Gets Auburn on probation. He has already had one issue with an assistant coach at AU fired for corruption and bribery (considering his past at Tenn, many thought this would get him fired), had the issues with illegal recruiting at Tenn, had the issues when he was an assistant coach at Iowa, recording conversations with a recruit, getting Illinois in trouble. Fact is, guy is a great basketball coach but also fact is, the guy is a SLIMEBALL. He currently is living off a roster with GA kids, if Crean starts recruiting better as he already is, I wonder if Pearl will have to resort to cheating again. Some of his best players are Bryce Brown from Stone Mtn, Okeke from Atlanta, Jared Harper from Mableton, and Mclemore from Worth County.

I know a lot of AU fans and they are so excited, rightfully so, but I can't help but remember how I felt abut having Harrick-I was so excited and thought, man, we finally got a us coach (after Tubby left us) and then BAM, the Tony Cole scandal and Jim Harrick JR scandal. UGHH, guess just waiting to see if that happens to Auburn-hoping it does honestly. When you play with fire, you usually get burned.

Don't jinx us... I get nervous throwing stones.
Of those Auburn kids from GA, Chuma is the only one that we recruited hard to the end. We already had Jordan & Tyree committed and weren't recruiting Harper (oops!). We're recruiting with the big boys now, it's dirty up there.

I have a good friend that coaches basketball at worth, said we never recruited mclemore.

Well, Pearl was a team manager at Boston College during that point shaving scandal years ago, so there's that.

Oh I get your point, but we had Harrick so I felt safe!! Pearl is a good coach and obviously either a better judge of talent than Fox or better at developing talent.

Don't forget that a 2 Star (JJ) and 3 Star (Yante) developed into 1st Team All-SEC and SEC POY while also becoming two of the greatest Dawgs ever while Fox was here. Fox's teams were filled with bottom third SEC talent and finished top third regularly.

Yep, that was a stretch... bottom third talent and top half results is more accurate. We were fourth in 10/11 and 6th at 10-8 in 15/16.

It was time for a change but Fox and Staff did a respectable job in their time here. I've said before that Fox had 5 or 6 NCAA Teams but the problem is we only made it twice and that sits squarely on Fox's shoulders.

The 16/17 team was really good, that's probably the most disappointing year (9-9). We lost at Florida in OT in a game we had in hand. We had KY beat at home and on the road but Monk and DeAaron Fox made crazy shots to beat us and then we had the epic melt down at A&M. Win just one of those and we're probably in.

Fox had some good teams while here without recruiting very well is my point. He doesn't deserve the bashing he gets for coaching (maybe recruiting) and Crean doesn't deserve praise quite yet when we just went 2-16 and looked awful.

This recruiting class is gonna be rated extremely high in the end but I am a bit baffled by it. Get a PG and a big man or two and I'll feel a whole lot better about it. Are we gonna sign 7, maybe so?? This position less basketball talk sounds good until you need to break a press or get a rebound or defend on the post.

Sid-

I think Fox's biggest issue was that he was hired here and didn't try to hire coaches with ties to the area-and then he refused to even try to tap into the AAU circuit. I don't think he was a horrible coach, I think he was stubborn but his teams played hard for him. I also know he started his career not much better than Crean, 14-17 and 5-11 in the SEC, at a time the SEC was not as strong as it is now. He had taken over a roster with Trey Thompkins and Travis Leslie, also had Dustin Ware-better than any PG we had this year, Chris Barnes, Jeremy Price and Albert Jackson. I believe he might have taken over a more talented roster-you could certainly make an argument.

The jury is certainly out on Crean, I felt they should have won more games this year, but they were changing styles more than Fox/Felton, as both those guys in my mind were more about slower pace/defense while Crean is more up tempo and offense focused. You can say that Crean recruits at a much higher level than did Fox, and while that might not produce the results, adding talent is the best way to make a team better.

I agree we need a PG and a big to compliment what we already have. By my count, we are losing 7 of our 15 player roster, 5 of those are scholarship players. So, we have one more spot left, and there are many rumors that one more, likely Toppin will leave. That creates two more spots, one for a PG and one for a big which is what I think you will see.

Haney,
Agree with bout everything you said. The recruiting to UGA and AAU is/was a complicated matter, as we're seeing it is/was very dirty and Fox and Staff were not.

