According to Jeff Goodman at Fox Sports, Isiah Thomas has accepted an offer from Florida International University to become their head coach. We briefly discussed the situation yesterday, but now that it’s all but official it is probably a good time to review Isiah’s prior experience. As a basketball player, there is no question that he was an all-time great. As a basketball executive/coach? Not so much.

Here is a quick recap of his prior stints in a managerial role:

• Toronto Raptors (1994-1998): Serving as the GM and part-owner, he started by taking B.J. Armstrong with the #1 pick in the 1995 expansion draft. While Armstrong isn’t what you would consider #1 pick material, when you look at the other luminaries that were available it was probably a pretty good pick (at the very least he could show the young guys all the three championship rings Michael Jordan won for him that he won). Unfortunately, Armstrong refused to report to the team and was promptly traded. Even though the team was 67-179, Isiah did exhibit some draft acumen by taking Damon Stoudamire (turning the #7 pick into the Rookie of the Year), Marcus Camby (the #2 pick who might have won Rookie of the Year that year if it wasn’t for some guy named Allen Iverson), and Tracy McGrady (with #9 pick out of high school just 2 years after Isiah’s hilarious plan for Kevin Garnett). Sadly, this was probably the high point of Isiah’s managerial career.
• NBC (1998): Briefly worked with Bob Costas and Doug Collins. Not particularly memorable, but it worked out better than his last appearance on NBC (see below).

• CBA (1999-2000): Purchased the league for $10 million on October 7, 1999 and turned down an offer from the NBA to purchase it for $11 million and a percentage of the profits, which according to some sources would have been a $2 million profit (or a 20% ROI) in March 2000. Isiah then promptly proceeded to show everyone what a shrewd businessman he was for turning down the 20% ROI in 5 months by running the league into bankruptcy. [Ed. Note: The fact that the CBA Museum has a page for Isiah Thomas is amazing. Isn’t that kind of like a Jewish charity museum starting an exhibit on Bernie Madoff?] Sadly, this was not the low point of Isiah’s managerial career.
• Indiana Pacers (2000-2003): Took over a team that Larry Bird had coached to the Eastern Conference finals and decided to change directions with a youth movement by playing Jermaine O’Neal, Jamaal Tinsley, and Al Harrington more minutes. Even though he had a respectable 131-115 regular season record, his stint is largely considered a failure as his team’s lost in the first round in each of his 3 seasons as a coach. Heading into Isiah’s 4th year, Larry Bird came back as President of Basketball Operations. At his press conference, Bird assured the media that he would work with Isiah. He promptly fired Thomas and replaced him with Rick Carlisle. [Lesson: Don’t mess with the Basketball Jesus.]
• New York Knicks (2003-2008): I don’t know what can be said that hasn’t already been said. I’ll just refer you to Jeff Coplon’s article that says everything in its title “Absolutely, Positively the Worst Team in the History of Professional Sports”. Quick Cliff Notes style summary: Threw away two 1st round picks for Eddy Curry. Fired Larry Brown (his best move) and made himself coach (his worst move–on the court). Ordered his team to commit a hard foul against the Denver Nuggets resulting in a brawl. Despite having the highest paid team in the league and the pipe dream of landing LeBron James he continued to blow money/cap space on over-priced/under-performing players. “Reassigned” and forbidden to have any contact with the Knicks’ players. Charged in a sexual harassment lawsuit that led Madison Square Garden to pay $11.6 million to his accuser and offended multiple sponsors. Reportedly overdosed on Lunesta and was taken to the hospital, but afterwards tried to throw the entire thing on his 17 year-old daughter.

So, um yeah, good luck with that FIU.

Two springs ago Bill Self received the bittersweet news that his star forward Brandon Rush had torn his ACL during predraft workouts and was returning to Lawrence for another year.  Rush followed that up with a junior year that led to Kansas’ first national title in twenty years.  This time around Self won’t even have to cry crocodile tears over a player’s injury because his two stars, point guard Sherron Collins and center Cole Aldrich, decided tonight that they will officially return to Kansas for another year.  From the AP report:

“I do think we return the best guard in the country and the best big man in the country,” said Self. “I think if you’re going to start a team, why not have an anchor and why not have a guard?”   Aldrich and Collins both said the decision to say was so easy that they didn’t even ask Self to explore a level of interest that NBA teams might have, a common practice of undergraduates who are thinking of jumping to the pros early.  “I’ve known for a while,” said Aldrich, who had the sixth triple-double in NCAA tournament history. “It’s been a blast of a year and the fans are so fun here. I was watching highlights on my computer back in my room and I got goose bumps. I was like, ‘I’ve got to come back here.'”

