However, I disagree with people all the time. I don’t let it bother me.

I realized you are adamant in your position, and I like the rest of the stuff you publish on the site, so I just move on past it.

These people that get all insane and intense about things like that are kinda weird to me. Its a website Its one person’s (Nestor’s) opinion. I can read your website and not agree with your opinon 100% of the time and still enjoy the site. People need to grow up.

I don’t get all the Holiday bashing. That is just me though. Others are entitled to their opinions.

I know, I’m a Geezer and by definition don’t know what words like "bashing"means. (I still say “Nimrod” shouldn’t be a derisive term – Nimrod was a great warrior, but I digress.)

Anyway, I thought the analysis of Holiday was pretty fair on the BN. Nestor was critical of what he perceived to be a lack of support for the program from Holiday, but his criticism seemed to be fair and factually based. It certainly isn’t bashing to compare the comments made by Holiday to those made by Collison. Or course, other people could see those same facts and come to a slightly different conclusion, but that doesn’t equate to “bashing” as far as I’m concerned.

There was intense criticism of Holiday’s production, and I thought that was entirely fair. His numbers were what they were. From what I heard before the season started, I thought we were going to have the best player ever to walk the face of the earth, but we didn’t. He certainly wasn’t the best player even on the team. I thought he was a thorougly ordinary D-1 player, and that there were many guys on the team that should have been given some of Holiday’s minutes. I deferred to Coach Howland’s greater knowledge, but if it had been up to me, Holiday wouldn’t have been starting based on the numbers.

To me, this wasn’t “bashing.” “Bashing,” from my perspective, is when people disagree with me about my well thought out, carefully reasoned and brilliantly explained analyses of subjects such as why Doh! be banned from society, why 99.999% of all sporting events should be watched with the sound off, why the use of childish grammar and syntax should be a major felony and why opera attendance should be mandatory. Disagreeing with me on those subjects – now that’s bashing.

The major contributors to this site have been very openly critical of the way JH has marketed himself at the expense of his coach and program. It has been an ongoing subject with numerous debates. The lasting tone from the process of the NBA draft has left many here with a less than stellar impression of JH as a Bruin. Also contrasting his statements with those of DC, JH does not fit the mold of a “Ben Ball Warrior,” a moniker reserved for special players who put school first and give back to the program. So yeah there are people down on JH, but only for how he has behaved and tried to boost his own stock by pulling away from the program.

Maybe most of it is just perception. But this site has never made apologies for its style or its tone. I don’t always like it. But these are stubborn people. You will not beat them. They don’t get paid, so you can’t get them fired by boycotting. Grow up and move on.

and until e-mailer dedicates his time and energy tracking down all things Bruin, he doesn’t get the benefit that N does.

I’m indifferent about Jrue. I could care less how he does in the NBA. The guy was hyped to be a superstar yet he never lived up to that billing. His cronies and himself continued to pimp themselves throughout this whole process. Instead of saying, “I’m a natural PG but we had an AA PG so the best thing for the team was for me to contribute in other ways. However, I’m confident in my abilities as a PG and I was also able to learn from DC”. THAT is what a BenBall Warrior would say. Not this whining that was constantly being put out by him and his camp. Youth is not an excuse IMO.

I mean….what’d he expect? He thought he was going to come in and be the PG? Please….. DC could have jumped after his Soph or his Jr years. Yet he continued to say that he wanted to win a NC and loved UCLA. He bypassed his payday due to his loyalty to CBH and UCLA. This is the type of person we SHOULD and WILL salute. Not some hyped hotshot that has this sense of entitlement and need for instant gratification. Instead of fighting through adversity, he chose to pout. How would everyone feel about Westy if he pouted and transferred after his 1st season? Whether you transfer or leave for the draft, that in essence is the same to me. They’re both abandoning the program and all the people that are trying to make them better.

I get that he needs to do what is best for him. He should and I do not begrudge him for it. However, he CHOSE to continually throw shots at CBH and how he held him back. Yeah, CBH’s coaching and system really held back JF/AA/CB/RH/RW/LMM/KL/DC. And I guess those NBA execs that talk about how UCLA players are ready for the Pros don’t know jack shit either.

And don’t forget that Jrue and his camp was the one that was bitchin’ about CBH and his system FIRST. CBH is too much class and too smart to get into this. So, we all need to set the record straight. How each of us goes about doing this is up to them.

right on with everything you said, i couldn’t have put it better myself

At times, I feel bad for JH because he’s just a kid. He has said some things that appear to be selfish and unfairly attack our bball program, but I generally dismissed them as comments from a kid who simply doesn’t know any better.

