Ollie fighting to keep his job..Link from ESPN

[Paesano]

The University has fired the first shot, they didn't care about him as they are smearing his name. Do you think Ollie cares if he's dead to you or me? The man has every right to fight and defend himself.

Don't you have classes to study for Jay?

You Ollie folks are irrational and clueless. There is NO WAY the AD would jump to firing him for cause without first approaching him to negotiate. NO WAY. The AD is not an idiot. Herbst is not an idiot and UConn's lawyers are not idiots. It is WAY more likely that Ollie refused to negotiate or that they couldn't agree on a number. No one knows what the university offered. Or do you? If you do, stop being a coward and tell us what they offered and who you are to know this. Otherwise, you and Kathy and the rest of you nut jobs need to stop accusing the university of not trying to negotiate.

 

[whaler11]

Don't you have classes to study for Jay?

You Ollie folks are irrational and clueless. There is NO WAY the AD would jump to firing him for cause without first approaching him to negotiate. NO WAY. The AD is not an idiot. Herbst is not an idiot and UConn's lawyers are not idiots. It is WAY more likely that Ollie refused to negotiate or that they couldn't agree on a number. No one knows what the university offered. Or do you? If you do, stop being a coward and tell us what they offered and who you are to know this. Otherwise, you and Kathy and the rest of you nut jobs need to stop accusing the university of not trying to negotiate.

You give all of those people way too much credit.

THOSE ARE THE SAME IDIOTS WHO SIGNED THE CONTRACT.

 

[AntG168]

Credit I guess you are just a little slow to the draw.

When you genuinely like someone and you want something to work it can cloud your judgement. I genuinely like KO and I wanted him to succeed and I thought he could, so yes it took a little more evidence than usual for me to pull the plug on my KO hope

 

[jibsey]

I bet they settle on $5 million. They should do it soon and avoid the headaches.

 

[noeynox]

Don't you have classes to study for Jay?

You Ollie folks are irrational and clueless. There is NO WAY the AD would jump to firing him for cause without first approaching him to negotiate. NO WAY. The AD is not an idiot. Herbst is not an idiot and UConn's lawyers are not idiots. It is WAY more likely that Ollie refused to negotiate or that they couldn't agree on a number. No one knows what the university offered. Or do you? If you do, stop being a coward and tell us what they offered and who you are to know this. Otherwise, you and Kathy and the rest of you nut jobs need to stop accusing the university of not trying to negotiate.

Well the AD agreed to the buyout...so I don't know that he isn't an idiot. As this gets uglier, the national media is going to be brutal on UConn for this. It's Saturday and the conference tournaments are on. Someway, somehow, this should have been handled better.

 

[nomar]

Is there a binding arbitration clause in his contract? If so, UConn needs to fire the lawyers working for the the AD. If there isn’t, he can go pound sand.

Arbitration clauses are almost always inserted by employers, not employees.

But I guess here he has some special kind of right to a hearing

 

[noeynox]

When you genuinely like someone and you want something to work it can cloud your judgement. I genuinely like KO and I wanted him to succeed and I thought he could, so yes it took a little more evidence than usual for me to pull the plug on my KO hope

Nothing wrong with this. I kept hoping it worked, but it was trending terribly bad for us/him.

 

[amory]

He'll never coach the huskies again, and thank god for that.

He has every right to fight for his money.

 

[Javjudah]

So getting fired for breaking rules is now a smear campaign?

Don't you have classes to study for Jay?

You Ollie folks are irrational and clueless. There is NO WAY the AD would jump to firing him for cause without first approaching him to negotiate. NO WAY. The AD is not an idiot. Herbst is not an idiot and UConn's lawyers are not idiots. It is WAY more likely that Ollie refused to negotiate or that they couldn't agree on a number. No one knows what the university offered. Or do you? If you do, stop being a coward and tell us what they offered and who you are to know this. Otherwise, you and Kathy and the rest of you nut jobs need to stop accusing the university of not trying to negotiate.

The University asked him to resign... They can't afford to pay him a $10 million buyout and another coach $2.5-$3 million annually.

