Posted by Willy Mac

Off season worries are starting to turn into real fears in Clemson as the basketball team starts to break into the ACC portion of their schedule. The walls of Littlejohn aren’t falling down, but something is definitely amiss on the Tiger hard court.

They’ve taken care of business with most teams on their OOC schedule thus far. They’ve also clumsily stumbled through a few victories as well as been embarrassed on several occasions. One major hang up that has been plaguing Clemson this season is the lack of intensity that the Tigers have carried with them in recent seasons past.

The torch bearer of intensity for Clemson the past few years has traditionally been Trevor Booker. His recent quietness in the paint could be seen as the reason for the down play of the rest of the team. In this, his final season, he’s seen his numbers drop in average over what’s supposed to be the easier part of the year. He’s playing with reservation and it’s affecting just about everybody around him. Now, the reason of this post isn’t to bash him or make a scape goatout of him, but rather it’s just to point out what many Clemson fans having been noticing lately: Booker is not playing with the passion and focus as he has in years past to this point of the 2009/2010 campaign.

It seems as if he’s trying to adopt a more NBA-like attitude in his approach to playing the game. Trevor still plays well on defense, but his aggression has disappeared. His fouls troubles have pretty much gone away as well as a result of his new adopted passive style of play. This isn’t necessarily good news for Clemson fans.

Booker has seen as many minutes per game (about 29) as he did last year (about 30) and has been in possession of the ball throughout the game more now – averaging 24.9% of the total team possession – than at any other point in his career. Booker’s rebounds per game (8.667), field goal percentages (52.4%), and blocked shots per game (1.2) have all dropped down from his numbers last year of 9.719 RPG, 57.1%, and 1.969 BPG respectively.

NCAA Basketball

There are some bright spots as Booker’s assists are up and his fouls are down, but these figures have seen almost negligible change from last year.

That’s not to say that Trevor Booker is slacking off, but rather that he hasn’t played up to the huge and demanding expectations after a standout performance in the 2008/2009 season. Booker is still putting up great numbers and showing great leadership on and off of the court. Despite not playing as well as he has in the past, the Union High School product has been named to the Wooden Award Midseason Top 30 Watch List. He hasn’t involved himself with any off campus drama or mixed words with the media. He’s done what has been asked of him day in and day out. Hopefully he’ll get a chance to show more of his former self when the Tigers go up against Boston College tomorrow at 4pm. Facing off against the ACC’s smallest team will give Booker the much needed opportunity to remind ACC opponents of how dominant “Big Book” can be.

Posted by Willy Mac

Thanks to everyone who sent the following link about Clemson Men’s Soccer coach Trevor Adair.  As you may or may not know by now, he’s stepped down and left the university.  This could be a huge blow to the program as he had our team playing as good as they have since our last national title run back in the late 80’s.  Word around campus is that he was pretty much forced out politely.  Rather, he was politely asked to leave before he was fired.

Again, my stance on firing people is that people get canned way too often and way too early  these days.  My take is that yeah, he fucked up.  Who doesn’t?  People deserve second and sometimes third chances.  Adair could have quite possibly been one of the last good coaches that had that old school swagger to him. I know I’ve been using this phrase a little bit too much lately, but he really is a Clemson-first kind of guy.  He always had the best intentions for our university.  He really took care of his players and Clemson students in general.  He made his decisions with the best intentions in mind (disregarding that one that got him in trouble).

So why, why should we be like everyone else and just fire a guy because he’s in a little legal trouble? Or fire him because he has a problem with the sauce?  Wouldn’t it be more prudent to give the guy a second chance and… wait for it… actually help out somebody that really needs it?  The guy obviously has a problem with alcohol and rage issues. So instead of helping him get the help that he needs, we just unceremoniously dumped a good Clemson guy.  I mean, we dropped him at the worst possible time for both parties involved and it kind of looks a little ugly.  Maybe I’m affected because I really liked Adair (but really could haven given a shit less about soccer).  Maybe I feel this way because he always treated my friends and I well. I don’t know, I just don’t like the situation and how they dressed it up as “Adair seeks new opportunities” for the news outlets.  I just think that this is a really retroactive, forced, uncaring, self-preserving, knee jerk (am I leaving anything out?) decision that was made.

Maybe him being asked to leave is a rumor, but that’s what I’m getting from some people that I know.  Of course, he really could have just stepped down to reevaluate his life. In that case, we still need to help him out.  I seriously doubt that thisis true largely due to the fact that he really needs a paycheck right now. What do you think?  Take it to the comments…

Posted by Willy Mac

It pains me to say this, but at this point in his career Barry Humphries has done more damage than he has good for our team.  I say this because he recently got his second DUI, as you probably already know by now.  On a moped, no less.  A vehicle that Clemson offensive linemen have had trouble navigating in the past. One can only wonder if alcohol played a factor in Hairston’s wreck as well…

I don’t enjoy writing this as I’ve hung out with Barry a few times and we kind of know each other.  I don’t mean that in a Clemson superfan, Tigernettish bragging sense nor do I mean it as if I’ve only been near him at a party and want to stretch the truth for storytelling’s sake.  He’s a good guy with a great personality.  I also have some good friends that grew up and went to high school with him.  He’s a good Clemson guy.  But you have to look at the facts at this point in time:

• Humphries has seen limited playing time and hasn’t garnered any real consideration as a leader on our front five.
• Barry already had a knee injury last year via the Bama/Tech games, so riding around on a moped drunk with only one year of eligibility left wasn’t the best choice of action.
• This is his second DUI.  He’s from Belton so he gets a pass on the first one, but two??? You didn’t learn your lesson the first time via legal fees, community service, etc?

