ya let's run another coach off guys , geezzz can't you guys see the guy just needs better guards?? the jethros ran down jerry green for his lack of discipline, then we get a coach who comes in who does expect discipline and runs 2 of our guards off who would have made this team 100 % better . buzz ran these clowns off who weren't following the rules even though he knew it was gonna cost him several games. i love the effort that jenis grindstaff gives and the heart he has , but hell he's a one legged slow white boy , and he's our best damn guard.he's the only one who tries to penetrate. so buzz did exactly what the jethros wanted and they're still circling and smelling the blood in the water. hell let the guy have some good guards on the team before everyone decides that buzz don't have a clue. we know the guys gonna be a good coach so lets support him and i agree with volhunter , let him be our coach for the next 20 plus years !! lets show him some loyalty , then maybe TENNESSEE can once and for all have a great basketball program !!!!

nm

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UT 82
OP 76

Well, Ole Piss basketball is stinky and rotten; Championships and rings are long forgotten; We kicked that ass, kicked that ass, kicked that ass, in BuzzyLand; Well, I'm glad I'm not in Oxfraud; Hooray! Hooray! Cause Rebels fans are Redneck flagwavers, who live and die without rings; Hooray! Hooray! I'm glad I'm uuuuuuuuuuup in Knoxville!

We have to support Buzz. He is the only hope left. People shouldn't rip him until he has a least his players on the floor. UT has no guards. Sribling is a bust. Where is Troy Bell when we need him? UT has Higgins instead. VY is a wuss!!!! Folks, Slay is one of the few on that team that has any heart. How much longer will the cancer Tall stay on?

"Where is Troy Bell when we need him?"

I knew it again!

"How much longer will the Cancer Tall stay on?"

I called this response hours ago! I can read Catfish like a cheap comic book!

_____________________________________________
UT 82
OP 76

Well, Ole Piss basketball is stinky and rotten; Championships and rings are long forgotten; We kicked that ass, kicked that ass, kicked that ass, in BuzzyLand; Well, I'm glad I'm not in Oxfraud; Hooray! Hooray! Cause Rebels fans are Redneck flagwavers, who live and die without rings; Hooray! Hooray! I'm glad I'm uuuuuuuuuuup in Knoxville!

I thought Stribling was a top 50 recruit! Interesting!

Guys,

I think your jethrophobia is totally unwarranted to date in Buzz’s tenure. 99 out of 100 callers, posters, and folks I talk to on a daily basis are completely supportive of Buzz and optimistic about his potential as our Head BB Coach. As a matter of fact I think most seem reluctant to utter a disparaging word for fear it will be perceived as treasonous to a program desperately seeking a solution to 25 years of sorry entertainment. I think the vast majority of Tennessee Basketball fans realize that we must give Buzz every opportunity to lead our DEAD program to the rebirth we all desire and to build some stability that has been missing since the early eighties.

Jerry Green was genuinely (justifiably or not) disliked by the vast majority of Tennessee fans. Initially he was an undeserving target of the fans dislike for Doug Dickey and dissatisfaction with what was perceived as a botched search for O’Neill’s successor. Later he became his own worst enemy due to his team’s consistently lackadaisical play and by his penchant to lash back at critics, which was perceived as a lack of self-control and instability. I make this point not to reopen old wounds or live in the negative past but rather to differentiate between the Jerry Green saga and the opportunity that Buzz has been presented with. Tennessee fans LIKE Buzz. We RELATE to Buzz. We’ll be PATIENT with Buzz. We BELIEVE he represents a long awaited opportunity for long-range success of the program. I hear your warnings about avoiding the negative aura that has surrounded the program for years. I simply think you’re premature in your criticism because I don’t hear it or see it happening.

i have to disagree with you because i already see a lot of negative criticism about buzz. not just on this forum or the radio , but also on other boards and with people i'm talking to every day about sports . ya it's not a wildfire yet but the embers are starting to glow. i just think it's pathetic that we have fans who are so negative , this is how it started for jerry green too , and then it just kept snowballing. if our fans run buzz off too we will be the laughing stock of the sec

presentation but it has always bothered me that UT didn't pursue seasoned college coaches such as Skip Prosser and Dave Odom-- two quality coaches that changed jobs after Buzz was hired.
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I was concerned last spring and still am, that Peterson became the front runner early on in the process because of the homecourt advantage-- Peterson had on the competition.
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I do agree, that now that he's been hired the community needs to have patience and remain supportive,
but this team is not playing up to expectations. Although this team has it flaws, its a much better team than a 8-10 club, that gets blown out by 34 points at home against South Carolina.
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It will be interesting to see, what adjustments Buzz and his staff make in the coming weeks ??? In my opinion, with the recent loss of Ron Slay, this team has to drastically change the way it plays offensively.
UT has to be much more patient in its half court sets. They need to try to keep games in the mid-60's and low 70's and if they don't they are going to get blown out on a reular basis.
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We all know of Tennessee's deficiencies in the backcourt but those shortcomings have been exacerbated by Slay's injury. People forget that Slay handled the ball a lot in UT's offense.
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Great coaches find ways to overcome injuries and weaknesses in their team's roster. Unfortunately I haven't seen too many adjustments from this coaching staff. What game this season, can we say Buzz outcoached the other fella ????
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I'm not saying Buzz is going to fail but I do have my doubts. Unforutnately with the the SEC lineup of coaches Tubby, Billy D, D. Odom, Stallings, Nolan Richardson, Shady Brady, R. Barnes, R. Stansfield, Mark Gottfried and Rod Barnes-- some quality coaches in this conference are going to lose their job's down the road. The big question is who will that be ????

1.) As been mentioned ad nauseam, UT's backcourt has no depth, and more importantly, they have no true PG. Anybody that discounts the importance of a quality PG at the Div 1 level is living in La-La Land. The PG is the heart of the team.

1a.) With Slay out, teams can collapse on Haislip. They can overplay the passing lanes, and make points in the paint really hard to come by.

With Slay out, that takes away a legitimate offensive threat. The guards have to take up the slack, even more than the two freshman playing the #4 spot (in Slay's place). But UT's guards are not consistent outside threats. And almost as bad as the guards' poor outside shooting is their lack of aggressiveness taking the ball to the tin. They have to take the ball to the hole more. Grindstaff is the only one that is predisposed to doing this.

2.) This point may be the most important of them all:

Yarbrough MUST respond. He has GOT to step up. He's a senior, and he's the most talented player on the team. If he doesn't step up and play more aggressively and with more more determination, he going to do two things -- hurt his team, and hurt his chance at playing in the NBA. As a matter of fact, if VY doesn't step up his game, he has NO CHANCE to make it in the NBA, IMO.

I agree that Buzz needs to find ways to motivate his team more consistently, especially since Slay is out for the season. But aside from last night, this team has played their butts off in all the other games I've seen this year. And I don't agree that Buzz has been routinely outcoached this year. But then again, I disagree with a lot of Michigan fans that I've met over the years (AIM).

AIM,

I respect your sports knowledge and passion but your suggestions for direction of the Tennessee Basketball program are diametrically opposed to what I desired at the time of the search for Green’s successor. IMO the last thing we needed was a middle-aged retread (probably too harsh a term) such as Odom or Prosser. I felt that the perfect candidates were young, energetic, excited to be here guys with head coaching experience at the mid-major level. I had no problem with Marshall, Lebo, and Peterson being our finalist. Did we make the best choice? That remains to be seen, but I thought at the time and still contend that we couldn’t go wrong with any of the above. At the risk of being pretentious I think while suggesting legitimate potential concerns you are too hard on Buzz because you perceive (perhaps rightly so) that he is being held to less stringent standards by the fan base than his predecessor. To that I reply, “To whom much is given much is expected”. I think we both would agree that Jerry Green was playing the game with more parts than Buzz presently has at his disposal. Tennessee’s record should be better and Buzz has made mistakes. Right or wrong however I’m still much more comfortable with the prospects for the programs future than I have been in some time.

I do have to ask myself how Louisville gets Pitino and we get Tulsa's Coach with one year of Big time Experience. This is not a negative comment about Buzz but the way UT goes about bringing in good people. I can assure you this-if you run Buzz off with the people in charge of replacing him that we have now- it will be an unmitigated disaster.