Whipped Cream Difficulties

This is only sort of a firings watch because Mel Tucker isn’t out as head coach of Michigan State yet.

But the school has notified him they intend to fire him “for cause”. Which means no contract payout.

This is a weird story that I’ve been following from a distance, but have had trouble finding a way into that treats everyone involved with respect. Mr. Tucker is accused of sexual harassment. I’m just going to quote from the ESPN story:

Prominent sexual assault awareness speaker Brenda Tracy filed a sexual misconduct complaint against Tucker in December 2022. She claims that Tucker made unwelcome advances after she was hired to speak to the Spartans football team about sexual misconduct and her experience as a rape survivor. She said Tucker also masturbated without her consent during a phone call in April 2022. Tucker admitted to masturbating, but said in a statement last week that it was part of a consensual intimate relationship.
Tracy told USA Today that after she raised concerns about Tucker’s conduct, he postponed and eventually canceled a speaking engagement at the university. Because she had an ongoing professional relationship with the athletic department, she was able to file a claim under the school’s sexual misconduct policy.

Mr. Tucker has seven days from yesterday to respond to the termination letter.

I guess the baseball season is winding down. I’ll probably do a loser update, either as an individual post or as part of the regular post, when the season ends.

In the meantime: Chaim Bloom out as “chief baseball officer” of the Boston Red Sox.

Bloom was hired in 2019, bringing with him a plan for sustainable success from his time with the Tampa Bay Rays. He instead angered much of the fanbase by methodically stripping the team of its stars and replacing them with an ever-changing cast of veterans on short-term contracts, role players and prospects.
The Sox are 73-72 this season, tied with the Yankees at the bottom of the American League East and 267-262 under Bloom over four seasons. His tenure was marked by the franchise losing its status among Major League Baseball’s powers.

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Under Bloom, the Sox traded Mookie Betts and David Price to the Dodgers in 2020 in what was essentially a salary dump. The return was Alex Verdugo, Connor Wong, and Jeter Downs.
Verdugo has been a solid player in right field. Wong, 27, has shown promise as a good defensive catcher and Downs was released in 2022.
Betts helped lead the Dodgers to a World Series title in 2020 and remains one of the premier players in the game.

Jim Foster out as baseball coach at Northwestern.

Foster had been investigated by the university’s human resources department before the season. The probe found evidence that Foster “engaged in bullying and abusive behavior,” according to a document obtained by the Chicago Tribune, and made an inappropriate comment about a female staff member.

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Northwestern had several coaches depart the program in February, and the team struggled to a 10-40 record. After the season, 16 players reportedly entered the transfer portal.
Radio station 670 The Score in Chicago reported that Foster discouraged players from seeking medical attention for injuries and that players hid their injuries from him. The station also reported that Northwestern coaches and other staff members attempted to meet with Gragg but were denied an opportunity.

This seems like fallout from a story I missed covering earlier this week: football coach Pat Fitzgerald got canned on Monday, for pretty much the same reason.

The firing of Fitzgerald, 48, comes after the school announced Friday that he’d be suspended without pay for two weeks this summer following the conclusion of a university-commissioned investigation into allegations made by a former Northwestern football player. The school said the investigation, which was initiated in January and conducted by an outside law firm, did not find “sufficient” evidence that the coaching staff knew about ongoing hazing — though there were “significant opportunities” to find out about it.
The school then reversed course Saturday night after The Daily Northwestern published a story detailing allegations from the former player, who described specific instances of hazing and sexual abuse. That led Schill to write an open letter to the university community in which he said that he “may have erred in weighing the appropriate sanction” for Fitzgerald and acknowledged focusing “too much on what the report concluded (Fitzgerald) didn’t know and not enough on what he should have known.”

This is somewhat unusual. It isn’t common to fire a whole team from a league.

The only example I am aware of before the past few days is NK Veres Rivne, an “association football” team, which got thrown out of the Ukrainian Second League in 2011 for not paying dues.

On Thursday, the Albany Empire (“Albany?”) was thrown out of the National Arena League…for not paying dues.

“After exhausting all avenues, the NAL board of owners have decided unanimously to terminate the membership agreement of the Albany Empire,” the league said in a release. “The decision was reached after an emergency conference call of the members in good standing to discuss the Empire’s failure to pay their league mandated and overdue assessments.”

The Albany Empire was recently aquired (maybe: it is complicated) by Antonio Brown, former NFL player.

