,. He did meet expectations at the very least.

The last Sweet 16 run was the only year Martin had a player that went to the NBA. Tyndall had a NBA player last year and couldn't make the NIT. You can't count players as NBA players if its before they develop into NBA players. If Hubbs, Mostella, or Punter explode and get drafted we won;t say Tyndall had 2 or 3 NBA players on that team. They weren't NBA ready yet. Like I said earlier. These aren't one and done players. If we count this way Pearl should have went to the Final Four the last year when he was blown out 30. He had a NBA first rounder and andother NBA player in McRae. No matter that McRae was a freshman who averaged 1.8. I guess we will count him even though he hadn't developed yet and never really played in the NBA.

The petition didn't make them make the tourney. We were 16-11. Every year we finished really strong. Finishing strong is an indicator of good coaching. Bad coaches collapse like Tyndall last year. They finished like they had the two years prior. We made adjustments early and pulled together. Martin's teams did that each year.
 
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#143
#143
Considering this is UT we're talking about, I feel like the effect of football is not being discussed as much as it should. The Bruce Pearl/Cuonzo Martin eras coincided with some of the worst UT football seasons in a long time. In a fan base desperate for wins of any kind, rehiring Pearl was the closest thing to guaranteed success we could think of (because of his success before). I don't think the petition would have happened if we had been winning 10 games in football instead of 5.
 
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#144
#144
k-town_king said:
Its not bs when its true. His family received racist threats.

Also a lot of the personality, fit, and can't understand him criticisms are coded racist bs.



Where were the teams picked preseason? Did Maymon not miss the second year? Most people thought we got snubbed. Maymon had been our best player the year prior.



So you count players as professionals even before they develop? Stokes had to mature. He came in early. Richardson was a unheralded recruit that Martin developed. McRae averaged 1.8 ppg before Martin. They weren't great players from day 1 like UK players. Its called developing a program. He would have won more than Tyndall last year with Thompson at pg and Richardson at his natural spot.



Tyndall is a horrible offensive coach. Martin is Steve Kerr in comparison.
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Tyndall and Martin are horrible offensive coaches - doesn't help your case imo.
 
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#145
#145
So no one threatened his family, or as he intimated "directly", but he felt the need to hire security and now that he lives in OAKLAND...he finally feels "safe"? :huh:
 
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#146
#146
k-town_king said:
Once again it shows how little some of you know about basketball and or a bias.

The Sweet 16 year we were never in danger of missing the tourney. I told yall calm down because we had a winning record and were on pace to make the tourney which was what mattered.
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K-town, you are dead wrong on this part.

Here's a link. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013–14_Tennessee_Volunteers_basketball_team

We won 5 straight to make a PLAY IN GAME!!!!!! That is "in danger" and what you are spouting is revisionist history.

The petition peaked with that loss against Texas A&M on February 22nd. AFTER that, the team went on a run 5 game run where they outscored opponents by 115 points.
 
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#147
#147
BigZiti09 said:
K-town, you are dead wrong on this part.

Here's a link. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013–14_Tennessee_Volunteers_basketball_team

We won 5 straight to make a PLAY IN GAME!!!!!! That is "in danger" and what you are spouting is revisionist history.

The petition peaked with that loss against Texas A&M on February 22nd. AFTER that, the team went on a run 5 game run where they outscored opponents by 115 points.
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He lost any right to intelligently speak on the matter with that line. His view is clearly clouded
 
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#148
#148
k-town_king said:
Racists love to have black people perform for them, be it sports or entertainment. That has been true since slave days. That doesn't mean that they aren't prejudiced.
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Yeah ok. Must be why Rupp recruited so many black players...
 
#149
#149
BigZiti09 said:
K-town, you are dead wrong on this part.

Here's a link. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013–14_Tennessee_Volunteers_basketball_team

We won 5 straight to make a PLAY IN GAME!!!!!! That is "in danger" and what you are spouting is revisionist history.

The petition peaked with that loss against Texas A&M on February 22nd. AFTER that, the team went on a run 5 game run where they outscored opponents by 115 points.
Click to expand...

We did the same each year. We had a winning record. We had a slate of winnable games coming up and the team had just lost a couple to bad luck. We were gonna make it. Some less informed poster chose to focus on individual games instead of the big picture and already disliked Martin , so they wouldn't give him the benefit of the doubt.
 
#150
#150
I remember the last season being blown with many losses to inferior teams and everyone saying the season didn't matter. It didn't matter to the TV fans but those that paid to see those drubbings were not happy about it. He got lucky just getting into the tournament but got even luckier with the draw. UT, with the highest seed, could have easily drawn at 1 or 2 seed and been eliminated in the 1st round. Instead I don't think we faced a top 10 team.

For me personally I hated the grinding style of play. Insert here I did not like the style of play Bruce Pearl shifted to in the last 2 seasons either, even though he made the elite 8. I liked the team that made the sweet 16 and lost to OSU after holding a big lead at the half. That was exciting basketball!
 
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