Miami Herald & consolidated B. Donovan discussion

[hifigator]

www.miamiherald.com/605/story/128908.html



I think this writer brings up a couple of interesting points. I don't think it makes Billy's actions any more "right" or "wrong," but I think it does put things in a better light.

I think the irate Magic fans ought to pay special attention to when he asks the question would they rather have this happen now after 24 hours or 2 years from now. If his heart wasn't really behind it 100% and if he didn't have the full support of his family behind him 100%, is that really who they would want coaching their team anyway?

And from the Gator fans perspective, aren't we glad that this happened now. What might happen in 2 years had Billy not started to make the move now?

For what it is worth, even though I understand his mixed emotions, I still think the complications and the resulting turmoil for so many people are Billy's fault. I think he should have insisted on a little more time when the Magic pushed him for a decision. If they said no then I think he should have been strong enough to say then maybe now is not the time. But I can't honestly say that I wouldn't have done the very same thing, except for the fact that I would have told my other half what the decision was, not asked. (God, I hope my wife doesn't read this ....)

[hifigator]

Not that I am sure I will get an honest answer, but for those of you who voted for the "No excuse" option, do you really feel that way or is it just because it concerns the Gators or because I asked the question?

In 1973, Joe Paterno agreed to leave Penn. St. and become the coach of the New England Patriots. He changed his mind 24 hours later and remains the coach of the Nittany Lions to this day. This is almost identical to what Billy D. did. The only question is whether Billy will be here in 34 years. Would you have been/were you as critical of Joe Pa for his very same actions?

Hypothetically, put on your Hoya goggles and let's say that you guys win the National Championship next year, but JTIII hasn't signed an extension yet. Then in late may he is rumored to be high on the Boston Celtics list for their vacant position. Suppose they pressure him to make a decision and he decides to jump to the NBA. But a day later and after 24 hours of talking to his family, he decides that they are too happy at Georgetown and wants out of his $27.5 million contract. Would you want him back? Of course you would. But would you feel any differently about him then and would you feel any more confident that since he reniged on that contract, then you most likely have your coach for quite a while? I would guess that the honest ones among you would be of a like mind to what I am today.

[Deleted]

Did we really need ANOTHER thread devoted to the Eddie Munster saga?

C'mon, hifi...

[hifigator]

Buff, I was just curious what the sentiment was around the Country. Obviously we only see the local views or the talking heads. Oftentimes neither one actually capture the real sentiment of the general public. I thought I was very fair in selecting the choices as well. Those are basically the 3 views which I have seen. Dickie V. basically gave the first option, and said which of us hasn't changed our mind on far less important things and thus shouldn't Billy have that opportunity too? In Vitale's mind Billy has earned at least that much. I fall in the second group although when you talk about it at any length at all, almost everyone agrees that much: It wasn't handled properly and it jerked around too many people and/or disrupted too many lives. Then there are those like Jay Bilas who admitted to understanding the difficulty of the decision but mixed no words in saying that such thought and discussion must come before you sign the contract and that having second thoughts after such a point is entirely unacceptable. I was wondering what typical "outsiders" thought.

The mix is about what I would expect thusfar with only one giving him a free pass and slightly more of the opinion captured by the middle option than the last.

[kghoya]

what would have happened if the magic had decided they wanted out of their contract with donovan a few days after the agreement?

i imagine he would have been paid off quite well...

what happens when recruits decide they want out of their loi or when they want to transfer after a year or 2?

seems very one sided to me...

[hifigator]

kghoya said:

what would have happened if the magic had decided they wanted out of their contract with donovan a few days after the agreement?

i imagine he would have been paid off quite well...

what happens when recruits decide they want out of their loi or when they want to transfer after a year or 2?

seems very one sided to me...

I agree totally with regard to the Magic. I posed that question on the other thread. We all know now that Billy agreed to the contract on Thursday and actually signed it on Friday. Then actually called them Friday night and wanted out. So the window is shrinking. At first people said it was a few (3?) days then 2 days and then 24 hours. Now we know it was actually closer to 12 hours after the papers were signed that Billy wanted to back out. I don't think the amount of time changes the legal argument but from the emotional standpoint it makes a lot more sense and is easier to understand. That being said, I posed the question that supposed rather than Billy calling on Friday and wanting out, Phil Jackson had called the Magic Friday evening and said that he was tired of the whole Kobe thing and he was interested in the Magic job. Could Devos or Otis Smith have called Billy and said that they changed their mind and wanted to go in a different direction? Of course not. Well actually they could, but they would still be obligated to pay Billy the guaranteed part of the contract plus any buy-out money. So there is a double standard.