Since Brown bought the Empire — becoming a part-owner in March and taking over a 94% stake in the franchise in May — the team has been through multiple coaches, and both quarterbacks on the roster were released after last weekend’s loss to the Orlando Predators that dropped Albany to 1-6. The Empire had entered the season as two-time defending champions.
Brown, a four-time NFL All-Pro wide receiver, had vowed to play for the Empire but had yet to do so. He practiced Wednesday and caught passes from quarterback Dalton Cole — who played at Division III Brevard College and played for the Sharks for a short time — before giving an interview in which he questioned whether “AB” was going to pay him; Brown has stated in the past that AB the owner and Antonio Brown the player are different people.

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Thursday’s decision was the latest drama during Brown’s tenure in Albany. Players and suppliers complained about not getting paid, and eight players were suspended after one player filed an aggravated harassment report with police over a dispute that occurred on the team bus, The Albany Times-Union reported last month.

Doc Rivers, who as far as I can tell is neither a doctor or a river (discuss) out as coach of the Philadelphia 76ers.

He went 154-82 in three regular seasons with the organization but, like predecessor Brett Brown, failed to get the team past the playoffs’ second round.

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Rivers has been one of the NBA’s most recognizable and successful coaches for more than two decades, being honored as one of the top 15 coaches in league history during its 75th anniversary celebration. He won a championship with the Boston Celtics in 2008, before guiding a once-embarrassing Los Angeles Clippers franchise to six playoff appearances in seven seasons. The former All-Star point guard began his coaching career with the Orlando Magic in 1999-2000, where he was named coach of the year in his first season and took that team to three playoff berths in five seasons.
Yet Rivers has also become known for playoff failures, particularly in close-out games. He is now 17-33 in such situations, and 6-10 in Game 7s, after the Sixers surrendered their 3-2 series lead to Boston.

Monty Williams out as head coach of the Phoenix Suns.

In four seasons, Williams posted a 194-115 record in the regular season, 27-19 mark in the playoffs, but had disappointing playoff exits last year and this year.

They lost to the Nuggets in six games this year. They made the finals in 2021, and lost in seven games to Dallas in the semi-finals last year.

Mike Budenholzer out as coach of the Milwaukee Bucks.

Milwaukee went 271-120 (.693) during the regular season with Budenholzer at the helm, the best record in the league across that span. The Bucks finished with the best record in the NBA during three separate seasons (2018-19, 2019-20 and 2022-23), but never made it to the Finals in any of those years. They dropped two playoff series against the Heat — this season and in the Orlando bubble in 2020, both in five games — when they were overwhelming favorites.

They lost to Miami in this year’s playoffs. I get the impression that they consistently did well in the regular season, and were a consistent disappointment in the playoffs. But as you know, Bob, I don’t follow basketball closely, so I could be wrong about this.

Rob Murphy out as assistant GM of the Detroit Pistons for being a sexual harasser.

Brad Bohannon out as baseball coach of the Alabama Crimson Tide.

The reason why is a bit shocking:

“Alabama director of athletics Greg Byrne announced he has initiated the termination process for head baseball coach Brad Bohannon for, among other things, violating the standards, duties, and responsibilities expected of University employees,” the university said in a statement Thursday morning. “Bohannon has been relieved of all duties and Jason Jackson will serve as the interim head coach. There will be no further comment at this time pending an ongoing review.”

What’s specifically going on is that there’s an investigation into “suspicious wagering activity” on Tide games. Three states where betting is legal (Ohio, New Jersey and Pennsylvania) have stopped all betting on Alabama.

ESPN first reported Monday evening that the Ohio Casino Control Commission had suspended betting on Alabama baseball games at the state’s legal sports books after U.S. Integrity, a Las Vegas-based independent monitor, detected suspicious bets on last Friday’s Alabama-LSU game in Baton Rouge.
U.S. Integrity, which monitors gambling data to detect abnormalities and misuse of insider information, sent a warning to all of its clients after Friday’s game. Ronnie Johns, the chairman of the Louisiana Gaming Control Board, told NOLA.com that one of the bets was a parlay involving the Alabama-LSU game, and another was a “large” straight-up bet on the game. Both wagered LSU would win.

Alabama lost to LSU, 8-6.

Alabama sophomore pitcher Luke Holman was scheduled to start Friday’s game, but according to UA’s game recap, reliever Hagan Banks was told “an hour before” first pitch that he would be starting in Holman’s place. Holman was scratched after experiencing back tightness before the game, The Advocate in Baton Rouge reported Friday evening.

Well, really, only one, and oddly not men’s (or women’s) college basketball.

Chuck Fletcher out as GM of the Philadephia Flyers.

The Flyers, currently 24-30-11, went 141-144-43 (.495 points percentage) overall under Fletcher. They only reached the playoffs once, in the 2020 season. Three of those seasons were impacted by COVID-19, including that playoff season when the Flyers racked up a 41-21-7 record and came up one game short of reaching the conference finals.
Things quickly started to go downhill during the 2020-21 season, though, as the Flyers, who entered that season with lofty expectations, finished sixth of eight teams in their division and missed the playoffs. Last season was even worse, as the Flyers’ .372 points percentage was the second-worst in franchise season. The team also suffered through two 10-plus game losing streaks, including a franchise-record 13-game skid, while suffering a slew of injuries that resulted in over 500 man-games lost.

I have no joke here, I just like saying “man-games”.

Edited to add: Well, spoke too soon.

Mike Anderson out as men’s basketball coach of St. John’s.

St. John’s finished eighth in the Big East with its worst NET ranking (98) under his watch and a 2-14 record in Quad 1 and 2 games.
Over Anderson’s final two seasons, St. John’s went 3-22 in Quad 1 games and 2-14 against ranked opponents.

Side note: St. John’s is rumored to be looking at Rick Pitino as a new coach.

Which leads me to side note #2: “How an FBI agent’s wild Vegas weekend stained an investigation into NCAA basketball corruption”.

Also: Josh Pastner out as men’s basketball coach at Georgia Tech. Seven seasons, 109-114 overall and 51-78 in conference.

Pastner’s tenure will be remembered for the 2021 ACC championship – Tech’s first since 1993 – and his seemingly endless enthusiasm and positive energy. He spoke of how he didn’t see the glass as half full, but instead overflowing.
He was generous with his time and happily served as an ambassador for the institute. On behalf of the ticket office, he called fans to help sell season tickets and even personally answered emails from fans telling him that he should resign.

Playing catch-up here. Sorry for drawing heavily on the Entertainment and Sports Programming Network, but I’m having trouble finding better links.

Patrick Ewing out as head basketball coach of Georgetown. Six years, 75-109.

Mark Fox out as head coach of the California Golden Bears. Four seasons:

The Golden Bears finished their season Wednesday with a first-round Pac-12 tournament loss to Washington State that dropped them to 3-29 on the season. They went 2-18 in Pac-12 play.

Mark Adams resigned as head coach of the Texas Tech men’s basketball team. I’m calling this a “firing” because he was suspended eight days ago for making an “inappropriate, unacceptable, and racially insensitive comment.”

According to the school, Adams was encouraging a player to be more receptive to coaching and “referenced Bible verses about workers, teachers, parents, and slaves serving their masters.” Adams apologized to the team immediately after the comment, the school said.

Jim Boeheim out as men’s basketball coach of Syracuse. This one is weird: I can’t tell if it is a firing or a retirement. It feels like a “mutually agreed” retirement.

47 seasons, 1,015-441 overall in his career, and the second best record as a Division I coach. (Mike Krzyzewski is the record holder.)

…that much being 2-13 in conference play this season.

Kermit Davis out as men’s basketball coach at Ole Miss.

The Rebels are among the worst offenses in the SEC this season. They present no real interior threat, and shoot only 28.9% from 3-point range. Without a true strength on that end of the court, Ole Miss is often prone to long, listless stretches of offense that cost it games. Defensively, the Rebels are better, but the analytics ultimately place them comfortably in the SEC’s bottom half. Ole Miss is good enough to offer some resistance at times, but not good enough for Davis to get the wins he needed to keep his job.

He coached for close to five seasons, but I can’t find an overall record for his tenure.

I didn’t get a chance to blog this yesterday, as I was busy pretty much all day (for reasons I hope to be able to post shortly).

Bruce Boudreau out as coach of the Vancouver Canucks. That’s a NHL team, for those who might be wondering: I was a little confused at first myself and thought they were a CFL team.

The Canucks have lost 28 out of 46 games this season.

Boudreau is the second coach Vancouver has fired in under 14 months. Boudreau took over in December 2021 when previous coach Travis Green and general manager Jim Benning were let go 25 games into the 2021-22 season.
The Canucks have missed the playoffs the past two seasons since reaching the second round in the bubble in 2020.

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Teams coached by Boudreau for a full season have made the playoffs nine out of 10 times. His .626 points percentage ranks fourth among coaches with at least 500 games behind the bench, and his 617 wins are tied for 20th in league history with Hall of Famer Jacques Lemaire.