Fire Todd Butler

[ShockerFever]

Good thinking. Chasing off 10% of the remaining fans aware a baseball program exists is a great approach.

Thank you dizzle. Doc may hate me. Play Angry may not stand me, but damn it, I listened to 90% of the game from start to finish today. How many other fans out there that we got are still listening, or even casually following the baseball program?

People like shoxtop, among others, are getting butthurt because I (and thankfully more others than not) feel this traditionally-rich program deserves better than 5 years of absolute nothingness and continued destination towards obscurity.

I think most have seen all they have needed to see for FIVE years. Is it unreasonable to think that 5 years is long enough to get a once very relevant program back into an NCAA regional? With all that is being lost, everybody not on drugs knows next year will be another nosedive. So in the entire Butler coaching history, his peak will be finishing 7th in conference, while once again sitting outside of the postseason with a cool above .500 record (mostly padded by wins over losing teams).

But I guess people like shoxtop think people shouldn't post on message boards. And if for some strange reason they do, they should only post positively, and anybody wearing a WSU uniform or wears the yellow and black can do no wrong.

Amazing.

[ShockerFever]

And still can’t add to the discussion.

I love these hypocrites. Are you related to lostshocker?

[shoxtop]

You haven’t added anything new to the forum all season. It’s just the same thing. Over and over and over and over again. We got it last year. We all know we can do better. There are very few around here that don’t feel something needs to change. Yet I don’t think I could read a single page in a game thread without you banging your drum. There were some (many fewer than we would have liked) good moments this year. It’s too bad you were too busy pounding your narrative into every topic to enjoy them.

At this point I’m just wasting keystrokes. Enjoy the offseason. Perhaps you’ll get your wish.

[ShockerFever]

Yah I’m gonna beat my drum. Because I can. And because it needs to happen.

Don’t like it? Put me on ignore.

Otherwise. Sit back, and shut up in your little corner where you belong. You add NOTHING.

[shockfan89_]

I do have a question for those that still support HCTB to continue at the helm (although Downtown Shocker Brown seems to be AWOL as of late)...

HCTB will be entering year 6 of a 7-year contract. This summer is typically when an extension takes place (if not before). What do you think should happen to his contract? Wait one more season? It seems like we have been saying this for 3 years now, just wait until next year. This could also begin to have an impact on recruiting (the one area I think HCTB has met expectations). Do you expect improvement next year with a loss of the SRs and a few JRs? Do you think we will repeat this year's non-conference record next year? Do you think we will do better in the conference next year?

I'm just curious because to me it seems like we are losing a lot of talent from this year's team that had a mediocre finish (54 RPI, 9-14-1 in conference for a 7th place finish). I think we had an amazing non-conference record (not against top teams, but still we won the games). I don't feel confident we will have that good of a run next year. I think there are younger players with potential, but I don't honestly think we will replace what we lose after this season and envision a step back for the next year or two. After last year, the reason to continue was "Look at everyone we have coming back" and we did return almost every starter. This year everyone we are losing has been a multi-year starter. We can't really say look at what we have coming back next year...

[C0|dB|00ded]

Bob doesn't like our poll.


T


...:cool:

[shockfan89_]

It's a poll of 50 people who actually follow Shocker Baseball though. And Bob can't count, it is 68 people!

[C0|dB|00ded]

I'll tell you this much, if a coaching change is not made - immediately - this will be the lowest point of our storied baseball program's history going back to 1978. It will signify that the athletic department now considers baseball on par with non-revenue sports like softball and tennis. And as unbelievable as it may sound, we likely have not reached the bottom yet...

Let's just drain the final remnants of goodwill that remains in this program. Let's take it down to zero. Then our next coaching hire will come REALLY cheap as nobody worth more than $75k per would accept the job.


T


...:cool:

[WSU Grad 09]

Per Wikipedia-Todd Butler has been fired. Hope there is some substance to this. Trusting Wikipedia is like trusting CNN...

[shockfan89_]

Where does trusting someone who is banned after 3 posts fall?

[Cdizzle]

Somewhere close to "Finances have nothing to do with any decision I’m making on the leadership of our baseball program"

[1972Shocker]

WSU at large chances are not 0%, they are also not significant enough that I will be paying attention to the NCAA announcement. But this is the NCAA we are talking about.

They may not be zero but you nay need to add some decimal points to be able to find them.

As of today the Shockers have an RPI of 54 per warrenolan.com which is 6th in the AAC, Combine that with a 7th place league finish and a 9-12 record over their final 21 games (excluding the USF tie) you have to be Lloyd Christmas to believe the Shocks have a chance at an at-large.

That said waiting at least until after the NCAA Selections are made is appropriate. Not sure the team has even returned to Wichita yet. If they were flying commercial they may not be coming back until Sunday. And, of course, who knows whether or not there will be anything to wait for. If WSU retains HCTB they may not say anything at all.

However, as has been pointed out on this board when you get down to 1 or 2 years remaining on your contract you are getting into lame duck territory from a recruiting standpoint which brings an extension into question. I don't think he will get an extension or if he does it will (or should) contain a reasonable buyout clause that goes into effect at the end of next season. Whether or not they would publicly announce that is another question.

[ShockTalk]

I guess I would strongly question why it would not contain a very low buyout. HCTB already has the best possible buyout one can have a year from now. It could also be added as something that could be renegotiated based on next year as WSU would either buy him out at that time or give another extension.

