Watson Brown on Plaster's show

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Re: Watson Brown on Plaster's show

Post by MrMemorial »

Bryce Drew had the worst SEC season in 70 years and Brown is the only person to lose 200 NCAA football games as a coach. Ever. That's plenty bad. Other than one season, Pancoast was pretty awful too.

Ironic though that somebody who is tired of people ragging on past VU coaches loves to rag on current ones. As if the past ones are off limits. Which they are not. They are fair game. Unless "no complaining about former coaches" is added to the terms of service, well...


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Re: Watson Brown on Plaster's show

Post by alathIN »

Doreknox wrote: Thu Dec 16, 2021 12:29 pm
Bryce Drew's three year winning percentage at VU - 40%
Jerry Stackhouse's three year winning percentage at VU - 38%
19 of Drew's wins came in a season he inherited a Senior-laden NCAA tournament team and started the season dismally, until the players reinstalled Kevin Stallings' offense and basically coached themselves.
19 wins and a tournament berth that year were in spite of Drew's coaching, not because of his coaching.
Drew's winning % when he was actually coaching the team was 33%. And Stack did not inherit a Senior-laden NCAA tournament team.
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Re: Watson Brown on Plaster's show

Post by VUgearhead »

alathIN wrote: Thu Dec 16, 2021 9:21 pm
Doreknox wrote: Thu Dec 16, 2021 12:29 pm
Bryce Drew's three year winning percentage at VU - 40%
Jerry Stackhouse's three year winning percentage at VU - 38%
19 of Drew's wins came in a season he inherited a Senior-laden NCAA tournament team and started the season dismally, until the players reinstalled Kevin Stallings' offense and basically coached themselves.
19 wins and a tournament berth that year were in spite of Drew's coaching, not because of his coaching.
Drew's winning % when he was actually coaching the team was 33%. And Stack did not inherit a Senior-laden NCAA tournament team.
That's a pretty scathing, yet factual, accounting of the two most recent MBB coaches Vanderbilt has had. Almost makes me wish for a return to the VBK days.
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Re: Watson Brown on Plaster's show

Post by MrMemorial »

Even though Drew lost 20 in a row and had the worst SEC season in 70 years, certain people wanted him retained because he reminded them of back when they hung out in the parking lot behind Moon Drug Store in the afternoons with their hair full of Brylcreem (TM)

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Re: Watson Brown on Plaster's show

Post by FayetteDore »

Just my 2 cents:
Watson wasn't a great coach BUT he was a Vanderbilt star player who played clean and was (and is) a good guy. In my book, that means he deserves a little respect from VU fans.

Personally, Watson's exploits were what got me interested in the Commodores. I was in high school in Middle Tennessee while he was playing.
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Re: Watson Brown on Plaster's show

Post by MrMemorial »

JVBK wasn't a great coach BUT he was a Vanderbilt star player who played clean and was (and is) a good guy. In my book, that means he deserves a more respect from VU fans than he gets.

Personally, Jan's exploits were what got many people interested in the Commodores. Especially those who were in junior high and high school in Nashville & Middle Tennessee while he was playing.

And his longest losing streak here in 6 years as a coach was FOUR.
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Re: Watson Brown on Plaster's show

Post by Jason94 »

MrMemorial wrote: Fri Dec 17, 2021 7:50 pm JVBK wasn't a great coach BUT he was a Vanderbilt star player who played clean and was (and is) a good guy. In my book, that means he deserves a more respect from VU fans than he gets.

Personally, Jan's exploits were what got many people interested in the Commodores. Especially those who were in junior high and high school in Nashville & Middle Tennessee while he was playing.

And his longest losing streak here in 6 years as a coach was FOUR.
I'm not sure why you are obsessed with losses, but what most fans care about are wins, mainly meaningful wins. VBK was far from the worst coach we've ever had, and was given 6 season, in which he was able to get to the tournament just once, and showed significant decline in his final season. In the end, it wasn't that he had failed in any particular way, it was that he hadn't provided any memorable moment in 6 seasons that gave him something to hang his hat upon or point to as a reason why he should get another season. Much like you are able to separate Watson Brown's on playing days from his coaching, most are able to do so with VBK, who despite being a hall of fame player for VU, didn't work out as a coach, and had made it clear he wasn't going to do any better by his 6th season.

