Jim Wells thoughs on returning.

[Bama Baseball 1]

This is what Jim Wells had to say when Ian Rapport aksed him about returning next year.

Given that, and given the [ame="http://sports.espn.go.com/ncaa/news/story?id=2912258"]Wells' retirement ends 13-year career at Alabama - College Sports - ESPN[/ame] then un-retirement in 2007, I felt I had to ask again when he stepped outside. Does Wells want to return?
"Oh yeah, I do," Wells said. Then, he paused...

I won't interpret his words, but you can judge for yourself what he means:
"But I mean, right now it's one thing at a time," Wells continued. "I feel like everybody does. I mean, I'm very disappointed. I'm thinking about what we need to do. I've got to meet with every one of those players there. So that's the next thing on my mind. I'm not able to turn and go, 'This is what I'm going to do the rest of my life, this is what we're going to do next year.' There's a lot of wait and see for our club. Who we have -- that's the main concern right now. Make sure the organization's in good shape, not (focus on) what I do."

Just does not sound like he has the motivation we need as the head coach. I understand he wants to talk to the players before doing anything, but they need to see their coach is standing behind them and the program.

RTR
:BigA:

 

[rolltydebb]

A reporter asks a question 30 minutes after the season ends, and your questioning motivation? Come on! What he's saying is exactly that, yes he does want to be back, but before I could even begin to think about me, there are 100 other things that I must take care of. Why is that such a bad thing to say? My duties as the baseball coach for this season are not over yet, and 30 mintues after the 09 season ends, he is expected to start thinking about the 2010 season? Geez.

Any how, my thoughts on the entire situation:

I realize this time of year everyone is looking for someone to blame this season on, and Wells and his coaching staff seem to be the ones wanted to be ran outta town yet again. While I'm not saying Wells and his staff doesn't deserve critisism or blame, there is a bigger issue at hand:

Bottom Line--- Until Alabama puts money into their facilites they'll never be good. They'll be average to above average, now and then they'll put together some good clubs, but the year in year out success just isn't going to happen.

When Bama was in its hey day, back in the 90s. They had a state of the art stadium. The Joe was one of the best stadiums in the COUNTRY, now its one of the worst in the SEC. How the heck are you suppose to get anyone good in here. People on these boards complain about not developing talent, and not recruiting. Think about it, what does Alabama have to offer a high school kid nowadays? Every other school in the SEC has more to offer than Alabama does.

Wonder why we lose kids to the draft? Because we have no scholarship plan, yes the new NCAA rule helps, but not really. Think about this if you are drafted in the 11th round and offered 50K to go play pro ball, you might think about it if Alabama had offered you a full ride to play college ball. And while there are other schools that can and are doing this, Alabama simply can't because they have no scholarship system. The dang university won't even waive out of state tuition to help baseball out, and help land promising out of state talent.

Bottom Line-- Wells isn't the problem. To win in the college game you have to have superior talent. Wells is the same coach he was back in the 90s, and Gaspard and Dax just havent suddenly forgot how to recruit. The playing field is slanted heavily away from Alabama, and we can bring the best coach in the country here and its not going to change anything. We'll have good seasons, average seasons, so-so seasons, and every now and then if the chips falls right make a push at omaha, but the days of dominance are over until the playing field is leveled. Some people want fresh blood in the program, I'm not saying you are wrong, I'm saying it doesn't matter whose in the dugout, if we aren't helped out in other ways

 

[edwd58]

Welcome to the board rolltydebb.

At this point, I'm not going to weigh in, again, on what I think about Wells and whether he should return. I've done that before and nothing has happened to change my mind.

However, not everything wrong within the program can be blamed on facilities. The failure to exercise a sacrifice bunt, lack of plate discipline, lack of pitcher development, and at times, lack of just good old baseball savy, can't be blamed on facilities. Perhaps facilities costs you a kid here or there, but I've personally never heard a kid state that he chose another program over ours because he didn't like the looks of The Joe (perhaps some of you do know this to be the case, but I don't). I'd like to see the place improved as much as the next guy, but using it as an excuse for how the team plays, just doesn't cut it with me.

Regarding scholarships; is it even allowable to waive out-of-state tuition for athletes if they don't do it for all, or at least most, out of state students? I have no idea. I know surrounding states have scholarship programs that give our competitors an advantage. Georgia's Hope scholarship program (I think Florida has something similar) helped take them from being relatively insignificant in baseball, to the CWS. What I don't understand is how the NCAA doesn't also see it that way.

