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Stuckey donation a la Roos???

oldtimeewualum

Active member
I decided to put this post on the football side even though it pertains more to basketball. A couple months ago I heard that Rodney had changed his cell number (when he changed agents) and has refused to give the new number to anybody at Eastern. I was finally able to get confirmation that it is true. and also the story behind his unhappiness.

The genesis of the rift was when Earlywine was told by the athletic administration, less than 9 months after becoming the coach, that he was not to contact Rodney. Earlywine had hired an assistant coach (Wortham) based almost entirely on Stuckey's recommendation and was, along with Wortham's help, developing a really good relationship with Rodney. Sound familiar...Beau/Best relationship with Roos? But because way too many people from Eastern were hounding Rodney for favors, pictures, autographed items, tickets etc, Rodney asked that Eastern designate one person to contact him and his agent. Chaves, in his infinite wisdom, decided that person should be the former golf coach instead of the basketball coach. Who do you think Rodney would rather talk to or have visit him, the former golf coach or the basketball coach who had hired a close friend onto the new staff based on his recommendation???

After Earlywine was fired, a combination of things led to the point where Rodney told a close friend that it will be a very, very long time (if ever) before he would consider doing anything to help EWU: Wortham was treated poorly by the AD and assistant AD, Wortham was treated really poorly and lied to by Coach Hayford, and we didnt hire they guy Rodney wanted - Carl Howell.

I continue to be dismayed by the stories of mismanagement that I hear coming from our athletic department (feel free to see my posts on the Bball board). Taking into account that I am most likely only hearing a small percent makes me wonder how much worse it really is?
 
It's been quite a while since I've posted on this site, but I just can't take "oldtimeewualums", idiotic statements anymore. Come on man, you really need to get your facts straight instead stating your insight from a "so-called" source close to the program...Anyone can say they have an "inside" source by simply knowing a person connected to EWU. When will you wake up and realize that Coach Earlywine was one of the worst coaches in EWU history. I find it very amusing that you really believe that the AD would "restrict" Coach Earlywine from having contact with Stuckey. Coach Earlywine was a HORRIBLE coach and even worse "communicator"..Earlywine was an embarrasement when it came to public speaking engagements (oh wait, he refused to do them) and connecting former EWU Men's bball players. If you have a so-called "insider" you would've found out that Earlywine never tried to make connections with EWU alumni and former players didn't want anything to do with him. It's pretty sad, when we've played 2 times in Seattle each year for the past 2-3 years and not one former Eag was contacted by Coach Earlywine to come to the games. EWU has a ton of former athletes and NO ONE was connected to him. Get your facts straight and realize that Stuckey actually didn't want anything to do with Earlywine, not the system. Hmm, sounds like your source is Earlywine.

Your remark about the "ex-golf" coach being the "appointed" person to talk to Stuckey; has it crossed your mind that he actually has "people" and "communication" skills? Hmm, seems like an important thing to have when your in the business of creating "relationships" and "donor driven" agendas.

Carl Howell - I won't even go there. You should've done your homework to see why he didn't get the job. Last time I checked, a former player doesn't decide who gets a coaching job.

If you're a so-called EWU fan, please quit the bashing of EWU and start supporting EWU Athletics! I completely get this is an opinion site which everyone is entitled to. I just can't stand it when people like yourself claim to have an "insight" into a program and do nothing but bash with false information.

Cheers
 
Swoop55 said:
It's been quite a while since I've posted on this site, but I just can't take "oldtimeewualums", idiotic statements anymore. Come on man, you really need to get your facts straight instead stating your insight from a "so-called" source close to the program...Anyone can say they have an "inside" source by simply knowing a person connected to EWU. When will you wake up and realize that Coach Earlywine was one of the worst coaches in EWU history. I find it very amusing that you really believe that the AD would "restrict" Coach Earlywine from having contact with Stuckey. Coach Earlywine was a HORRIBLE coach and even worse "communicator"..Earlywine was an embarrasement when it came to public speaking engagements (oh wait, he refused to do them) and connecting former EWU Men's bball players. If you have a so-called "insider" you would've found out that Earlywine never tried to make connections with EWU alumni and former players didn't want anything to do with him. It's pretty sad, when we've played 2 times in Seattle each year for the past 2-3 years and not one former Eag was contacted by Coach Earlywine to come to the games. EWU has a ton of former athletes and NO ONE was connected to him. Get your facts straight and realize that Stuckey actually didn't want anything to do with Earlywine, not the system. Hmm, sounds like your source is Earlywine.

