Rumor mill is turning and churning
1 May 2008 — rbkSpecifically, there is word out that Ramar Smith has been dismissed from the team. Jimmy Hyams says it is not true and that he heard this from an assistant coach, and Volquest is backing that up. But other sources are insisting that this is false information and that Ramar will indeed not be on the team next season.
In a related rumor, UT is said to have offered JUCO PG Bobby Maze, a very talented player that started for Oklahoma as a freshman but was dismissed and went to JC to get his act together. The Vols had been in deep in his recruitment but backed off and signed Daniel West instead. If this rumor is true, it seems likely to me that the Ramar rumor is true too.
I guess we will know soon. What a crazy time of year, folks.
1 May 2008 at 6:16 pm
http://www.hoopsreport.com/news/hoopsnews/tennesseeoffersjucopointguard
1 May 2008 at 7:43 pm
Wow. What a job Bruce did to manage through Chris Lofton’s cancer and - perhaps - this kind of disturbance as well. I wonder if it was something more than not finishing at the basket or being unselfish with the ball that caused Bruce to change point guard strategies before the tournament? Just speculation at this point, but it makes more sense than moving to JP out of the blue.
3 May 2008 at 9:49 am
I read someone on a message board say recently, “There is too much smoke around this Ramar situation for there not to be a fire somewhere.” Turns out that was a very correct statement. I am so mightly disappointed in Ramar and Duke. To have everything given to you and have nothing but positive things in your future and to blow it by a consistent pattern of selfish and destructive acts is somewhat mind-boggling to me. And the worst part of this whole situation? Chris’ struggles will be quickly ignored for the selfish acts of these two people. Chris reminded us of the courage and heart a student-athelte can have and it is all effaced by two players who couldn’t get past their own vices.
So, where do we go from here? First, we need to find the basketball players hook up for Mary Jane and see if we can reroute that away from the athletic dorms. Second, hopefully this will further reinforce to our student-atheletes that Bruce will not tolerate activities like this and the message will sink in to everyone on the team.
What does this do to the starting lineup next year? I’m thinking: Prince, Hopson, Tatum, Smith, Chism. First off the bench I guess West for Prince, Tabb for Hopson, Williams for Chism, Chill for Smith, and Woolridge coming in at the 4 with maybe Smith sliding down to the 3?
Just such a disappointment.
5 May 2008 at 8:30 am
Okay, I am just throwing this out, but are we giving Bruce too much leeway on academic/misbehavior issues? He has been here for three years and has had 3 players dismissed from his teams for academic/misbehavior issues. He only has 12 players on his teams at any one time. So, in essentially 36 player positions, he has lost 3 of them to “issues.” That is around a 8% mark. We constantly deride Phil for his players off-the-field issues, but there are 85 or so of them at a time and I would venture that his percentage is lower than Bruce’s. Is anyone else concerned about Bruce’s ability to keep players on the straight and narrow or am I reading too much into these things?