Keep up the good work Jessie

[Turbine]

Every coach UL has ever had has had players with eligibility problems. Jessie is no exception in this regard, except, only Jessie has continued to work with these players year after year. Working to keep them eligible long after other coaches would have buried them and looked the other way. That makes him the best UL has ever had. He should be applauded.

To some this may sound farfetched in light of recent eligibility problems for some of the transfer students, and repeat offenders. Inside I know Jessie will not give up on making his players students.

This fact is borne out in one very simple statistic, that being the number of letters worn by his teams year in and year out.

I'm not talking about the number of letter winners; I'm talking about the total number of letters worn by these letter winners.

In order to get this number high you need players who remain eligible. You can't get this number high with a bunch of transfers and freshmen who don't stay with the program. Bunches of 1’s don’t add up very fast.

With this simple stat a 3-year letter winner counts as a 3, added to the 4 of the 4-year letter winners, and the 2 and yes the freshmen and transfer letter winners.

A 1 and out student would count as 1 letter but would be gone and could not accrue letters. A high number of letters indicates players remaining eligible.

Below is the last 5 coach’s average yearly letters playing on their court. If a player had to sit out their letters do not count like Reggie Poole Jessie’s first year.

Beryl Shipley is included but freshmen could not play otherwise his numbers would far higher. Jim Hatfield's numbers are included but he was starting from zero coming off the death penalty.

Jessie has averaged 25.16 letters on his team through his first 6 years. He has had 3 (one and out) single letter winners in his first 6 years, compared to Marty and his 12 (one and out) through 11 years.

Jessie Evans 25.16 average letters on the floor.
Bobby Paschal 23.13
Marty Fletcher 20.18
Beryl Shipley 19.06
Jim Hatfield 17.67

This absolutely cannot happen unless you keep players in the program and eligible. Jessie I know it's not an exact science, but keep up the good work. Even if these kids don't know it yet, they will never forget you, and will thank you and the school when you are in your eighties and long since retired.

[RaginRash]

I am not clear on the corrolation between the number of letters a student athlete has and academic progress?

I guess I could say that based on this "analysis", that the coaches with the lowest numbers on your list were able to keep student athletes eligible and on track academically. Not stringing out their eligibility where they could garner a larger number of years as lettermen. So there you have it. You've got it all backwards.

I'd be curious to know what the graduation rates are of this list of coaches? :confused:

[Turner]

A high letter number means the kids stay in the program a little long.

[RaginRash]

Originally posted by Turner
A high letter number means the kids stay in the program a little long.

I understand that, just not the correlation to academic progress.

[Turbine]

Originally posted by Turner
A high letter number means the kids stay in the program a little long.

There is no such thing as "a little long."

Every student athlete has 5 years to play 4. The only exceptions being medical redshirt years.

If Jessie has a player that maxes out at 3 letters, he probably needed an extra year to become eligible.

If he has a player that maxes out at two letters he probably needed two years to become eligible. This could be within the program or a transfer from a Junior college.

Sometimes you get transfers from Junior colleges who are not quite ready and they end up lettering only one year.

"a little long" does not gain extra letters, it can't happen. You must play to letter. You must letter in the class room to play.

[Turbine]

In modern UL history the last quarter century . . .

Adding up the combined letters of the various letter winners has proved crucial in producing winning seasons.

If there were at least 21 or more letters playing on the floor during the season, Louisiana has suffered only 2 losing seasons in the last 25 years.

The two being Jessies 21 letters of 1998-99 and Marty Fletchers 25 letters of 1987-88

Jessies smallest letter year was his only losing season. This season may be his toughest coaching job to date, as he may be forced to make do with very few letter winners on the team. Hopefuly he can do as good a coaching job as Marty did in 92-92 when his program dwindled down to 9 letters on the floor and the team still won with a 17-13 record.

The attached chart shown below (must be registered to view) shows the total letters on the floor in each of the last 3 coaches respective year1, year2, year3, ... as coach of Louisiana.

[Oldman]

so it doesn't matter to you if the player, "go to class or not, go to workouts, go to weight training, follow curfew, or any other things that goes on. the only thing you want is wins. i'm shocked!

[Turbine]

Originally posted by oldman
so it doesn't matter to you if the player, "go to class or not, go to workouts, go to weight training, follow curfew, or any other things that goes on. the only thing you want is wins. i'm shocked!

You are right it should and does matter to me. My whole point is this; 6 years of the Jessie Evans era tell a more complete story than simply looking at the problems of 2003.

There are at least two factors to consider here.

If you don't go to class, you won't get a passing grade, or at least you shouldn't.

You can't accrue letters on the basketball court unless you get a passing grade in the classroom.

Since Jessie’s players have historically accrued a high number of letters on the basketball court -6 year track record- then they had to make the grade in the classroom.

His current problems with slacking student-athletes to the point of no return are recent phenomena by a select couple of repeat offenders. Yet some, not looking at his 6-year track record have implied this is a career problem with Jessie Evan's players. This is simply not true.

If it were me I would not allow any student to skip class, workouts, weight training, and I would demand that curfews were met. But that's easy for me to say, it might be harder to implement 100%.

Recently at the end of the 2001 football season we had the example where Jon Van Cleave quit going to class, didn't take any of his finals and basically dropped out of school while still in school. Every effort was made to get him eligible prior to the 2002 season with a very heavy load during the summer session.

While I deplore what JVC did I applaud how many tried to help him get his education back on track. During the 2002 season the actions of the year prior were semi repeated and he dropped out of school. Their efforts were in vain.

But just because the efforts on behalf of JVC came up short, I see no reason for Jessie to quit trying to help his players. The difference between basketball and football is the basketball regular season straddles two semesters, and football doesn’t. So while an ineligible football player will not be missed, a basketball players troubles are under the microscope.

I just hope all of Jessie’s patience and hard work result in players who want him to look good. Right now they are doing the opposite.

[1stTake]

Trust me you are a goofball if you defend Jessie Evans. There are things you must not know.

[RaginRash]

What exactly are the criteria for getting a "letter"? How many games, periods, or starts?

I'd like to see one of those cool Excel chart wizard graphs showing the number of graduates per coach.

[RaginFan]

Originally posted by Chuck
Trust me you are a goofball if you defend Jessie Evans. There are things you must not know.

Tell us Chuck, inquiring minds want to know.

[OldBullDog]

Impressive chart Turbine I would like to know if the opposite is true. Do low number of lettermen cause losing years? It doesn't look like the relationship is as strong, what do you think?:confused: :confused: