Billy Donovan to the Magic?
 

So says ESPN.com.

$6M a year.

Good for him I say. Orlando is in a great position with Howard & Darko (when does Hill's contract expire, btw?) whereas Florida just lost everyone. He couldn't possibly leave on a higher note, and if it doesn't work out he can just take his kajillion $ and get a job at another elite school.

And if he fails, at least he won't be ruining a hallowed team like the Celtics.

Hill's contract has expired.

The Celtics have a GM that can do that thank you very much ;)

Ah, I forgot Darko was an RFA--I've been too busy to follow sports since last fall! What kind of $ is Darko expected to get?

Great move for Donovan - go after the money when your stock is at it's highest. He can always go back to college if it doesn't work. What I don't get is NFL and NBA teams still throwing crazy money at college coaches. The success rate is extremely low.

something between 3 years 24 million and 6 years 60 million.

Dear Billy,

Have fun in Orlando. Can we count on you to be in Columbia in three years?

Go Gamecocks,
Steven O. Spurrier

P.S. Click Clack!

Not that I want to stir up any trouble but......

What kind of buyout does John Pelphrey have in his contract with Arkansas?

Of the most recentish college coaches to make the jump, at least he's headed to a team that, well, isn't as bad as Atlanta or Floyd-era Bulls.

Yeah this move has me worried for that reason. At least he's just going to be the coach and not coach/GM.

Huh... I bet Virginia Commonwealth University is biting their fingernails right now...

Billy Donovan back to Gators?!

Ya, I just saw the break-in on the Yanks/Sox game that he's now trying to get out of the contract. Kinda funny.

When it comes to these fucking college coaches, you just can't make shit up.

I don't know what I'm hoping for here...the other day I thought it was a nice situation for him where he had a good chance at succeeding. Now I think I want Orlando to hold him to the deal and fail miserably.

If you're Florida, do you want him back? From a coaching standpoint, sure. But it's a bit like a marriage in a way... A guy I used to work with's wife up and left him one day for another guy she met online. I warned him that she's be back afte about a month, saying she made a mistake. It took two months, but he was ready... and felt great when he told her that she left and it was over (he even met someone new!)

My point is once you sever a relationship, going back never seems to work the same. If Donovan ends up back at Florida, how long will it be before he ends up in Miami? He obviously has a wandering eye and will walk for the right deal. Orlando must have got him good and drunk. Like many men he woke up on Saturday morning and said "OMG!!!"

you take her back if she has won 2 straight titles

lol

Practically speaking, there's no way for the Magic to keep him if he doesn't want to be there. At best, they can force him to pay to end the contract, and usually something like that is in the contract already. But the simple fact is, you can't have a coach who doesn't want to be there. That's worse than a top 3 college coach taking your job and then leaving in 2 days. Either they convince him to stay and lie that none of this really happened, or he goes back.

Well, this is interesting. According to SI, the contract wasn't signed. Everything else I've read says he signed the contract on Thursday.


"GAINESVILLE, Fla. (AP) -- Billy Donovan is "conflicted" about his decision to leave the Florida Gators to coach the Orlando Magic, and he will continue talking with the NBA team about the contract he agreed to last week, the Magic said Monday.
Donovan has not yet signed the five-year, $27.5 million contract with the Magic."

I want him at the very least to pay for the season tickets that were bought immediately after he was named head coach. :)

Interesting to see the difference in how this is being reported.

As I mentioned above, SI has specifically said that Donovan didn't sign the contract. However, the article quotes the Magic in its press release from this morning about the situation, including reference to his "contract signing."

ESPN.com not only says that the contract was signed - several times - but then goes into a discussion of how he could get out of it, etc.

I'm going with ESPN on this one.

The state of Florida has a law that contracts can be voided by either party within 72 hours of signing it. If Donovon wants out of the deal there's really not a damn thing the Magic can do about it. I used to do service work that involved selling and executing terms of contracts in Orlando and this was something we always cringed about within the first couple days of a big deal.

From ESPN

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/news/story?id=2892334

State of Florida contract law automatically provides that provision.

You would think that Donovan's lawyers would know that provision. I wonder if he is still vacilating and will be talked into staying.

I think Donovan just wants to go back to Florida, but if this is a play for more money or control it's genius.

UF's reaction to all this demonstrates that they are a program that happens to have a great basketball coach--not a great program.

What do you mean?

Wouldnt you say that is true of Duke as well?

he probably is doing orlando a favor

Per SI, he's going back to UF and Stan Van Gundy is the man in Orlando.

There are a few programs (UNC, Kentucky, Kansas) that are greater than any one coach. When Roy Williams left Kansas, they did not become a second-tier program. They got the best coach on the market and hired him and stayed on top.

UF's reaction to this (the whole idea that they kept asking Donovan to reconsider (which information I read somewhere)) indicates that they realize that they are not a great program, but a program that happens to have a great coach and the resources with which a great coach can win. After Donovan leaves, they will not be a top five program.

As for Duke, I think that time will tell. Coach K has been there so long and has been so successful that it is hard to imagine Duke without him. I would speculate that as long as the University dedicates the resources, Duke can become one of those programs post-K.

As a UNC fan, I hope that Duke does maintain greatness. A rivalry is at its best when both programs are on the same footing.

