bleach wrote:If Marshall had to replace 4 or 5 starters and was doing what he is this year that would be a great coaching job THIS YEAR. The award is for who did the most impressive job of coaching THIS YEAR. As is, His team would be a failure THIS YEAR if they do any less than win the conference title going away. Marshall is in my opinion the best coach in the league by a LOT (I think a lot of Jacobson). The award is not for the best coach but for who did the most impressive job. Marshall could still win it this year if they play great and no one else does a superior job. I would say to this point what Moser has done is more impressive than what Marshall has done THIS YEAR. I wouldn't think of hiring Porter over Gregg though.
Personally, I think this argument is pretty ridiculous. What you're arguing for is the Most Improved Coach of the Year award.
Right now, Kyle Korver is probably the most improved player in the NBA right now, relative to the expectations that he created for himself. So should he be the front-runner for the NBA MVP?
That's what you're arguing for coaches. You're arguing that a coach's performance in any given year should be judged relative to their expectations, and their expectations are based on their past performance ... thus, the award should only be allowed to go to coaches with past bad performance who then show good performance. That's "Most Improved." And, ultimately, Gregg Marshall has to be DQed from future Coach of the Year awards unless he wins the conference undefeated or by six games, while any other far inferior coach can win by improving their team from Thursday night to 5th place.
As for what Moser has done specifically ... what is that, exactly?
Go 3-1 against Evansville, Drake, Bradley, and SIU? Three of those teams are guaranteed to be playing on Thursday night, and Evansville isn't out of the woods of doing so themselves. Go 8-2 out of conference? Wonderful, they played ~200 SOS out of conference. Have a top 50 RPI at one point? They'll probably be out of the top 100 in another week at their current pace.
Here is where Porter Moser has been successful: They are 8-1 this year (about to be 8-2) against RPI sub-150 teams. Last year they were 5-14 against those same teams. For the last several years Moser's teams have been barely losing to bad teams -- this year they're been able to turn the corner and beat those bad teams. But they're not actually beating GOOD teams. Loyola will most likely finish in the top half of the Valley this year, but they will also most likely not defeat a single other top-half team in the Valley (depending on whether Evansville can stay in the top half). Loyola, BTW, is about to fall to two games out of 5th place, and closer to 7th than 5th.
I don't get this relative-to-expectations thinking with the Coach of the Year award. If that was the thinking we had with the Player of the Year award, who would we actually be looking at this year? It certainly wouldn't be FVV, Baker, Doyle, Balentine, Mock, Tuttle, etc. All of those guys would need to have their performance this year based relative to expectations, not relative to their competition's performance.
Downplaying a coach's success in terms of an award like this because he's expected to be having success is silly. The coach is the REASON his expectations are so high. Gregg Marshall didn't walk into a favorable situation -- he created the current expectations based on being, by far, the best coach in the Valley. And Porter Moser didn't walk into an unfavorable situation -- his expectations for this year were low because he is, ultimately, not a very good coach, as proven by his three previous years at Loyola, and four years of coaching at Illinois State. But Most Improved Coach, sure, I guess? I think his team performing at a level that's an exception to his entire career is likely less about his coaching.
Hell, I think this is the inherent flaw with a Coach of the Year award, anyway. It implies that coaching is something that can be judged on a single year. It's not. The value of a coach is in their ability to create a program, one that can survive long-term, not catch fire at the right moment, or luck into the right transfer, or have a senior-filled team all at once. WSU's team this year isn't a reason of Marshall's coaching this year, it's the result of Marshall's performance for the last decade -- or even for his entire career. The same with UNI's success. Our tendency to look at a coach's performance in terms of single years is what leads to so many bad coaches being given huge contracts and failing miserably. Too many coaches get credit for individual years as outliers against their larger body of work, or get credit for winning with players they didn't recruit, etc. Successful coaches build programs, and the success of a program can't be judged in a single year, so judging a coach on a single year is a fallacy to begin with.
