UCLA hired a director of scouting this last offseason (aka a GM in name only) over the summer, so we'll see if that makes a notable change to take recruiting and scouting off of Cronin's plate.
I did not get out of bed until the second half, in which it seemed we were at least competitive, my impression is despite past success Cronin will not get us past the first weekend if we even make the tournament. Bilodeau surprised me, he seems to be improving as the season goes along which is what we should expect from the whole team really.
It is unlikely that there would be an individual who would bank roll Cronin's $22 million buyout and UCLA won't fire him as they don't want to pay it...
UCLA needs to save their pennies to pay the Rose Bowl zillions so we can play football in lifeless SoFi in the midst of lovely Inglewood.
Our only hope is that Cronin resigns. He has plenty of money and he has stated in the past that he's accomplished enough (youngest to 500 🤣) and doesn't need the job. Let this be true.
I honestly hope Chesney can avoid Jelly 2.0, it's our only hope for at least the football program. UCLA's football schedule doesn't look too difficult other than Oregon, SUC and Michigan. They may be able to beat Michigan, who knows. SUC and Oregon will be a lot more challenging. But again, I have hope that Chesney can at least begin to change the culture and of course the only way to do this is to avoid the entire Athletic Dept of LOSERS. Now Cronin has to some extent done this on the basketball side, he has "walled off" Jelly 2.0 and his band of miscreants, but as we've all seen it hasn't helped much, he's just a bad coach. Both football and basketball have been terribly neglected at UCLA and continue to be. Again, I just hope Chesney can change some of that on the football side. Chesney is attempting to pull a "Cignetti" at UCLA, I don't think it's the same situation. At Indiana the Athletic Dept operates different and they at least have some competent people working there. At UCLA, that is hard to find.
Point redux: The problem isn't that YoungestTo500™ (who will be challenged to hit .500 next year) doesn't know how to construct a roster. It's that he is unable to do so because he is toxic. Consider next year's starting 5 and roster. Can he even field a team?
Gotta wonder if his verbal rebuke is intended to make the players that he recruited play better defense, or if he's expressing total frustration that nothing can be done about it and that he's actually lost control of the players that he recruited. Trading players during midseason seems like an idea that only he could conceive of and support (lol).
Just so sad that this is where we have landed. Cronin is simply not the right coach. I don't know how low our team needs to fall before a change is made, but donut head has pulled another chipster with the extension.
Bilo had a very telling comment... he said that the players were quiet on the court, not really talking to each other. We do not have one leader on this team, and it feels disjointed and dispassionate.
Seems the players' confidence has taken big hits after trying different things and still nothing is working consistently for them. So far, the HC doesn't appear to have any answers, with no useful switch to flip for quick and permanent improvements, given the roster that he created. Add the contract extension to the fire and he'll have one very hot seat going into next season.
I guess you can read whatever you want from post game comments. I take "no excuses" as Mick taking responsibility for the loss and responsibility for "poor" recruiting
That was my interpretation, as well. Though, that comment will probably make the players feel pretty crappy and is certainly not encouraging to these young men, who are presumably doing the best they can and trying to win.
Yeah, watching that full clip again of his post-game comments, he was very clear in saying that he recruited them, but also labeled them as "free agents". In other words, if they're not performing well, and they want to leave for another school after this season, it's on them, not necessarily on him (if I am interpreting correctly).
It's very interesting positioning for him to put out there. I admit I haven't watched all of his post-game press conferences, so I don't know if he's been saying that same thing for a while, or if this is a new tact.
But, I do agree with him, and with you, that if you're getting paid to be a "free agent', then you have to put it out there on the floor. The other thing he noted was that they scored 76 points on the road, which is an achievement. But you also can't allow the home team to get 80+.
Maybe it is passive aggressive, but there is some merit to what he is saying.
So far, I think this is HC Cronin's most inconsistent and underachieving team that he's had at UCLA. They lack the ability to play good defense for an entire game and aren't tough and hard to beat as with his previous teams. Losing Mara and trying to replace him with Booker was HC Cronin's biggest blunder, in my opinion. For a team that had a #12 AP preseason ranking, missing out on the NCAA tournament this year would be a huge disappointment. And if there are problems constructing and coaching a competitive roster next season, the UCLA basketball program could be at risk of sliding further back into mediocrity and irrelevance. This season is far from being over yet, but are these Bruins going to turn the corner soon? Apparently, I'm still Waiting4ever...
