New court filings name former UConn standouts Rodney Purvis, Sterling Gibbs, Terry Larrier in Kevin Ollie case

[Madmannsucks]

I listened to this Calhoun/Jacobs podcast from last October-Listening to JC on KO is poignant, to say the least. Good listen, the KO portion starts around 18:45-this is as good a place as any for this.

 

[nelsonmuntz]

Part of the job of a coach is to keep players. The way to keep players is by proving you can coach them up and help them achieve their career goals. KO failed at that. We saw that failure in the won-loss record, in the eye test of quality of play, in the lack of player development, and in the transfers.

Look, Ollie was fired for two reasons -- poor performance and NCAA violations. The NCAA violations gave UConn the right ("cause") to stop paying him 6 months after he stopped working. There's nothing unfair about that. Ollie should either show he didn't commit NCAA violations, or go home.

All Ollie has to prove is that UConn went looking for a technical violation to void his contract because he wasn't winning enough, and he is probably going to win the legal fight.

 

[superjohn]

JC had a final report and was given a slap on the wrist. KO has open accusations and was fired without due process. Does that make it rasism, no. It became rasism the day KO was born black. That simple. If there is a minory involved and there is injustice or a claim of unequal treatment then we have to look at racism. Not saying that this equals racism but it definitely doesn’t exclude it. As a white man myself, I had to look in the mirror and ask myself am I a racist based on the privileged life I grew up in in CT and can I relate to someone from Compton that had to fight for everything his whole life and worked his ass off. I will say I’m not a rasist but I have to ask myself to see things from the other side. That’s all we can do as Americans and especially as Huskies.

Kathy gave a like for the rasism!

 

[Madmannsucks]

Kathy gave a like for the rasism!

Soon as I stop laughing, I WILL report this. Fair warning.

 

[Kathy]

Kathy gave a like for the rasism!

Wtf is this post about? - we all get typos. And yes they could argue he was treated differently because of race or because of losing either argument could be made. Made successfully who knows but lawyers always looking at different angles.

 

[Madmannsucks]

Wtf is this post about? - we all get typos. And yes they could argue he was treated differently because of race or because of losing either argument could be made. Made successfully who knows but lawyers always looking at different angles.

They were mocking Alexa who had a typo. As you are probably aware, this has NEVER happened here before. So they piled on you personally, because they disagree with you and lack the maturity to understand having a philosophical difference with someone must then lead to intense dislike for said person.
Typed in my best Hans Sprungfield voice.

 

[superjohn]

Wtf is this post about? - we all get typos. And yes they could argue he was treated differently because of race or because of losing either argument could be made. Made successfully who knows but lawyers always looking at different angles.

And Ollie told Calhoun to go screw because Calhoun is an old white man.

 

[Dogdeacon]

Yeah...he is an insult to all those people that worked hard. How could he relate. Growing up in a single parent home in Compton. Playing hoops for 4 years at UConn while earning a degree. Bouncing around the CBA with a series of 10 day NBA contracts

Ollie was born in Dallas, Texas to parents Fletcher and Dorothy Ollie and grew up in the rough neighborhood of South Central Los Angeles. When Ollie was 7, his parents divorced and his father moved to Dallas. He spent summers there, cutting lawns and doing other odd jobs so he could be with him for some length of time.[3] His mother, a school teacher and ordained minister, raised him and his older sisters, Vita and Rhonda, by herself.[4

Give me a break. Kevin Ollie also worked his tail off over a 12yr NBA career and made $20MM, more than 99.99% of the earth's population will make in their lifetimes. Then he was UConn's head coach for 6 years and made another roughly $14MM. He earned most of that other than the last 2 years of his UConn salary where he didn't work hard, violated his contract and under-performed in every meaningful aspect of the job. But no one is coming after him for the $6MM he was paid during two years that were an abject failure that UConn is still paying for in lost image, performance & hence revenues. HOW MUCH DO YOU THINK OLLIE'S, RECRUITING, DEVELOPMENT, PLAYER RETENTION, ADMINISTRATIVE, RULES VIOLATIONS AND COACHING FAILURES HAVE COST UCONN FROM 2016 to the present day?
Since Kevin Ollie got fired for not doing his job, rather than go back to work like before, it seems the only thing he's up to is blaming and lawsuits.

 

[HuskyHawk]

The race card argument can be scuttled by 1) Pointing out that Calhoun's punishment, or lack thereof, was overseen by an entirely different administration. and 2) Discussing the negative impact that Calhoun's NCAA violations had on the program and the university, thus illustrating why the current university brass would want to take a hard line approach and mitigate the potential damage caused by Ollie's transgressions.