I’m by no means saying we should cut our losses. There really needs to be a concerted effort in-house to not only take care of this issue, but make sure he gets the long term help he needs.  Don’t get me wrong, I’ve driven around Clemson drunk before too. Most of us have a time or two.  I’m in no way supporting drunk driving, but you get in the car (or on the moped in this case) and figure, “Eh, I’m not that bad.  Plus, it’s Clemson.  We’re so far out in the country, there’s nothing to hit.”  Heck, I know some people who just have it in their skill set to be excellent drunk drivers. Another interesting fact is I used to be one of those annoying people on mopeds that cruised around campus and I learned pretty quickly that even though you’re paying attention, other people aren’t. I wound up halfway pinned underneath some dumb, blonde ADPi’s car in the Barre/Lehotsky parking lot a few years ago.  I never said this to her but in retrospect I should have at the time so I’ll do so now:  “Fuck you, dummy.  Pay attention to where you’re going and get off your fucking cell phone next time, you fucking pig.” Mopeds aren’t toys, despite what other people think.  The things can get you killed or hurt real easily… that sounded like a responsible adult thing to say and I just got douche chills typing it.

I guess this is the point where Barry finds out that Clemson players aren’t invincible and that they aren’t in a protective bubble in matters concerning drunk driving.

Chalk it up to being young and making a few stupid decisions, I guess. Unfortunately with South Carolina’s push on the drunk driving issue and this being his second, more likely than not the courts are going to make an example out of him.

Posted by Chili

That man is old enough to remember when Florida State was all-girls, and apparently some Nole fans carry on that proud tradition by continuing to be whiny bitches.

The other day, Deadspin picked up on this hilarious photo from Rivals of the Dabo Swinney Fantasy Camp or whatever it’s officially called, we mentioned it on our Twitter feed (I WILL NOT SAY THAT I “TWEETED” IT), it was seen in the forums and around the web. This morning, Tomahawk Nation took their turn with it, and couldn’t help but continue their completely unsubstantiated claim that Clemson coaches lied to FSU recruits with this caption:

About the 12 player thing, never mind that scholarship numbers wouldn’t have prevented more signees without a loss of scholarships for existing players (a not uncommon practice at some *cough SEC cough* schools), Clemson only signed 12 and that doesn’t seem like many so let’s not look into it any further but to mock them for their small class. Ha, see, we mocked you for your small class. Also never mind a mid-season coaching change or the inevitable recruiting shakeup that is bound to occur because of that, they only signed TWELVE it’s hilarious, they couldn’t even cop a baker’s dozen.

Anyway, back to that whole claim about lying to recruits, if you recall from the earlier situation detailed in this missive from Willy Mac and myself, TN used a bullshit anonymous source to claim Clemson coaches were waging a systematic misinformation campaign against Florida State by lying to recruits about the possible ramifications of FSU’s NCAA sanctions. Then, desperately grasping at straws in an attempt to legitimize their claim, they tried to use a single nebulous line from an ESPN interview with a recruit to prove their claim. Then they whined like fucking babies that Clemson should issue a formal apology to Florida State.

What is hilarious to me is that, not only did they essentially fabricate a situation, then use a quote from a recruit off an ESPN article with absolutely no inference of where he got the idea in his head that FSU’s sanctions might be big ones and attempted to use that quote to tie it back to their original messageboard gossip-level claim, they now look back on that situation and somehow in their Garnet colored glasses Dabo was “caught with his hand in the proverbial cookie jar.” Seriously? They’re reflecting on the supposed situation of several months ago as if it were an actual event. Really? If by “caught” you mean “not seen anywhere near or documented by any reliable source,” and by “cookie jar” you mean “complete fabrication of your imagination” then sure, I guess you’re right!

The commenters on that site are really something special, too. Usually that kind of gathering of backslapping, guffawing bufoons ends with a cookie covered with cum, here it just ends in comments that remind me why I’m glad we don’t write for SB Nation and why I wish crib death was far more common in the Florida panhandle.

Posted by Block-C Staff

Willy Mac:

I’d like to preface this article by saying that I only go after people who really deserve it.  Most notably, people that make assumptions and go on hunches and relay it as reliable, trustworthy information.  The last time I went off and just bulldogged someone was this guy.

I sat down today and was checking my email and Tomahawk Nation (Florida State blog in the sidebar) sent us a link to an article they wrote entitled “Attention Potential Recruits: The Florida State Seminoles can play in bowl games and on television.” I read it and mushed it around in my head over breakfast.