[1972Shocker]

Not sure what you would consider a very low buyout. I doubt if HCTB would sign a very low buyout. He would probably say if you want to get rid if me at the end of next year just pay me the $340k remaining on my contract. And WSU gains nothing by offering him a buyout equal to one year's salary unless the keep Butler for a longer period than 2 more years. I suppose it depends on what HCTB thinks an extension is worth to him. He may figure he is gone one way or the other and go ahead just play the string out and collect the remaining $680k on his contract whether he stays or not.

If HCTB thinks he can get the program where it needs to be if he just gets one more year he might agree to an extension with a relatively low buyout. But I doubt he would agree to less than maybe $200k.

Hard to read the minds of the parties involved and, of courrse, ADDB actually has all the financial data that could influence the way he goes on this. Something the fans on the outside can only guess at.

The whole situation is simply the result of an ill-advised contract in the 1st place. The contract should have had a reasonalbe buyout clause that would kick in after 4 years (or 5 at the most).

[shockfan89_]

This is the entire reason to cut your losses on the $680,000 and pull the trigger now. Hire Hooper and sign him to a very low salary with huge incentives. If we win then the man gets paid. If not, you are only out his salary for the next two years. We could probably even save what we pay Hoop by renegotiating salaries for the assistants and making them heavily weighted on performance.

Year 3 would need to contain a substantial raise but have a reasonable buyout for the remaining years. It can easily be done to mitigate the budgetary concerns, if ADDB wants to make it happen.

[Aargh]

There is no reason for Butler to agree to any contract extension with a limited buyout. He'd be better off just refusing to sign and get fired, taking the buyout that's built into the current contract.

Giving him an extension with a small buyout would make it obvious he was going to be fired after next season, so why negotiate for a contract that would pay him less money over the next two years than he would make for getting fired and just cashing the checks from his current contract?

I doubt he would think much of the chances of improving the Shox record next year and getting another extension. He knows as well as we do what he's got coming back and not coming back.

[ShockTalk]

Isn't giving him no extension making it obvious he was going to be fired after next season and no incentive? He'd be walking through the motions in year 6, burying the program even further, and getting paid off for year 7. Giving him a small guarantee (buyout) for the "8th" year means he gets both the 7th and buyout on the 8th. If he does well after year 6, the 8th year and anything beyond would/could be renegotiated.

If you're not giving any extension, you might as well buy him out now and get it over with. If the resources aren't there yet, how do you go about making things best for both parties. No doubt, the current contract has WSU in a bind.

[Cdizzle]

He knows as well as we do what he's got coming back and not coming back.

I'm not willing to make any crazy assumptions.

[1972Shocker]

Here is a 20 minute discussion of Shocker Baseball on Sports Daily this morning:

http://www.kfhradio.com/media/audio-...moving-forward

Would have been better with Shane Dennis who actually knows a thing or two about Shocker baseball.

[Cdizzle]

Interestingly, someone went to the effort to change the wiki page back, but didn't bother to update the season results. Wonder why.

[Play Angry]

Good to see Bruce was paying close enough attention to have no earthly idea why the schedule was rearranged in Clearwater.

[Play Angry]

Not really.

[1972Shocker]

Well Dennis called in and explained the weather situation. Then opined about the lack of offense in AAC play although if you look at the AAC stats the Shockers are at are near the top in a lot of the key offensive stats.

After that it got a little better but nothing you would call expert insights.

[Cdizzle]

Thank folks. That'll save me 15 minutes of theBruce, which will really improve the long weekend.

[1972Shocker]

Here is Bob and Jeff Lutz talking about it yesterday afternoon. Have not had time to listen to it all but Bob said his thinks it is 65-35 the Butler will be gone. Sounds like the first caller is a pro-Bulter call but had to turn it off at the point. I'll get back to it later.

http://www.kfhradio.com/media/audio-channel/after-5-years-what-s-store-now-todd-butler

[1972Shocker]

The first caller named Jim was shall we say less than impressive in the neuron department although he claims he is very, very close to the situation.

This 10 minutes worth listening to just for the entertainment value of this call. I sure didm't expect the argument (by the caller) to be that winning doesn't matter.

[SB Shock]

Jim - wins don't matter, this team was so much fun to watch.......WHAT?

[ShockerFever]

Interestingly, someone went to the effort to change the wiki page back, but didn't bother to update the season results. Wonder why.

Downtown Shocker Brown?

[shockfan89_]

We need to get over budget as a restraint to making the correct decision. We are going to pay HCTB $680,000 over the next two years regardless of what happens.

We have a current budget of $358,000 for the 2 assistant coaches and a DOBO.

I am 100% confident that we could find an energetic coaching staff and DOBO that would take over at WSU tomorrow for a total salary of $475,000 per year. That means it would cost us exactly $117,000 more for each of the next 2 years.

You sign the new coach to a 7 year deal at $200,000 per year with attainable incentives that can easily get them to 300,000 and could get them even higher. You still have $275,000 available for 2 assistants and a DOBO.

You will easily recoup the sunk cost of $680,000 paid to HCTB over the next 7 years if you only perform as good as we have the past 5 years. If no incentives are earned, this contract would pay out $4,005,000 in the next 7 years and that is including the $680,000 to buy out HCTB. If the current salary was paid to HCTB and assistants over the next 7 years it would cost a total of $4,886,000 in salaries. In other words, we are saving $881,000 over the next 7 years. Hopefully we would spend all of that and more on incentives, but at least that would be tied to production on the field.

[C0|dB|00ded]

If you consider Hoop as the next HC you'll be in the black immediately as paid attendance will literally double over night.


T


...:cool:

[C0|dB|00ded]

Waiting with bated breath on news of the start of the next era of Shocker baseball! Let's Go!!!!!


T


...:cool: