ESPYs: Best Coach Tara - Printable Version
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ESPYs: Best Coach Tara - mbdude - 07-11-2021
https://youtu.be/dm8unr1-gbA
RE: ESPYs: Best Coach Tara - jonnyss - 07-11-2021
thanks for posting. wow, what a speech! i loved the tribute to nneka.
RE: ESPYs: Best Coach Tara - Card10Fan - 07-11-2021
Deserving recognition for Tara and a fine acceptance speech indeed. There were also great acceptance speeches from Paige Bueckers and Maya Moore that are worth rewatching.
RE: ESPYs: Best Coach Tara - WBB fan - 07-11-2021
So happy to see the recognition, and Tara's remarks were right on point, in so many ways.
RE: ESPYs: Best Coach Tara - old spanish trail - 07-11-2021
(07-11-2021, 10:39 AM)Card10Fan Wrote: Deserving recognition for Tara and a fine acceptance speech indeed. There were also great acceptance speeches from Paige Bueckers and Maya Moore that are worth rewatching.
Agree re the three speeches. It was interesting. I'd guess 75% of the eve featured black commenters, presenters and award winners. And, celebration of black women and social justice was the main theme. Wonder what the SEC folks who tuned in to hopefully celebrate their various winners thought. Bueckers made very thoughtful comment that it's the sports writers and commentators who tell us who is great, and who should be featured, and they focus primarily on white athletes. Maya Moore was a revelation. I don't think she was reading. PS: Reading speeches isn't Tara's strength.
RE: ESPYs: Best Coach Tara - 81alum - 07-11-2021
Great speech, but Tara is clearly not practiced with a teleprompter! That is exactly what happens when you use a teleprompter but are more comfortable with paper notes. Well, given that Tara coaches, skis, and plays the piano I don't really want her to take up teleprompting!
Very nice that they gave the award to Tara--and given that it is ALL coaching that is a phenomenal achievement.
Is Paige Bueckers even the best college wbb player, let alone the best college female athlete? Or is this just the UConn network's obligatory sop? Bueckers may one day be the very best--but not her freshman year. She was 35th in fg percentage, 29th in ppg, 4th in 3pt%, 14th in assists per game, 31st in a/t ratio, and she played for a team that didn't make it to the finals. The team they lost to had a star who outplayed Bueckers. Would you pick Bueckers over Aari McDonald for your pick-up game?
It was gracious of Bueckers to give that nice speech, and she certainly was not responsible for her own selection, but could this itself be an example of the kind of bias that was being discussed?
RE: ESPYs: Best Coach Tara - teejers1 - 07-11-2021
(07-11-2021, 07:18 AM)mbdude Wrote: https://youtu.be/dm8unr1-gbA
Sorry. The Espys are a contrived fraud. Probably ESPN's worst programming . . . and that's saying something. I have never watched a second of it, based on principle (other than channel surfing stop to see what's on).
The height of faux self-importance/real arrogance from the network that is loaded with such personalities. It's all part of the profile: ESPN thinks it is WAY better/more important than it is.
Because it's an Espy, I can't even bring myself to congratulate Tara.
P.S. Can't wait for a la carte sports on streaming platforms to really dominate the landscape. It's coming.
RE: ESPYs: Best Coach Tara - Spiny_Norman - 07-11-2021
(07-11-2021, 07:52 PM)81alum Wrote: Would you pick Bueckers over Aari McDonald for your pick-up game?
It was gracious of Bueckers to give that nice speech, and she certainly was not responsible for her own selection, but could this itself be an example of the kind of bias that was being discussed?
Fans help to select the ESPY winners. All you need to know - Bueckers has 854,000 Instagram followers. McDonald has 50,500.
RE: ESPYs: Best Coach Tara - DC 86 - 07-11-2021
(07-11-2021, 07:52 PM)81alum Wrote: Is Paige Bueckers even the best college wbb player, let alone the best college female athlete? Or is this just the UConn network's obligatory sop? Bueckers may one day be the very best--but not her freshman year. She was 35th in fg percentage, 29th in ppg, 4th in 3pt%, 14th in assists per game, 31st in a/t ratio, and she played for a team that didn't make it to the finals. The team they lost to had a star who outplayed Bueckers. Would you pick Bueckers over Aari McDonald for your pick-up game?
It was gracious of Bueckers to give that nice speech, and she certainly was not responsible for her own selection, but could this itself be an example of the kind of bias that was being discussed?
She swept the AP Player of the Year award, the Naismith Trophy, Wooden Award, Nancy Lieberman award and USBWA award, so if there's bias it's a complete consensus among independent judges.