Lastly, Wells is a good coach, he knows plenty about the game. I don't, however, believe he is a great coach. A great coach finds ways to overcome some of these obstacles, as other coaches do. I'm sure we could use and enjoy better facilities, I'd like to see the playing field level in regards to scholarships, but right now, those are just crutches being used to prop up a coach with deeper issues within his program. That's just how I see it today. Everyone else is free to see it as they will.

 

[JoJoforHeisman]

However, not everything wrong within the program can be blamed on facilities. The failure to exercise a sacrifice bunt, lack of plate discipline, lack of pitcher development, and at times, lack of just good old baseball savy, can't be blamed on facilities. Perhaps facilities costs you a kid here or there, but I've personally never heard a kid state that he chose another program over ours because he didn't like the looks of The Joe (perhaps some of you do know this to be the case, but I don't). I'd like to see the place improved as much as the next guy, but using it as an excuse for how the team plays, just doesn't cut it with me.

While rolltydebb certainly brings up some valid points, edwd58 hits the nail on the head.

Maybe it's my frustration from the way the season ended, but I can't sit here after yesterday's embarrassment and be content to think, "Oh well, we lost to Tennessee Tech, but that can all be traced to our poor facilities." Yes, facilities and scholarships are a huge disadvantage for this program, but to place all of the blame on those factors seems to be oversimplifying the situation a bit.

 

[rolltydebb]

Understand what I am saying:

I'm not saying that Wells has zero blame. But like was mentioned in another thread, its hard to blame this weekends play solely on the coach. Every team has slumps and goes through slumps, this team simply picked a bad time to have its lull for whatever reason. You can surely attest some of that to coaching, but not all of it.

However what I'm trying to say, is that baseball is about PLAYERS. This isn't football, where X's and O's matter, baseball is more about the PLAYERS than any other sport. And you can't develop studs, you can make players better (ex. Hyatt-- walkon, reshirts, Friday night ace, certainly devloped), but studs are studs. Alabama isn't getting their share of studs like they were in the late 90s and early 00s. That can be directly attributed to other programs catching up with alabama in terms of facilites and what they can offer a high school player that alabama cannot.

EDWD:
- facilites are a huge part of recruiting, players aren't going to come out and say nah I'm not going to bama b/c their park sucks... but all things being equal, which happens a lot, would you rather play your home games at the Joe or at Ark, SC, or a host of other stadiums, its for sure matters.

- and yes, it is completely allowable to waive out of state tuition

- I also agree with you, Wells is a good coach, no neccessarily a great one, but with the state of the program and the hurdles that are going to have to be jumped in order to be successful, we aren't going to be able to bring in a "great" coach IMO

 

[JoJoforHeisman]

And you can't develop studs, you can make players better (ex. Hyatt-- walkon, reshirts, Friday night ace, certainly devloped), but studs are studs.

You're exactly right on this point. However, I think Hyatt is more of an exception when it comes to Wells and his development of pitchers. Consider the number of pitchers on the current roster that have either failed to improve at all under Wells or actually managed to regress since their arrival. Howell, Nelson, Quigley, Graham, Kebodeaux, Evans. Head obviously couldn't have been this bad in junior college. The number of failures far exceeds the successes. I agree that we have not been able to sign the number of highly-talented players that we did in the 90's, but Quigley, Howell, and Nelson are three who were considered elite prospects coming out of high school. That kind of track record does not offer a lot of incentive for a pitching recruit making his college choice. Hire a real pitching coach and allow him to actually coach the pitchers, and perhaps Wells will no longer represent a recruiting deterrent for prospective high school hurlers.

 

[rolltydebb]

I agree Wells has a bad rep in regards to handling a pitching staff, but one can also say he's done well in getting the studs there as well, even recently. Guys like LeBlanc, Hunter, Roberson, Cormier, Tankersley.

I guess the point I'm trying to make, without beating a dead horse is I'm not saying Wells did a great job. I'm sure if you asked him he wouldn't be 100% pleased with the job he did as a coach either, and thats part of the deal, coaches like players have good and not-so-good years. But it's not like he screwed up a national championship team, full of 1st rounders, we don't have studs at Bama, we haven't gotten studs at bama for sometime, and until something is done to aid in getting the studs, then we'll always be just an above average program. We'll make our hay, by getting players that fly under the radar, or have a year where 2 or 3 guys decide they wanna go to college instead of sign pro. And developing the talent(Matthes) we do get.

We can't offer full rides like other programs in the SEC and around the country can. We can't offer kids to come play in state of the art facilities like teams around the country and the SEC can. And all of that does matter to a kid out of high school that is getting pulled 10 different directions.