Your remark about the "ex-golf" coach being the "appointed" person to talk to Stuckey; has it crossed your mind that he actually has "people" and "communication" skills? Hmm, seems like an important thing to have when your in the business of creating "relationships" and "donor driven" agendas.

Carl Howell - I won't even go there. You should've done your homework to see why he didn't get the job. Last time I checked, a former player doesn't decide who gets a coaching job.

If you're a so-called EWU fan, please quit the bashing of EWU and start supporting EWU Athletics! I completely get this is an opinion site which everyone is entitled to. I just can't stand it when people like yourself claim to have an "insight" into a program and do nothing but bash with false information.

Cheers

:clap:

This is clearly sour grapes from someone with very little insight. I will add that said former golf coach is probably the individual in the athletic department most responsible for the red turf project.
 
@Swoop55 - you seem to have mistaken my post as some type of argument in favor of Earlywine. I do believe he should have been given another year. But that wasnt the point. The post was simply to state the reasons why Rodney Stuckey will not be donating any money.

I have to get back to work now, but I will comment later on your reply to my post as well as my thoughts on why Earlywine should have been given another year. Howeve, I will do so on the bball board as this has drifted away from fundraising and any chance that we could have got a Roos-type donation from Rodney.
 
oldtimeewualum said:
@Swoop55 - you seem to have mistaken my post as some type of argument in favor of Earlywine. I do believe he should have been given another year. But that wasnt the point. The post was simply to state the reasons why Rodney Stuckey will not be donating any money.

I have to get back to work now, but I will comment later on your reply to my post as well as my thoughts on why Earlywine should have been given another year. Howeve, I will do so on the bball board as this has drifted away from fundraising and any chance that we could have got a Roos-type donation from Rodney.

i think he was given one year to many, but that's just me.
 
EdubAlum said:
oldtimeewualum said:
@Swoop55 - you seem to have mistaken my post as some type of argument in favor of Earlywine. I do believe he should have been given another year. But that wasnt the point. The post was simply to state the reasons why Rodney Stuckey will not be donating any money.

I have to get back to work now, but I will comment later on your reply to my post as well as my thoughts on why Earlywine should have been given another year. Howeve, I will do so on the bball board as this has drifted away from fundraising and any chance that we could have got a Roos-type donation from Rodney.

i think he was given one year to many, but that's just me.

Agree with Edub....I have nothing against Earlywine, be we were 12 and 18 3 years ago, 9 and 21 2 years ago and 10 and 20 last year...no coach will survive with that record. I don't know much about coach earlywine and I'm sure it will work out for him somewhere else, but we did need a change at the head coaching position. Hayford has more local ties and that should help.
 
Why does this keep showing up in football? Besides every time some idiot tries to promote what a great coach Earlywine was it demonstrates their ignorance and bias.
 
Swoop55: again you seem to have misconstrued my post as a defense of Earlywine. I will get to that later. This post was simply an explanation of the reasons that Rodney Stuckey has stated for why he wont be giving any money to EWU. It was not a comment about Hughes. I have stated on this board that he (along with Westfall and Simonowski) did most of the heaving lifting on the turf project despite many obstacles on campus - including some from within the athletic department. I also was not saying that Carl Howell should have been named our new coach. Quite the contrary. I agree with you that it would have been an awful decision and that no booster/fan/former player should be able to influence that type of decision.

Now, for my contention that Earlywine was told not to communicate with Rodney, I am right. After initially hearing this from Earlywine several months ago, I didnt post it because I didnt realize some of the inadequacies in our athletic department in the fundraising area, and I wasnt going to post it based on 1 person (who obviously has a bone to pick). But, I have spoken to several people who were in the athletic department staff meeting when the entire department was told that Hughes was the only person who was authorized to contact Rodney. Shortly after that, Earlywine privately asked Chaves if that included him, and was told that it did. There were only 2 people in on that conversation, and 1 of those two told me. I'll let you figure our which it was! After having many conversations with Earlywine during his time here, I'll tell you this: he is the most honest SOB I've probably ever met. To his detriment at times, but still. No matter what you think of him as a coach, or communicator, or fundraiser,etc I challenge you to find somebody who can honestly tell you that he lied to them.

Once again, I was not trashing Hughes. He was doing his job. But, a basketball player wants to talk to the basketball coach - just as Roos wants to deal with Beau and Best. As much as our bball program needs money, this was a horrendous decision that came from above Hughes' head. The single wealthiest person with ties to EWU basketball, now refuses to give anybody at the university his cell number - let alone any money. It didnt have to happen. Go back to my original post. This has happened due to really poor leadership/decision-making in the athletic department.