Yes, I was actually not mad at Fox at first, you have to be careful with that group, but you really do need to explore it and see what you can do. With all these one and done kids, you have to decide if you want to go that route or not. I think Crean is ok with that obviously with going hard and getting Edwards-but I think the reason he wanted to get Edwards is because he is like the pied piper that Crean needed to show elite recruits Athens is a good place-not just for football studs.

And it's not like Fox and Staff ignored AAU games, tourneys, coaches and players, they went.... it was the elite players and AAU Coaches who ignored Fox and Staff for $ome reason.

Sid and Haney, I also agree with the last several posts. I think Fox was a good coach in terms of game prep and X's & O's, and so forth. He just didn't get the talent to Athens - for whatever reason. And there's probably a different reason for everyone you ask. I'm not an insider, so I can't say what the best way to navigate those waters is.

What I do know is that there is an absolute ton of hoops talent in this state. And for seemingly forever, the huge majority of that talent has never made it to Athens. With Crean - a big name himself - landing the big fish in year 1 (1st full recruiting cycle), that can only be a good thing for the program. It's just one piece, but Basketball is a game where one player can completely transform a team. Plus we've got a few good pieces around him, as well as some good pieces coming back. And just a few good pieces over 2-3 years can transform a program. Hopefully Crean can make that happen.

So true! If I think about it too much, my head will explode. I could strangle Adams for how he treated our program and those kids. He didn't even have the guts to face the players. Gutless piece of crap IYAM....

I think we already have a grad transfer PG committed. It can't be announced yet. I think we will get a post -either a freshman or a grad transfer. Crean's not done with this class yet. Don't you worry.

Fox was not a great coach by any stretch. If he was, he would have been in demand after his firing. Let's see if he gets one of the jobs more geographically suited to him this off season. I think his daughter graduates this year. Good coaching is more than Xs and Os. You have to recruit talent. He recruited lesser talent and then played a slow game to shorten the clock and try to win games at the end. Frankly, that's boring basketball. Crean's losses were usually more exciting than Fox's wins. He refused to recruit some kids that we have normally gotten in Athens over the years. Piss poor evaluations of talent. The staff begged him to offer Harper, the AU PG - nope. The staff begged him to get in on Brown at AU - nope. And those kids play us with a big ole chip on their shoulders. 4 of AU's 5 starters are from GA. Pathetic really. I get really tired of people praising Fox's coaching. He rarely played freshmen, which basically wasted 1 year of a kid's eligibility; he cursed at and belittled kids in front of the entire crowd if he didn't like something they did. He recruited poorly. He admitted he was too tough on JJ, and JJ flourished when Fox got off his back and let him play.

I agree with your last paragraph, Red. Crean is gonna get talent. He always has.

Monk, you and Driiler and I saw Adams's agenda and how he SCREWED our basketball program for years.

We can debate how good a coach Felton was, but can we all agree he never stood s chance at UGA considering what he walked into in 2003?

Felton got Mike Mercer, Billy Humphrey, Channing Toney, and several others of worth. Thompkins, Leslie, Woodbury, etc.

Felton had arguably the best recruiting of any coach in a long, long time. He had a chance here. He had more than enough chance.

Speaking of Pearl and AU, their instate rival, Bama, is rumoured to be about to make a coaching change.

That was a lot of money poorly spent to walk away now.

More than a rumor on Avery, he's done. Negotiating buyout now but it's a done deal, team has already been notified.

He also got Sundiate Gainesand Levi Stokes.

He was handicapped terribly by Adams and Evans in more than one way. One way was Adams destroyed UGA's reputation among AAU and High school coaches. That is why those early classes were full of out of state guys.
He was able to sign an NBA quality player early, but other than Gaines and Stukes he was unable to recruit much talent early.

He was able to improve UGA recruiting his last fe2 years but depth was a problem. Louis Williams ever enrolled. Mercer suffered a devastating knee injury. Humphrey had the nonsense arrest for having a weapon on campus and had academic issues causin* him to miss time. Travis Leslie had to sit out the second half of his freshman year to concentrate on academics.

Felton was not able to take what he had and do well enough with it to keep his job, but to claim that he had the advantages and support from the administration that Fox and Crean have is factually incorrect.

I agree for the most part. Felton recruited OK at times; he just was not a good coach. His "system" was awful and hard to watch.