As a tactician, mick is fair. I have yet to see him able to adopt a fast paced offense, in some part because he doesn’t recruit that style of player but even when he’s had teams capable of playing up tempo, he’s throttled them back and played his grinding matchup offense. As a defensive coach, I think he’s one of the better. As I compare him to Roy Williams or Bill Self or Calipari, he’s a better defensive coach. However, he’s never had the caliber of player as those coaches and his offensive liabilities are detrimental. Apart from a weak mid Major, when was the last time in the Cronin era that Bruins blew out anyone? The more I watch him, the more I think of Howland and the similarities. However during the Howland glory days, he was willing to embrace the up tempo game when he had the opportunity. Mick makes every game a grind. I’m starting to believe that has been a big factor in his recruiting outcomes as well.
Finally, I’m going on record as saying Dent has been a big disappointment. I was so excited to move past Andrews and see a floor leader with great vision, true scoring and distributing ability. Apart for a few early season cupcakes, we’ve seen none of that. He doesn’t score, gets in foul trouble, and disappears for long stretches. This team desperately needs a floor leader and scorer who is never afraid to shoot, gets the tough bucket and keeps his teammates in the game. Dent hasn’t been that guy.
He's been banged up a lot but dunno if that is the reason for his hesitancy, or if it is adjustment to the Big 10, or just that he doesn't fit into Mick's system
UCLA basketball is a used car lot full of lemons. The paint looks great but underneath the hood is nothing more than bad transmission and engine ready to blow the minute you drive it off the lot. This all squarely falls on Cronin. He’ll never be the Bugatti salesman. He is more the go kart attendant coach
- Last season, Cronin worked the transfer portal. Kobe Johnson flopped, Skyy and EDJ are OK, Tyler Bilodeau is the only one showing up now.
- This season, he repeated last season, thinking Dent would be that guy. Flop. Don't even get me started on Xavier Booker.
To be competitive, as in challenge for Big 10 champion, protected 1-2 seed, we need 2-3 NBA-level talent folks on the roster (solid 5-star freshmen) that is mixed in with transfer talent and 4-stars that stay multi-year.
We cannot rent a roster every year and expect to win.
Though I agree with this premise, I don't think "4-stars that stay multi-year" is possible now in the NIL era. Either they will go to the NBA, or players will transfer , for more $$, more playing time etc.
The NIL era is going to be "rent a roster", unless the NCAA changes the rules
Mendoza, Indiana QB who just won a national championship was a 2* player out of high school. Many of Indiana's players were 3* from JMU. They have chemistry, character, and an outstanding coach. That's why they won.
Cronin is the problem. He can't adapt, his player evaluation is either poor or he destroys good kids with good potential after they arrive, or both. And great local kids don't want to play for him.
He throws blame around like a hot potato. He is not a great coach and he is a terrible offensive coach. His screaming is all to the wind, at this point.
And he's a multi millionaire tyrant who has made the comment that he was worried about how to pay for his daughter's private school tuition. Oh and that he can't trade his players... what a guy!
I agree that in the NIL era, a coach needs to perfect the "rent a roster" strategy to be able to win.
It's not just Cronin who is struggling in this new era. Bill Self and Kansas has struggled the last few years and his record this season is barely better than ours. John Calipari was almost fired by Kentucky before he saw the writing on the wall and resigned. Florida is having a down year even though they just won the championship. Dan Hurley also had to endure a down year and we'll see how they do this year. The only teams that seem to do well the last few years consistently are Duke, Houston, and Arizona. Arizona's tournament record is Alford-esque however. Duke went to the national championship game but their NIL chest is also equivalent to the GDP of a small country so they can just reload with whoever they wish. I think Kelvin Sampson is the best coach in the game today but he's nearing retirement for sure. Then you have random schools like BYU and Arkansas throwing insane amounts of money at recruits. Are you willing to pay a 5-star recruit more than what we are paying Bob Chesney? Because that's what BYU is doing with AJ Dysbansa - and they had enough money left over to build a competent roster. That's the market rate to secure 5-star talent nowadays.