So they're not a great program because they recognize the value of a coach who won back to back championships? Not sure I see your logic there.

They're not a great basketball program because the only reason anyone at UF cares about this team right now is because they are winning. That's it. If Donovan left and the next guy didn't pick up where he left off, it would be no big deal. It's only a big deal now because of the bragging rights - adding this to the football team's success is just gravy. Take it away, and they still only care that the football team is on top.

You might recognize it and just not agree with it.

I have no problem with their AD, etc. trying to keep Donovan. Indeed, getting the best coach in college basketball (IMHO) to build a program at a football school indicates a top notch AD.

But, Donovan is still bigger than the program. When he leaves, Florida will not be a top-five program anymore.

Please start a thread with this as a title. FOFC has been on fire lately.

You're probably right about that, although it depends on who they hire to replace him obviously. I think that's true of almost all schools, though - without a good coach, they're not competitive. UCLA, Indiana, and UNC have each gone through down periods in recent years, and ended up firing their coach. I would say those are three of the best programs in the country.

Anyway, I originally thought you were making some sort of moral critique, that Florida was acting shady in some way.

Wow, interesting turn of events. I think he should've tried his hand at the NBA. He didn't have much to lose if he doesn't do well there, it's not as if he can't back to college and still make huge bucks afterwards. I mean, back to back titles is nothing to sneeze at.

He needs to stop listening to those folks in Gainesville.

Florida does not have a great basketball program right now. Especially not when compared to UNC, Kentucky or Kansas. That is why you try to keep a Billy Donovan. If you get him to coach at Florida for 20+ years (a la a Coach K, or a Dean Smith), maybe you can create a great basketball program at Florida. However, a great basketball program at Florida will never match the greatness of the basketball programs at Kansas, UNC or Kentucky. I think the same could be said for Syracuse, Texas, Connecticut, among others.

Kansas is a great program. UNC and Kentucky are not great programs.

Kentucky isn't even a top tier program anymore. They just have history.

Who's to say that the next UF coach won't continue what Donovan would have left behind? That VCU coach looks very promising.

We just see the world differently. When I think of great programs--taking into account success, history, fanbase, and tradition--I rank them like this:

1.) Kentucky

2.) UCLA/UNC/Kansas

3.) Duke/UConn/Indiana (Some others fit here, too--probably 6 to 10 more schools, but if I try to complete this list, I will forget an obvious team).

4.) Everyone else

*blinks* By what measure exactly is UNC not a great program?

I think he could be a great coach, but I do have to be a little skeptical of a coach who does well at a mid-major with another coach's talent (see: Stan Heath @ Kent State). If you were going to hire him if he was still the top assistant, then go ahead...if you're relying on one year at VCU, then I think you need to step back and take a harder look.

Funniest thing I've read today.

Anthony Grant was the lead assistant at Florida for years before he took that VCU job. He's got history there, would want to be there and Donovan basically recommended him for it before he left.

I think that'd be best for that program to move forward with, because he's not headed to the NBA and it'd be better for Otis Smith to tell Billy "Sorry, I understand how you feel. But a deal is a deal." He'll get over it and he'll move on and if he doesn't, he'll resign from the Magic and have to basically save face in the college world after a year as an analyst on TV.

I don't think you let him go back and "storybook" this with nothing to show for it, especially with a young team that could use him and that would probably do well with him at the helm.

He'll get over his 'conflictedness' after the team decides it for him.

I don't think Grant would necessarily do a bad job, but I don't think you would want to give him the job unless you would have if he hadn't taken over a program already. But, that point is pretty moot now...Donovan is coming back and Grant will have a better opportunity to prove himself.

Not that it matters now, but..

My impression was that Grant would have probably been next in line even if he never left Florida and stayed as an assistant.

And to your point above about other coach's talent. Yes, it was another coach's talent. However, it is worth noting that he used them in an ENTIRELY different way than the previous coach did and did far better with them despite losing the conference MVP the year before. Time will tell, but I think what Grant did with that VCU team was almost more impressive than if he did it with his own players. He completely changed that team. And, all signs right now point to an absolutely incredible recruiting class.

Florida has a great athletic department fueled by tons of money brought in from one of the great football programs in the country. They happen to have an excellent basketball coach who has recruited really well and was lucky enough to have a group of guys committed to staying together to make history by repeating for a title. The state of Florida in general has not traditionally been a hotbed of basketball. Talented players occasionally come from Florida, but up until this recent Florida run there has been nothing resembling a basketball dynasty by any of the Florida schools. The state of Florida has been, and almost certainly will remain a football first state.

I believe Donovan will always have a top 20 program, wherever he goes, but it remains to be seen if he will ever have a run like these past two years again. IMO it was a fluke. Ohio State had just as talented a group of young players come in last year and they are all leaving already. Even Duke can't keep top talent in school anymore. Building a basketball run like that is just the luck of the personalities of the guys you recruit. I don't think there's a coach alive who has any control over it one way or the other.

IMO right now Roy Williams, Jim Calhoun, and Coach K are the very best. If Donovan can take this new class he has coming in and put it in the Final 4 in the next 2-3 years then I would consider him a member of that group. If he leaves Florida, I agree, it would go back to being a football school that occasionally has a good basketball team (much like Florida State), unless they are lucky enough to get someone really talented to replace Donovan.