I don't blame Ollie for trying to throw whatever he can at the wall to see if anything sticks. He's a desperate and broken man. But in the end, this is all his fault. Maybe one day he can become mature enough to accept responsibility for his own actions.

It is further scuttled by the fact that Calhoun was great at his job and Ollie wasn't. That's a perfectly legitimate reason to hold someone to the strict requirements of a contract, or not.

 

[BigErnMcCracken]

Since Kevin Ollie got fired for not doing his job, rather than go back to work like before, it seems the only thing he's up to is blaming and lawsuits.

There is not a single coach in America that would would simply walk away from his buyout in a situation like this. End of story.

 

[HuskyHawk]

Except he asks the question many are dodging. Ollie never claimed he was fired due his race. He alleges he was not treated the same as his white counter parts/predecessors. Those are 2 distinctly different things.

He is claiming disparate treatment on the basis of race. At a school that hired him even though he was utterly unqualified for the job. At a school who had a black AD at the time and which has other black coaches even now.

It's a ridiculous claim because he knows it is false, you know it is false and we all know it is false. He was treated differently than Calhoun because Calhoun built the program, and was a Hall of Fame coach and Ollie had become disinterested, complacent, and was generally doing a terrible job. That can be true, and they still would have properly fired him for cause. Why is this hard to believe? And does anybody think a CT jury won't accept the real reason? As opposed to some fanciful charge or racial discrimination?

 

[Madmannsucks]

Give me a break. Kevin Ollie also worked his tail off over a 12yr NBA career and made $20MM, more than 99.99% of the earth's population will make in their lifetimes. Then he was UConn's head coach for 6 years and made another roughly $14MM. He earned most of that other than the last 2 years of his UConn salary where he didn't work hard, violated his contract and under-performed in every meaningful aspect of the job. But no one is coming after him for the $6MM he was paid during two years that were an abject failure that UConn is still paying for in lost image, performance & hence revenues. HOW MUCH DO YOU THINK OLLIE'S, RECRUITING, DEVELOPMENT, PLAYER RETENTION, ADMINISTRATIVE, RULES VIOLATIONS AND COACHING FAILURES HAVE COST UCONN FROM 2016 to the present day?
Since Kevin Ollie got fired for not doing his job, rather than go back to work like before, it seems the only thing he's up to is blaming and lawsuits.

If I remember correctly, he inherited a program deemed ineligible for the post season, caused by his predecessor.

 

[Madmannsucks]

He is claiming disparate treatment on the basis of race. At a school that hired him even though he was utterly unqualified for the job. At a school who had a black AD at the time and which has other black coaches even now.

It's a ridiculous claim because he knows it is false, you know it is false and we all know it is false. He was treated differently than Calhoun because Calhoun built the program, and was a Hall of Fame coach and Ollie had become disinterested, complacent, and was generally doing a terrible job. That can be true, and they still would have properly fired him for cause. Why is this hard to believe? And does anybody think a CT jury won't accept the real reason? As opposed to some fanciful charge or racial discrimination?

1st, I do NOT know he was "utterly unqualified"............many make that stupid comment. Calhoun turned over a program in shambles. academically disqualified, reduced scholarships, etc, etc. Glad you can predict a jusy outcome, yet we on this board cannot agree.

 

[intlzncster]

Except he asks the question many are dodging. Ollie never claimed he was fired due his race. He alleges he was not treated the same as his white counter parts/predecessors. Those are 2 distinctly different things.

His mistake is assuming they were operating under the same set of circumstances/variables. They weren't.

 

[intlzncster]

1st, I do NOT know he was "utterly unqualified"..many make that stupid comment. Calhoun turned over a program in shambles. academically disqualified, reduced scholarships, etc, etc. Glad you can predict a jusy outcome, yet we on this board cannot agree.

His resume made him unqualified . UCONN, despite sanctions, was a top tier program. It deserved a nation-wide coaching search. And preferably a coach that had some D1 HC, tournament, NCAA experience.

They gave the keys to a rolls royce , one that was in the shop no less, to someone who'd never had a licence before.

And not for nothing, but the program still had studs in the pipeline, unless you don't consider guys like Bazz, Boat and crew studs.

Ollie rewarded that choice by outperforming at the start. We all know what happened after that.