I mentioned in another thread that I didn't consider Dent a flop. Yes, he's not scoring as much as we all hoped, but he's still one of the best PGs in the country in assists and with him running the offense, UCLA had one of the most efficient offenses in the country before Sky Clark went down. It was often the defense that failed us.
That said, I can fall either side on whether or not to keep Cronin. I think he's a decent X's and O's coach and he is a good developer of talent. But recruiting misses and lack of NIL has definitely impacted his record. Problem is, I doubt a new coach would help when it comes to generating excitement for NIL. We were all so excited for Bob Chesney and the best Bob Myers said we can hope for is that we'd be top 1/3rd in NIL in the conference, not even the country! But I can easily name more than 6 B10 schools that have more NIL for football than we do so I think even top 1/3rd is optimistic.
- Aday Mara leaving is on Cronin. And him betting on Booker is also on him. I don't know why we thought spending $1M on a stretch PF who can't rebound and shoots too many 3s is a good idea. Vs someone who can rebound and lock down the interior (Adem Bona prototype).
- On Dent: The problem is we shelled out $2M. That means you expect more than a facilitator, you need someone who can also generate offense themselves, whether iso or at least hitting the 3.
Do college basketball teams have GMs? Is that a thing that could work? Seems like football teams are beginning to use that model
UCLA hired a director of scouting this last offseason (aka a GM in name only) over the summer, so we'll see if that makes a notable change to take recruiting and scouting off of Cronin's plate.
I also would argue that Cronin has never been the best recruiter, at least in recent years, and the NIL portal era exacerbates this issue
I did not get out of bed until the second half, in which it seemed we were at least competitive, my impression is despite past success Cronin will not get us past the first weekend if we even make the tournament. Bilodeau surprised me, he seems to be improving as the season goes along which is what we should expect from the whole team really.
Sorry to disagree run, but we were a disaster in the second half, falling behind by as much as 19 points, when only down by 6 in the first half.
As DD said, Dent disappeared, EDJ fouled out and it was several minutes before we even scored in the second half.
Roster construction is a central problem but players do not want to come to UCLA. They don't want to play for Cronin.
The problems are multiple... no offensive flow, living by the 3, no chemistry, no defense, no heart, no dancing.
I guess I just thought that because I missed the first half...
It would have been better to sleep through the second half 🤣
lol I guess so!
I'm glad it was too early for me to be drinking.
🤣
Better if we'd all sleep through this season. They won't make the tournament; this is Cronin's last season at UCLA. It's written all over the place.
It is unlikely that there would be an individual who would bank roll Cronin's $22 million buyout and UCLA won't fire him as they don't want to pay it...
UCLA needs to save their pennies to pay the Rose Bowl zillions so we can play football in lifeless SoFi in the midst of lovely Inglewood.
Our only hope is that Cronin resigns. He has plenty of money and he has stated in the past that he's accomplished enough (youngest to 500 🤣) and doesn't need the job. Let this be true.
I hope you are right. it's basically a dumpster fire at this point.
I honestly hope Chesney can avoid Jelly 2.0, it's our only hope for at least the football program. UCLA's football schedule doesn't look too difficult other than Oregon, SUC and Michigan. They may be able to beat Michigan, who knows. SUC and Oregon will be a lot more challenging. But again, I have hope that Chesney can at least begin to change the culture and of course the only way to do this is to avoid the entire Athletic Dept of LOSERS. Now Cronin has to some extent done this on the basketball side, he has "walled off" Jelly 2.0 and his band of miscreants, but as we've all seen it hasn't helped much, he's just a bad coach. Both football and basketball have been terribly neglected at UCLA and continue to be. Again, I just hope Chesney can change some of that on the football side. Chesney is attempting to pull a "Cignetti" at UCLA, I don't think it's the same situation. At Indiana the Athletic Dept operates different and they at least have some competent people working there. At UCLA, that is hard to find.
Point redux: The problem isn't that YoungestTo500™ (who will be challenged to hit .500 next year) doesn't know how to construct a roster. It's that he is unable to do so because he is toxic. Consider next year's starting 5 and roster. Can he even field a team?
Mick's no excuses comment was textbook passive aggressive.
He went on to say that he recruited the players but he couldn't trade them 🤣 just wow...
Passive aggressive 💯
Here's the quotes...