 

[SouthBayHusky]

At this point the University has showed it's true colors. If UCONN wants to fire KO as the head coach because of the performance of his team over past few years they have every right to do so. To smear his name and fire him for just cause for allegations that have not been proven is plain wrong. They're doing this to avoid paying him the $10 million he's owed if he's fired.
You're right, Ollie will show his true colors and his true color is he's a fighter. The fact that the University is putting him through this and smearing his name will only make this very very bad for the University moving forward. No love lost now. Fire him, pay him his money and both parties move on.

It’s all about the contract and just cause. If there was a violation and just cause defined broadly in the K, the University wins. I don’t think for a moment the university wants to stiff him and offer zero. At the end of the day, it’s not a charity it’s a state entity in the state has a duty to defend their contracts not to give away money they are not legally obligated to give away. This will settle and I would be shocked if offers were not already made and rejected. Eventually it will settle before binding arbitration

 

[polycom]

The University asked him to resign...

How do you know this?

 

[WestHartHusk]

Arbitration clauses are almost always inserted by employers, not employees.

But I guess here he has some special kind of right to a hearing

Yup. If half of what we have heard is true, KO breached his contract and gets $0. Any sane council will tell him to take $3m and walk into the night. Arbitration on his contract won't work out well for him.

 

[Fishy]

This is not rocket science.

It’s not as if UConn’s surprised by what Ollie is doing or Ollie is surprised at what the university is doing.

Ollie has a contract that very broadly says that he can be fired for cause for breaking any rule. He’s not walking away with $10,600,000. And the university is not going to get off paying him $0.

They’ll negotiate a settlement. There won’t be a Perry Mason moment in court on this one.

Neither side will want this to go on a minute longer than it has to.

 

[Jaker]

With out a doubt the AD probably tried to negotiate a buyout, but remember, Ollie belongs to a union. Unions negoatiate and play hardball when it comes to fullfilling labor contracts. They may have told Ollie in no uncertain terms it is their responsibility to go for the full Monty.

 

[ZenConn]

Just cause is having Sean Miller on tape discussing payments to DeAndre Ayton.
Just cause is Roy Williams' players taking fake classes at UNC.
Just cause is having the balance sheet of ASM Sports agency showing Dennis Smith Jr, Isaiah Whitehead and a whole boatload of players getting payments. (LOL @ the dude that got less than $100)
Just cause is Lemont Evants, Chuck Person, Book Richardson and Tony Bland being charged.

So which head coach has been fired here? Which AD has been fired here? None.

Just negotiate the settlement and be done. There's no reason to drag KO's name in the mud before he's actually charged with anything. He's still a part of the UConn family.

 

[SouthBayHusky]

And we know who you'll be rooting for in that fight.

We can have an official boneyard Moot trial. I’ll proudly represent our great Uconn state university. Javajuda can represent Ollie. Maybe Chief can serve as judge.

Kidding,...

 

[MadDogRevival]

They’ll negotiate a settlement. There won’t be a Perry Mason moment in court on this one.

Lol. For the non-lawyers out there over the age of about 55, there is never a Perry Mason moment in court. Or if you're between 40 and 55, there is never a Matlock moment in court. If you're under 40, it'd be that Few Good Men - you're GDed right I ordered the code red - moment. If you're younger yet, I'm not sure what goofball legal show represents you, but the moment Fishy is referring to, I believe, is when the good lawyer gets the bad guy to fess up on the stand. Never happens.

When do companies litigate? When the amount you are likely to win (or lower your loss) in court is greater than the amount you're going to pay a lawyer (lawyer fees are usually not recoverable).

 

[Tenspro2002]

The people who are outraged by this ... do you have adult jobs in the real world?

Exactly none of what's happened either on the AD's side or on KO's side is unexpected. In fact, anything different than what we've seen so far would have been shocking.

 

[polycom]

Just cause is having Sean Miller on tape discussing payments to DeAndre Ayton.
Just cause is Roy Williams' players taking fake classes at UNC.
Just cause is having the balance sheet of ASM Sports agency showing Dennis Smith Jr, Isaiah Whitehead and a whole boatload of players getting payments. (LOL @ the dude that got less than $100)
Just cause is Lemont Evants, Chuck Person, Book Richardson and Tony Bland being charged.

So which head coach has been fired here? Which AD has been fired here? None.