 

[Northbound]

And in their efforts proved that Ollie was running a really clean program in relation to other power conference programs.

The comparative to other programs is meaningless and has zero relevance to the contract and KO’s situation.

If you sign the deal and you choose to not abide by all the terms you need to understand and be prepared to handle the conesquence of your actions, regardless of if you and others perceive the actions as technicalities.

Its really pretty simple

Call me what you want, in my opinion KO was treated unfairly by many here on the BY and by the university. The hate spewed toward him is unrelenting. He was a great player for us, represented us well in the NBA, and won us a National Championship. To listen to some of you, you would think he was Jack the Ripper.
The way his personal life has been put under the microscope with innuendo and gossip - how many of you could pass that test.
Interesting how so few talked well.of Enochand Durhsm but now they would have saved the program if they stayed. The recruits you all loved like Akinjo and now glad we don't have him.
At least I have been consistent- do call me an apologist, call me KO's mom whatever you want. If you don't like what I post - don't read it.

Here's the difference on personal lives - I'm betting most here don't have a high profile public profession. The off-court/field conduct is a part of the equation for any university whether you think it should be or not. I'm not saying that had any implication in this case, but if it did it's not unexpected.

Also the idea that because you were a contributor to any team or hell even a company at one level and that should insulate you from critique or condemnation when you have a different role in that organization is flawed. Nobody is dismissing KO's past contributions, but at some point the his most recent current performance and his behavior will outweigh that in his legacy - tough, but true.

You become a CEO because you were a great CFO, but you can't do the CEO gig, you're getting kicked out and that's the memory of employees and shareholders - your legacy isn't:

Gary sure knew how to balance the books and was a picasso with spreadsheets*

*Gary almost drove the company into financial ruin and the stock price tanked when he was CEO

It's the other way around.

I've been consistent as well - he was a piss poor hire who should never have gotten the job to begin with because being a head coach at a mainstay top 20 basketball program is about WAY more than X's and O's - I said it when the rumors were out there and I said it after he was hired and I maintain that to be true today and I'm happy he's gone.

I don't wish ruination on the man and his family and I certainly hope he gets a gig that works for him.

 

[Madmannsucks]

His resume made him unqualified . UCONN, despite sanctions, was a top tier program. It deserved a nation-wide coaching search. And preferably a coach that had some D1 HC, tournament, NCAA experience.

They gave the keys to a rolls royce , one that was in the shop no less, to someone who'd never had a licence before.

And not for nothing, but the program still had studs in the pipeline, unless you don't consider guys like Bazz, Boat and crew studs.

Ollie rewarded that choice by outperforming at the start. We all know what happened after that.

You make valid points, and manage to do so with saying " you idiot". So I partially agree. Why didn't the job go to Miller? Fair question? The team had some players for sure as nearly all are playing for a living somewhere.
The position as an assistant was his grooming. It is fair to say his rise was expedited and obviously JC put him on the fast track. Maybe success came to fast and along with that, he was hit with massive injuries. The rest is history.
Having said all that. The AD(who is an outsider)clearly could have and more importantly SHOULD have worked this out, taking into consideration KO's history with the program. That did not happen. And that is the saddest part of this mess.

 

[CL82]

KO has open accusations and was fired without due process.

What makes you believe that KO's discharge for just cause somehow violated his due process rights. Serious question.

 

[HuskyHawk]

You make valid points, and manage to do so with saying " you idiot". So I partially agree. Why didn't the job go to Miller? Fair question? The team had some players for sure as nearly all are playing for a living somewhere.
The position as an assistant was his grooming. It is fair to say his rise was expedited and obviously JC put him on the fast track. Maybe success came to fast and along with that, he was hit with massive injuries. The rest is history.
Having said all that. The AD(who is an outsider)clearly could have and more importantly SHOULD have worked this out, taking into consideration KO's history with the program. That did not happen. And that is the saddest part of this mess.

Miller wasn't qualified either. The team deserved an experienced, successful head coach. Calhoun thought that Ollie had what it took, and timed his retirement in a way that left the University with no real options but to go with his choice. He got a probationary hire, and did well enough to earn a longer deal, and had initial success then with a 2014 NC we all remember. We all agree he did a good job at first. But whether that success got to him, or whether he simply didn't know how to sustain what had been largely handed to him (in terms of roster construction primarily), I don't know. The energy he displayed in 2013-15 was utterly gone by 2016-18.