In the case of the recruits, as long as the student-athletes haven't taken any benefits (tuition, housing, per diem etc...) then they can request a release if there is a head coaching change and precedent tells us that it will be granted. If however they have received benefits, then they must still request a release and it is somewhat up in the air as to whether it would be granted. My opinion is that if the release was requested due to a coaching change it would most likely be granted somewhat automatically. But in any case, if the players had already received benefits then they would be required to sit out a year and would lose one of their 5 years given to complete their four years of eligiblility. Look at it this way: at least two of this year's recruiting class is due to arrive on campus June 26th and enroll in Summer B. Had Billy left after this point, then those two players would most likely be forced to sit out a season and lose one of their 5 years. The other recruits however, who were not slated to enroll until fall could request a release and would most likely be eligiblt to play this coming season wherever they choose.

So at least the incoming student athlete has some options. The ones who get screwed most in my mind would be the redshirt freshmen who came here last season and worked their tails off expecting to see playing time this year only to have their coach get up and leave. Now if they wanted to leave too, they would be forced to sit out another season, making it 2 full years since they had game action and since they would have already used their redshirt season, they would also lose a year of eligibility. Thankfully Billy is coming back and no one will be in that situation.

[HoyaSinceBirth]

What I'd like to see done is him suspended from coaching for a year or something like that. If he doesn't want to honor his contract with the magic he should have to pay them some large sum of money equal to what the magic would have to pay him if they decided to renig on the contract and then he shouldn't be allowed to run back to Florida and coach them as if nothing happened. He shouldn't be able to coach anywhere for atleast a year. And yes i'm fully aware that that is pretty unreasonable. But it's still what i'd like seen done. At the very least he should have to pay a large amount of money.

[hifigator]

I don't think they have officially announced the terms of the agreement yet, but all of the rumors are that the agreement contains a non-comp type of clause whereby Billy can't coach in the NBA for the 5 years that he would have been under Magic contract. As for the money angle, I would expect them to charge Billy for both sides of the legal fees. Aside from that I really don't know.

As for your suggestion of a 1 year suspension, do you really believe that or do you just say it because you don't like the Gators and would like to see anything that damages th program?

In all honesty, the Magic could have played hardball with Billy and made enforced the contract but why in the hell would they want to make someone coach who didn't want to be there. That would be akin to cutting off their nose and both ears to spite their face. Another option would have been to hire another coach, but to keep Billy under contract. That wouldn't make any sense either and would only make their coaching expenses twice as high. The only real option was to reach a settlement. What good would it do to make Billy sit around for a year not coaching? Aside from giving him a vacation and not benefitting either the Magic or the Gators it would accomplish very little.

[ExcitableBoy]

hifigator said:

I don't think they have officially announced the terms of the agreement yet, but all of the rumors are that the agreement contains a non-comp type of clause whereby Billy can't coach in the NBA for the 5 years that he would have been under Magic contract. As for the money angle, I would expect them to charge Billy for both sides of the legal fees. Aside from that I really don't know.

As for your suggestion of a 1 year suspension, do you really believe that or do you just say it because you don't like the Gators and would like to see anything that damages th program?

In all honesty, the Magic could have played hardball with Billy and made enforced the contract but why in the hell would they want to make someone coach who didn't want to be there. That would be akin to cutting off their nose and both ears to spite their face. Another option would have been to hire another coach, but to keep Billy under contract. That wouldn't make any sense either and would only make their coaching expenses twice as high. The only real option was to reach a settlement. What good would it do to make Billy sit around for a year not coaching? Aside from giving him a vacation and not benefitting either the Magic or the Gators it would accomplish very little.

What good does it do to make recruits sit out a year when they transfer or even (gasp) back out of a LOI!!?? I'm sure we would be spouting off the same excuses if JTIII had pulled this kind of stunt, but the fact of the matter is the system is extremely one-sided. What's more, its one-sided against the very constituents it was set up to protect--the student-athletes.