Comparing statistics isn't necessarily fair for numerous reasons, but since you based your argument on Bueckers' statistics and brought up Aari McDonald, consider the following. Buecker scored 20.0 ppg vs McDonald's 20.6. However she shot 52.4% from the field and 46.4% from 3-pt (vs McDonald's 40.7% from the field and 34.5% from 3-point) and her assist/turnover ratio was 5.8/2.5 (vs McDonald's 4.0/3.1). Maybe you would prefer McDonald in a pickup game but that's not relevant. Who actually had better statistics last year than Bueckers across the board?
(07-11-2021, 08:24 PM)Spiny_Norman Wrote: Fans help to select the ESPY winners. All you need to know - Bueckers has 854,000 Instagram followers. McDonald has 50,500.
Fans don't help select the AP Player of the Year award, Naismith Trophy, Wooden Award, Nancy Lieberman Award or US Basketball Writers Association award.
RE: ESPYs: Best Coach Tara - Spiny_Norman - 07-11-2021
(07-11-2021, 08:32 PM)DC 86 Wrote: Who actually had better statistics last year than Bueckers across the board?
Maybe not notably better, but these women posted season numbers that are comparable (for the position they played) and worthy of consideration. I was surprised a bit when Bueckers swept the major WBB awards.
Rhyne Howard - 20.7 ppg, 7.3 rpg, 3.8 apg, 2.5 spg, 37% 3 point FG, 78% FT
Caitlin Clark - 26.6 ppg, 5.9 rpg, 7.1 apg, 47% FG, 41% 3 point FG, 86% FT, 1.49 assist to TO ratio
Naz Hillmon - 23.9 ppg, 11.4 rpg, 62% FG, 75% FT
Of course, there is no disagreement about the best team this year.
RE: ESPYs: Best Coach Tara - 81alum - 07-11-2021
DC86 makes good points. My impressions of Bueckers were influenced by the fact that she wilted a bit in the tournament, and that McDonald outplayed her head-to-head--most especially on defense. Taken as a season, though, Bueckers did have better offensive stats than McDonald--perhaps because Stanford played Arizona three times and never played UConn! That helps to illustrate the point that McDonald played in a MUCH more challenging conference than Bueckers, which (as DC indirectly alludes to) means that statistics are probably not a great way to make comparisons.
Despite Bueckers running the gamut of awards, I will remain a slight skeptic. I guess I could say that about all awards, which seem to be based in part on hype and visibility, as Stanford has discovered painfully all too often--usually in football. Fans, journalists, and even coaches will vote for the great player they know well over the great player they know less well. And being at UConn means you will be known well. Iowa or Arizona, not so much.
And I also thought of that other freshman, Caitlin Clark. She led the nation in scoring and was 2nd in assists per game--both significantly better than Bueckers. I think we will eventually have to play against each of them. Would be fun to see how Tara would defend them.
By the way, were there no memorable seasons for women athletes in all the other sports that were comparable to Bueckers' in basketball? If Macario and Plummer had not left I could have cited either of them, of course--but surely there must be comparable players out there in non-revenue sports who had similarly phenomenal seasons.
https://www.espn.com/womens-college-basketball/story/_/id/30993738/should-uconn-paige-bueckers-win-national-player-year
RE: ESPYs: Best Coach Tara - DC 86 - 07-11-2021
(07-11-2021, 09:50 PM)Spiny_Norman Wrote: Maybe not notably better, but these women posted season numbers that are comparable (for the position they played) and worthy of consideration. I was surprised a bit when Bueckers swept the major WBB awards.
Rhyne Howard - 20.7 ppg, 7.3 rpg, 3.8 apg, 2.5 spg, 37% 3 point FG, 78% FT
Caitlin Clark - 26.6 ppg, 5.9 rpg, 7.1 apg, 47% FG, 41% 3 point FG, 86% FT, 1.49 assist to TO ratio
Naz Hillmon - 23.9 ppg, 11.4 rpg, 62% FG, 75% FT
Fair enough, there were women with comparable statistics; there wasn't one with such superior statistics that made it outrageous for Bueckers to have won any of the the awards. I definitely agree with you that it is surprising that Bueckers swept the awards. My reply was directed more at the instagram follower comparison between her and McDonald as being the reason for her ESPY.
(07-11-2021, 10:04 PM)81alum Wrote: DC86 makes good points. My impressions of Bueckers were influenced by the fact that she wilted a bit in the tournament, and that McDonald outplayed her head-to-head--most especially on defense. Taken as a season, though, Bueckers did have better offensive stats than McDonald--perhaps because Stanford played Arizona three times and never played UConn! That helps to illustrate the point that McDonald played in a MUCH more challenging conference than Bueckers, which (as DC indirectly alludes to) means that statistics are probably not a great way to make comparisons.