Dont take my word for it. Call Rodney's agent, Steve Banks. Call Wortham. Ask anybody who was in that department meeting. Hell, ask Earlywine - I hear he is going to be in Spokane this weekend for the Coaches vs Cancer event. Even better yet, ask Chaves. He will be forced to do one of three things: confirm what I have said, lie (which we know he is not averse to based on his public comments during the Glen Dean transfer saga), or begin talking in a circle like a politician and never actually give an answer. I know Vic is betting on the third option!!!
 
oldtimeewualum said:
Swoop55: again you seem to have misconstrued my post as a defense of Earlywine. I will get to that later. This post was simply an explanation of the reasons that Rodney Stuckey has stated for why he wont be giving any money to EWU. It was not a comment about Hughes. I have stated on this board that he (along with Westfall and Simonowski) did most of the heaving lifting on the turf project despite many obstacles on campus - including some from within the athletic department. I also was not saying that Carl Howell should have been named our new coach. Quite the contrary. I agree with you that it would have been an awful decision and that no booster/fan/former player should be able to influence that type of decision.

Now, for my contention that Earlywine was told not to communicate with Rodney, I am right. After initially hearing this from Earlywine several months ago, I didnt post it because I didnt realize some of the inadequacies in our athletic department in the fundraising area, and I wasnt going to post it based on 1 person (who obviously has a bone to pick). But, I have spoken to several people who were in the athletic department staff meeting when the entire department was told that Hughes was the only person who was authorized to contact Rodney. Shortly after that, Earlywine privately asked Chaves if that included him, and was told that it did. There were only 2 people in on that conversation, and 1 of those two told me. I'll let you figure our which it was! After having many conversations with Earlywine during his time here, I'll tell you this: he is the most honest SOB I've probably ever met. To his detriment at times, but still. No matter what you think of him as a coach, or communicator, or fundraiser,etc I challenge you to find somebody who can honestly tell you that he lied to them.

Once again, I was not trashing Hughes. He was doing his job. But, a basketball player wants to talk to the basketball coach - just as Roos wants to deal with Beau and Best. As much as our bball program needs money, this was a horrendous decision that came from above Hughes' head. The single wealthiest person with ties to EWU basketball, now refuses to give anybody at the university his cell number - let alone any money. It didnt have to happen. Go back to my original post. This has happened due to really poor leadership/decision-making in the athletic department.

Dont take my word for it. Call Rodney's agent, Steve Banks. Call Wortham. Ask anybody who was in that department meeting. Hell, ask Earlywine - I hear he is going to be in Spokane this weekend for the Coaches vs Cancer event. Even better yet, ask Chaves. He will be forced to do one of three things: confirm what I have said, lie (which we know he is not averse to based on his public comments during the Glen Dean transfer saga), or begin talking in a circle like a politician and never actually give an answer. I know Vic is betting on the third option!!!

I'm no lawyer, I've never watched law and order, but this seems like quite a bit of hearsay. Is that the right term? :mrgreen:
 
I'm not going to argue if Earlywine was told not to talk to Stuckey. I don't know that for a fact. However, as I stated before, Earlywine has horrible communication skills and I do know for a fact that Stuckey was not an Earlywine fan. Not sure where you are getting your information from, but the whole (Stuckey will not allow any EWU staff to contact him) is false. He still talks to staff and in fact will be in Seattle on the sideline for the EWU/UW FB game. Just sayin..Obviously I'm not an Earlywine fan and honesty or not, I wouldn't trust the guy more than I can throw him. (For Glen Dean's sake, I hope the kid does well at Utah) I would hate to see the horrible decision by Dean to leave EW backfire because ol' Earlywine got in the poor guys head!!!
 
EdubAlum,
I hope we can get our minds off the past, and look towards the future. I knew Coach Earlywine, he was a good man, he always treated me with respect. I never heard him talking about anyone, former players, the admin,etc. I usually get information about incomeing players, once they release the information.

I worked for 21 years at EWU, will be retired 16 years Aug 31st, 11. Someone stated he was the worst Coach at EWU. I can honestly say he wasn't the worst. Go back some years and you will see what I am talking aboout. I will not utilize any names, trust me he wasn't the worst. Now here I am asking individuals to forget about the past, what am I doing? Talking about the past. I just had to correct some of the quotes.

