A Final Four appearance and making the Sweet 16 five out of six years (only three teams did that in those six years) tells me that Barnes must coach basketball pretty well. Do you watch UT basketball... at all? Or did you just read the Simmons' blogs, and he told you that Barnes sucks?
Sorry... but I don't consider bashing my university's basketball coach as "humor". It's more like slander and malicious intent. And that fact that he is well appreciated by many does actually damage Barnes' reputation and opinions that fans would have about him. Fans that didn't know anything about Barnes will read Simmons' blogs and assume he really is a terrible coach. Because Simmons is so knowledgeable about the NBA, people will assume that he has knowledge about college basketball. He started watching UT because of Durant, and he was basically b****ing about Barnes not giving Durant 35+ shots a game. I'm not alone either. Any Longhorn fan that posts on the Longhorn sports forums know exactly what I'm talking about.
I can definitely see that then. There's still no excuse for writing that junk. What is he accomplishing by throwing a coach under a bus when he doesn't even know what he's talking about? Uhhh.... yeah he's a douchebag. You need to read the blogs he made about UT. He might be just a "fan" according to you, but the bottom line is people value his opinion. If a fan doesn't know anything about UT basketball, they will read Simmons' blog and give him the benefit of the doubt.
If the people reading his articles dont know anything about UT, then why does it matter? I go to UT and have watched every game the last couples of years, and I agree that Barnes is a very poor game manager that probably cost us several games by his inability to adapt to new game plans and get Durant the ball in positions to score consistantly enough.
Barnes costing UT games? More like executing one of the best coaching jobs at UT ever. Inability to adapt to new game plans... I don't know... maybe that had something to do with the fact that WE WERE STARTING FOUR FRESHMAN? Durant should get some blame also in not getting the ball enough. If you watched him at the end of games, he was clearly getting fatigued. There were some possessions where he did not even move a step. How can you blame the coach for players fatiguing? I give you that Barnes may not be one of the best in-game coaches, but keep in mind that he's always been a defensive minded coach. This year, he had to deal with a bunch of freshman that played poor defense. He had to completely adjust his mindset and focus much more on offense. Out scoring opponents was our only chance of winning.
I got some questions: 1. Since when did anyone VALUE Simmons' opinion? Sure, we read what he writes and what not, but I consider him like a friend that I talk to about sports--nothing more, nothing less. So.... 2. Why did this turn into a thread about UT basketball? Simmons have said time and time again that he doesn't follow college basketball enough to know about EVERY team in the nation. In fact, I think his opinion's on college basketball teams are just as limited as the next casual NCAA fan. So.... 3. Why get hot and bothered that he bashed UT basketball? He's not a Digger Phelps or a Dick Vitale so why treat him like he's an authority on NCAA basketball or specifically UT basketball? The guy lives in LA.
Nobody values his opinion? That kind of contradicts with the responses here about the blog he made today. It was me. I turned it into a UT bball thread. If Simmons doesn't follow college basketball, he should simply stop talking about it. It's pretty simple. I was getting sick of people complimenting him and his blog. Plus Simmons is a jack ass. Not only is he not an expert, he has no idea what he's talking about... yet during the college basketball season, he continually criticized Rick Barnes in his blog for how he coached the team. Simmons still has a lot of his own fans. As a UT fan, it's pretty sickening to read his BS and think that some people could actually agree with him.
I think people on here are more surprised that someone--especially someone at ESPN--gave McGrady some MVP considerations and that's quite a shocker since the Rockets never seem to get any respect individually or otherwise. Simmons is the "everyman" of the sports media universe. He doesn't try to be a sportswriter and proclaim that what he writes is end all be all. In fact, ever since he started writing for Page 2, I always felt his writing is more of a blog than anything else. People like his articles because he has a sense of humor to them and writes about things we all can write about or relate to. Jackass? Maybe but who isn't when they don't have the same opinion you do? Why are you getting an aneurysm over what Simmons write about Barnes? Barnes is a good coach and that's about it. He's a pretty good recruiter but not an elite coach.
By the time we played USC, we had 4 seasoned players, the freshman excuse only works for so long. Also, maybe Durant was tired because he was never taken out, ever. If a player is tired, give him a 2 or 3 minute break, not rocket science. When you have a very good point guard, the best player in college basketball who commands double teams and one of the best 3 point shooters in the game, it shoudlnt be that hard to score points, but every time he came up against a better coach, he looked clueless at adapting to new strategies. There is no doubt he is a very good recruiter, but there is also no doubt he does not get the most out of him team's talent.
this is absurd. He makes logical, rational points as to why he believes Barnes is a bad coach. Get over it. You don't agree, I'm sorry. Doesn't make him a "douchebag". He's transcended sports journalism with his wit and character.
"Seasoned" or not, they were still freshmen. The fact that they couldn't finish games even late in the season showed that. The bigger problem than inexperience was a lack of size and depth. USC had the size that we lacked. They matched up well against us. We couldn't stop Taj Gibson (a 21 year old freshman). They were more experienced also. I give more credit to USC's size and toughness than us failing to adjust.
You didn't read the blogs did you? Either that, or you don't follow UT basketball that much. Any real UT fan that follows the team would know how wrong Simmons was. He was getting killed on the Longhorn forums.
I'm as big of a UT fan as the next person, but dude...did you SERIOUSLY think there was ANY chance the future #1 draft pick would stay at school? hell, he probably would have skipped college if it wasn't for stern's new rule.
while Rockets64 has kinda gone off the deep end here, simmons was over the top in the barnes criticism. you'd have thought we had by far the best talent in the nation, capable of rolling to a national title, yet it was only b/c of barnes that we weren't going to get there. hell, reading the blogs you were surprised barnes could dress himself in the morning, much less coach a basketball team. and for whoever said we should be able to score with our talent. well, i believe UNC was the only major conference team to score more than UT last year. we scored plenty, our problems were a few things called defense and rebounding, which will happen when your entire frontline (hell, entire starting lineup) graduates or enters the nba draft. and to get back on topic, definitely nice to see tmac getting some well-deserved credit for carrying us this year. still having nash at the top (behind me at #1) though is not good. also, i didn't even notice yao wasn't mentioned, but it is kind of weird now that it's been mentioned.
