[Austroturf]

Man, this quote. I don't know how many times I and others on this board beat this drum, but it was quite a few.

“He doesn’t fire anyone, and everyone also thinks that they can’t get fired, so what you get is an environment (that is) the exact opposite of insanely competitive,” a former starting player said. “Then over time that becomes the norm, and you fall out of being the best.”

Yes, I was also banging that drum ad infinitum.  Shaw was often praised for his even-keeled demeanor and soft-spoken manner; but the flip side was a certain comfortable family-style culture that allowed performance standards to sag.  

I never saw him get really mad, and that worried me from the start.  Fierce competitors almost always get mad at some point and bare their teeth.  Not Shaw.  Always composed, always professional.  This certainly was part of his allure and made him so universally admired and appreciated by players, colleagues and university administrators.  But when there is no longer a culture of accountability, the bottom is near.

I suspect that only very few of his staff members will be retained (maybe some low-level staffers).  And it will become quickly apparent that most of them will not manage to land positions anywhere near the kind they had at Stanford.  That will be the ultimate indictment of the program and the lack of accountability that prevailed.

[Austroturf]

Man, this quote. I don't know how many times I and others on this board beat this drum, but it was quite a few.

“He doesn’t fire anyone, and everyone also thinks that they can’t get fired, so what you get is an environment (that is) the exact opposite of insanely competitive,” a former starting player said. “Then over time that becomes the norm, and you fall out of being the best.”

Yes, I was also banging that drum ad infinitum.  Shaw was often praised for his even-keeled demeanor and soft-spoken manner; but the flip side was a certain comfortable family-style culture that allowed performance standards to sag.  

I never saw him get really mad, and that worried me from the start.  Fierce competitors almost always get mad at some point and bare their teeth.  Not Shaw.  Always composed, always professional.  This certainly was part of his allure and made him so universally admired and appreciated by players, colleagues and university administrators.  But when there is no longer a culture of accountability, the bottom is near.

I suspect that only very few of his staff members will be retained (maybe some low-level staffers).  And it will become quickly apparent that most of them will not manage to land positions anywhere near the kind they had at Stanford.  That will be the ultimate indictment of the program and the lack of accountability that prevailed.