I haven't seen anyone argue that Bobinski was the sharpest tool in the shed.
My entire argument boils down to wins matter.
The response is that it doesn’t, that its unreasonable to win at Tech and we should expect less, that he has several awards unrelated to winning, and at least he’s not Brian Gregory. Then there’s the “you don’t know what you’re talking about” and “that’s not how college sports work.”
The definition of a competition is that you want to win. I may be the only one here that understands that.
Of course wins matter! We all want to win. EVERY game.
But competition is a zero sum game. For every two contestants, there can only be one winner.
Commitment to excellence and dedication to winning is occurring simultaneously from both contestants. In conditions of parity, wins and losses can come down to very small factors. Domination is easily conceived. Domination is easy to want. But demanding domination in a competitive situation is not a mechanism for achieving it. Competitive domination is a statistical improbability. For the most part, domination is simply not how the world works.
The best anyone can do is execute the processes by which success is achieved, and then hope the chips fall in your favor. The question then becomes, are those processes being executed?
Your assumption is that if a team loses, then that must mean that the processes that result in success must not have been performed. But is that true? Is it possible for a coach to do the right things and still come out a loser in a situation where every competitor is also executing the processes required to have success?
A Pastner defender like me sees a coach that is doing what is required to have success. We have seen successful seasons and poor ones. The inconsistency, I would argue, is due to variables outside of operational process, for instance, injuries to Lammers and Alvarado, The Duke kid ratting-out LaBarrie over the Cheetah visit and the subsequent probation, a player like Gigiberia not panning out al all. Things like that.
Fans like to point at recruiting results. I think a huge factor here is the regional domination of the SEC. How the SEC is pulling away from the rest of the Power 5 is causing extreme turbulence throughout college athletics, and Gt finds itself directly in their wake, especially on the recruiting trail. That will be true of every single coach that gets plugged in here.
Fans can take the "Buck Stops Here" approach and simply hold a coach accountable to the bottom line. But that is not a very sophisticated way to look at it and, as often as not, will punish or reward a coach for things that were never really under his control to start with.
After seeing how Hewitt's teams played after Keener and Warren left, and how Brian Gregory's teams played, I will take and enjoy the type of basketball that Pastner's teams play 24-7, the poor season last year notwithstanding.
