Memphis has followed Calipari's lead to title game
This is madness
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It was not the kind of remark you'd have heard from coaches of the other Final Four teams. Those men have similar personas, and are all regarded as circumspect potentates. After all, UCLA, North Carolina and Kansas represent the game's aristocratic houses. By contrast, it seemed inevitable that Memphis would be cast as the interloper, and its coach, with some justification, as the hustler.
But now, with a week gone by, UCLA is gone. Same for North Carolina. But the hustler remains ascendant. He believes it's his time, and so do his players.
What's more, who can tell the hustler from the prophet? The nature of this game requires him to be both.
Consider Calipari a ward boss of the new age. In the past several days, he's turned his strolls on the Riverwalk into targets of opportunity for adoring fans and sympathetic journalists. But this is the same guy who had one of his assistants call my colleague, Jeff Goodman, telling him he was not welcome in Memphis. Goodman's crime: He had written about some of the Tigers' thuggish proclivities.
It was a legit story. Calipari — whose previous Final Four appearance was vacated after it was learned that his UMass star Marcus Camby was on an agent's payroll — should know that. Still, his response was the kind of move that diminishes the man.
Still, there's this: He can coach. Though most college coaches regard their "systems" as sacrosanct, Calipari is unburdened by dogma. The system he advocates isn't designed to maximize his glory so much as his players. In this case, the dribble-drive stratagem he's adapted is an advanced scheme for abundantly talented players with great basketball aptitude.
For all the talk of student-athletes, Calipari actually trusts his players to be students of the game.
"These guys feel unleashed," he said. "There's more freedom for them to make choices. You have to count on your team to be unselfish, you have to count on your team being able to make great decisions on the run. ... They never feel like they can't make a play."
Calipari's is not an unjustified faith. The Tigers — averaging almost 84 points in the tournament — have turned the ball over just 42 times in their five victories.
Finally, as shabby as Calipari's treatment of Goodman has been, I feel obliged to acknowledge a debt of gratitude to the coach. If nothing else, he's dispatched with the insufferable false modesty that emanates from the interview podiums. His team is 104-9 over the last three seasons. There's no need to soft pedal how good they are.
"This is what a dream team is," he says.
On the talented of his junior guard, Chris Douglas-Roberts: "Ridiculous."
On his freshman point guard, Derrick Rose: "He reminded me of Earl the Pearl. ... There are going to be people five years from now talking, 'Is he like a Derrick Rose?' This kid is a unique program changer, probably, in my opinion, at all levels."
Lastly, as it concerns Rose, consider this: "If he wants to do what's right for him and his family, he'll go pro. If he wants to do what's right for me and my family, he'll stay."
At this level, the line between amateur and professional is as obscure as the distinction between prophet and hustler. At least Calipari knows the game he's playing. A lot has been made lately of his relationship with William Wesley, a man best known as "Worldwide Wes."
Worldwide's ostensible occupation is a mortgage broker. More to the point, though, he is an expert facilitator, cultivator and manager of relationships. Among Worldwide's relationships are those with Michael Jordan, LeBron James and Bill Clinton.
Calipari has called him "a goodwill ambassador to our program." Of course, such goodwill has helped Memphis acquire the services of players like Rose and, before that, Dajuan Wagner.
"He's my friend of 20 years," Calipari said Sunday afternoon. "This stuff on recruiting is about relationships. ... That's what recruiting is ... I have a lot of relationships. That's why I've been able to recruit pretty good players."
Here the hustler was talking. The hustler can chalk up his recruiting successes as a matter of people skills. Similarly, he can dismiss Joey Dorsey's penchant for brawling on Beale St. as a series of youthful "screwups."
"Joey is the first person in his family to graduate from high school," Calipari said.
I didn't know quite what to make of that. But it got me thinking: Who's really getting hustled?
Joey Dorsey stayed in school. Does that make him a hero or a sucker? And what of Derrick Rose? Should he stay, too, and play for Myles Brand and Dick Vitale?
The NCAA has a $6 billion deal to televise March Madness. The same dons who cut that deal have no problem pimping out their so-called student-athletes in dunking contests sponsored by Vegas.com. Of course, it's all done under the guise of amateur athletics.
So maybe Calipari is right. Maybe it's his time. Time to win one for the hustlers.
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