But then I think about K Love. I think it’s fair to compare the two because I’m sure JH thought he was as good or better than KL. KL was also a pretty clear one and done. But he didn’t treat UCLA as a pit stop. He initially felt a bit constrained in the way CBH used him, and he (and his dad) voiced some displeasure, but in the end, he bought into the program and did what was best for the team. He thought he wasn’t being used like he should have been, and that we should’ve dumped the ball into low post more often, but for the most part he worked within the system. And what happened? He grew to appreciate CBH. He became a better defender. He became a team player. He developed.

Now take a look at JH. He wasn’t happy with the way he was used and I suppose you can say he bought into the system to some extent, but not entirely. He became frustrated and didn’t seem committed to learning defense. He seemed apathetic because he wasn’t putting up the numbers he used to put up on high school (a lot of that had to do with his poor shooting). He went up against better players, struggled, and promptly went on to blame UCLA. When he entered the draft, he took the selfish route and continued to point to system for his lackluster performance, even though it has been proven that if you buy into CBH’s system, you and the team will go far.

That’s the difference between KL and JH. One was willing to buy into a team’s style of play and he flourished. NBA teams saw this and liked it. The other was focused on himself, and was quick to point his finger for his shortcomings. NBA teams saw this and that’s why he fell out of the lottery.

So does JH deserve some hard words? I think so. He was selfish and promoted himself at the expense of our program. Do the comments go too far? I guess that’s up to the reader. I personally feel bad for him sometimes because he’s a kid. But at the same time he’s deserving of the criticism.

I think if Jrue had known he wasn’t going to get that lottery pick the fake gurus kept predicting for him, that he was going to fall to 17, to a place he didn’t even deign to visit, then he would have been back to Westwood for his sophomore year. Most of the “experts” had him going in the top ten, some in the top five. Wrong, wrong, and wrong. It’s hard to blame him. I made a lot of dumb decisions when I was 19, but none of them made me rich.

The sort of people that would spend the time to send hate emails to this site’s moderators are the sort of people whose opinions and input neither I nor this site need. Moreover, anyone that would refer to a fellow bruin as any derivative of trojan obviously doesn’t have the same sense of family and community that most of us have come to love about this site. If a friend of these people decides to believe his/her criticism of BN then they are obviously not making fact-based decisions, and once again there is no need for their presence either.

Differences of opinion are crucial for this site to thrive and create passionate debate. Yet, so too is respect for others opinions and the ability to debate use facts and logic rather than slurs and trolling. I may not have felt as much satisfaction in Jrue’s slipping out of the draft as Nestor did, but i respect the fact that his opinion was based on quotations directly from Jrue and his people. Many times I have seen Nestor and many others disagree strongly with the opinions of posters and yet be able to have a courteous while lively (and almost always fact-based) debate. If it weren’t for the passion most of us have for all things Bruin this site would not have lasted and grown.

If you need to feel like your opinion is always right and not be challenged talk with your dog. If you want to be challenged to back up your assertions with sound logic and facts this is the place.

is the active attempts to downgrade the importance of Jrue getting drafted in the first place. Despite his average performance he made it to the league. Like it or not, he is one of the 6 first round Bruin draftees in the last 5 years. That means something to our program and should instill at least some pride among Bruin alumni/fans.

Clearly he didn’t play very consistently (or very well overall) but I don’t think his words really deningrated the program or CBH to the extent some think, which I believe had a negligble effect overall. The traditional media and college basketball followers have held the same opinion of Howland’s offense since his Pitt days. Fine. Whatever. Three straight final fours and having a program on the brink of an elusive title and I could give two shits about what the media or other fans say. We don’t need our success to be substantiated by espn talking heads. We know they spew (mostly) worthless “analysis” and overspeculate on material. They are not the source of UCLA basketball’s dominant tradition.

Lastly, Jrue adulated DC for being a player that has meant alot to our recent success. He claimed he played out of position. He said some naive things, he said some things with poise and class. All of this media ring a round the rosey during pre draft workouts is commonplace and means little in the end game regarding the success of our program. We are not narcissistic dookies that need to be jocked all over espn. Our program is at the top, and it will remain there under Howland even with the “negative” coverage Jrue has put on our school and our coach.

The draft on Thursday was a great day for Bruin fans, in part because of Jrue. DC will always mean more to us, and his success in the league would be most satisfying. Jrue’s pre draft media coverage will never take away from DC’s phenomenal accomplishments at UCLA.

On a semi-unrelated note, my last days as a UCLA student several weeks ago couldn’t have ended any better. Graduated with DC from the History department (he was lounging in the last row of students) with CBH looking on. As we were filling in to sit down, coach was standing behind the roped off area (probably waiting for DC). I said thanks for the last four years and he replied, “This is about you guys today. Congratulations on a tremendous accomplishment.” I’ll never forget it.

GO BRUINS