Aldrich deserves particular praise here given that his father, a construction worker, has been jobless for a while due to the economic recession.  He is a projected lottery pick and could have erased those financial worries immediately, yet his dad was the one urging him to return for another year.  It’s rare that we actually see players pursue love of school and the precious present over guaranteed riches, so Aldrich just became our newest favorite player for 2009-10.  Unlike last year’s Great White Hope, however, Aldrich’s dad isn’t already a millionaire surgeon – he’s just a regular guy from Minnesota who wants his son to be happy.

Getting those two stars back is enough cause for celebration, but Self is sitting on a loaded team with every key contributor returning.  Tyshawn Taylor is a star in the making and the Morris twins (Marcus and Markieff) are poised to break out next year.  Then there’s the unthinkable, which is that Kansas is in the running for Xavier Henry, the nation’s #1 shooting guard, and Lance Stephenson, one of the top uncommitted wings.  If KU manages to get even one of those two freshman studs, you’d have to believe that the Jayhawks become the odds-on favorite for the 2010 national title, regardless of what happens in Lexington or E. Lansing in the offseason.

The latest idiocy to come out of the NCAA rules tome involves the ubiquitous Facebook pages.  You know, the social networking site that every man, woman and child under the age of 35 already has as a must-visit every day of their lives?  Over the weekend it was reported that NC State had sent a cease-and-desist letter to one of its students, Taylor Moseley, for starting a Facebook page called “John Wall, PLEASE come to NC State,”  referring to the nation’s #1 point guard who is still unsigned.  Talk about a tactful approach!  The original page, which featured over 700 members, is now closed to the public with the forboding warning attached: The name of this group has been changed to comply with a request in regards to NCAA Regulations.

NC State was ostensibly acting upon the NCAA’s interpretation of its rules with respect to such social networking sites and how they may be used in the recruiting process.  The problem, of course, is that Moseley has no more proximate relationship with the NCSU athletic department than the janitor working in his dorm or the random fan with the red Wolfpack emblem on his car.  In the NCAA’s narrow-minded worldview, each of these people are potential “boosters.”  And if you’re a booster, you cannot make such open, outward displays of affection toward a potential recruit such as John Wall lest you put your favorite school in jeopardy of a violation.

Cue the hordes of Duke fans who just started John Wall groups for Carolina, and vice versa.  Or Xavier Henry to Kentucky groups created by Kansas fans.  Or Lance Stephenson… well, you get the picture.  Where does it end, and assuming the NCAA could figure it out (without subpoena power, good luck) how on earth is any of it enforceable?  There are already dozens of these kinds of pages on Facebook (see the UK example below), and anyone can start one on their own and regardless of school affiliation.  RTC can put up a page right now begging John Wall to attend our school of choice, and what can the NCAA do?  Punish the school – no way, we have no affiliation with the school.  Punish the player – for what?  He didn’t have anything to do with our endorsement.  Punish us – ennnnh, sure, except they already deny us to their credentialed events (i.e., nothing will change). 

The most amusing part of all of this is the NCAA’s response to the ever-changing spectre of technology.  From the WRAL report:

NCAA spokesman Erik Christianson said the group considers its rules “technology neutral.” A Facebook page is simply a high-tech way to try to influence recruits.  The NCAA’s concern is “intrusions into a high school student’s life when they’re trying to decide where to go to college,” he said. He said the NCAA is keeping up with technology, noting new rules on text-messaging from coaches.

New rules on text messaging!  Wow, Eric, we’ve certainly moved right on up to 2002 with 2003 in our sights with that progressive legislation!  This means that by around 2014 the NCAA will have this Facebook thing figured completely out.  Kudos to them. 

If this were April 1st, we’d definitely be wondering about the veracity of this story, but both Jeff Goodman at Fox Sports and Andy Katz at ESPN are reporting that Mr. Congeniality, Isiah Thomas, may be close to accepting the head coaching job at Florida International University (apparently the school is located in Miami, which suddenly reveals a modicum of why to this story).  The former head coach, Sergio Rouco, was reassigned after a 55-94 record over five seasons. 

