Occam's razor: Baylor not on the level

Bump to see if your understanding of Occam's razor or the meaning of slander have improved.

Yours apparently hasn't...

It still doesn't change the fact that you accused somebody of cheating without having any proof. Furthermore, you haven't shown that the violations that took place directly led to Baylor's success, which was the basis for your argument (i.e Baylor is successful so they must be cheating).
 
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My cousin went to Baylor, and annoys the heck out of me. I don't like Baylor for that simple reason.

Is this your cousin? He annoys the heck out of me too.

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Yours apparently hasn't...

Is this going to turn into a match of "my dad can beat up your dad"?

The OP had a point in that where there's smoke, there's often fire. But, to say that Occam's Razor should have made everyone suspicious discredits all of the hard work being done by legit coaches, since "they cheat" is the simplest explanation in most cases.

Look at schools like Syracuse, Gonzaga, and Duke--at one point in time, they were all small religious schools in small cities in the middle of nowhere without much history. Maybe some of them cheated back in the day to get jump-started, but maybe having a charismatic coach who's planted roots helps, too. Would it have been fair to accuse Jim Boeheim, Mark Few, and Coack K of cheating when they started having rapid success, even though no evidence of cheating existed?

Who knows, maybe they are all cheaters, too. Maybe Scott Drew is the Tony Montana of basketball coaches; he got too cocky and ****** off the wrong people while guys like Boeheim cheat "quietly" and fly under the radar. At the very least, though, I think they deserve the benefit of the doubt; innocent until proven guilty.
 
Yours apparently hasn't...

It still doesn't change the fact that you accused somebody of cheating without having any proof. Furthermore, you haven't shown that the violations that took place directly led to Baylor's success, which was the basis for your argument (i.e Baylor is successful so they must be cheating).

You do not understand what slander is in the slightest. Your last sentence shows you don't understand my original post about Occam's razor either. I didn't say they're successful so they must cheat. I said that cheating is the simpler explanation for their recruiting success and Occam's razor would say that means it's probably the true explanation. The concept was right, it usually is.

Your desire for me to be wrong at all times is so strong you've now aligned yourself with proven liars and cheaters in order to keep disagreeing with me...about a post you never even understood.
 
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Is this going to turn into a match of "my dad can beat up your dad"?

The OP had a point in that where there's smoke, there's often fire. But, to say that Occam's Razor should have made everyone suspicious discredits all of the hard work being done by legit coaches, since "they cheat" is the simplest explanation in most cases.

Look at schools like Syracuse, Gonzaga, and Duke--at one point in time, they were all small religious schools in small cities in the middle of nowhere without much history. Maybe some of them cheated back in the day to get jump-started, but maybe having a charismatic coach who's planted roots helps, too. Would it have been fair to accuse Jim Boeheim, Mark Few, and Coack K of cheating when they started having rapid success, even though no evidence of cheating existed?

Who knows, maybe they are all cheaters, too. Maybe Scott Drew is the Tony Montana of basketball coaches; he got too cocky and ****** off the wrong people while guys like Boeheim cheat "quietly" and fly under the radar. At the very least, though, I think they deserve the benefit of the doubt; innocent until proven guilty.

I have to take some of my own medicine here, though, and admit that I've always wondered whether Syracuse has been involved in some shady recruiting, for the exact same suspicions as the OP. For the life of me, I've never been able to understand why so many kids from NYC commit to a program 6 hours away in a dumpy rust-belt town full of snow when there are so many better, closer options in the Northeast.
 
Is this going to turn into a match of "my dad can beat up your dad"?

The OP had a point in that where there's smoke, there's often fire. But, to say that Occam's Razor should have made everyone suspicious discredits all of the hard work being done by legit coaches, since "they cheat" is the simplest explanation in most cases.

Look at schools like Syracuse, Gonzaga, and Duke--at one point in time, they were all small religious schools in small cities in the middle of nowhere without much history. Maybe some of them cheated back in the day to get jump-started, but maybe having a charismatic coach who's planted roots helps, too. Would it have been fair to accuse Jim Boeheim, Mark Few, and Coack K of cheating when they started having rapid success, even though no evidence of cheating existed?

Who knows, maybe they are all cheaters, too. Maybe Scott Drew is the Tony Montana of basketball coaches; he got too cocky and ****** off the wrong people while guys like Boeheim cheat "quietly" and fly under the radar. At the very least, though, I think they deserve the benefit of the doubt; innocent until proven guilty.

To my knowledge, Gonzaga didn't build their tradition with elite recruits. ISU had one elite recruit they built a B12 championship season around, the next year they won another B12 Championship again with exactly zero elite recruits. The NCAA investigation on ISU those two years found 1200 less instances of illegal recruiting than Baylor. Food for thought.

Winning, playing, coaching and building in different ways give rise to different levels of suspicion.
 
I wasn't the one who resurrected the month-old thread just to show everybody how I smart I was on the Interwebs.

Really easy way to avoid these types of discussions JBH...don't call other Cyclone Fanatics dumb.

Especially when they're correct and you don't understand what you're talking about.
 
To my knowledge, Gonzaga didn't build their tradition with elite recruits. ISU had one elite recruit they built a B12 championship season around, the next year they won another B12 Championship again with exactly zero elite recruits. The NCAA investigation on ISU those two years found 1200 less instances of illegal recruiting than Baylor. Food for thought.

Winning, playing, coaching and building in different ways give rise to different levels of suspicion.
I'm interested to know your definition of an "elite" recruit. Is there a cutoff as to where one can be considered an "elite" guy vs a very good guy, or is it entirely subjective?
 
You do not understand what slander is in the slightest. Your last sentence shows you don't understand my original post about Occam's razor either. I didn't say they're successful so they must cheat. I said that cheating is the simpler explanation for their recruiting success and Occam's razor would say that means it's probably the true explanation. The concept was right, it usually is.

:biglaugh: Of course you "said" it. You just tried to veil your accusation so that you could bail out when someone called you on it. Why else would you make a post postulating that the most likely reason that a school is successful is that they cheat, without having any formal proof of said cheating?

Your desire for me to be wrong at all times is so strong you've now aligned yourself with proven liars and cheaters in order to keep disagreeing with me...

Like I said before, stop psycho-analyzing me, and start looking at yourself. In particular, you might want to investigate why you had the burning need to resurrect a month-old thread when there were already two active threads discussing the same topic.

about a post you never even understood.

I understand exactly what you are up to, and I see through to your motives. And I can tell by your responses that it bugs the hell out of you.
 
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To my knowledge, Gonzaga didn't build their tradition with elite recruits. ISU had one elite recruit they built a B12 championship season around, the next year they won another B12 Championship again with exactly zero elite recruits. The NCAA investigation on ISU those two years found 1200 less instances of illegal recruiting than Baylor. Food for thought.

Winning, playing, coaching and building in different ways give rise to different levels of suspicion.

Their recruits haven't been elite by UNC/Kentucky/Kansas standards, no, but they've been amazing for a school of their size and in that conference. All I know is that prior to 1999, about the only thing Zags had to hang their hat on was John Stockton. Then suddenly Mark Few shows up, convinces kids to come play at some tiny *** school in remote eastern Washington instead of sunny California, and they've absolutely dominated the WCC since. Shouldn't that trigger some scrutiny if this is the standard by which we accuse coaches of cheating?
 
Their recruits haven't been elite by UNC/Kentucky/Kansas standards, no, but they've been amazing for a school of their size and in that conference. All I know is that prior to 1999, about the only thing Zags had to hang their hat on was John Stockton. Then suddenly Mark Few shows up, convinces kids to come play at some tiny *** school in remote eastern Washington instead of sunny California, and they've absolutely dominated the WCC since. Shouldn't that trigger some scrutiny if this is the standard by which we accuse coaches of cheating?

Dan Monson actually started the success at Gonzaga. And Mark Few didn't show up out of nowhere; he was an assistant at Gonzaga for 10 years before getting the head job.
 
Dan Monson actually started the success at Gonzaga. And Mark Few didn't show up out of nowhere; he was an assistant at Gonzaga for 10 years before getting the head job.

Wasn't Monson there like, a year? And my point still stands: their rise to dominance was pretty swift and coincides with a coaching change, which is about all the OP had on Scott Drew before suspecting him of cheating.
 
Wasn't Monson there like, a year? And my point still stands: their rise to dominance was pretty swift and coincides with a coaching change, which is about all the OP had on Scott Drew before suspecting him of cheating.
Except Mark Few actually has coaching ability.
 
Wasn't Monson there like, a year? And my point still stands: their rise to dominance was pretty swift and coincides with a coaching change, which is about all the OP had on Scott Drew before suspecting him of cheating.

But Baylor's coaching change came on the heels of a murder in the program. One would think, regardless of who the next coach was, that it would be pretty difficult to bring in players to a program where a kid had just been murdered.
 
Looks like he was an assistant for ~10 years there and HC for 2 years.

Yeah, I googled him afterwards. I'd forgotten all about him until seeing "the Beach" in the tournament this year.

Him and Mark Few are two contrasting examples of mid-major coaching career paths: one stayed small and successful, one bolted for the big show and floundered there. I can really see why guys like Shaka Smart and Brad Stevens are content to stay where they're at every year.
 

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