First off, a few disclaimers:
With Shaka Smart, you have a guy who is only 42 years old, and basically still has a full decade of experience coaching major Division 1 college basketball. How often does that happen?
And it's not just neutral coaching experience... a big chunk of it is successful coaching experience. I understand why so many of our fans want to use his four seasons at Texas as the primary metric by which to judge his competence as a coach, and they're not at all incorrect in doing so... it makes sense to judge a coaching candidates largely by his most recent results, generally speaking, as well as by his results at a program that is most similar to yours. (We can all agree that Texas Basketball is much more similar to Michigan Basketball than VCU Basketball is.)
But I think many of our fans have chosen to completely discount his tenure at VCU completely, and I think that's a mistake. What Shaka put together there was a genuinely impressive run, and it suggests to me that he does have some coaching acumen. And while his 4-year results at Texas have surely not been up to par, his track record at VCU matters, too.
Now, he certainly has some hard questions to answer for himself now about what he would need to do to translate those VCU results to a major program... would he want to try to mimic the "Havoc" style that led to success at VCU, which he clearly has not tried to do so far at Texas? Is it even possible to do so in 2019 at a major program, under the current set of rules governing defense in college basketball? Or does he have it in him to forge an entirely new program identity at a place like Michigan, given the different profile of kids he would likely recruit there and the different level of expectations and competition he would face? These are tough questions that Warde would absolutely need to be asking him if in fact they ever do sit down for a formal interview.
And then there's the question of his track record at Texas so far. It's not been successful, or even acceptable, to date--I think we can all agree on that, relative to what that program did under Rick Barnes prior to Shaka, and relative to what fan expectations can reasonably be in Austin given their program resources and recruiting base.
But in regards to his track record at UT, I think our fans are again making the mistake of an overly extreme assumption: that the results he has generated over the past 4 years in Austin are guaranteed to be duplicated if he takes the Michigan job. While it's possible that would be the case, I don't think it's likely. I'll fully admit that I don't know Shaka Smart personally, and it's possible that he has the unhealthy personality type such that he is never looking to evolve or grow or improve, and never asks himself tough questions about the mistakes he's made in the past so as to avoid them in the future. But I think it's more likely that a 42-year-old young, energetic coach IS someone who is constantly looking to grow and improve at his craft. (Again--this is something that would be critical for Warde to try to evaluate in an interview.)
So what kinds of things MIGHT Shaka have learned from his failures in Austin? While this is all admittedly speculative, here are some possible ideas:
(Contrast everything I wrote above about learning from mistakes to what we'd be dealing with if we hired Juwan Howard, for instance. He literally hasn't even had a chance yet to make mistakes to learn from as a head coach. And if hired, he WILL make them... let's not try to pretend otherwise. Does that mean he can't quickly learn from them as he goes in Ann Arbor, and take quick corrective action to mitigate them and still be successful? No, it doesn't. It's possible he can, and will. But doing that is SO much harder than learning from your mistakes in one role, and then getting a chance to apply the lessons learned in a new setting with a totally fresh start.)
And then there's the question of personality, ethics, and recruiting prowess. By all accounts, Shaka excels in each of these areas. Whether we like it as fans or not, there will be a firm expectation for the new Michigan Basketball coach to be squeaky clean, just like John Beilein was--and I'm not sure there's a coaching candidate in America who would be more likely to recruit at a high level given these constraints than Shaka Smart. And if you're assuming--as I am personally--that there is literally not a single candidate out there, realistic or otherwise, who is going to be able to identify under-the-radar talent and develop players the way Beilein did... bringing in blue-chip guys with a high degree of frequency is going to be essential to our success moving forward. I think Shaka is more likely than anyone to be able to accomplish this, given his track record. (I do think it's reasonable to project that Juwan Howard would also be a very strong recruiter if hired, but that's still just a guess... he has not one day of experience coaching college basketball and has never even tried to recruit teenagers. Shaka has already affirmatively demonstrated that he can land top-level recruits.)
In summary: Shaka Smart is far from the perfect candidate, but I think there would be a lot to be excited about if we do hire him. I really think he can get it done, if only he's willing to learn from his prior mistakes.
- This post is not meant to suggest that hiring Shaka Smart would not carry significant risk--it surely would--or that there would be no chance of him failing badly at Michigan... he surely could. But 95% of the time, that's just the nature of the beast in this coaching searches. It's typically going to be something of a roll of the dice.
- All of the known and realistic candidates, as best as those of us on the outside can tell--I'm defining those guys as Juwan Howard, Shaka Smart, LaVall Jordan, and Ed Cooley, perhaps even Luke Yaklich and Saddi Washington still--have significant risks associated with them. On the flip side, all of them also have a very decent chance at being successful at Michigan. If it is in fact any of those guys who gets the job, I will not only get fully behind him immediately, but get genuinely excited for the future. (To be clear, I'll support the hell out of whoever Warde hires... but if it's any of the names mentioned above, I'll do so with legitimate hope for great success in the future.)
