According to a report from ESPN, soon-to-be FOX Sports radio personality and serial deleter of bad tweets Doug Gottlieb got the call from Oklahoma State to interview for the school’s men’s basketball head coach opening.
Gottlieb, a former player for the Cowboys (he played there after he was kicked out of Notre Dame for stealing a teammate’s credit card), has zero head coaching experience—since graduating, he’s held positions at CBS and ESPN as a radio personality, analyst, and commentator. It was announced this week that he accepted a job at FOX Sports and is set to start in late April.
Brad Underwood, who replaced Travis Ford as Oklahoma State head coach this season, took the program back to the NCAA tournament after a one-year hiatus from postseason play. Less than a week after the team’s opening-round loss, Underwood bolted for the coaching vacancy at Illinois, ending his Oklahoma State career after just one season in Stillwater. The former Stephen F. Austin coach seemed to have a fine relationship with his administration; the fact he left for an Illinois program that hasn’t gone dancing in four years indicates this wasn’t some Lane Kiffin, career-ladder shit. The Illini simply offered to triple his salary, and Underwood happily penned a six-year, $18 million deal.
The Cowboys have also arranged to interview former assistant coach James Dickey as well as three current assistant coaches in Danny Henderson, Mike Boynton, and Lamont Evans, per The Oklahoman. Gottlieb, who was ignored when he tried to throw his name in the hat last year, joins that group because “athletic director Mike Holder is intrigued by the idea of Gottlieb and his potential,” according to ESPN.
The move on the part of Oklahoma State to even interview Gottlieb is baffling, to say the least—school administrations generally hate drawing out the hiring process, especially when they have to go through it two offseasons in a row.
It’s hard to imagine Gottlieb getting the job over the other, vastly more qualified candidates, but maybe Holder is playing the long game here. Perhaps he’s looking for a coach that will never have a reason to bolt the program, because no other school in a power conference would be dumb enough to hand him a job.
[ESPN]