Paul Daugherty: Mick

Saturday, March 25, 2006

Mick

Sorry this is a little tardy. I needed to sleep a few hours. Here's what has to happen for Mick Cronin to succeed: Stay the hell out of his way.

It's time for the athletic director and the president to concern themselves with what they should: Raising confidence, morale and oh, yeah, money. Please allow Mick to run the basketball program. Do not mess with him the way you messed with Huggins and Kennedy. There is so much image repairing to do, letting Mick do his job should not be a problem. I'm all for moving on -- the horse is dead -- but I do understand the way the masses feel about Mike Thomas and Nancy Zimpher. They believe Thomas is duplicitous and underqualified. They think Zimpher is arrogant and condescending. They didn't make that up. It seems to me the president and her athletic department hireling need to busy themselves mending those perceptions, not messing with Mick.

If they do, we'll all be in a better mood. And Cronin will succeed as much as Huggins did, likely without the baggage. Live big.

29 Comments:

at 11:01 AM

Anonymous said...

I think Mike Thomas has more than redeemded himself. He made an excellent selection.

You may not have liked the process, but he hit a home run.

Nobody pays too much attention to what the count was when Griffey hit a home run, the fact he hit it was enough.

A properly run personnel search will be at odds with the public's right to know. I was as curious as everyone else and would have liked to have my mine put to rest earlier, but the selection of Mick was superb.

at 11:19 AM

Anonymous said...

Paul..

This still doesn't excuse the damage NZ has done to the University. With all the negative press she has deserved, and all the negative and petty actions she has ordered, her image here is beyond repair. Sorry about that, but as someone who has been with UC over half my lifetime, she is the most inept and contemptable administrator we have ever had. If you want a "miracle cure" for what ails UC right now...give Zimpher her walking papers.

The same goes for certain select board members as well...

Once this administration is gone, the acceleration in donations will be astronomical, and UC will be back where it should be--serving the community and the University population, and not the ego of one person. Her damage has not been limited to basketball--it has extended to other aspects of the University. More importantly, the University population as a whole want her out.

Nancy needs to go back to a blue university in a blue state and be welcomed home--she is the poorest fit for this community I've ever seen.

Give me a president with a CEO outlook who has actually run a successful buisness and understands that personalities are trumped by output on the road to success. If you do your job well, you've earned your position. Enough with emotional , unstable leadership. It helps nobody...

I'm glad you've taken off the rose-colored Nancy glasses--now that you can see, help us out of this mess. We'd really appreciate it!

Thanks!

at 12:30 PM

Anonymous said...

The controversy is obviously going to continue. The situation with the Huggins termination was handled poorly and the wounds are still there.

When two strong personalities clash, the institution is never healed until both parties are gone.

NZ has to go too.

The Board of Trustees or at least one member on the board should have intervened and mitigated the process when Huggins contract was not extended. Failing that, after Huggins reported the problems he was experiencing in recruiting. This should have been handled quickly, quietly and effectively behind the scenes.

There was no one on the Board of Trustees capable and/or willing to fill that role. A word of advise to the Board of Trustees, I don't know why you're on the board, but you have all collectively failed the university.

We do not need you at cocktail parties, ribbon cuttings, or rubber stamping some contract or policy that the staff has developed, you are needed to step up during the hard issues.

The Board of Trustees and NZ have unnecessarily divided the community. Now that the Basketball coach has been selected (an excellent one by the way) it is time for the President and the Board of Trustees to resign for the good of the university. All vintages of the problem should be removed so the university can thrive again, alumni feel proud of the university and start contributing again.

If you indeed love the university do the right thing and resign.

at 3:13 PM

Anonymous said...

We wish Mick well and I do believe he will do a good job - but to give Thomas credit for the selection is a joke, all he had to do was offer the job to Andy or Mick and it would have been a good choice - so why does he have to hire and pay, I bet over $100,000, to a consultant do reference checks on Mick - unless it's payback for getting him the AD job at UC - it's clear the only Thomas is good at is lying.

at 7:37 PM

Anonymous said...

Congratulations to Dr. Nancy Zimpher and the UC Board of Trustees for standing up to Huggins and doing the right thing. Even head basketball coaches have bosses. Dr. Zimpher's going to be president of UC for a long time. Trustees on the UC Board of Trustees will be there for as long as their term lasts - they cannot be fired and no one is going to resign that gig. AD Mike Thomas has proven that he can identify and hire the right person for the job.

So, for the last time, get over it Huggins apologists! Your act has become tiresome.

at 8:08 PM

Anonymous said...

Unfortunately I fear you're right about removing the Board of Trustees, but the appeal is for them to do the right thing and resign.

