Wednesday, December 13, 2006

Thoughts on the Practice Facility and Dodge

Orsini Blog

SMU Release

Dallas Morning News


SMU broke ground on a new practice facility on Friday. The facility will honestly be as good as any facility in the country. Add to that new lights, a new scoreboard and a new floor for Moody and the building blocks for a first class basketball program seem to be in place.

SMU men’s basketball is ridiculously high in the RPI and Sagarin rankings. The RPI will start to plummet as SMU will play a couple of really low ranked Division I teams. Sagarin, I am not sure about-that one may stay up there a while. If I were to guess, the RPI drops into the 50’s by the Oklahoma game, even if SMU wins every game up to that game.

So the basketball team takes to the court tonight for the first time in seemingly forever. I am not going to be there, but I will make the game at TCU on the 21st.

The world is apparently ending because NTSU hired a high school coach. Now, granted, Todd Dodge is a really frickin’ good high school coach. But he has never been a head coach at this level and we really don’t know how well he is going to be able to recruit to NTSU, though most think he will be a good recruiter and most think he is an offensive genius. Only time will tell.

My thoughts on this are pretty simple. The average SMU fan is so beaten down, it has started looking around for where the next punch will come from. Therefore, everything is a negative. And if SMU loses a game, SMU needs to fire the coach. And if the season doesn’t end with a bowl, SMU needs to fire the coach. It is just the nature of the “SMU condition.” SMU fans view potential offseason changes as the only excitement to be had. Yet hiring a new coach yields only temporary gratification if he isn’t immediately successful. And since success, let alone immediate success, is hard to come by at SMU, the SMU fan starts to look for the next coach.

Well, Steve Orsini thinks differently. He believes that the best thing for SMU is to keep the current coach. Steve Orsini believes Phil Bennett will be successful at SMU. Two thoughts oh that. First, it doesn’t matter what you or I believe because Steve Orsini is the one making the decision, and as long as he really believes it and actually cares, I am willing to go along with it. Second, assuming Orsini is right, Phil Bennett and SMU being successful is ultimately far more important than any instant gratification to be gained by hiring a new coach.

So best of luck to Todd Dodge; I hope SMU beats NTSU by 50.

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

I do not know if this was printed everywhere else, but in the NTSU story it was mentioned that they average 16,000 per home football game. Looks pretty much like SMU attendance.

Art Briles did a good job at UH, and his only non high school coaching job was as an offensive position coach at Texas Tech for a couple of years, so it can be done. I wonder if Ramon Flanigan sticks around up there, or if he could come back to SMU. After the episode of fighting coaches, he may be available. And, our offense could use his input now.

Anonymous said...

Blog,

I do not think everything concerning SMU athletics is negative, nor do I believe the average SMU fan feels that way.

I am extremely optimistic about BB, especially since there is no BCS cartel to deal with.

FB is another story. Bennett’s record since arriving here is 17-41. Only 3 victories have come against teams with winning records (forgive me for excluding SHS).

I have been impressed with Orsini so far, although I believe history will show he was a year late in firing Phil.

SMU Football Blog said...

I said, "everything is a negative," not "everything is negative." The difference is we have a lot to be positive about SMU and basketball in particluar. However, at the first sign of adversity in the basketball program and I expect there will be some adversity, people will panic like they always do.

Anonymous said...

Ramon Flanigan? Are you crazy?

Yeah, let's hire a guy who got into a fight with a fellow assistant. Yeah, let's hire a guy who got fired along with his head coach because the offense was B-O-R-I-N-G.

Flanigan work for Todd Dodge? Not in a million years. You think Dodge wants that ego/headache on his staff?

Oh, and Ramon Flanigan was whooping it up to no end after UNT beat SMU this year. You would have thought he won the lottery. He doesn't have any love for SMU. With Ramon, it's all about Ramon, period.

Please do not confuse Ramon Flanigan the player with Ramon Flanigan the coach/person.

Anonymous said...

Whoever suggested Ramon Flanagan for any job, must be crazy! This guy has a couple of children by two different unmarried women, and now is having a restraining order put on him by another. He's loser's loser.

Anonymous said...

My, how the proud has stumbled. Flanigan has two children with two different women. He's not married to either one. Flanigan has a restraining order placed on him from another, who is a Denton high school teacher. He has been arrested for stalking. He has even stooped to impersonating young girls on line to gain access to web sights that they frequent. All around loser!

Patience said...

I am Ramon Flanigan and the things that were posted by ANONYMOUS are incorrect! I have never been arrested for stalking, I do not have a restraining order placed on me from anyone. I did not physically assault any fellow coaches on the staff! There is not a shred of evidence anywhere to support any of these slanderous claims! The only thing that is true is that I do have two wonderful daughters who are the absolute love of my life!! The bad thing about these type of things is that people who are looking to hire qualified coaches see these things and do not do the necessary checks to find out that they are false and I may perhaps miss out on job opportunities. Critiquing my coaching ability is fine and well within the rights of fans but please do not say false statements concerning my character that could prohibit me from gaining employment. If you have any questions that you would like for me to answer regarding the false things that are claimed against me please do not hesitate to email me. SMU8QB@aol.com

Ramon Flanigan- still very proud!

Anonymous said...

Ha! I checked into the Ramon Flanigan loser blog, and found out that Flanigan does have a restraining orders on him in different counties. He was arrested for repeatedly stalking some high school teacher on line. As for the fight, he did charge someone in the stands and he almost fought with one his fellow coaches. He seems to be your typical athlete who never grew mentally past the 8th grade.

Anonymous said...

I was a part of the north texas program with Ramon, most self centered and horrible human being I have ever known. Constantly boasted bout sexual conquest and I honestly never even knew he had children so which one is more important. Can't think of anyone who would be worst to coach and mentor young men, well maybe Hitler.

Anonymous said...

Sir, this is Ramon Flanigan, will will you please take this part of your blog down? I am putting my life back together and the brothers of Anna Glasgow, my ex, have a huge axe to grind. If you email me I will send you background reports or any other information that you may need to see that these things that are said about me are false...This blog continues to be brought up in conversations that I have currently by people who actually know me. I am trying to put North Texas and Anna Glasgow behind me but these things that are not only untrue but are extremely hurtful are hindering my attempts to get past two great periods of my life that ended poorly. I can not find your contact information but you can email me at smu8qb@aol.com ..thank you