Frank Martin's return leaves USC athletic department with egg on its face

Frank Martin is coming back for his 10th year as South Carolina men's basketball head coach. The news comes after two weeks of conflicting reports.

LINK: Beamer hire has more questions

LINK: Gamecock coaching staff young, unproven

Martin is coming off the worst season under his leadership, going 6-15 and marred by arguably the worst defense of the era. 

The bad year can be attributed to COVID 19, which Martin contracted twice, and the start-stop-start protocoals in place. Martin has earned one more year.

Historically, Martin is one of the best coaches to march the sidelines. He is third in all-time wins with 153 (behind Frank Johnson and all-time wins leader Frank McGuire). He was also the third longest tenured coach in school history, again behind Johnson and McGuire. 

Under Martin, this has been one of the best eras for Gamecock basketball. You could argue the Eddie Fogler era, with a pair of NCAA tournament appearances and a regular season conference title, or the Dave Odom era,  with one NCAA appearance and two NIT titles, were equally good, if not better. 

But even those two come with their detractions. 

But the history of Gamecock basketball, especially the last 40 years, is not sterling. Since McGuire's retirement, South Carolina has made five NCAA tournament appearances and won two regular season conferene titles. They have zero SEC tournament titles and just nine 20-win seasons, with a majority of those 20-win seasons (4) coming under Odom.

Overall, the Martin era is best known as one great year surrounded by missed opportunity and bad luck. The biggest missed opportunity being not capitlizing on recruiting efforts after the Final Four run. If you want one crippling indictment of Martin, that is it.

By all account, his players stay out of trouble, with the exception of one, conduct themselves well and Martin himself has garnered many awards for being an ambassador for the game, most recenlty from the National Association of Basketball Coaches.

To be clear, recruiting in-state talent wasn't exclusively a problem for Martin. Historcally, both Carolina and Clemson have had issues getting the best in-state players to say in state.

Unfortunately, it doesn't appear Martin is returning on the merit of what he has done. Rather, it cost too much to let him go.

The Charleston Post and Courier put out a solid behind the scenes recount. Check it out.

LINK: Martin's returns highlight backstage politics

LINK: Michigan State-Rocket Mortgage deal sign of things to come

Financially, the athletic department is already on the hook for the expensive buyout of former football coach Will Muschamp. Martin was due a $6.5 million buyout, meaning the Carolina administration will have paid out close to $19.4 million.

According to reports, Martin was 50-50 on returning, but the board of trustees raised concerns about having another coach’s buyout to pay.

This recent news paired with the poor contract extension Tanner gave Muschamp two years in, gives the perception the AD is in over his head, and is in a job that, frankly, he was never qualified for in the first place.

The calamity has also seemingly increased since president Bob Caslen has come on board, from the fact he was unqualified from the start, according to the school’s own job description it put out, the political circus that went along with his hiring and now this.

Add in the recent news of sexual abuse on the campus, and the school’s perceived siding with the abusers, and it has been poor decisions and one public relation misstep after the other. 

The escapade revealed not only an administration that apparently can’t get its act together, namely athletic director Ray Tanner, university president Bob Caslen and an ever-meddlesome board of trustees. 

Certain media outlets were also guilty of irresponsible reporting. 

SportsTalk SC was the first to come out with an anonymous source that Martin was set to not return two weeks ago, but reversed course. This reverse came with a slight acknowledgement that Phil Kornblut’s site got it wrong initially.

In today’s landscape, you can get recruiting wrong, it is in essence a guessing game to begin with. One thing you cannot get wrong is the employment status of people. 

In fairness, until political figures voiced concern, it appeared Martin was  gone. That of course opens another can of worms to tackle, namely the role political interference has plagued the university.

No question, anonymous sources play a role in finding information, I used them myself from time to time.

But with the exception of rare circumstances, or usually in reporting on government activities, running a story based solely on anonymous sources is a bad idea. There is no issue in getting information to point you in the right direction, but that information has to be verified later by an authoritative source, on the record. 

This would be, maybe not an acceptable mistake, but understandable for someone just fresh in the business trying to hook a big story and make a name for themselves. Kornblut has been doing this for a long time, and he and his media entity should know better, but the last few years indicate the contrary. 

Irresponsible, hackneyed “journalism" aside, this issue leaves the university and its leadership with another black eye over the last two years.

This next season will likely be a lame duck year for Martin, and I'm not sure short of another Final Four run if he isn't fired this time next year. 

It is clear where the issues are, and it isn't solely with the head basketball coach.