'Blame me. I offer no excuses.'
What can you do?
'Nothing. I can't trade guys.'
To Cronin... Please resign. Take your 'youngest to 500' stat and leave. You said it yourself, you don't need this job, remember?
Gotta wonder if his verbal rebuke is intended to make the players that he recruited play better defense, or if he's expressing total frustration that nothing can be done about it and that he's actually lost control of the players that he recruited. Trading players during midseason seems like an idea that only he could conceive of and support (lol).
Just so sad that this is where we have landed. Cronin is simply not the right coach. I don't know how low our team needs to fall before a change is made, but donut head has pulled another chipster with the extension.
Bilo had a very telling comment... he said that the players were quiet on the court, not really talking to each other. We do not have one leader on this team, and it feels disjointed and dispassionate.
Seems the players' confidence has taken big hits after trying different things and still nothing is working consistently for them. So far, the HC doesn't appear to have any answers, with no useful switch to flip for quick and permanent improvements, given the roster that he created. Add the contract extension to the fire and he'll have one very hot seat going into next season.
I predicted midyear trades of these professionals. If midyear acquisitions can be made, then why not trades?
I guess you can read whatever you want from post game comments. I take "no excuses" as Mick taking responsibility for the loss and responsibility for "poor" recruiting
That was my interpretation, as well. Though, that comment will probably make the players feel pretty crappy and is certainly not encouraging to these young men, who are presumably doing the best they can and trying to win.
Idk watching the last couple of games, it feels like there are more than a few players who aren’t doing the best they can to win.
Yeah, watching that full clip again of his post-game comments, he was very clear in saying that he recruited them, but also labeled them as "free agents". In other words, if they're not performing well, and they want to leave for another school after this season, it's on them, not necessarily on him (if I am interpreting correctly).
It's very interesting positioning for him to put out there. I admit I haven't watched all of his post-game press conferences, so I don't know if he's been saying that same thing for a while, or if this is a new tact.
But, I do agree with him, and with you, that if you're getting paid to be a "free agent', then you have to put it out there on the floor. The other thing he noted was that they scored 76 points on the road, which is an achievement. But you also can't allow the home team to get 80+.
Maybe it is passive aggressive, but there is some merit to what he is saying.
So far, I think this is HC Cronin's most inconsistent and underachieving team that he's had at UCLA. They lack the ability to play good defense for an entire game and aren't tough and hard to beat as with his previous teams. Losing Mara and trying to replace him with Booker was HC Cronin's biggest blunder, in my opinion. For a team that had a #12 AP preseason ranking, missing out on the NCAA tournament this year would be a huge disappointment. And if there are problems constructing and coaching a competitive roster next season, the UCLA basketball program could be at risk of sliding further back into mediocrity and irrelevance. This season is far from being over yet, but are these Bruins going to turn the corner soon? Apparently, I'm still Waiting4ever...
As a tactician, mick is fair. I have yet to see him able to adopt a fast paced offense, in some part because he doesn’t recruit that style of player but even when he’s had teams capable of playing up tempo, he’s throttled them back and played his grinding matchup offense. As a defensive coach, I think he’s one of the better. As I compare him to Roy Williams or Bill Self or Calipari, he’s a better defensive coach. However, he’s never had the caliber of player as those coaches and his offensive liabilities are detrimental. Apart from a weak mid Major, when was the last time in the Cronin era that Bruins blew out anyone? The more I watch him, the more I think of Howland and the similarities. However during the Howland glory days, he was willing to embrace the up tempo game when he had the opportunity. Mick makes every game a grind. I’m starting to believe that has been a big factor in his recruiting outcomes as well.
Finally, I’m going on record as saying Dent has been a big disappointment. I was so excited to move past Andrews and see a floor leader with great vision, true scoring and distributing ability. Apart for a few early season cupcakes, we’ve seen none of that. He doesn’t score, gets in foul trouble, and disappears for long stretches. This team desperately needs a floor leader and scorer who is never afraid to shoot, gets the tough bucket and keeps his teammates in the game. Dent hasn’t been that guy.