[HoyaSinceBirth]

Just because i'm not particularly fond of your prescence on this board does not mean I am transfering that moderate annoyance into hatred towards your team. the purpose of the suspension for a year or some amount of time is to teach Donovan or any other coach who pulls this kind of a lesson. Your actions have consequences and you have to pay the consequences that should be equivalent to the severity of the action. I seriosuly cannot understand making that big of a decision and then changing your mind that quickly the smaller gap of time is even more alarming. It really makes no sense. Has he stated that his reason for changing his mind was his family? what was his reason? Changing your mind in that short of time is if anything kind of suspicious.

[hifigator]

Birth, the timeline was clarified yesterday in the press conference. On Friday afternoon they had the initial press conference in Gainesville and then Billy went over to the basketball camp that was going on and spoke to some of the kids. Then on his drive home he said he just got this feeling that something wasn't right. When he got home he told his wife that it (leaving)didn't feel right. Jeremy Foley went over to his house that evening as a friend and talked about old times. When he left Billy and Christine talked about it and she told him to get a good night's sleep. He said he did a lot of tossing and turning and not much sleeping. When he got up Saturday morning he felt the same way. He immediately called Otis Smith of the Magic while Christine called Jeremy Foley to tell him that Billy was having second thoughts. The Magic told Billy that they understood, but to give it 48 hours and see if he felt the same way. He said that he felt that he owed them at least that much. But throughout Saturday and Sunday nothing changed. By Sunday night, it was unofficially official.

For what it's worth, Jay Bilas was one of the more vocal critics. He praised Donovan for his track record and his character, but said that this was entirely unprofessional and very uncharacteristic of Billy. Donovan didn't like that choice of words and said that making a mistake isn't unprofessional, taking the money when his heart wasn't in it would have been unprofessional. Billy totally discounted the rumors that it was pressure from his wife at all. He said it was entirely his decision and that she was behind him 100%. I am still not sure that I buy that, but that is what he said.

Excitable, I agree with you that the system isn't totally fair, but I would expect that if a recruit were to sign a letter of intent and then started having second thoughts that very same day and then wanted to change his mind the very next day, there would be some kind of appeal process which could get him out of the LOI. If you or I were to agree to a new job and then changed our mind the very next day then we could probably get out of it as well. I am not saying that what Billy did is fine, but let's be reasonable. It's not remotely as egregious as many other mistakes which happen on a daily basis, and it is the type of thing which could happen to anyone ... well aside from the $27.5 million part ... that's not too likely to happen to most of us.

[HoyaSinceBirth]

Ok I just find it kind of crazy to have made that kind of comitment because it seems fairly obvious that when he signed those papers he was unsure of his decision. I just don't understand comiting to a decision like that when you're not sure it's what you want to do. That'd be like me sending in my letter saying i'm going to college A and then later that day telling them you know what i don't actually want to go to your school I want to go to college B. It's not exactly the same because my Decision only affects me and my family. Where as Billy's decision impacted The fan bases of an NBA franchise, And two college franchises Florida and VCU to an extent. It just seems really surpising to me that someone would make a life altering decision with out being pretty darn sure that's what I wanted to do.

[hifigator]

I pretty much agree. The consensus seems to be that the Magic had been talking to Billy a bit longer than we knew and they were ready for a decision. The timeline I keep hearing is that they asked him last Tuesday for a decision within 48 hours (by Thursday, May 31st). Billy said yes but almost immediately regretted it. Like everyone, I don't like the way he handled it. He doesn't like the way he handled it. No one liked the overall handling of the situation, but I'm not going to bash the guy for essentially changing his mind on a very important situation. Again, the key is which is worse: for him to backtrack some 24 hours later or to bite the bullet and stay with the job since he signed the papers, even though his heart isn't in it and he is not in a position to give it his best effort? I say the former is far more acceptable, although obviously the best alternative would have been to say no in the first place. I still think in the back of his mind, Billy was thinking that he would be able to make the commute a far more times than he actually could and I think more and more he started coming to that realization almost immediately.

Someone brought up the point that high school games are typically on Tuesday and Friday nights. SEC games are typically on Wednesdays and Saturdays. With his son moving into high school coaching at the college level will allow him to attend many games, while the NBA wouldn't allow hardly any. I know he should have thought of that sooner, but I think he just underestimated the difficulty in making that work.

You are totally correct with regard to how many people it affected and I think that is what Billy feels the worst about. Billy is many things, but he is very honest and open. That is perhaps what made this situation so difficult to understand. Even in the eyes of Jay Bilas however, one of his most vocal critics, it really is only strike one in an otherwise unblemished coaching career.