Just negotiate the settlement and be done. There's no reason to drag KO's name in the mud before he's actually charged with anything. He's still a part of the UConn family.

This post is silly for 100s of reasons. You or I have no idea what UConn tried to do. Those other coaches/ADs are winning therefore people look the other way this is how the scam of college sports keeps moving forward. KO was not winning so the AD wasn’t willing to look the other way. It’s pretty simple to understand.

As for the UConn family thing, can we stop saying this? Idc if he was the founder of the school he is a terrible coach he needs to go and if there is cause he shouldn’t get paid. His job was to win he didn’t do that, and worse he is under investigation.

 

[TJT]

even if he broke the smallest rule possible, the contract is pretty damn clear that it's cause to terminate the buyout provision. you don't get to decide what rule constitutes a firing and what doesn't.

There were recruiting rules broke by Jim Calhoun and he was not fired by UConn. The school did not discipline him to my knowledge as it was the NCAA that suspended him for games back in 2011. One has to think Ollie and his lawyers will bring that up and accuse the school of treating him differently. How can one coach be fired for breaking a rule while his predecessor wasn't? KO may actually have a good case. This all looks like it is going to get really messy and possibly very public. It would not surprise me if we even saw the race card eventually thrown out there.

 

[AntG168]

Just cause is having Sean Miller on tape discussing payments to DeAndre Ayton.
Just cause is Roy Williams' players taking fake classes at UNC.
Just cause is having the balance sheet of ASM Sports agency showing Dennis Smith Jr, Isaiah Whitehead and a whole boatload of players getting payments. (LOL @ the dude that got less than $100)
Just cause is Lemont Evants, Chuck Person, Book Richardson and Tony Bland being charged.

So which head coach has been fired here? Which AD has been fired here? None.

Just negotiate the settlement and be done. There's no reason to drag KO's name in the mud before he's actually charged with anything. He's still a part of the UConn family.

Severity does not matter

 

[Da_Aisijimo_Gou]

This allows me to think that this was all a surprise and the school's AD, Pres, McHugh and BoT did not seek some type of amicable parting solution - something that should have occurred Time for a complete housecleaning - start with McHugh ...

McHugh is easy... he’s been retired since December!

Forget it, Bluto's rolling!

 

[King1983]

Ollie is technically a state worker.....as a union representative for the state and a state it's hard as hell to prove "just cause". I am guessing they will lose and pay him a large portion of the especially if you display the academic state of the program when he took over and Calhoun was still a paid consultant. The program lost scholarships and had a post season ban.

 

[VAHuskyFan]

I cannot believe there is any way this happened without DB or someone at the school first floating the possibility of an “amicable” parting of ways with a reduced buyout.

My guess is that conversation went one of two ways. Either there was a number mentioned (say 2 million) that KO considered insultingly low. Or the conversation never got to a number. DB may have raised the possibility of reaching a resolution that works out for the best interests of everyone and KO replied with something about how “only quitters quit and I’m not a quitter” or rats and ships or something and basically made it clear he wasn’t willing to negotiate. And so now we have this unfortunate development as a way of getting KO’s attention and forcing him to the negotiating table.

This should have ended with Ollie announcing his “resignation,” and walking away with ~$3 million and DB making supportive public comments highlighting KO’s many contributions and successes both as a player and a coach.

Something broke down and eventually we’ll find out what that was. Either DB somehow forgot he had the most leverage before KO’s integrity was publicly impugned and didn’t try to negotiate first (which I find hard to believe), or we didn’t have the money to make even a good-faith parting offer, or KO was unwilling to stand down (either on principle or for financial reasons). None of these options are terribly positive. Let’s just hope it’s over soon.

 

[MadDogRevival]

BTW - to all the people making arguments as to whether this was properly "for cause" or not for cause, you should just stop. You don't have all of the information that DB has. I promise you. You're jumping the gun. It's possible that DB has info from the FBI investigation that is not publicly known. Maybe UConn already did an internal investigation. Maybe UConn already had dirt on him and they were biding time. It's entirely possible that the two sides reasonably disagree on what "just cause" is. The law is full of gray, and very often two intelligent lawyers can look at the same set of facts and believe that a court will reach two different results. It happens.
Gotta let the facts come out before you can even begin to assess "just cause." It's unripe, wild speculation at this point.