That is what defines "Memorial Magic" - those wins that we have had where the team jumps up and beats a team that was clearly better than them, or the comeback that defies odd, or the buzzer beater. Most can think of several examples throughout the decades, but I cannot think of a single defining example of Memorial Magic during the VBK seasons, and that is ultimately what did him in. And since you have it out for CEF, note that VBK went 5-7 against USCe in his six seasons, losing 5 of his last 6 games against CEF. He also went 2-6 in the SEC-T. He also had zero wins against UK, zero wins in the tournament, and also went just 5-7 against UT, even though they were a bad team for his first 4 seasons. It is fine that he never lost more than 4 in a row, but when it comes down to it, who cares? There was zero chance we would have been a tournament regular under VKB, and next to zero chance we would have had a memorable season under him.
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Re: Watson Brown on Plaster's show

Post by MrMemorial »

Jason94 wrote: Fri Dec 17, 2021 9:23 pm VBK went 5-7 against USCe in his six seasons, losing 5 of his last 6 games against CEF. He also went 2-6 in the SEC-T. He also had zero wins against UK, zero wins in the tournament, and also went just 5-7 against UT, even though they were a bad team for his first 4 seasons.
See, some of you people just want to rag on our former coaches instead of pointing out the positive.

VBK had impressive back to back wins over Florida and uut. A win over Wake Forest when they had Tim Duncan, one of the best bigs in history. An impressive win at Oklahoma. A win over 4th ranked UCLA. An impressive win at Memphis when they were good. Two impressive wins over Ohio State when they were good. Back to back wins over Florida and LSU another year. An impressive win over Notre Dame. Another win over (ranked) Florida in his last home game.

It's just a darn shame you people want to dwell on the negative about a former all-time VU great player while giving a pass to a guy like Bryce Drew who stunk it up on an epic level and had no connection at all to VU or Nashville.
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Re: Watson Brown on Plaster's show

Post by cc11316 »

Ok, this putting Watson Brown and Bryce Drew in the same category in terms of caliber of coaches seems inaccurate to me. Let's look at the numbers.

Watson Brown
-------------------
Seasons HC : 31 Years
Overall Record: 136-211-1. (.390 winning %)
Note: Had a losing record at every school other than APSU
Only postseason appearance in 2011 1-AA Playoffs (lost round 1)


Bryce Drew
-------------------
Seasons HC: 10th active year [currently 10-2 this season]
Overall Record (including Vandy): 196-117 (.626 winning %) - 7 postseason appearances
Overall Record (not including Vandy): 156-58. (.728 winning %) - 6 postseason appearances
Note : 2 seasons with losing records (both at Vandy)
Best recruiter that Vandy has ever had in basketball (based on national rankings)
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Re: Watson Brown on Plaster's show

Post by MrMemorial »

cc11316 wrote: Tue Dec 21, 2021 3:32 pm Ok, this putting Watson Brown and Bryce Drew in the same category in terms of caliber of coaches seems inaccurate to me. Let's look at the numbers.

Watson Brown
-------------------
Seasons HC : 31 Years
Overall Record: 136-211-1. (.390 winning %)
Note: Had a losing record at every school other than APSU
Only postseason appearance in 2011 1-AA Playoffs (lost round 1)


Bryce Drew
-------------------
Seasons HC: 10th active year [currently 10-2 this season]
Overall Record (including Vandy): 196-117 (.626 winning %) - 7 postseason appearances
Overall Record (not including Vandy): 156-58. (.728 winning %) - 6 postseason appearances
Note : 2 seasons with losing records (both at Vandy)
Best recruiter that Vandy has ever had in basketball (based on national rankings)
While Bryce Drew did well at Valpo and is doing good at "GCU" - some of those "wins" at "GCU" are highly questionable in nature. Life Pacific College? Ottawa College of Arizona? Benedictine College of Arizona? Bethesda U. of California (twice)? Dixie State College of Utah (twice)?

Here's a picture of Bethesda Calif. Christian College...(yes the college is a 2-story office bldg.)
Image

Here's Benedictine's ball players. (no, the college, not the high school)
Image
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Re: Watson Brown on Plaster's show

Post by commadore »

My father in law's granddaughter just graduated from Dixie. Therefore, I can verify it is a real college. Soon as she graduated though, the whole family made a beeline back to Alabama. Her dad actually works in IT at Vanderbilt.
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Re: Watson Brown on Plaster's show

Post by cc11316 »

MrMemorial wrote: Tue Dec 21, 2021 5:52 pm
cc11316 wrote: Tue Dec 21, 2021 3:32 pm Ok, this putting Watson Brown and Bryce Drew in the same category in terms of caliber of coaches seems inaccurate to me. Let's look at the numbers.

Watson Brown
-------------------
Seasons HC : 31 Years
Overall Record: 136-211-1. (.390 winning %)
Note: Had a losing record at every school other than APSU
Only postseason appearance in 2011 1-AA Playoffs (lost round 1)


Bryce Drew
-------------------
Seasons HC: 10th active year [currently 10-2 this season]
Overall Record (including Vandy): 196-117 (.626 winning %) - 7 postseason appearances
Overall Record (not including Vandy): 156-58. (.728 winning %) - 6 postseason appearances
Note : 2 seasons with losing records (both at Vandy)
Best recruiter that Vandy has ever had in basketball (based on national rankings)
While Bryce Drew did well at Valpo and is doing good at "GCU" - some of those "wins" at "GCU" are highly questionable in nature. Life Pacific College? Ottawa College of Arizona? Benedictine College of Arizona? Bethesda U. of California (twice)? Dixie State College of Utah (twice)?

Here's a picture of Bethesda Calif. Christian College...(yes the college is a 2-story office bldg.)
Image

Here's Benedictine's ball players. (no, the college, not the high school)
Image
Fair enough. I will say ... I wouldn't want to play GCU as they seem dangerous. The only common opponent with VU this season is MSVU. GCU defeated them 91-44 while Vandy defeated them 75-36 so pretty similar results. Vandy is currently ranked 196th in the RPI and GCU is 110th.

I just always thought CBD was a victim of some really unusual circumstances that caused the cliff dive of this basketball program. Honestly, there hasn't been much of a recovery since then but I guess that's what started this thread in the first place.
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Re: Watson Brown on Plaster's show

Post by AuricGoldfinger »

commadore wrote: Tue Dec 21, 2021 9:21 pm My father in law's granddaughter just graduated from Dixie. Therefore, I can verify it is a real college. Soon as she graduated though, the whole family made a beeline back to Alabama. Her dad actually works in IT at Vanderbilt.
Way OT--it's surprising to me that Dixie State is just now getting around to changing its name. (It will become Utah Tech beginning next summer.) No, not because it's not a politically correct name, but because so few people nationally know that the school is in southern Utah. And fewer still probably know the story of how southern Utah became known as Dixie after the Mormons who settled the region began growing cotton.
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Re: Watson Brown on Plaster's show

Post by MrMemorial »

AuricGoldfinger wrote: Tue Dec 21, 2021 10:40 pm
commadore wrote: Tue Dec 21, 2021 9:21 pm My father in law's granddaughter just graduated from Dixie. Therefore, I can verify it is a real college. Soon as she graduated though, the whole family made a beeline back to Alabama. Her dad actually works in IT at Vanderbilt.
Way OT--it's surprising to me that Dixie State is just now getting around to changing its name. (It will become Utah Tech beginning next summer.) No, not because it's not a politically correct name, but because so few people nationally know that the school is in southern Utah. And fewer still probably know the story of how southern Utah became known as Dixie after the Mormons who settled the region began growing cotton.
Yep. It was a unanimous vote, the board of trustees REALLY wanted a name change.

As far as "GCU" - real time rpi says their strength of schedule is #270 in the nation which is generous.
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Re: Watson Brown on Plaster's show

Post by charlestonalum »

Unless my memory fails me, both Jan and Bryce are the sons of successful basketball coaches. I will never forget Jan as player for VU nor Bryce making the miracle shot against Ole Miss. Sorry they were not more successful as coaches at VU.
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Re: Watson Brown on Plaster's show

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And then Jan went to Pepperdine the next season (hardly a traditional hoops powerhouse) and went 25-9/12-2 which included a blow-out upset win by 20 over Indiana in the NCAA tourney.

:lol: Helped get Bobby Knight fired. :lol:
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Re: Watson Brown on Plaster's show

Post by AuricGoldfinger »

MrMemorial wrote: Tue Dec 21, 2021 5:52 pm While Bryce Drew did well at Valpo and is doing good at "GCU" - some of those "wins" at "GCU" are highly questionable in nature. Life Pacific College? Ottawa College of Arizona? Benedictine College of Arizona? Bethesda U. of California (twice)? Dixie State College of Utah (twice)?
OT, and not to pile on further, but I find this non-conference scheduling philosophy so strange. I know GCU has had trouble getting home non-conference opponents in the past due to its for-profit status and teams wanting to avoid playing in what might be a tough road environment, but some of these schools aren't even classified as NCAA or NAIA programs. I pride myself on knowing the location of many DII and DIII schools, but even I had to look up every one of these programs except Dixie State (which is transitioning to DI and is in the same conference as GCU). I'm guessing they were incredibly cheap pay-to-play opponents.
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Re: Watson Brown on Plaster's show

Post by UltimateVUFan »

cc11316 wrote: Tue Dec 21, 2021 3:32 pm Bryce Drew
-------------------
Best recruiter that Vandy has ever had in basketball (based on national rankings)
I think this is an overstated (and oversimplified) idea that is actually a common misconception. Drew did have the one really good recruiting class. Of course, on the whole it ended up being a bit of a bust, though that wasn't entirely his fault with the Garland injury. However, Shittu did not pan out at all! But I digress...

I was curious about the recruiting comparison, and since you brought up the basis of national rankings, I explored that. However, to some extent that metric is flawed, because this takes class size into account, and if a team only recruits 1-2 players in a class to fill needs/scholarships, their ranking will be low even if the players are well-rated. At any rate, out of curiosity I checked the 247 composite for the last 15 years (+1 for the incoming class) to get a sense of this comparison.
I gathered the players' average composite rating and National Rank. You'll see what I mean when you look at the composite average relative to the national rank, which varies according to overall class size. (I'm including notable players.)

YEAR / AVG / Ntl
Stallings
2007 / .8648 / 45 (Ezili/Ogilvy - only two)
2008 / .8570 / 19 (Taylor, Tinsley, Tchiengang, Goulbourne)
2009 / .9901 / 63 (Jenkins - one man class)
2010 / .9139 / 30 (Siakam, Odom, fan favorite Henderson)
2011 / .9302 / 24 (Parker, Johnson)
2012 / .8836 / 60 (Jeter... oh, the situational irony)
2013 / .8780 / 76 (Jones, Kornet - only two, but both ultimately exceptional for #76 rank)
2014 / .9195 / 27 (LaChance, MFD, Baldwin)
2015 / .9117 / 39 (Toye, Justice, Baptiste)
Stallings/Drew takeover
2016 / .9122 / 70 (Brown, Willis)
2017 / .9059 / 52 (Lee, Obinna, Evans)
2018 / .9899 / 12 (Shittu, Garland, Nesmith)
Drew/Stackhouse takeover
2019 / .8900 / 50 (Disu, Pippen / Wright was a late CJS add)
2020 / .8625 / 65 (Lawrence, Stute, Thomas)
2021 / .9117 / 42 (Dezonie, Daniels, Dorsey, Mann, Robbins, Frank, Chatman)
2022 / .9297 / 23

A lot to unpack there, but I'll keep my points relatively straightforward:
The AVERAGE national recruiting rank going back to the last ten years of Stallings (if you count the year Drew took over and managed to retain committed players) was 45.
AVERAGE national recruiting rank during Drew's tenure (including the crossover year with Stackhouse, for which he is also responsible) was 46.
Stackhouse's current average, including the Drew crossover year, is 45.

At the end of the day, recruiting to VU has gone through up and down years, but the average level of recruiting is pretty much consistent. Furthermore, seeing what Drew did on the court with that highly touted 2018 class, I think it is a safe assumption that he wasn't going to maintain that level of recruiting. High caliber recruits don't want to lose 20+ games and go winless in conference. Needless to say the dismal performance of his last two seasons made recruiting to VU far more difficult, which is all the more reason to find cautious optimism in the last two classes Stackhouse has put together, both of which were better than Drew's first two classes (if we're talking about national rankings).

I also find it humorous that a common criticism of Stackhouse is that he is the type of coach to just roll out the ball and let the team play. That seems more like Drew's MO than Stackhouse's based on the level of player development and team growth from start to finish in a season. That may work at a Valpo or Grand Canyon, but not so much in the SEC. As much as I agree that the jury is still out on Stackhouse, I really do hope that we can lay the bones of Drew to rest as the negative impact he had on this program is hopefully coming to an end soon.
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Re: Watson Brown on Plaster's show

Post by OldDude »

MrMemorial wrote: Fri Dec 17, 2021 12:50 pm Even though Drew lost 20 in a row and had the worst SEC season in 70 years, certain people wanted him retained because he reminded them of back when they hung out in the parking lot behind Moon Drug Store in the afternoons with their hair full of Brylcreem (TM)

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Dang, MrMemorial, how old are you ? :lol:
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Re: Watson Brown on Plaster's show

Post by MrMemorial »

OldDude wrote: Wed Dec 22, 2021 11:13 am
MrMemorial wrote: Fri Dec 17, 2021 12:50 pm Even though Drew lost 20 in a row and had the worst SEC season in 70 years, certain people wanted him retained because he reminded them of back when they hung out in the parking lot behind Moon Drug Store in the afternoons with their hair full of Brylcreem (TM)

A Little Dab'll Do Ya!
Dang, MrMemorial, how old are you ? :lol:
Old enough to remember when the balconies were under construction. Old enough to remember that Ben West always wore a bow tie.

Barely old enough to remember when greaser teens with hot rods hung out in front of Nick Varallos. Barely old enough to remember when a train derailed over there by the Harding Rd/Post Rd crossing. And lots more but those are a long story for a different day.
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