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ESPN anchor Jay Bilas recently ripped into UM head basketball coach John Beilein on national TV....
"When you go into a season and all the coaches try to give their wisdom to them, it's got to be almost a Montessori experience," Beilein said of the interactive approach to learning. "They've got to put their hands on it and say, we told you (that) you can't lean back on a charge, then you won't get it. They've got to see it over and over. That's what we're doing. We're learning how to play college basketball." Michigan has played with the inconsistency expected of a team led by two freshmen in the backcourt and two sophomores in the frontcourt, and a team restricted by the loss of players from the roster.
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MLiveBlog
MLiveBlog's responseI detest having to bring this up again because I love John Beilein and think he was a great choice for Michigan, and that he will do a good job there in time. But, what is he talking about?!
Beilein has taken great pains to suggest that his players don't know a basketball from a bowling ball, that his players are "learning how to play college basketball" and that when the Michigan coaches "give their wisdom to them, it's got to be almost a Montessori experience." What?! Beilein makes his players sound so stupid and clueless that it is insulting.
First, and I say this as a guy who thinks that basketball is far more complicated than most seem to understand, to refer to your own basketball understanding as "wisdom" seems a bit much. Knowledge, yes. Wisdom, take a pill. Even John Wooden wouldn't refer to his own knowledge as "wisdom."
Second, if your system is so complicated that you need to refer to recruited athletes and students admitted to the University of Michigan as the basketball equivalent of toddlers, maybe you should simplify things so you can compete favorably with Harvard, Central Michigan or Western Kentucky.
Beilein has no depth (because of attrition), but Manny Harris (consensus top-50 recruit), DeShawn Sims (consensus top-50 recruit), Kelvin Grady (heavily recruited) and Ekpe Udoh (heavily recruited) are all good enough and smart enough to be competitive. Heck, Purdue is full of freshmen and sophomores, and its players are not being referred to as if they are idiots.
Michigan is off to its worst start in 25 years, and it is not all the players' fault. Nobody is complaining about the poor play because Beilein deserves time to do it his way. Nobody asked me for my advice, and I understand that. But, if I were in Beilein's situation, I would quit making so many excuses and save my breath for teaching. Or, maybe I'm not smart enough to get it, either.
Is Bilas still mourning Amaker or just plain wrong? Probably both.
Posted by jcarty January 08, 2008 09:53AM
It's rare to see anyone on ESPN criticize a college basketball coach, let alone lay the boots to a first-year coach who accepted what everyone agreed was a rebuilding job.
So Jay Bilas' savaging of John Beilein and the job he's done at Michigan this season would have stood out regardless of both men's backgrounds, but when you add in the fact Bilas is the close friend of the man Beilein replaced, Tommy Amaker, the ESPN analyst's comments have become the topic of the week around Ann Arbor.
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