Put yourself in Greg Byrne's shoes. It's easy to say, "fire Johnson." Cecil's article says that the buyout goes from $9 million to $8 million in a few weeks.
My feeling is that another year of Johnson would do more than $1 million damage to the program, and you'd end up with no choice but to fire him in March of 2020, with high school level talent for the new guy to work with. So that would indicate a change now.
But then what? Or more properly, then who? I don't have a good answer for that one.
Here's my suggestion: Bite the bullet, demolish Coleman, and build a new 8,000 seat arena. Move the start date up to 2020. Pay $4 million for a new coach, and put in his contract that if the new arena doesn't start at that time, he is free to leave with his buyout.
I think those terms would attract someone we couldn't normally get.
The obvious downside is the cost. It would be expensive. But how expensive is having a basketball program in the doldrums for nearly two decades? I believe the donor support would respond to the commitment, and offset a lot of it.
OR
We decide we are perpetually a .500 team (.333 in the SEC), come to terms with that, and keep Johnson.
They certainly werent moving as fast as that other team. I for one am suprised they didnt play alittle peppier at home