Could the coaching be better at times, I'm sure it could be. But we ain't gonna get anyone any better and we could hand it to someone way worse. We could change just to change, but the problems are much deeper, and its not inside the dugout. We HAVE to get the program on the level as other programs around the SEC and country, when we were on par with those programs, we won SEC championships, we went to Omaha 3 times in 5 years, we had an impressive 5-8 year run. When others caught up on the facilities, others started catching up on the field

 

[edwd58]

EDWD:
- facilites are a huge part of recruiting, players aren't going to come out and say nah I'm not going to bama b/c their park sucks... but all things being equal, which happens a lot, would you rather play your home games at the Joe or at Ark, SC, or a host of other stadiums, its for sure matters.

rolltydebb, I'm enjoying the discussion. Keep in mind that is all we're doing here, nothing personal. But again, I somewhat disagree with you. I think with all things being equal, it comes down to playing time, and how quickly a kid can get it. He's not going to sit on the bench at LSU just to look around at how nice the stadium is. If he can get playing time, more of it, and get it quicker in Tuscaloosa, then that is where he will go. If that (the ballpark) is the deciding factor, then likely you didn't really have a chance to get the kid in the first place, or, maybe you don't really want him.

A case in point about facilities, previously Auburn has been voted the best college park in the country (more than once I believe). They have the nice green wall to look at and all that, but it doesn't seem to have helped them too terribly much in attracting top of the line talent since Baird left.

Here is a thought about recruiting. Wells and his staff have been fairly successful in their recruiting endeavors, up to a point. However, here is where I think it fails. They have consistently gone after the "studs' as you call them and frequently gotten committments from them. Only problem is, they lose them to the draft. This is why you had better be able to develop some of your own "studs". The number of kids that we have signed that never made their way to campus is incredible, but that is the risk you accept by signing them. Then, you are left to fill the new holes in your roster with... less than elite players. Example, a year or so ago we signed A. Bailey from here in Prattville as a pitcher. He was projected an early round, high draft choice. Now, everyone here knew that if he got drafted he was going to go pro, without a doubt. He had been groomed for that since birth and there was no way he would not sign. But Wells signed him anyway, a gamble for sure, and lost. Too much of that and your talent level falls as a result of your own actions. I'd like to give Wells credit for developing Matthes, but, by his own words that I read in the paper as recently as this week, he and his staff never saw this coming.

The Joe is what it is. We all agree we'd like to see it made better. Heck, why not build a new park in a better location, do it up right. But the cold hard fact is, it isn't going to happen with the current people in place, both on the admin side, and the coaching side. One last opinion from me and I'm moving on; there are coaches around the country doing more, with less. Lesser facilities, lesser players, lesser fan support. I've always been a Wells supporter because he is our guy, and will continue to support him as long as he is here. But, I wouldn't beg him to stay, and I'm not convinced we couldn't get better.

 

[rolltydebb]

Agreed-- But if you have ever been a part of the recruiting process you'll know that Coach hardly ever promise anyone playing time. Playing time is a HUGE factor, but coaches can't and don't promise playing time to players as part of the recruiting process. I'll say this, I did play college ball and was recruited by some schools back in my day. And walking into certain places you knew you weren't going to play there, others fit the bill, and some made you go WOW. At one point, bama had the WOW factor now it doesn't. You are right, playing time is a HUGE factor, however its nothing more than a guess at that point, like you were saying its hard to judge whose going pro, whose not, whose leaving, etc etc.

The stud issue, again, I don't think its possible to develop a stud. You can make someone a better player, but to develop a stud is impossible IMO. I too think you can fault the staff for going after the studs and have them sign the pro contract. Heck I think Bama even signed Brian McCann at one point in time. But it is PLAYERS that win games, and I'd sure hate to miss out on a guy signing some marginal prospect. I guess the thinking is We'll sign 5 studs, if we get 5 on campus we are going to be really good, 4 we are still gonna celebrate, and you see where this is going. I guess their thinking its worth the gamble, I don't know if thats even their line of thought, or if that is the right line of thought, just my guess.

The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence and I get that. I don't think things just went bad all of a sudden. Its a little by little process, and we look up 10 years later and wonder what the heck. The biggest think that has changed in that time, isn't the person in the dugout, it isn't the staff, its the ability to get those big time players into the program. Coaching a lineup full on MLB talent is easy. The big change b/t now and 10 years ago are the facilities, and its foolish to think that those facilites aren't a HUGE factor into getting the better players into your program.