What I came back with is the following: There appears to be something dumber than the Tigernet on this wonderful place we call the internet.  I was astonished at how uninformed and how serious this guy took himself in his article, especially considering his “source.”  Let’s break this thing down, shall we?

“I wrote this because a source of ours told us that persons affiliated with Clemson told some prominent recruits that FSU is no longer eligible to play on television or in bowl games.  This source has been correct on multiple Clemson issues in the past, including tipping us to the probable hire of defensive coordinator Kevin Steele nearly a month before Clemson made the move.”

I hate to burst your bubble pal, but the Clemson internet cesspool known as Tigernet where every Clemson hayseed and their brother comes to take a dump on anything resembling intelligence in the Clemson community broke this story a month or two beforehand as well.  You mean to tell me that you wrote this seething pile of biased shit because someone who knows someone who might know something told you a rumor?  Really?

“I will call Jimbo Fisher tomorrow and pass him the news. This conduct does not reflect well on new Clemson coach Dabo Swinney, who has never beaten Florida State as a head coach.”

I’m sure the last person that Jimbo Fisher wants to hear from is a blogger who spends their free time fanning the flames that set the rumor mill ablaze.  Also, now we’ve gone from “persons affiliated with Clemson University” to our coaches in the same breath.  Are you on of those people that writes angry letters in response to insignificant things that offend just you to large corporations that are indifferent and could care less about what you think? Having trouble feeding your family of five?

He then goes on to link an article from ESPN that indeed confirms that a recruit named Brandon Willis made multiple unofficial visits recently, most notably to Clemson and UNC.  They claimed the article “confirmed their findings.” Look man, the article doesn’t even hint that our coaches told this kid anything about your program.  Nevermind the fact that news of your school’s bed shitting is on every five seconds on all the ESPN channels, can be readily found via most sports media outlets on the internet and in print, and is being talked about by every joe blow on a radio show or around a water cooler.  And you want me to believe that our coaches are responsible?

I hate to say it, but you guys probably do deserve some television restrictions and a bowl ban.  Cheating is cheating, and you guys got caught not just redhanded, but balls deep in your evidence.  The facts are as plain as day so don’t try to avert attention or make someone else your scape goat.  Even our good buddy Bill from ScalpEm gets a little hot under the collar on the subject, which is fine and is expected.  We commend him on having at least a level head on the subject.  Hell, we’d be pissed if it happened at Clemson, but we wouldn’t try and make excuses about the thing and find something else to talk about.  We don’t make excuses about our shady past under Pell and Ford.  We fully admit that we were cheaters and that we were good at it.

“Let’s hope all of our coaches are hitting the recruiting trail and speaking honestly with these potential recruits in order to correct the lies told by coaches from other schools… Clemson University should issue an apology to Florida State.”

Really?  You think so?  Well, we’re still waiting on ours from when we got hammered back in the 80’s and your very own Bobby Bowden did the same thing to us.  What comes around goes around and even if it is true that Clemson coaches are the main and sole reason that some eighteen year old kid who thinks with two heads and acts on instinct and in the moment doesn’t choose Florida State and goes with one of the sixty other top flight programs that are literally beating his door down and stuffing his mailbox with scholarships… then good.  I’m glad.  Same thing happened to us.  Deal with it.

Chili:
I think this whole thing is sort of childish. I like Tomahawk Nation most of the time, but the same blog who declared themselves “legit media” last week, (before quickly scrambling to edit that claim out once they were called on it in the comments section) is now citing “inside sources” for information like there’s some kind of jort wearing Deep Throat out there in a musty trench coat dishing the dirt on Clemson to some self promoting FSU blog. The thing that is most amusing to me is the faux naivete present in the post, pretending to be shocked that schools would spread rumors about other programs when recruiting gullable, dumb athletes, and then demanding an apology like an outraged soccer mom who found foreskin in her jar of Jif. Really? You want an apology? Don’t be a fucking baby.

Another part of this post that really gives me a good belly laugh is the part where they play the “valiant defenders of FSU” and get all super serious:

I will call Jimbo Fisher tomorrow and pass him the news… …There should be no doubt, however, that this is going on in multiple locations.  Luckily, FSU has 11 months to get the word out.  They subjected themselves to this negative misinformation campaign and now must do their job to set the record straight.

This isn’t a fucking political scheme, it’s a recruit not grasping the ramifications of FSU’s probation through either his own misunderstanding or, perish the thought, through a “negative misinformation campaign,” you know, unlike all those positive misinformation campaigns. So go ahead, call Jimbo and let him know this valuable nugget, and then inform him that you put on those new break pads and he should pick up his car between 8 and 6, Monday through Saturday.

The article they cite provides such scant information, that to imagine that it provides any foundation for accusations against Clemson is silly. Hell, I hope they are spreading shit about FSU. We watched other teams pluck our recruits from under us during the coaching change over the past year, so fuck em. Recruiting is a dirty game, we all know this, let’s not get all self righteous and pretend to be shocked about the whole thing.