Despite Bueckers running the gamut of awards, I will remain a slight skeptic. I guess I could say that about all awards, which seem to be based in part on hype and visibility, as Stanford has discovered painfully all too often--usually in football. Fans, journalists, and even coaches will vote for the great player they know well over the great player they know less well. And being at UConn means you will be known well. Iowa or Arizona, not so much.
And I also thought of that other freshman, Caitlin Clark. She led the nation in scoring and was 2nd in assists per game--both significantly better than Bueckers. I think we will eventually have to play against each of them. Would be fun to see how Tara would defend them.
By the way, were there no memorable seasons for women athletes in all the other sports that were comparable to Bueckers' in basketball? If Macario and Plummer had not left I could have cited either of them, of course--but surely there must be comparable players out there in non-revenue sports who had similarly phenomenal seasons.
https://www.espn.com/womens-college-basketball/story/_/id/30993738/should-uconn-paige-bueckers-win-national-player-year
I think we generally agree. My theory is that with many awards (not just sports) a narrative sometimes forms early in the process and it's difficult to dislodge the frontrunner unless they stumble. Bueckers came in with enormous hype and to her credit she lived up to it immediately; at that point it's difficult for someone to have surpassed her in the eyes of awards voters absent a major change in her performance or those of the other candidates. I liken it to college football polls. If a big name team is ranked #1 in the preseason it's probably going to remain #1 until it loses, even when the #2 or #3 or lower ranked team is objectively playing better.
As far as the Espys go, I don't know the full history of the college awards, but among women's sports basketball has so much more visibility than other sports that I assume its best basketball player has a big advantage. Softball, soccer, volleyball get some attention in the postseason but basketball it the only women's college sport that gets a decent amount of coverage on ESPN throughout the regular season.
RE: ESPYs: Best Coach Tara - Goose - 07-12-2021
(07-11-2021, 10:04 PM)81alum Wrote: I guess I could say that about all awards, which seem to be based in part on hype and visibility, as Stanford has discovered painfully all too often--usually in football. Fans, journalists, and even coaches will vote for the great player they know well over the great player they know less well. And being at UConn means you will be known well. Iowa or Arizona, not so much.
One of the appealing things about sports (except those scored by judges) is that there is a "score" and you win or lose based on that and that alone. It is "pure". Yes, officials make mistakes and sometimes you win or lose based on a lucky bounce, but at least both teams are on the field and can play well enough to take these random variables out of the equation. Awards, OTOH are the opinion of a a self-selecting group that may know little or nothing about the choice they are making. They also may know a lot about some of the players and nothing about others. In any case, it is an opinion. IMHO it means exactly nothing. It may be entertaining and fun to discuss, but it isn't based on anything "real" or even approximately objective.
FWIW, this applies to the Director's Cup and other similar awards. The scoring system is arbitrary and ever changing. The playing field isn't even approximately level. Each athletic program has different goals, different constraints, and different opponents to match up with. How can one be "better" when the objective function is a vector with different types of elements? Maybe fun to discuss, but objectively meaningless.
RE: ESPYs: Best Coach Tara - BostonCard - 07-12-2021
(07-11-2021, 08:21 PM)teejers1 Wrote: Sorry. The Espys are a contrived fraud. Probably ESPN's worst programming . . . and that's saying something. I have never watched a second of it, based on principle (other than channel surfing stop to see what's on).
The height of faux self-importance/real arrogance from the network that is loaded with such personalities. It's all part of the profile: ESPN thinks it is WAY better/more important than it is.
Because it's an Espy, I can't even bring myself to congratulate Tara.
P.S. Can't wait for a la carte sports on streaming platforms to really dominate the landscape. It's coming.
As are the Oscars and Tonys and all the other self-important awards shows. And the fact that ESPN televises not just the draft, but the draft lottery, tells me that there are way too many people with too much time on their hands. Then again, I'm posting to mostly strangers on a random message board...
BC
RE: ESPYs: Best Coach Tara - ColoradoTree - 07-12-2021
(07-12-2021, 09:00 AM)BostonCard Wrote: As are the Oscars and Tonys and all the other self-important awards shows. And the fact that ESPN televises not just the draft, but the draft lottery, tells me that there are way too many people with too much time on their hands. Then again, I'm posting to mostly strangers on a random message board...
BC
The difference for me is that in sports, we have competition to resolve "who is the best" arguments. With film and theater and music, we don't. We can have box office numbers and album sales/streams to show us what is the most popular, but we don't have head to head competition to determine what is the best film/musical/album, etc. Sure, there's a lot of self-indulgence in those award shows, too, but those serve a purpose that many find interesting, while the ESPYs are completely surplus to requirements. I will tune into other awards' shows because it's something of an event, I may have rooting interests because I loved a particular movie, and if nothing else, it gives me ideas on what to watch if I haven't seen it already. The human drama on the nominees' faces is real because these awards mean something to them--it's history and prestige and real money (in future contract negotiations).