Enjoying the talk as well.

 

[crimsonkelly]

My .02 now. Facilities aside, players don't have to be "studs" as you guys have been calling them for the program to be great. Look at Oregon St. Couple of great players and the rest were decent. National champs 2 years ago. UCI, name a player off of their team without looking it up (JoJo you can't take part in that as you can probably name 10 players ). Baseball is not about having the best players on the field, it is about who plays best as a team. Guys don't have to be a top pick to be successful in college sports. While Wells has recruited guys like Bailey and McCann, they were obviously great players but ultimately left us at the alter. It appears that the last couple of years we are getting guys to campus and not the draft, so I think things will begin to get better, its gonna take another couple years but I think Gaspard and Norris do good jobs recruiting and will help get us back to Omaha. As far as the studs go, you have to go after a couple or you will never get one.

I do truly feel we need a pitching coach or we will never win a NC with our current scenario.

Now, to change the focus of my post a little:

The coach has a lot to do with how his teams plays as a unit by who he recruits. I'm not gonna turn this into a keep/fire Wells post either, I stated my piece on him in another thread. But, look at Coach Murphy, granted he is getting great softball players, but look at what he did after game 1 of the WCWS. The next day all the players wrote something negative that happened at the game and put in a bucket and set it on fire to erase the memory of it, that is creative and shows the team that you have to get past something. Now, this probably works with females more than males, but the thought process is the same for both sports. Baseball & Softball players have to put a lot of mental energy into playing the game, when that energy is gone or gets side tracked, you have to refocus it or give it a day off. As a coach it is extremely hard to do this because not all players are the same.

 

[marion PG]

baseball is about players yes-but they have to have direction and have to progress as the season goes on not take a step back.

he is not a very good judge of talent either when it comes to gamers verses "has all the tools" to be good

 

[bamanut_aj]

if a replacement has to be found for Wells, I'm throwing Jeff Forehand in the ring. He's in his second year at Lipscomb, coming over from NAIA Trevecca where he won championship in 2005. Before that, he won three state titles at Goodpasture High School.

Now, would he really be a candidate? No? But I'm a Lipscomb grad, and we're all real proud to have him. Some people can just coach, and he appears to be one of them.

 

[resmith]

After being recruited in another lifetime, I remember very little about the facilities of the places I visited. What I do remember is: what kind of persons were the coaches; what were my opportunities for playing time; and, what were the academics like?
Now, if I had been a stud with a lot of opportunities at different schools, then facilities may have made more of an impression on me and my questions listed above would have been less of a priority.
I still have the opinion that most average and above average players look at those same questions.
In the end, my dad told me that I needed to go where the academics were the best for me because my future was not in baseball. Those were hard words for an 18 year old to hear, but he couldn't have given me any better advice because he was absolutely correct.
I would love nothing better than to see the Joe put in shape to compete with the other programs in the SEC, but that is not a priority. I would love nothing better than to see some young, impressive coach come in and re-energize the program, but I just don't see that happening anytime soon either. But most of all, I would like to see our teams play with higher baseball intelligence and more fundamentally sound techniques, but I don't think that is CJW's strategy for winning games. Instead, it is hit the ball out of the park and hope that our couple of pitchers can hold on long enough so that we outscore the other side to win another 17-16 game.
And, next year when the season rolls around, I will be following the Tide, making as many games as my work schedule and family obligations will permit and following the other games on this site on Gametracker because there is nothing that will keep me from being as big a fan and supporter of Tide baseball as I can be. I hope that is the way that the rest of you feel as well.
Finally, Ole Sis is winning their Regional 4-1 in the 8th. South Carolina lost to WKU 10-9 in 10 innings (really surprised about that one) and Vandy lost to Louisville 5-3, which makes me mad because I think Louisville is running a bush league, rogue type of program right now. And, Clemson came back to beat the Cowboys 6-5 with a late inning rally.

 

[BamaInMo1]

I, too, think the facillities could use an upgrade, but I don't think that's why the team doesn't play good fundamental baseball.

Coach Wells has shown no abillity to change strategies and play small ball and teach fundamentals. Wether we have a bunch of studs on the team or not, catching, throwing and hitting are the same for everyone. Yeah, one guy might be able to hit more homeruns but if you're gonna try to win games based on homerun ball you're never gonna get too far now days. All CJW knows is "hommer ball".

 

[liquidvengeance]

Is there a reason that UA baseball is not carried everywhere around the state like football and basketball are? Ive wondered because I would like to hear it but its not offered around the state.