Now to the future, let us all get behind Coach Hayford, an wish him the best. He has a team will compete in the Big Sky. We just have to wait and see once the practice games get on the way. Have a gret weekend. My BD is 9/9, I will be 39, ;) :lol: :lol: Jack Benny stated 39 for quite sometime :lol: :lol: :thumb: :thumb: You little Princess BD is also coming up next month. Go Eagles!!!!!Vic Wallace
 
Swoop55: Now that Wortham (Rodney's friend and former teammate) is no longer at EWU, and the athletic department staff has been told that nobody other than Hughes is supposed to contact Rodney, I would throw out the challenge to you to state exactly who it is that speaks with him. My sources (that is plural), one of whom is very close with Rodney, and a couple who intimately know the situation, say that Rodney has cut off communication and refuses to give his cell phone to anybody at EWU. Once again, I am right about this.

By stating that Glen Dean made a horrible decision, you are showing your ignorance. He left a Big Sky school with no money (the worst budget in the Big Sky) or support from the administration to transfer to a nationally-renowned university in the Pac-12; to go to a university with a medical school and university hospital (he is a biology/pre-med major who wants to go to medical school); to go to a basketball program that has an academic advisor just for basketball instead of a school with one advisor for 300+ student-athletes, a strength/conditioning coach strictly for basketball, that charters to every road game, that has training table for the players to eat properly (Eastern doesnt even pay for 3 meals per day according to Earlywine and several players I spoke with), that plays every game on TV, that has a coach that has played in the NBA, won in the NCAA tourney, been an assistant and head coach in the NBA. I guess other than those reasons...

Please dont reply with "he's not going to play/he'll sit on the bench." It will only amplify the appearance of your ignorance because you will be stating or implying that you know more about basketball than Utah's new coach, Larry Krytkowiak. You dont...by a wide margin.

One last thing, your statement that you wouldn't trust Earlywine as far as you could throw him: is that based on a personal experience of him lying to you or just an unfounded dig at the guy? The reason I ask is, as I stated in an earlier post, the guy is one of the most honest people I have ever met, and I have yet to meet anybody else who can give me an instance of him being untruthful.
 
Enough of this crap; the time for debating Earlywine's merits have long passed. Whether it was the correct decison or not, it wasn't ours to make. Jim Hayford is in charge of the basketball program now and as alums and boosters we should get behind him and his staff and the players. Let's give him a chance before we comment about his ability/inability to do this or that.

Dean transferred - great, wish him the best. That was a personal decision for him to make and I hope he makes the best of it, but I don't think we need our own "fans" on here blasting the program and criticizing the AD and every aspect of the athletic department. You can either be part of the solution or part of the problem, but I will offer that's its easy to cast stones from a distance. I find it humorous that the same people that bitch about poor facilities, lack of this or that, are usually not even EAA members. I bitch about things from time to time as well, but its because I want the athletics programs to do well. But at least I put my money where my mouth is.
 
It looks like you and your sources are quite misinformed because it didn't sound like Rodney was too upset with Eastern when he gave his half time interview from the press-box of Husky Stadium at today's game.

He even stated that if the lockout continues in the NBA that he would be spending a lot of time around Cheney during basketball season.
 
Me and my sources are not misinformed. Go back and look at what I stated. I did not say that Rodney would never come to Cheney again. I said that he would not give his cell number to anybody at EWU and that he would not be giving any money - both of which are still true. Notice that Rodney did that interview from the press box at Husky Stadium not Woodward. Let me know when you actually see him in Cheney.
 
Wow, ladies and gentlemen, can someone please tell all of us what the truth is on this situation.

The comments are so far diverse, that myself and many others have come to the conclusion that no one is telling the truth, I realize that is a bold statement, but perception is greater than reality.

Am I making sense here? I hope so.

Thank you
 
In my opinion we were never going to get any money from Rodney and he could have cared less about what happened to Earlywine. I also wonder if oldtimeewualum is really an alum, and does he belong to the EAA? The ones who are most negative about our program usually do not contribute financially to make it better. Who besides 'old alum' wants to keep the Earlywine era discussion going? I am very optimistic about Eastern basketball under Coach Hayford, and I understand it will take time (but not four years) to bring us back to respectability. Go Eastern Athletics from a booster who bleeds Eagle red.
 
Spoeagle said:
In my opinion we were never going to get any money from Rodney and he could have cared less about what happened to Earlywine. I also wonder if oldtimeewualum is really an alum, and does he belong to the EAA? The ones who are most negative about our program usually do not contribute financially to make it better. Who besides 'old alum' wants to keep the Earlywine era discussion going? I am very optimistic about Eastern basketball under Coach Hayford, and I understand it will take time (but not four years) to bring us back to respectability. Go Eastern Athletics from a booster who bleeds Eagle red.

great post and I agree completely but I must be in the minority in thinking that we will actually be respectable in the next couple of years. Hayford is bringing in some nice talent, cant wait to watch these guys play.
 

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