He's been banged up a lot but dunno if that is the reason for his hesitancy, or if it is adjustment to the Big 10, or just that he doesn't fit into Mick's system
Agree with your other points and about how Mick is similar to Howland
UCLA basketball is a used car lot full of lemons. The paint looks great but underneath the hood is nothing more than bad transmission and engine ready to blow the minute you drive it off the lot. This all squarely falls on Cronin. He’ll never be the Bugatti salesman. He is more the go kart attendant coach
Apparently, somebody saw that lemonade was possible from the lemons and immediately offerred up a nice warranty extension.
LOL
Same issue as last year.
We haven't figured out a winning recipe in the post-NIL world.
- 2 seasons ago, Cronin tried going international. That failed horribly.
- Last season, Cronin worked the transfer portal. Kobe Johnson flopped, Skyy and EDJ are OK, Tyler Bilodeau is the only one showing up now.
- This season, he repeated last season, thinking Dent would be that guy. Flop. Don't even get me started on Xavier Booker.
To be competitive, as in challenge for Big 10 champion, protected 1-2 seed, we need 2-3 NBA-level talent folks on the roster (solid 5-star freshmen) that is mixed in with transfer talent and 4-stars that stay multi-year.
We cannot rent a roster every year and expect to win.
Though I agree with this premise, I don't think "4-stars that stay multi-year" is possible now in the NIL era. Either they will go to the NBA, or players will transfer , for more $$, more playing time etc.
The NIL era is going to be "rent a roster", unless the NCAA changes the rules
Mendoza, Indiana QB who just won a national championship was a 2* player out of high school. Many of Indiana's players were 3* from JMU. They have chemistry, character, and an outstanding coach. That's why they won.
Cronin is the problem. He can't adapt, his player evaluation is either poor or he destroys good kids with good potential after they arrive, or both. And great local kids don't want to play for him.
He throws blame around like a hot potato. He is not a great coach and he is a terrible offensive coach. His screaming is all to the wind, at this point.
And he's a multi millionaire tyrant who has made the comment that he was worried about how to pay for his daughter's private school tuition. Oh and that he can't trade his players... what a guy!
I agree that in the NIL era, a coach needs to perfect the "rent a roster" strategy to be able to win.
It's not just Cronin who is struggling in this new era. Bill Self and Kansas has struggled the last few years and his record this season is barely better than ours. John Calipari was almost fired by Kentucky before he saw the writing on the wall and resigned. Florida is having a down year even though they just won the championship. Dan Hurley also had to endure a down year and we'll see how they do this year. The only teams that seem to do well the last few years consistently are Duke, Houston, and Arizona. Arizona's tournament record is Alford-esque however. Duke went to the national championship game but their NIL chest is also equivalent to the GDP of a small country so they can just reload with whoever they wish. I think Kelvin Sampson is the best coach in the game today but he's nearing retirement for sure. Then you have random schools like BYU and Arkansas throwing insane amounts of money at recruits. Are you willing to pay a 5-star recruit more than what we are paying Bob Chesney? Because that's what BYU is doing with AJ Dysbansa - and they had enough money left over to build a competent roster. That's the market rate to secure 5-star talent nowadays.
I mentioned in another thread that I didn't consider Dent a flop. Yes, he's not scoring as much as we all hoped, but he's still one of the best PGs in the country in assists and with him running the offense, UCLA had one of the most efficient offenses in the country before Sky Clark went down. It was often the defense that failed us.
That said, I can fall either side on whether or not to keep Cronin. I think he's a decent X's and O's coach and he is a good developer of talent. But recruiting misses and lack of NIL has definitely impacted his record. Problem is, I doubt a new coach would help when it comes to generating excitement for NIL. We were all so excited for Bob Chesney and the best Bob Myers said we can hope for is that we'd be top 1/3rd in NIL in the conference, not even the country! But I can easily name more than 6 B10 schools that have more NIL for football than we do so I think even top 1/3rd is optimistic.
I mostly agree with you.
Couple of points of disagreement:
- Aday Mara leaving is on Cronin. And him betting on Booker is also on him. I don't know why we thought spending $1M on a stretch PF who can't rebound and shoots too many 3s is a good idea. Vs someone who can rebound and lock down the interior (Adem Bona prototype).
- On Dent: The problem is we shelled out $2M. That means you expect more than a facilitator, you need someone who can also generate offense themselves, whether iso or at least hitting the 3.
Dent is a $3M man. What expectations, then?