You may remember Mr. Thomas (not to be confused with the mercurial rising star Isaiah Thomas from the Washington Huskies) from his days as a player at Indiana (national champs in ’81), or as a Detroit Piston (world champs in ’89 and ’90), or as a relatively successful Indiana Pacers coach, or his most recent disastrous stint as team president and coach for the New York Knicks.  If Thomas actually takes this coaching position, he’ll join other Sun Belt retreads John Brady (LSU to Arkansas St.) and Mike Jarvis (St. John’s to Florida Atlantic) as coaches with the uncanny ability to turn water to vomit in the blink of an eye.  Somewhere Stephen A. Smith, Bill Simmons and Will Leitch all began independently yet simultaneously typing in unison. 

The problem with Thomas in New York was his utter incompetence in the ability to successfully put a team together (well, that and the sexual assault thing).  He seemed to believe that having fifteen me-first guards on the roster was a healthy concoction, and the thought of him getting to craft and coach his own team of players in the combustible environment of Miami should break all kinds of blogosphere records throughout his tenure there. 

On its face, this job makes absolutely no sense unless Thomas is now importing packages through South Florida from Bolivia and he wants to keep a close eye on his product.  He has absolutely no college coaching experience whatsoever, and the truth is that he still could have gotten a bigger ‘name’ job had he heretofore shown any interest.  Additionally, why wouldn’t he wait for another NBA opening?  He may be damaged goods in many fans’ eyes, but that’s never stopped stupidity in the form an NBA GM before.  At least Thomas would still be in his comfort zone, though.  We can already envision Thomas trying to sell an unsuspecting mother of some 16-year old prodigy on the virtues of FIU Basketball, with his snakeskin shoes and 100-watt smile beaming across the room. 

Come to think of it, maybe this will make for a good fit after all. 

Wow, this place clears out as soon as the season ends, doesn’t it?  Let’s talk more early entries…

• Tweeting Away.  Hasheem Thabeet still hasn’t made up his mind about returning for his senior year, but is there really any question?  The certain lottery pick is just trying to play people with his coy references to coming back to UConn on his Twitter account.
• Well, that’s one way to do it. Ole Miss’ second-leading returning scorer, David Huertas, packed up his stuff and is headed back to PR to play professionally there.
• Memphis’ Shawn Taggart – also taking a dip.
• Someone’s staying! UNC’s Ed Davis will return to try to lead the Heels to B2B titles.  Gary Parrish believes they have a legitimate shot at it (as do we, gulp…).   Also, WVU’s Devin Ebanks is officially sticking around.
• This is the future, gents.  NCAA Tournament online viewership was way, way up.
• Portland St. will promote Tyler Geving to head coach to replace Ken Bone.

And we’re finally down to the RTC Mascot Death Match Championship between the W. Kentucky Big Red (who pulled the shocking upset over Xavier’s Big Blob) and the Cleveland State’s Magnus the Viking.  As always, vote early and often.  We’ll keep this up all week for your final selection. 

You’ll remember last week that we put together an aggregate list of the 2009-10 Insanely Too Early Rankings.  In the interim, we’ve gotten Top 25s from basketball luminaries Andy Katz, Jeff Goodman and Gary Parrish, so we’ve added their choices to our list.

There were only three teams who made it onto all eight ballots (Kansas, MSU and Purdue).  UNC made it on seven ballots (even more likely now that Ed Davis is officially staying) and five other schools made it onto six.  Those are the nine we ranked in the aggregate column.  After that, it gets too squishy to draw any conclusions with confidence.  Here are the rankings:

It’s gearing up as another interesting offseason for Tim Floyd at USC.  For the second consecutive year, with the news that Demar DeRozan, Daniel Hackett and Taj Gibson are going pro, he’ll be losing a significant portion of his team to NBA early entry after another relatively disappointing campaign.  (note: we’re sorry, but if you lose potentially five draft picks in two seasons and win only one NCAA Tournament game in that period, that’s really disappointing).  And guess what, probable one-and-doner Renardo Sidney is set to arrive on campus in 2009-10, further contributing to the problem that Floyd annually faces: it’s great to have NBA-level talent every season, but he doesn’t have enough ‘program guys’ who stick around for 3-4 years and provide consistency within the USC program.