As for the AD, they did offer a settlement to Ollie, who turned it down and reportedly insisted upon getting all the money. Whether that was driven by Ollie or the lawyers he should have fired long ago, I don't know. But it has been ruinous for him, his reputation and coaching prospects. He could probably have pocketed $3 and landed a job as an NBA assistant. Instead he's slinging mud at the University that gave him his opportunity, both as a player and coach. And we have this unpleasant thread.

 

[Alexa]

1st, I do NOT know he was "utterly unqualified"..many make that stupid comment. Calhoun turned over a program in shambles. academically disqualified, reduced scholarships, etc, etc. Glad you can predict a jusy outcome, yet we on this board cannot agree.

Furthermore Andre Drummond and Jeremy Lamb went to the NBA. That depleted team won in the Big East and thrived academically. KO was given an interim tag and it took in large part, a stamp from Tom Izzo after he was admittedly out coached by KO.

 

[CL82]

The treatment is unfair because there wasn’t due process.

You keep saying this. How so?

 

[CL82]

The AD(who is an outsider)clearly could have and more importantly SHOULD have worked this out, taking into consideration KO's history with the program.

How so?

 

[intlzncster]

You make valid points, and manage to do so with saying " you idiot". So I partially agree. Why didn't the job go to Miller? Fair question?

Fair question, but the answer is no. Given his previous middling success as a head coach. There was no reason they had to go 'in the family'.

UCONN was still riding high. They could have gotten a guy on an even higher level than someone even like a Dan Hurley. And Hurley had a ton of experience when hired.

Having said all that. The AD(who is an outsider)clearly could have and more importantly SHOULD have worked this out, taking into consideration KO's history with the program. That did not happen. And that is the saddest part of this mess.

I'd say this one went well above the AD. This was President/Board of Trustee sanctioned. You don't mess around with $10m (nor with the inevitable PR problems) at a school with budgetary issues, by keeping it solely in the Athletic Department's purview.

Should it have been handle it differently? Sure, ideally. As fans, we would have preferred that.

But the real question is, could it have been handled differently? Outside of rumor, nobody knows whether this was possible. Did UCONN offer? If so, was it reasonable? Did KO draw a line at 'all or nothing'? I've no idea.

 

[intlzncster]

As for the AD, they did offer a settlement to Ollie, who turned it down and reportedly insisted upon getting all the money. Whether that was driven by Ollie or the lawyers he should have fired long ago, I don't know. But it has been ruinous for him, his reputation and coaching prospects. He could probably have pocketed $3 and landed a job as an NBA assistant. Instead he's slinging mud at the University that gave him his opportunity, both as a player and coach. And we have this unpleasant thread.

Has this actually been reported? Honest question. I've never seen it myself, but certainly could have missed it. If so, what was the dollar figure?

 

[Madmannsucks]

How so?

Because it does not appear there was ever any real effort to settle this.

 

[CL82]

Because it does not appear there was ever any real effort to settle this.

Settlement offers are usually kept confidential. There's really no way to tell, without insider info, what happened in settlement talks.

 

[Madmannsucks]

Settlement offers are usually kept confidential. There's really no way to tell, without insider info, what happened in settlement talks.

Today on ESPN-Vanderbilt.
Drew on Friday had his first sit-down meeting with new athletic director Malcolm Turner, sources told ESPN. In what would be an unusual move, Turner is looking to reassign Drew to another position in the school to avoid paying his buyout, according to sources.

 

[Kathy]

Today on ESPN-Vanderbilt.
Drew on Friday had his first sit-down meeting with new athletic director Malcolm Turner, sources told ESPN. In what would be an unusual move, Turner is looking to reassign Drew to another position in the school to avoid paying his buyout, according to sources.

Interesting play, I wonder if he'll bite.

 

[Dogdeacon]

Today on ESPN-Vanderbilt.
Drew on Friday had his first sit-down meeting with new athletic director Malcolm Turner, sources told ESPN. In what would be an unusual move, Turner is looking to reassign Drew to another position in the school to avoid paying his buyout, according to sources.

Exhibit A what happens when you are fired for your team's record vs being fired for violations of UConn & NCAA policies, breach of contract, failure to adequately perform contractual duties, lying, etc...

 

[Madmannsucks]

Exhibit A what happens when you are fired for your team's record vs being fired for violations of UConn & NCAA policies, breach of contract, failure to adequately perform contractual duties, lying, etc...

Except that you are conveniently picking and choosing exhibits that support your argument while dismissing our exhibits of treating someone differently based on race as irrelevant.