With Shaka Smart, you have a guy who is only 42 years old, and basically still has a full decade of experience coaching major Division 1 college basketball. How often does that happen?
And it's not just neutral coaching experience... a big chunk of it is successful coaching experience. I understand why so many of our fans want to use his four seasons at Texas as the primary metric by which to judge his competence as a coach, and they're not at all incorrect in doing so... it makes sense to judge a coaching candidates largely by his most recent results, generally speaking, as well as by his results at a program that is most similar to yours. (We can all agree that Texas Basketball is much more similar to Michigan Basketball than VCU Basketball is.)
But I think many of our fans have chosen to completely discount his tenure at VCU completely, and I think that's a mistake. What Shaka put together there was a genuinely impressive run, and it suggests to me that he does have some coaching acumen. And while his 4-year results at Texas have surely not been up to par, his track record at VCU matters, too.
Now, he certainly has some hard questions to answer for himself now about what he would need to do to translate those VCU results to a major program... would he want to try to mimic the "Havoc" style that led to success at VCU, which he clearly has not tried to do so far at Texas? Is it even possible to do so in 2019 at a major program, under the current set of rules governing defense in college basketball? Or does he have it in him to forge an entirely new program identity at a place like Michigan, given the different profile of kids he would likely recruit there and the different level of expectations and competition he would face? These are tough questions that Warde would absolutely need to be asking him if in fact they ever do sit down for a formal interview.
And then there's the question of his track record at Texas so far. It's not been successful, or even acceptable, to date--I think we can all agree on that, relative to what that program did under Rick Barnes prior to Shaka, and relative to what fan expectations can reasonably be in Austin given their program resources and recruiting base.
But in regards to his track record at UT, I think our fans are again making the mistake of an overly extreme assumption: that the results he has generated over the past 4 years in Austin are guaranteed to be duplicated if he takes the Michigan job. While it's possible that would be the case, I don't think it's likely. I'll fully admit that I don't know Shaka Smart personally, and it's possible that he has the unhealthy personality type such that he is never looking to evolve or grow or improve, and never asks himself tough questions about the mistakes he's made in the past so as to avoid them in the future. But I think it's more likely that a 42-year-old young, energetic coach IS someone who is constantly looking to grow and improve at his craft. (Again--this is something that would be critical for Warde to try to evaluate in an interview.)
So what kinds of things MIGHT Shaka have learned from his failures in Austin? While this is all admittedly speculative, here are some possible ideas:
- How to manage a college basketball roster when you are dealing with turnover rooted in regular early NBA departures (something Shaka has had to do the past few years and never had to worried about at VCU).
- How to recruit in such a way that you're not only bringing in significant talent, but actually trying to build a team of complimentary skill sets... rather than just recruiting a platoon of quick, high-energy guards who you plan to shift in and out of games hockey line-style, as Shaka could do at VCU.
- The need to have at all times an "offensive coordinator" type of go-to assistant on staff who can help take the lead in building the kind of offensive identity and chemistry and execution that recent Longhorns teams have seemingly lacked.
(Contrast everything I wrote above about learning from mistakes to what we'd be dealing with if we hired Juwan Howard, for instance. He literally hasn't even had a chance yet to make mistakes to learn from as a head coach. And if hired, he WILL make them... let's not try to pretend otherwise. Does that mean he can't quickly learn from them as he goes in Ann Arbor, and take quick corrective action to mitigate them and still be successful? No, it doesn't. It's possible he can, and will. But doing that is SO much harder than learning from your mistakes in one role, and then getting a chance to apply the lessons learned in a new setting with a totally fresh start.)
And then there's the question of personality, ethics, and recruiting prowess. By all accounts, Shaka excels in each of these areas. Whether we like it as fans or not, there will be a firm expectation for the new Michigan Basketball coach to be squeaky clean, just like John Beilein was--and I'm not sure there's a coaching candidate in America who would be more likely to recruit at a high level given these constraints than Shaka Smart. And if you're assuming--as I am personally--that there is literally not a single candidate out there, realistic or otherwise, who is going to be able to identify under-the-radar talent and develop players the way Beilein did... bringing in blue-chip guys with a high degree of frequency is going to be essential to our success moving forward. I think Shaka is more likely than anyone to be able to accomplish this, given his track record. (I do think it's reasonable to project that Juwan Howard would also be a very strong recruiter if hired, but that's still just a guess... he has not one day of experience coaching college basketball and has never even tried to recruit teenagers. Shaka has already affirmatively demonstrated that he can land top-level recruits.)
In summary: Shaka Smart is far from the perfect candidate, but I think there would be a lot to be excited about if we do hire him. I really think he can get it done, if only he's willing to learn from his prior mistakes.
