Today is a Good Day- There Will Be No Need for My AK

I was actually going to write about something other than basketball today, but it seems, “EVERY TIME I THINK I’M OUT THEY KEEP PULLING ME BACK IN.”

Turns out Jim Boylen didn’t force all the old players to leave.

In a nice little piece about Jason Washburn in the Deseret News we got the little nugget,

"“Washburn also strongly dismisses rumors that Boylen told his players that they should transfer from Utah.“Coach Boylen never asked us to leave,” he said. “I heard those rumors too. Nope, guys left because they wanted to for their own reasons. Personally I don’t hold any grudges. They did what they thought was best. Me and coach Boylen were very close. But he never said anything like that to me.”"

So as I’ve said repeatedly and has been said elsewhere, the story that Jim Boylen told everyone to leave is a lie, a flat out lie.  And now we have conformation of that from a player.

So what happens now?

My guess is nothing.  The beauty of a lie is, if you repeat it enough it becomes believed and no amount of factual evidence can disprove that.  Now I don’t know where the lie started but judging by who was putting it out there the best guess is Chris Hill’s office.  Not to mention Larry was quite a co-conspirator in it all the way he kept mentioning Boylen in the off season.

Combine this with the absolute falsehoods that Utah Assistants Demarlo Slocum and Andy Hill floated about Jiggy and there seems to be some troubling things going on here.  We have people in the athletic department and basketball program who aren’t just willing to play hardball but willing to leak things that can hurt people’s futures.  I don’t think any amount of winning can justify that.

I know if this turns around people will point at me and scream how Larry was the right choice and I’m an idiot blah blah blah…  But is this really what we want the University of Utah to be about?

Plus we have to deal with the other reality.  Larry willingly tanked Utah basketball with Chris Hill’s consent to give the illusion of growth.  Yeah, we’ll be better next year because we couldn’t actually be worse.  We as fans were treated to this display for reasons that still can’t be explained.

While I’m happy that Utah fans can’t spread lies about Jim Boylen now without knowing they are lying, what my hoops program and athletic department are willing to do to cover up for two decades of neglect, makes me sad.