Answers, Part IX
Here is the ninth set:
You mentioned before that you didn't think Manti Te'o would commit to UCLA. Having some teammates aboard the UCLA train does increase the odds a few percentage points doesn't it?
I could see a a few percentage points, but not many. So, if I thought it was a 20 percent he would attend UCLA, maybe now it's 30 percent. Still, not very good odds.
How is Craft handling all the scrutiny lately? Were all the interceptions his fault?
Craft is handling it gracefully and with great character, and I think he should be applauded for that. He doesn't complain, and doesn't point fingers and hang his head. He stands there and takes the criticism. And in this case against Cal, I was told they were all his fault.
I don't like to hear the talk of lowering academic standards to get more football players in. UCLA needs to excel on and off the field. Do you agree? What about the coaches, especially Neuheisel who is an alum?
I don't really care which way UCLA goes on the academic vs. football front, but I think the administration should be open about it. As for the coaches, the object is to win football games at UCLA. If it were about getting great students and nice kids, Karl Dorrell would still be the coach, so I think the staff wants admissions to no longer be an issue.
Who do you thinks Howland's favorite player to coach over the last 5 years has been?
I don't like putting words in his mouth. That would be unfair. I do know he talked with great affinity about Arron Afflalo and Russell Westbrook and Alfred Aboya and Luc Richard Mbah a Moute, and I'm sure there are others he really liked that I left out.
Who has been your favorite UCLA basketball player to cover since you've been covering UCLA?
Arron Afflalo. A great kid with class and very little ego. He was always willing to blame himself for a loss.
Can you see neuheisel ever giving eric scott another shot at UCLA? The guy is such a dominant recruiter, somebody would be dumb not to give him one.
I am not sure. I think in a few year's time it could happen, and I think it should happen. I didn't like the whole way Scott's departure from UCLA happened.
Chow is such a calm guy when talking with the media, is he that calm at practice too?
Most times he is calm, but he has the ability to jump all over a player who makes a mistake. Just ask the quarterbacks.
Do you feel chow is recruiting more this year at UCLA than he ever did at USC?
I don't know how much recruiting he did at USC, but he is not doing a bundle of it at UCLA. However, he is doing more than I thought he would.
Percentage chance D Walker takes a head coaching job after the season?
Depends if one gets offered. Right now I would say 50 perecnt.
For home football attendance , does UCLA use the payed count , or the actual people that show up ?
The actual people that show up. So on high school band day, all those band members count toward attendance.
"I don't like to hear the talk of lowering academic standards to get more football players in. UCLA needs to excel on and off the field."
Why? UCLA does excel off the field. Problem is that it doesn't excel on the field. Are you not watching? It's been 10 years since we had some serious run. So what if the standards are lower for football players. They already are as it is. Or do you think all our athletes carried 4.0 GPAs and scored at least 2100 on the SATs during high school? And yet they were admitted and are currently playing. So please, get off the high horse. UCLA will never be successful until it takes its collective nose out of Balaam's you know what and gets real. We are not Stanford, so stop trying to emulate them. CAL hasn't been hurt by their decision, neither will UCLA.
BTW...who cares whether Brian agrees. Is anything going to happen if he does or doesn't agree. Then what's the point of asking him.
You gotta realize UCLA already has the highest standards for footballers after Stanford. There's a long long list of great college players who would have donned the blue and gold if we had normal academic standards. Dohn is right, at some point we gotta ask: Do we want to field a competitive team or not? Achieving success(ie. being a consistent top 15 program) is not possible under the current situation. Anymore handicaps and we might as well do away with any scholarships like the ivies.
I agree. If we had a great football team, the school would be earning so much more money than it is now. It can use all those extra millions coming from both attendance and merchandising to make UCLA academics and infrastructure (athletic and academic) much much better. Besides, when I lived in Saxon suites, my downstairs neighbors were all football players and gang members, including a notorious leader of a gang from Long Beach. So I can't imagine the standards being THAT high. Oh and he assaulted a few people towards the end of school on a drunken/high binge till the cops came (I got a subpoena to testify.)
Arron Afflalo has always been my favorite bball player for those exact reasons!