Been thinking more about this and talking with some of my ISU buddies about this. I think if I were to sum up the Muller regime in one thought it would be....."Loyalty over Character."
If you were to grade Muller on bringing players into the program who have high a combination of high character, team-first focus and relentless attitude to improve as a team he would probably get a grade of D (and that might be generous).
If you were to grade Muller on demonstrating loyalty to his players and assistant coaches he would probably get a grade of A.
The problem with this of course, is that if you are loyal to low-character/low-team-first mindset/low-improvement players and you are overly loyal assistant coaches who routinely leave your program (or are looking to leave), then that is not a winning combination for Illinois State University in my opinion.
Being loyal to players who break rules over and over and over and never demonstrate a team-first attitude or an ability to get other players to buy into a single goal of winning at the expense of everything else is not helpful for ISU.
And so when you combine the D and the A together, you get a C+, which is probably how I would grade Muller overall. And we have gotten C+ results. And for that to change we need Muller to change his mindset to being LOYAL TO THE HIGHEST CHARACTER EVERY DAY AND STOP BEING LOYAL JUST TO BE LOYAL.
If you were to grade Muller on bringing players into the program who have high a combination of high character, team-first focus and relentless attitude to improve as a team he would probably get a grade of D (and that might be generous).
If you were to grade Muller on demonstrating loyalty to his players and assistant coaches he would probably get a grade of A.
The problem with this of course, is that if you are loyal to low-character/low-team-first mindset/low-improvement players and you are overly loyal assistant coaches who routinely leave your program (or are looking to leave), then that is not a winning combination for Illinois State University in my opinion.
Being loyal to players who break rules over and over and over and never demonstrate a team-first attitude or an ability to get other players to buy into a single goal of winning at the expense of everything else is not helpful for ISU.
And so when you combine the D and the A together, you get a C+, which is probably how I would grade Muller overall. And we have gotten C+ results. And for that to change we need Muller to change his mindset to being LOYAL TO THE HIGHEST CHARACTER EVERY DAY AND STOP BEING LOYAL JUST TO BE LOYAL.