An interesting analogy is John Calipari at Memphis.  When Calipari returned to college coaching at Memphis in 2000, there was a common presumption that he would do very well immediately.  The truth, however, is that it took Calipari five years at Memphis before he really got rolling – his first half-decade with the Tigers resulted in 2 NCAA appearances and only one NCAA win.  Remember the Dajuan Wagner, Antonio Burks and early Rodney Carney teams?  Yeah, we don’t really either.  It was only after he had built up enough depth of talent to sustain annual high draft pick losses and still win 30 games the next season did Memphis become a brand name again.

Floyd has struggled in his four seasons at USC to put together a team that looks largely like its predecessor, which is really the only way to consistently perform at an elite level.  The last three champions (UNC, Kansas, Florida) were essentially the same teams as the year prior, and that’s basically true of many of the F4 teams as well (with a piece here or there added).  Floyd’s problem is exacerbated by his tendency to utilize a short bench, as he typically plays only 7-8 guys throughout the season, so when he ends up losing a couple or three key players he’s left with depending on star freshmen to lead his team the next year (e.g., Sidney and star wing Noel Johnson in 2009-10).

Floyd would do well to continue recruiting elite players who are likely one-and-dones, but he should also try to get a few more of the three- and four-year players that will provide a backbone of consistency for his program.  Otherwise, the annual postseason rollercoaster of incoming/outgoing talent that USC basketball currently finds itself on won’t end anytime soon.  Of course, this all may be for naught if the NCAA continues snooping around…

Fresh off his (and UConn’s) first loss in Final Four history (previous: 4-0 with two titles), Jim Calhoun today ended any further speculation as to his job status and stated unequivocally that he will be back for the 2009-10 season.  Given his advancing age and some recent (the Ken Krayeske salary flap) and pending (Nate Miles) embarrassments for the program, it would have made sense if Calhoun had decided to take his golden parachute and say to hell with the rest of it.  Instead, Calhoun will stick around at least one more year to chide, deride and lambaste rogue reporters who dare ask a question he doesn’t like (call it the Gillispie Method, but more crotchety).  From the AP report:

“It is my full intention to return for the 2009-10 season,” Calhoun said. “I look forward to coaching next season and to continuing as the head coach at Connecticut into the future. In many ways, the journey of this past season has made me realize how much I love coaching this game, how much I love my kids and how much I enjoy being at Connecticut.”

Not sure what to make of this decision.  The guy is a great coach, unquestionably, and we’re sure that he loves the process and routine of the act of coaching up young, talented kids to play the game of basketball.  But his team stands to lose quite a bit this season (Thabeet, Price, Adrien, Austrie) and although UConn won’t be completely rebuilding, it’s not a strong bet that the Huskies will be back competing for a F4 next year. 

Furthermore, and despite some UConn fans’ admonitions to the contrary, this Nate Miles thing is going to be investigated, whether he was a junior or senior or whatever, and regardless of the length and timing of some of these phone calls and text messages.   There’ll also be inquiries into possible contact with other players, including uber-frosh Ater Majok.  Our point is this – it’s not necessarily that probation is looming or even that UConn necessarily did anything wrong here – but you can rest assured that having the NCAA poking around your program is never a fun endeavor and it ultimately causes nothing but an incredible amount of timesuck and headaches for those in charge (i.e., Calhoun). 

So why would Calhoun want to subject himself to that next year?  All we can think is that he really likes coaching (and his $1.6M salary). 

Would the word flood be an appropriate representation?

• Early Entry Fatigue.  LSU’s Tasmin Mitchell will test the waters, but he won’t sign with an agent.  Ditto for Memphis’ Shawn Taggart.  And Miami (FL)’s Dwayne Collins has the same idea.   UCLA’s Jrue Holiday is a bit of a surprise given how he struggled at the end of the season, but he too will take a dip. 
• Curry Watch.  One player who has yet to throw his hat in the ring is Davidson’s Stephen Curry.  Will he be back to make a run at Pete Maravich’s all-time scoring record next season?
• Nice raise.  Alabama’s new coach Anthony Grant will earn $1.8M annually through the term of his seven-year contract.
• Nobody?  It’s really hard for us to believe that nobody currently in D1 wanted this guy after he did a pretty good job keeping the Arizona program together this season. 
• Xavier Coaching Search.  Word is that assistant coach Chris Mack is the most likely candidate to take over for the departed Sean Miller.