Anyway, the Oscars add something to the world of film. What do the ESPYs add to the world of sports? Why do I need a "Best NBA/WNBA/MLB/MLS/NWSL Player etc." when we have the MVP awards from those leagues? Why do I need a "best international soccer player" when we have the Ballon d'Or? Why do I need a best tennis player award when the rankings and the Grand Slam titles tell me the relevant data points? Why do I need a contrived "Best Team" award comparing teams from different sports? Does the Baseball Hall of Fame keep track of the number of Best MLB Player ESPYs a candidate has won like it does MVPs, Cy Youngs, and batting titles? This is especially true when many of the awards themselves are such head-scratchers. For example, Roger Federer won the "Best Male Tennis Player" award in 2019--in the previous year (on which the award was purportedly based), Novak Djokovic had won 3 of the 4 Grand Slams, with Rafael Nadal taking the 4th. Same with Serena Williams winning the Best Female Tennis Player award the same year. Now, she's absolutely the greatest of all time in women's tennis, no question, but when she won that ESPY, she hadn't won a Grand Slam in over two years and was ranked #10. There was a case for Naomi Osaka (2 Grand Slams in the previous year) and Ashleigh Barty (the new World No. 1 when the award was given), but not Serena. Anyway, with the weird results and the redundant awards, I've just never seen the point.
Given the ratings, I don't appear to be alone. The 2021 ESPYs drew 1.11M viewers on ABC. At the same time, auto racing on CBS got 1.33M, a rerun of America's Got Talent on NBC got 1.92M, and MLB baseball on FOX got 2.29M viewers.
Meanwhile, the Oscars this year got 10.4M viewers (which is way, way down from the 23.6M that watched the year before, and there's obviously a "further evidence of the demise of live TV in the streaming/people following on social media era" story to be told there, and that's a topic for another day, but still--the Oscars remain an Event ™ in a way the ESPYs just aren't).
THAT SAID: I'm super glad for Tara to be recognized, and really, if you're going to compare the jobs championship coaches did at different levels across different sports, it's hard to imagine a tougher road to winning a title. She deserves all possible accolades, and she's always been a credit to the University. "Best Coach" and "Best Team" across sports is the kind of barroom conversation that is an interesting thought exercise, but building an awards show around such things seems to take that premise much too far.
RE: ESPYs: Best Coach Tara - fishman - 07-12-2021
This thread about Tara has been sidetracked more than a bit so I'd like to return the focus to Tara. Regardless of the awards to others and the other awards in other fields, I think her award is extremely well deserved.
•Her record total wins, primarily at a school that has severe limitations on who they can recruit is a testament to her ability to get the most out of
her players.
•Her record in the NCAA playoffs, final fours, championship games and national championships over multiple decades is the definition of consistent
excellence.
•Her record in the Pac 10 and Pac 12, the toughest conference in the country, is untouchable.
•Her undefeated Olympic record against all comers has not been matched by anyone.
•Her mentoring and promotion of other coaches gives her the most extensive coaching tree in her sport, and most any other.
•Her promotion of women's sports in general has made her a national leader in the field.
•The perennial togetherness of her teams is a testament to her team-first approach and her relationship with her players.
•Her forthright and self-effacing public relationship with the media and public is a rare and highly commendable one.
•Her Hall of Fame stature in basketball is a testament to her success and the highest regard of her peers.
Tara is a national treasure in sport. We have been so fortunate to have her for so long and it will be a long time, if ever, before we have the likes of her in Stanford's coaching ranks.
RE: ESPYs: Best Coach Tara - 81alum - 07-13-2021
(07-12-2021, 11:21 PM)fishman Wrote: This thread about Tara has been sidetracked more than a bit so I'd like to return the focus to Tara. Regardless of the awards to others and the other awards in other fields, I think her award is extremely well deserved.+++ to all the above.
•Her record total wins, primarily at a school that has severe limitations on who they can recruit is a testament to her ability to get the most out of
her players.
•Her record in the NCAA playoffs, final fours, championship games and national championships over multiple decades is the definition of consistent
excellence.
•Her record in the Pac 10 and Pac 12, the toughest conference in the country, is untouchable.
•Her undefeated Olympic record against all comers has not been matched by anyone.
•Her mentoring and promotion of other coaches gives her the most extensive coaching tree in her sport, and most any other.
•Her promotion of women's sports in general has made her a national leader in the field.
•The perennial togetherness of her teams is a testament to her team-first approach and her relationship with her players.
•Her forthright and self-effacing public relationship with the media and public is a rare and highly commendable one.
•Her Hall of Fame stature in basketball is a testament to her success and the highest regard of her peers.
Tara is a national treasure in sport. We have been so fortunate to have her for so long and it will be a long time, if ever, before we have the likes of her in Stanford's coaching ranks.