I found it very interesting that a posting on another blog credits Cox as being a XU alumni. I don't know what we did to deserve that jerk on our Board of Trustees. It would be nice if the trustees actually had a tie to UC. That guy clearly has no clue.

at 10:05 PM

Anonymous said...

Paul:

First, thanks for putting on paper over the last week what so, so many of us feel. I hope you will continue to closely monitor and report on the activities of Zimpher and Thomas as well as report on the thoughts and feelings of those of us in great unwashed (UC graduates before Zimpher's arrival).

As far as your suggestion to give Thomas another chance, I'm willing to do that. He inherited a difficult situation and thus deserves another chance. I can honestly say, however, I don't think many people will have changed their minds about him six months or a year from now. We got to see a real pro in action in Bob Goin and this guy doesn't apppear to measure up. Hopefully, I'm wrong.

As far as Zimpher is concerned, I feel just like the UCATS members you wrote about last week. I am very offended by references to "raising the standards" of the school, because it does imply that UC was substandard before her arrival. I also believe that Zimpher thinks she knows what's best for us and I resent it. Finally, unlike Thomas, Zimpher inherited a good situation from Dr. Steger and through arrogance and stupidity has screwed it up. The bottom line is she needs to be shown the door (along with Trustee Cox and a few others).

at 6:53 AM

Anonymous said...

NaZi needs to go.

The ill feelings remain, there is nothing that she can bring to the program and the university that she has not taken from the them severalfold. Time will not heal those wounds, only departure.

Leave NaZi leave!!!!!!

at 8:55 AM

Anonymous said...

I am very excited about my alma mater not being referred to as a renegade, out of bounds, rule breaking program. Timing may have not been right on the firing of Huggins but the right action was done.
Zimpfer looks crazy in the way she dresses and smiles, but she cleaned out a bad apple that had been rotting on the tree for a few years and making everyone outside of Cincinnati think of our univeristy as a four-year JUCO. That's not my image of UC, but it was the national perception.

For years Huggins was piling up regular season wins in a mid-level league and had not made the Sweet 16 in a decade. At programs like UCLA and North Carolina that does not build crowd support, that gets you fired. Just ask Steve Lavin and Matt Doherty. If Huggins had been around for 3-4 years in the Big East he would have flopped. Where has the recruiting been since Mick left? In the dumpster!

If you want to know the reason why the Hire AK chants were not answered with an OK look no further than the UC bench. His recruiting prowess was neglible and he did not have a handle on the team that he was babysitting for the past year as two of his guys obviously did not get the student part of being a student-athlete. If you are the CEO of Bearcat Basketball then you had better be able to nut up and take the responsibility for the bad times like academic issues and building a roster of basketbal players along with the good times like the win over WVU and the ability to overcome. I would have had a lot more respect for him had he taken control of this academic thing earlier in the quarter and not let it linger until the last week of the semester.

I am glad that all three of the heads of Bearcat basketball have jobs and that now we can get on with living BIG instead of just bitching BIG.

at 11:02 AM

Paul Daugherty said...

when you guys aren't tossing angry rhetoric, you're writing reasoned, insightful stuff. I read it all. And I thank you.

at 2:35 PM

Anonymous said...

The fact is NaZi & the Board of Trustees badly bungled the whole issue. One would expect the Board of Trustees to intervene when things broke down between NaZi and Huggins. Not a one of them had the skills to intervene and resolve the problem. They just stood around like a bunch of cigar store indians and let the whole thing happen.

The $100,000 used to hire a consulting firm was peanuts compared to the $3 million wasted to get rid of a top ten coach. Is it any wonder a lot of the alumni are not going to entrust the Board of Trustees and NaZi with their contributions to the university in hopes of it being used wisely?

I find it interesting that Cox is an XU alumni. I attributed his mismanagement, incompetence and general ineffectiveness to his own stupidity. I see know that perhaps his educational circulum may have contributed to shortcomings as an UC trustee. I agree with the previous writer, let's get UC alumni on the Board of Trustees.

Maybe the bylaws need to be changed to make that a requirement.

I certainly don't trust Cox's skills and it leads one to question his motives.

at 3:15 PM

Anonymous said...

If an election were held for President of UC,with the students, faculty, alumni and Board of Trustees voting and the selection was Zimpher or "None of above", then "None of above would get 85%-90% of the vote.

She is clearly a loser. She's the worst college president in the whole nation. The way the university is divided is unpreceded and brings additional bad press to the university way beyone what was done to Huggins.

How the Board of Trustees ever blundered so badly that we ended up with her is incomprehenible!!

at 10:09 PM

Anonymous said...

XBBall:

There should DEFINITELY be a requirement for alumni status for the University you serve. Without a connection to the institution, you will run a greater risk of serving your own ends vs. the University community. This makes for a bad situation. I would also add that BOT membership and the position of University president should be ELECTED and not APPOINTED positions. That way your actions reflect the wishes of the population you serve. Hopefully this will become the case in the near future.

Would you want an XU president from UD and a BOT chairman from UC! Think about it!

Later!

at 10:30 PM

Anonymous said...

This it truly pathetic, an XU alumni who truly hates the University of Cincinnati, commenting on our blog, extolling the virtues of XU alumni who have acted heavy handingly to get rid of our coach.

The Board of Trustees clearly do not have the capabilities to represent UC's best interest. The fact we have this controversy is in large part because they abdicated their responsiblities to act in the unversities best intestests. A sad and pathetic performance on their part. I add my voice to demand the resignation of all the Trustees.

When did the "trust" go out of "trustee".

at 3:25 PM

Anonymous said...

No kidding Paul, some of your finest writing was in Friday's paper. Two Doc columns.... it doesn't get much better than that... I carried around the sports section all weekend and made everyone I ran into read them. I was a complete pain in the ass, but after reading, everyone thanked me...

at 3:57 PM

Paul Daugherty said...

Thanks very much, Rick. I'm humbled and appreciative

at 4:17 PM

Anonymous said...

Since when does Paul Daugherty's blog become the "Official Blog for Whining Huggins Apologists"? If you want your own blog, go to one of the various Bearcat websites and do your crying over there.

As for the UC Board of Trustees, any decision by the Board requires a majority vote. Phil Cox's vote alone didn't decide anything. Jeff Wyler was the strongest pro-Huggins voice on the Board. Yet, Wyler changed his position on firing Huggs within a one-year period. Why? If the conspiracy theorists want to blame the Board of Trustees for the Huggins mess, perhaps they ought to waste their time investigating that angle.

Finally, re: changing the rules with respect to the UC Board of Trustees. This is just another example of the mind set that led to the Bearcats' negative national reputation [i.e., UNLV-East]. For example, when starting guard Darnell Burton violated team rules by allegedly using an illegal substance, was he booted from the team or even suspended for a meaningful period of time? Why, of course not - the team rule was simply changed! That's not to say Burton was a bad kid. By now, it should be painfully obvious that the "rules are meant to be changed" approach to UC athletics is officially over - and that's a good thing.

Paul Daugherty is right on this issue. Let's give Nancy, Mick , and Mike a chance.

at 5:19 PM

Anonymous said...

Paul's articles on the mess at UC were indeed great last week and I think giving Thomas the benefit of the doubt is reasonable. Zimpher is another story. She is a problem for the entire university not just the athletic department. The Huggins debacle is just the tip of the iceburg. She needs to be fired.

at 5:53 PM

Anonymous said...

My preference is to see ALL of the trustees resigned.

They were less than adequate thoughout the entire process. That mean's Wyler as well as Cox.

Zimpher should go too, maybe first.

at 6:34 PM

Anonymous said...

No one on the UC Board of Trustees is going to resign. If you were on the BOT, would you? No, of course not. And neither will Wyler or anyone else.

Get over the Nancy hating. It's time for us to move on. Have faith in Mick and Mike, if not Nancy.

at 7:58 PM

Anonymous said...

Paul:

That's good advice for Zimpher and Thomas. What's the line on them taking it? 100 to 1?

at 9:35 PM

Anonymous said...

To 6:34

Why would a person on the Board of Trustees who failed horribly, is hated by most of people who truly care about UC, what to subject themselves to the abuse they are receiving and will continue to receive?

They messed up, they didn't correct the problem after they messed up, they didn't apologize for messing up.

It is important for those of us who care about UC to speak up, point out their errors, make sure they or preferably their replacements don't repeat the same mistakes in the future.

Further we expect the Board of Trustees to be capable of and actually reign in "an out of control president". She does not have all of the skills needed to be a college president. She knows some things, but she does not listen, nor consider views of others involved. She absolutely divided the community, by unnecessarily pitting athletics against academics. It was a battle that did not have to be fought!!! She could have laid out the direction she wanted the coach to go in behind the scenes and he would have done want was requested to keep his job. He in fact did do many of the things NZ requested.

I don't think she has a learned a thing from the entire process. I have the feeling she is fully capable of making another huge mistake again.

The Board of Trustees are entrenched and seem to want to wait out the problem, weather the storm so to speak. We should not let them off the hook. New blood is needed on the Board of Trustees.

It is our duty to never let them forget, call them out on their mismanagement and force them out the door where they so deservedly belong.

As far as NZ is concerned no one should let up on her. If the pressure is applied she will not have the "polictical capital" (to coin a phrase) to implement her next hair brained idea.

Unfortunately, the rumor about her going to Northwestern is not true. How unfortuate for us.

She has more than worn out her welcome. Just go away.

at 9:49 AM

Anonymous said...

A little note for the pro-Nancy people on this blog: My major complaint is not the Huggins issue, or even the "raising the standards" issue. It is a University president that stood up in front of the national media and said that every UC degree granted prior to her arrival was not worth the paper it was printed on.

In addition, she slammed UC by implication--saying it was a substandard University before her arrival. She also wants to close UC's doors to the majority of students in the community who could most benefit from a more inclusive state institution (elevating the SAT entrance requirement higher than Duke!). A University should care about the end-product--the graduates, and not who applies. Those who can make the grades will earn the right to stay enrolled. Those who can't will not graduate. A merit-based system is the only way.

You accomplish little when you simply filter out all but the cream of the crop and then crow about your graduation rate--all you've done is narrow your focus to those who had many options to begin with. A University should provide an environment for those that need it to grow and mature. Her policies are at odds with that.

Her national image has also suffered to the point that it will be difficult for her to raise money for the University. This will damage the entire University community. All of these issues have only a peripheral relationship to the basketball situation. That was simply an incident that exposed her capricious, poorly planned, needlessly emotional, and petty leadership.

Am I a Huggins apologist? NO. Do I feel Nancy is damaging the University by her continued presence? YES. My issue is with her and how she has represented my beloved school. It is her leadership that makes me ashamed to be a UC graduate--a remarkable thing considering I have spent over half my life affiliated with UC! I used to bleed Red & Black--now I am ashamed of it. That is quite an accomplishment.

Love for the institution you govern should be the overriding factor in your decisions as a University president, not aggrandizement of a single ego. I fear we have someone who is more interested in self-promotion than the good of the University at this point. This has always been my major objection. The basketball situation simply enhanced it.

She's fired 8 deans since she's been here for heaven's sake! That's a record pace for a UC president in my lifetime...

UC vs. Nancy's ego...

Nancy’s ego should LOSE!

at 10:23 AM

Anonymous said...

Nancy Zimpher fired Dean Tomain, the well-respected Dean of UC's College of Law and replaced him with Louis Bilionis. Who's he?
Why, only a former national director of the uber-liberal ACLU. Nancy also fired the Dean of UC's medical school for no apparent reason. Nancy Zimpher is only using UC as a stepping stone to a presidency at an Ivy League institution. In her wake, she will leave the law school and medical school in worse shape than she found them. If she has no regard for the well-being of UC's respected colleges of law and medicine, how do you think she feels about athletics?

Until she's gone, we must support Mick and the basketball program she obviously disdains.

at 9:44 PM

Anonymous said...

I agree with Nancy we should raise the standards at UC. A good start would be to throw her sorry butt out of Cincinnati.

But let's not stop there. We can further raise the standards by getting rid of the entire Board of Trustees.

at 4:56 PM

Anonymous said...

You can't "get rid" of the UC Board of Trustees. Trustees are appointed by the Governor and are not subject to termination. Yes, trustees may resign, but that never happens. So ends the lesson. Class dismissed.

at 9:56 PM

Anonymous said...

Just had a UC trustee unexpectedly resign 2 months ago. Do a little research my friend. Trustees can also go to jail--if they do, they cannot continue to serve (i.e. the tax-cheating Phil Cox). We may very well see more turnover in the near future...

at 2:57 PM

Anonymous said...

"Tax cheating Phil Cox", say it isn't so. Everyone knows X turns out squeaky clean grads. They may be completely imcompetent as clearly demonstated by Phil Cox, but crooked???

There's just no way someone with his creditentials (or lack thereof can be replaced).

It seems almost to good to be true, maybe they'll even name a competent replacement.

How about our never do well president......

at 3:46 PM

Anonymous said...

Nancy Zimpher did not fire 8 deans. Four have left their positions and all four still work for the University.

Dean Tomain did not get fired. He's teaching in the law school.

The dean of the business school got promoted. Not fired. Promoted.

As of a couple years ago, UC was ranked over 160 by US News. It's now 145 and rising. Newsflash: 160 isn't all that good. It's mediocre. So Nancy isn't entirely wrong with her assessment with the overall condition of the University's academic reputation.

She was hired specifically to boost that reputation, so get off her case for doing what she was hired to do.

More deans left the University in the same time period under Steger than have left under Zimpher.

And about raising the standards. The new minimum standard is 22 on the ACT. That's right...22. Kinda, sorta, a little above average. NKU's minimum is 20. So a 22 is hardly excessive, huh?

UC isn't denying anyone admission. They're just making sure those who do get in can handle the work. The defunct University college had a 25% graduation rate...and that's a 2 year college. Those less qualified enter a remedial program or head to Cincinnati State and admit to UC later. It's the same thing Miami does.

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Saturday, March 25, 2006

Mick

29 Comments: