This forum is pure hardball. Bring the heat in this discussion of Flames baseball.

Moderators: jcmanson, Sly Fox, BuryYourDuke

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By TH Spangler
Registration Days Posts
#511809
Toman handled his decision well in the media. Do you think it's irreversible?

If it is I think Sidney is a natural choice. No real coaching record to go on though.
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By Jonathan Carone
Posts
#511810
This was a firing so it's definitely irresistible.

As for Sid, as much as we all would like that, it's a pretty long shot.
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By Purple Haize
Registration Days Posts
#511811
TH Spangler wrote:Toman handled his decision well in the media. Do you think it's irreversible?

If it is I think Sidney is a natural choice. No real coaching record to go on though.
There's really no 'take backs' at this level
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By TH Spangler
Registration Days Posts
#511812
Oh, I thought there was a meeting and then three hours later he resigned.
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By Purple Haize
Registration Days Posts
#511813
TH Spangler wrote:Oh, I thought there was a meeting and then three hours later he resigned.
There was a 3 hour gap after the meeting until he 'resigned'. I would love to know what happened during those 3 hours. I'm sure the final verdict was Resignation or Firing but I wonder why it didn't happen in the meeting. Maybe lawyers had to check out the contract language
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By Cider Jim
Registration Days Posts
#511815
Interesting discussion on the USC message boards: they want JT back.

http://www.cockytalk.com/showthread.php?t=225292
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By BJWilliams
Registration Days Posts
#511816
Purple Haize wrote:
TH Spangler wrote:Oh, I thought there was a meeting and then three hours later he resigned.
There was a 3 hour gap after the meeting until he 'resigned'. I would love to know what happened during those 3 hours. I'm sure the final verdict was Resignation or Firing but I wonder why it didn't happen in the meeting. Maybe lawyers had to check out the contract language
That's certainly possible PH. As I said before, they probably decided to play semantics with the release from AC.
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By Jonathan Carone
Posts
#511817
The only thing that lines up with the three hour narrative is if that's when Jim was deciding what he wanted to call the decision. The rest of it doesn't line up with the timeline of the morning.
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By Purple Haize
Registration Days Posts
#511818
Jonathan Carone wrote:The only thing that lines up with the three hour narrative is if that's when Jim was deciding what he wanted to call the decision. The rest of it doesn't line up with the timeline of the morning.
That's why I said lawyers were probably involved looking at the language to see what was in his best interest I would be interested to see what if any financial considerations were involved
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By Purple Haize
Registration Days Posts
#511819
BJWilliams wrote:
Purple Haize wrote:
TH Spangler wrote:Oh, I thought there was a meeting and then three hours later he resigned.
There was a 3 hour gap after the meeting until he 'resigned'. I would love to know what happened during those 3 hours. I'm sure the final verdict was Resignation or Firing but I wonder why it didn't happen in the meeting. Maybe lawyers had to check out the contract language
That's certainly possible PH. As I said before, they probably decided to play semantics with the release from AC.
This is how things are done. There is no need to speculate anything. Semantics also can have repercussions. There is no 'play' involved
By Chris Lang
Registration Days Posts
#511832
jinxy wrote:Timing wise I had a few thoughts. With layer he was canned the second the season ended. Granted he was horrible through and through. Season has been over for a month and the season was basically ruined by may1 meaning JB likely wasn't 100 percent sure he was going to make the move. I think a couple things have happened. Ill start with the least likely. The least likely is that something recently happeNed that resulted in the move. I think once kiriloff and Lee signed and coastal made the world series and kept advancing showing what was truly possible that then JB saw that it was time to make a move for sure. I could be wrong but that's the best I can come up with timing wise.
Layer was informed that he was fired the weekend before the conference tournament. It just wasn't announced until after the loss to Asheville.
By Dirty 30
Posts
#511873
BJWilliams wrote:I think his concern is more with the fact that Toman was very open to his playing baseball and football and whether the new coach will be as open to that arrangement
Liberty was the first school to allow him to play both. USC, Clemson, Coastal, would not allow him to play both. Coastal threw everything but the bus to get him to just play baseball since Football would not allow him to do both. He grew up a Gamecock and went to there camps and established a relationship with the coaches at USC including Toman when he was there because his dad is a high school coach that worked all of their camps and was good friends with the coaching staff. Choosing Liberty to play both because he knew Coach Toman and like the football staff and the atmosphere there. His dad knew his son was in good hands with the football coaches and especially Coach Toman. Now that situation is gone.
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By prototype
Registration Days Posts
#511876
Dirty 30 wrote:
BJWilliams wrote:I think his concern is more with the fact that Toman was very open to his playing baseball and football and whether the new coach will be as open to that arrangement
Liberty was the first school to allow him to play both. USC, Clemson, Coastal, would not allow him to play both. Coastal threw everything but the bus to get him to just play baseball since Football would not allow him to do both. He grew up a Gamecock and went to there camps and established a relationship with the coaches at USC including Toman when he was there because his dad is a high school coach that worked all of their camps and was good friends with the coaching staff. Choosing Liberty to play both because he knew Coach Toman and like the football staff and the atmosphere there. His dad knew his son was in good hands with the football coaches and especially Coach Toman. Now that situation is gone.
Dirty - I know this will be a change, but if history serves - Baseball will get a GREAT coach and the facilities, opportunities and Liberty will still be here. I'm sure that the next coach will honor his request to play both, since he was promised to be allowed to play both - I'm sure Barber will make sure that happens.
By Dirty 30
Posts
#511877
Prototype, I hope so. I have season tickets for Football and I will do the same for baseball to drive over 4 hours to watch this kid and the Flames play. Looking forward to the upcoming season. I just don't want anymore surprises.
By olldflame
Registration Days Posts
#511904
I've been thinking about why Toman is no longer our coach I think we can rule out anything to do with frustration over Coastal's success I believe JB is too smart for that, and after this week they are no longer in our conference While I'm sure it played a factor, and this year was definately a disappointment, I don't think it was primarily wins and losses either 2 NCAA trips in the last 4 years is not chicken feed I think it comes down to some things that have been mentioned numerous times by various posters on this forum Toman and his entire staff focused on recruiting almost to the exclusion of all else Player development and problem solving were at best an afterthought

While we know the AD's office monitors this board, I think we also all know they put zero weight (if not less) on what we want However, if JB was hearing the same things from more relevant sources like current and former players and recruits, along with their support systems as well as scouts, opposing coaches and other baseball people, it would get his attention Of course most importantly he could see first hand what the situation was

I think it just reached the point where he determined that the way things were being done was not going to get us where we want to go, and JT was not going to change Recruits like Khalid Lee, who have a tough choice to make, don't want to take a chance on delaying their pro career by 3 years to go to a program where as many or more players are regressing as progressing in their time on the mountain If anything, what Gilmore has done at Coastal showed another way of doing things It is possible to recruit hard and still take players who are diamonds in the rough and coach them up Hopefully our new staff will show us it doesn't just work at the beach
By Dirty 30
Posts
#511909
olldflame wrote:I've been thinking about why Toman is no longer our coach I think we can rule out anything to do with frustration over Coastal's success I believe JB is too smart for that, and after this week they are no longer in our conference While I'm sure it played a factor, and this year was definately a disappointment, I don't think it was primarily wins and losses either 2 NCAA trips in the last 4 years is not chicken feed I think it comes down to some things that have been mentioned numerous times by various posters on this forum Toman and his entire staff focused on recruiting almost to the exclusion of all else Player development and problem solving were at best an afterthought

While we know the AD's office monitors this board, I think we also all know they put zero weight (if not less) on what we want However, if JB was hearing the same things from more relevant sources like current and former players and recruits, along with their support systems as well as scouts, opposing coaches and other baseball people, it would get his attention Of course most importantly he could see first hand what the situation was

I think it just reached the point where he determined that the way things were being done was not going to get us where we want to go, and JT was not going to change Recruits like Khalid Lee, who have a tough choice to make, don't want to take a chance on delaying their pro career by 3 years to go to a program where as many or more players are regressing as progressing in their time on the mountain If anything, what Gilmore has done at Coastal showed another way of doing things It is possible to recruit hard and still take players who are diamonds in the rough and coach them up Hopefully our new staff will show us it doesn't just work at the beach

Old Flame, I agree with you and I think it is more than that as well. He average 37 wins for 9 years and had 9 straight 30 win seasons, had 3 of the 4 forty wins seasons in Liberty History and second in the state to UVA in wins the last 9 years among the 13 in state D1 programs, 30 guys drafted. I truly believe someone else made this firing happen. Just my gut feeling.
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By Jonathan Carone
Posts
#511910
Not enough winning and lack of player development were the reasons.

You can rack up wins but if they don't lead to championships, they aren't worth anything. He averaged finishing fourth in the league over the past four years. That's simply not good enough, regardless of win total.
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By jinxy
Registration Days Posts
#511912
I'm just saying coastal showed that it was possible making our last 2 years look worse. We peaked mid 2014 under toman and went down hill from there. I said it back then and got crushed it. Toman had simply taken the program as far as he could with the staff he had. A few regional here and there. It's a combination of things I'm sure like always. I disagree about how strong of a recruiter he was. It was mostly jucos. A lot of the studschool fell into out lap like Matt williams the breams. I think he was a good recruiter but not a great recruiter.
By Chippy
Registration Days Posts
#511959
Toman was probably a good recruiter for South Carolina. It's a different ballgame (sorry) recruiting for LU. Can you imagine what 2014 would have looked like if it had not been for Ryan Seiz transferring in from Louisville? It's the same with Karly Beuer (2015) in women's basketball - kids that weren't recruited making their teams much better than they would have been with just Toman's/Greene's recruits.
By olldflame
Registration Days Posts
#511978
He relied very heavily on JUCO players here, at least partially because they arrived more physically mature and with the benefit of 2 years of additional coaching and experience and thus less in need of development At SC he could go after more HS players and there were other guys to coach them up
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By Jonathan Carone
Posts
#511990
His juco recruiting also highlights another thing I really hope Jeff realizes: recruiting in the south (SC, GA, Florida, Louisiana, etc) is much different than recruiting nationally at Liberty. We don't have the talent at our back door that the schools in those area have. We have to rely much more on player development. I think Jeff knows this and hopefully it'll influence his decision.
By ballcoach15
Registration Days Posts
#512070
There is a lot of talent at our backdoor. Not as much as some schools have in their area "down south",

it burns me up every time I see an area athlete sign with another BSC school,, or a JMU or a Richmond.
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By BJWilliams
Registration Days Posts
#512089
We have talent...but do we have championship winning D1 level talent is the question...with that said, you can't put all your recruiting eggs in one basket either.
By olldflame
Registration Days Posts
#512091
ballcoach15 wrote:There is a lot of talent at our backdoor. Not as much as some schools have in their area "down south",

it burns me up every time I see an area athlete sign with another BSC school,, or a JMU or a Richmond.
Yeah, we know :roll:

Prepare to continue being burned up Not every local player is a fit for Liberty, and some flat out hate the place To find athletes who can play AND are a fit for LU, we have of necessity always recruited regionally and nationally, and I don't see that changing
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