Id also like to see Wells fired and replaced with a better coach who has a desire to win championships. Thats lacking and I hate it.

What about the stadium as far as expansion and improvements has been discussed before? Id love to see it upgraded too. Are there any distinct ideas of what could be done? Id like to see the entire grandstand seating area covered by a roof,much more seats added and other nice things.

Hasn there been any sign of UA wanting to upgrade the stadium?
I hope so.<!-- / message -->

 

[JoJoforHeisman]

Is there a reason that UA baseball is not carried everywhere around the state like football and basketball are? Ive wondered because I would like to hear it but its not offered around the state.

Id also like to see Wells fired and replaced with a better coach who has a desire to win championships. Thats lacking and I hate it.

What about the stadium as far as expansion and improvements has been discussed before? Id love to see it upgraded too. Are there any distinct ideas of what could be done? Id like to see the entire grandstand seating area covered by a roof,much more seats added and other nice things.

Hasn there been any sign of UA wanting to upgrade the stadium?
I hope so.<!-- / message -->

No substantive changes with the program or upgrades in facilities in the foreseeable future. What you see is what you get. The University is not going to spend money on such frivolities, especially when those funds can be used for Bryant-Denny luxury box enhancements, such as upgrading the quality of caviar and installing new bidets for the restrooms. There are also more pressing matters that must be addressed, such as commissioning a statue of Otto Wagonhurst to add to the Stadium Plaza.

Seriously...baseball? They only care about that sport at irrelevant no-name schools like LSU, South Carolina, Arkansas, Ole Miss, Mississippi State, Georgia, Vanderbilt, and Florida. Not our concern.

At this point, I'm considering the fact that we finally switched back to Coca-Cola products and made sunflower seeds available at the concession stand a significant victory.

 

[bamamick]

I guess that I am going to label myself 'loser' and get it over with, but I swear I think that we need to look at this with some perspective. We got cold at the wrong damn time. Our ace hit the wall and our hitters couldn't. Other than that it was a pretty darn good year. This was a top 25 team who looked at times like one of the top five in the country. This team accomplished some pretty good things yet we talk about the season as if it was a total failure. Well sure, if going to the CWS every year is your goal then it was a failure, and many if not most here would say that that should be our goal as it is at schools like Texas and LSU, but we did have some success and in some people's minds it seems that the program is just spiraling down the toilet.

Anger and frustration cause people to forget the good times. I am just now coming around to appreciating what this team accomplished. The collapse at Auburn cost us dearly, but this team was 1.5 games from winning the SEC and hosting a regional. Not too bad for a team that was 7-8 at the halfway mark I don't think.

As I said, a lot of people won't like what I have posted, but what I remember from 2009 is a lot of good baseball punctuated with a few moments of real disappointment. It could have been better, but it could have been a whole lot worse.

rtr

 

[JoJoforHeisman]

We have won one Regional in the last ten years.

 

[Bama Baseball 1]

I will not place all the blame on coaching, clearly there are other factors. However, I have attended most home games for the past 10 years, and this year, like many others, we had quite a bit of talent on this team. We simply could not find any consistency in our game. Look at how we played against LSU, and Arkansas. Both of them are in the CWS, and we appeared to be very close to their teams when we played.

We have hit the ball pretty well on offense, but our pitching has really struggled. Austin Hyatt ran into a wall at the end of the season. I wonder if could have been a result of throwing 120 plus pitches a game. Adam Morgan missed several games after throwing 138 pitches against Florida. We need a true pitching coach, so we can develop our bullpen, and not over work the few starters that figure it out on their own.

When your players do not perform up to expectations who is responsible?
I personally think the expectations have dropped off lately. There was a time when Jim Wells would stop the game and remove a player if he made an error, now we leave players in and they are allowed to make 2-3 errors in an inning. I am not saying the coach should be a hard a**, but he should let everyone know what is expected of them.

Depending on this weeks draft, the coaching staff, may have a pretty sizeabale job rebuilding this team for next year. We need everyone to be dedicated to putting in the Alabama back on top of the SEC.

 

[RamJamHam]

My biggest gripe about CJW is that he doesn't seem to know how to let the really good players he gets do what really good players do. To my way of thinking, he almost overcoaches them.

Also, he apparently does not have a very good idea of (1) what a good college pitcher looks like, (2) how to get him on campus, or (3) how not to absolutely wear him out by pitching him too much during the season. From other people I have talked to, a significant number of pitching prospects (and their parents) are starting to shy away from him a bit because of this reputation. Don't think the pro scouts are not liberal with their opinions as well.