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Odds and Ends

By Brian Barbour
  • T.J. Yates will have shoulder surgery next week to repair damage to the joint. Butch Davis says he expects Yates to be back at 100% for next season. The real question is will he be 100% for spring practice. Mike Paulus is waiting in the wings and would probably want to get his career as a starter going sooner rather than later. This should set up a spirited competition between Yates and Paulus in the spring if Yates is ready. If not and Paulus impresses, Yates could have an uphill climb in the fall. Regardless of that, here is hoping Yates heals up quickly.
  • Butch Davis has said he is not interested in the Arkansas job and sort of implied he would not listen offers from anyone else. According to ACC Now, when asked if by saying, "There is no interest in the University of Arkansas coaching job" he also meant he would not listen to other offers Davis said, "Absolutely. You got it. Exactly what you said. Exactly." Let me just say I find these answers interesting in that they are still somewhat guarded. Why not say "I am not interested..." instead of "There is no interest..." or when asked it means he will not listen to another school he basically agreed with the content of the question instead of saying something overtly committed using the first person. It is as though he is so steeped in giving vauge and non-commital answers that he is wholly incapable of giving a straight answer. It is odd because there is no reason to be guarded about his status in this current coaching search cycle and no one in their right mind is going to dredge these quotes up next year and think they still carry weight. And not that I think he is leaving or hedging his bets, I think the extension answered that question but it still strikes me as strange.
  • The Big Lead interviewed Rob Daniels at the News and Record about covering ACC basketball in the area. Daniels basically said the UNC beat was stressful but still fun and he also essentially called Roy and K the same in terms of media relationships:

    • Roy Williams doesn’t like us any more than Mike Krzyzewski does; it’s just that Roy speaks with an Asheville accent that the fawning TV, radio and self-appointed pseudo journalists who hang around the place decide they must find endearing. (Case in point: K endorses AmEx and he’s evil for it; Roy endorses Coke and it’s perceived as cute.)

    • First of all, I do not doubt the access issue. Roy does not like his own radio show, expresses disdain for email and the internet in general and I can imagine holds folks off. That being said I still(with bias) think Roy relates to the media more than K does but some of that might have to do with his being at a public university which seems to demand some level of exposure. However, I will take issue with comparing the commercial ventures because Daniels made it sound like K did one commercial and got villified for it and when Roy did his everyone thought it was cute. That is a bit disingenuous on Daniels' part because K did more than just the AMEX commercial. He also did Chevy ads and has been doing them for awhile. The second aspect to that is the K commercials were seen at almost every timeout during the NCAA Tournament in 2006 or so it seemed. I think I can count on one hand the number of times I saw Roy's Coke ad. I think the content of the commercials also make Roy's more likable since he was talking about his mother working to make extra money for him where K's commercial doubles as a plug for his business leadership seminar. Hearing him talk about how he prepares his players for life and what not comes off as arrogant where Roy talking about Mama resounds with those of us who still call their mothers "Mama"
    • Inside Carolina has some early renderings of the Kenan expansion project which is most likely part of the package to keep Butch Davis happy.

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