A Brief History of #DoneDeal By Ben Steele

[Oldgym]

https://www.jsonline.com/story/sports/college/marquette/2021/03/29/marquette-finally-has-done-deal-shaka-smart-after-2014-fiasco/7042106002/

[The Lens]

You cannot write that story without mentioning IWB or his famous "I am the source" tweet.

[DienerTime34]

Whatever happened to IWB? BrewCityBall is dead & the Pro-Am ended when Wojo came aboard. Is he still involved in covering the program?

[cheebs09]

Whatever happened to IWB? BrewCityBall is dead & the Pro-Am ended when Wojo came aboard. Is he still involved in covering the program?

The premium board is where most of the traffic is. It's pretty active.

[The Sultan]

Whatever happened to IWB? BrewCityBall is dead & the Pro-Am ended when Wojo came aboard. Is he still involved in covering the program?

BrewCityBall isn't dead.  The member forum is alive and well.

[Mr. Nielsen]

Whatever happened to IWB? BrewCityBall is dead & the Pro-Am ended when Wojo came aboard. Is he still involved in covering the program?

He was at the press conference.

[Galway Eagle]

He was at the press conference.

Had to see it with his own eyes this time to verify donedeal2.0

[Oldgym]

No doubt feeling a little snakebitten, even after seven years.  He has said little about the hire on Twitter....but there is this. 



And ain't Ben Brust just precious? I wonder if he came up with that on his own.

[MU82]

The Athletic has a very good piece today by the talented Eamonn Brennan on Shaka and Marquette finally getting together.

Within it, he included a link to the article The Anonymous Eagle wrote back in 2014 about the unfortunately #neverdonedeal:

https://www.anonymouseagle.com/2014/3/25/5545416/marquette-basketball-vcu-virginia-commonwealth-shaka-smart-twitter

I won't link The Athletic's article, but a few paragraphs particularly caught my eye ...

About how #neverdonedeal might have affected MU fans' own perception of the program:

It's not just that Smart had turned down yet another open college coaching job. Yes, Smart was a Madison, Wis., native whose ties to the area made Marquette fans especially hopeful he would come back, but even Marquette fans were reasonable enough to understand that Smart had become every fan's ideal hire, the panacea for every open position in the sport. Smart did a lot of turning people down for a few years there. No, the hurt ran deeper. It felt close. It felt like something was happening, like Smart had taken a good long look, had gotten close enough to saying yes that he realized it wasn't for him, and then it was made painfully obvious to the entire sport which party in the process had rejected whom. At best, it made the university's search more difficult, and more likely to disappoint. At worst, it revealed something scary to Marquette's own fans. Throw in the fact that Marquette was replacing Buzz Williams — a successful coach who left for Virginia Tech, which exactly zero Marquette fans considered a step up then or now — and the sudden status anxiety, the feeling of downward mobility, was terrifying. Wait: Maybe Marquette isn't as attractive as we thought? Maybe we're ... not desirable? The "done deal" tweet lives in infamy.

+++

About what both Shaka and Marquette have endured since #neverdonedeal:

At a bare minimum, both parties have learned plenty in the seven years since they almost hooked up, and both have the scars to prove it.

+++

About why Shaka didn't use Havoc at UT:

Seven years ago, few would have doubted Smart's ability to get that project going. It never quite happened. Smart inherited a group of Rick Barnes players — a group of tall, slow-ish forwards for whom a adopting "Havoc" style a la VCU would have been a hilarious mistake — so he quickly set out about adapting his own style to his players' strengths. It was a prudent move, and a humble one, but in turn Smart never truly established the kind of clear, unmistakable identity his Rams teams enjoyed, and at worst his Longhorns groups could fall into a bit of a muddle.

+++

On the importance of NCAA Tournament wins:

Sure, the tournament is everything, and everybody knows it. Coaches get it. This is, as the old movie quote goes, the life they've chosen. If you don't get to the NCAA Tournament and win in the NCAA Tournament, preferably consistently but at least somewhat semi-regularly, then it doesn't really matter how good your teams are in the regular season. And it works both ways: Coaches ride to prominence on the back of great tournament runs. Smart became a college coaching household name not just because he built (and built on) a quality program at VCU, or established a style of play, but also because he took the Rams to that defiant 2011 Final Four. Everything flowed from there.

[IrwinFletcher]

Whatever happened to IWB? BrewCityBall is dead & the Pro-Am ended when Wojo came aboard. Is he still involved in covering the program?

The private board has been the best source of information over the past 2-3 weeks.  Well worth the small annual price.

[PhillyWarrior]

No doubt feeling a little snakebitten, even after seven years.  He has said little about the hire on Twitter....but there is this. 



And ain't Ben Brust just precious? I wonder if he came up with that on his own.

Brust = typical dimwitted grad (maybe?).  They really produce a lot of weasels

[The Lens]

The private board has been the best source of information over the past 2-3 weeks.  Well worth the small annual price.

Tried signing up a few times in last 10 days but the registration page appeared broken. The captcha app they use wouldn't display.   

[avid1010]

Brust = typical dimwitted grad (maybe?).  They really produce a lot of weasels

Anything for attention...you'd never see Wade tweet something like that...because he has a life...

[tower912]

Anything for attention...you'd never see Wade tweet something like that...because he has a life...

Brust can't land a gig hosting a game show.

[4everwarriors]

Yeah butt herd Brad Davison is bein' cast for a part  in "The Nutcracker," aina?

[keefe]

Yeah butt herd Brad Davison is bein' cast for a part  in "The Nutcracker," aina?

That guy is one weird f#ck