Pat Murphy should absolutely be pursued as the next coach. He built the ND program from nothing into a national presence and its impossible to argue with the success he had at ASU.
His teams won the last 3 PAC-10 championships and he was the coach of the year in that conference the past 3 seasons. His players have done well in the classroom and if I remember correctly I dont believe he has ever had a player declared academically ineligible.
Living in AZ I have followed the ASU situation closely. From what I have read and heard, Coach Murphy has been used as a scapegoat by the AD and school president to hide the fact that they have underperformed in their positions. There is a prevailing feeling here locally that Murphy was run out of town.
In Coach Murphy's performance evaluations from AD Lisa Love in 2007-2009 Murphy received almost universal praise that made no mention of problems.
"The coaching job turned in by Coach Murphy and his staff this season cannot be overstated," a supervisor wrote in a 2009 evaluation. "(Murphy's) willingness to work within the guidelines set by the administration led to much success."
Love signed off on that evaluation with a congratulatory letter highlighting several accomplishments and awarding him an 8 percent pay raise.
Then at the time of his resignation Love said Murphy resigned on his own initiative. Truth is that Coach Murphy was fired without warning or explanation.
I am confident that in time (when Coach Murphy can fully tell his side of the story) it will be clear that university politics and nothing else led to coach Murphy's dismissal.
The university that realizes this first and acts first in hiring him is going to be getting themselves one helluva ball coach and will no doubt find themselves competing for a national championship in short time.
I wonder how seriously Mike Hamilton will take your message considering you spelled the name of the stadium wrong.
Living in AZ I have followed the ASU situation closely. From what I have read and heard, Coach Murphy has been used as a scapegoat by the AD and school president to hide the fact that they have underperformed in their positions. There is a prevailing feeling here locally that Murphy was run out of town.
I am confident that in time (when Coach Murphy can fully tell his side of the story) it will be clear that university politics and nothing else led to coach Murphy's dismissal.
He'd better take letters like this seriously. When you fire the only UT baseball coach who did anything right in 50 years, and replace him with a guy who runs scared from ETSU and loses to Binghamton, you've got a lot of explaining to do.
Oh, I know they've done what they need to do from a facilities standpoint. It was way overdue.They've raised the money to make the stadium the way it should be, worked really hard at it, as a matter of fact.
The investment is there, they'll spend the money to get it right in the next coaching search.
I just hope Hamilton's judgment on baseball coaches doesn't ape Doug Dickey's on men's basketball coaches. Hopefully he can get it right this time, but hiring Raleigh defied explanation even when he did it.
It's all about timing.
You don't let a guy go in March. You just don't do it.
Unless this team catches fire, though, Raleigh is done.
I'd say in private, Raliegh needs to be given the ultimatum either make the SECT or you're gone come the end of the season. Maybe he's even already had that conversation.
I'd say in private, Raliegh needs to be given the ultimatum either make the SECT or you're gone come the end of the season. Maybe he's even already had that conversation.
He'd better take letters like this seriously. When you fire the only UT baseball coach who did anything right in 50 years, and replace him with a guy who runs scared from ETSU and loses to Binghamton, you've got a lot of explaining to do.
Rehire Rod Delmonico. Hey, George Steinbrener rehired Billy Martin 2 or 3 times and won the World Series. Why Not? If you have followed UT Baseball and really believe that it is the No. 3 sport (as the AD should - but I'm dont think he does), you should know that Coach D took the program this program to great levels. Consistenly? Of course not. He had to rebuild like any other program. Do you see the cycle? Omaha in 95, then 01 and then 05. But keep in mind that during Rod's era, UT made it to Omaha as many times (except LSU) than any other team in the SEC. Factor in that he was recruiting to the 2nd worst facilities in the conference after begging the AD for improvements to keep up with the conference and we play in crappy, winter weather for the better part of 1/2 of the season. He recruited some of the best players in the nation to this place. He was a relentless recruiter. He did it himself. Now look what we have. Raliegh does not have the abilities that Coach D has. Coach D is a teacher of baseball. The truth is that his contract was not terminated based on performance. The contract ended because Mike Hamilton and Coach D just did not have a good personal relationship as AD and Coach. It is my understanding that toward the end of '09 they sat down for a lunch meeting and buried the hatchet, so to speak. I think it came down to the fact that Coach D was Doug Dickey's hire and Mike Hamilton wanted "his own guy" in there. Well, if he rehired the winningest coach in UT's history, I think he would be Mike's guy and he probably would reenergize this program like he did in 1990. I think he would take the conference by storm again. And, I believe he would get us back to OMAHA.
During that 10 years he got the program to OMAHA. You see, that's the difference between baseball and the other sports. You do what you need to do to get to a Regiona, Super Regional and Omaha. That is how you contend for a national championship Einstein.
If you are referring to Delmonico, you will have to get your facts straight. If I am not mistaken, R.D. had a .500 or slightly better conference record for his last several years, and even though he won a lot of games, many of them were against the King College and Carson-Newman's of the world. R.D. teams were not consistently competitive against major colleges. College World Series visits? Not enough to compensate for his lackluster conference records. A good fire by M.H. BTW, what college is R.D. head coach at now?