HAS UCLA'S MIKE MAYNARD LOST HIS MIND?

Jack Hoyt was my coach for three years.

I understand UCLA alum/current athletes are angry at the hiring of Jack Hoyt and everyone is concerned about only one thing. The vault. Yes, UCLA is historically one of the best vaulting programs in the United States. From what I have been told, do not quote me, Anthony Curran will be sticking around to volunteer coach solely the vault. Jack Will be the coach of the Multi's and jumps which is where Curran currently lacks ability to produce.

Jacks resume includes coaching three multi athletes to the olympic trials. One of which will be competing in the Olympic games for her second time. He coached Chris Randolf to two NCAA division two decathlon titles. In both those years he would have won the Division One titles with his score. Obviously Jack knows how to coach Multi athletes.

Furthermore he will be bringing with him Sharon day and Corbin Duer, which gives current UCLA athletes elite level training partners which will only benefit the the team more.

As for the vault, Jack oversaw two Cal Poly pole vaulters jump 5.40m (17-8) and 5.35m (17-6) this season. One advancing to the NCAA Div I meet in Iowa.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vY7sVhbvt7Y

So before everyone calls him a "know nothing" give him a chance. If the UCLA director sees him fit then he must not be an idiot. At the end of the day you want a program strong in many areas not only the vault. Because at conference you can only score so many points with vaulters.

You can read Jack Hoyt's Bio on the gopoly website here:

http://www.gopoly.com/sports/track/coaches

guess there is no such thing as loyalty anymore..

people talk about how he was just a good vault coach and they were risking it having a vault guy over all the jumps. I like how people think it is ok to have someone that knows nothing about the most dangerous event coach it, but a vault coach should not coach the long jump. But according to recent results, the UCLA jumpers were not too bad, having a freshman girl long jump close to 21' , a freshman triple jump 42', and a sophomore over 5'11 in high jump.

Maynard knows what he is doing. It's been no secret that the UCLA program has been in a slump the past ten years. The staff needs revitalization because the top notch recruits HS recruits continue to attend.

Curran is not leaving. His position has been reorganized. He is an asset to the UCLA program. He has two other jobs - making surfing films and cutting music CD's. He is going to stay with the team as a volunteer. it's cool.

Curran took on the jumps events but that was simply not right. Athletes and alums were putting pressure on UCLA to find a true jumps coach. The writing was on the wall.

Hoyt is neither a no name nor is he mediocre... Just call Harry Marra, Dan O'Brian, Frank Zarnowski, Ashton Eaton, Briann Theisen, or Kevin Reid... They are in the know (not you) and they will explain what a coup Hiring Jack Hoyt is for UCLA's revitalization plan. UCLA doesn't give a rip about PAC 12 points BTW, they are focused on a national title.

Sharon Day was coached by Sheldon Blockberger at Cal Poly before Blockberger took the Arizona job and Hoyt took the Cal Poly job. Sharon Day broke her foot but Hoyt trained her through a year of rehab and soccer and she made the 2008 Olympic team as she graduated college. She is only 5' 8" and she jumped 6' 4". Hoyt then taught her 6 new events from scratch - events Day had not done in high school or college - and she has been ranked number 1 in the US in the heptathlon and made the Olympic team in a brand new event in 4 years' time. COACHES notice.

Blockberger has had seven national titles in the high jump and decathlon during that time. That looks dang good on paper! But he didn't even try to get Sharon Day into the heptathlon, nor did he try to get a hep/dec program going at Cal Poly. Hoyt did that. Sharon Day's little sister Jasmin Day went to Arizona for high jump, got injured and that was the end of that. Ask Sharon and Jasmin which coach they would recommend.

Blockberger coached Jake Arnold in the decathlon to a national title. Hoyt coached Chris Randolph to a national title in Div II with virtually the same score. But Randolph came in to college as a walk on with only experience in the high jump and 400 meters - not a blue chip. And his Div II college in Seattle had no track and crummy training weather.

Hoyt also recruited Jessica Pixler to Seattle Pacific just as he left the program for Cal Poly.

This year Hoyt coached two vaulters to almost 18 feet. He coached Aris Borjas to the Olympic Trials in the Javelin. Cal Poly is a distance program so he gets about 1.75 scholarships to work with for hep, dec, high jump, pole vault, shot, discus, Jav, hammer, men's and women's. He is still the coach whose athletes score strong at conference - many of them walk ons- and go to nationals. He may not be getting full ride athletes to pad his resume with national titles, but coaches in the know give him full respect.

20 bucks says that JP.CP.PV is Jon Prader from Cal Poly. Dude can't even come up with a good nickname. WHADDUP WITH THAT?!

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Bear minded wrote:

Cal Poly is a distance program so he gets about 1.75 scholarships to work with for hep, dec, high jump, pole vault, shot, discus, Jav, hammer, men's and women's.

You make it sound like Cal Poly gives money to it's distance program. You sir, you're good.

I think Hoyt will do a good job of recruiting at UCLA. When he was in Seattle he recruited a ton of athletes from my HS (it was a Christian school, same demographic as SPU) and as far as I ever heard they all had really positive experiences at SPU. Athletes who train with him usually like him.

It sucks that Anthony got the boot. If he left, I would not blame him one bit. If he does stick around as volunteer, that's a great situation for the vaulters. They will be getting really solid general training from Jack, and if Anthony can't make it to a practice or a meet for some reason, they have a competent backup in Jack.

Why would I need to come up with a good nickname? I'm proud to say I'm a vaulter and know Jack Hoyt. Due to the fact everyone was in the dark whether or not Curran would stay on board as an assistant coach I shed some light on the subject. But you "loose butthole" do have a good nickname.

JP.CP.PV wrote:

Why would I need to come up with a good nickname? I'm proud to say I'm a vaulter and know Jack Hoyt. Due to the fact everyone was in the dark whether or not Curran would stay on board as an assistant coach I shed some light on the subject. But you "loose butthole" do have a good nickname.

+ 1

Just keep in mind that there are a lot of very good quality coaches out there that have not had NCAA national champions. Do a great job of identifying and developing talent. Coach Hoyt will do a fine job at UCLA.

Obviously you have never been coached from Curran (both pole vault and jumps) so making any points about him not being feasible as a jumps coach is complete and utter bullcrap. The man was at UCLA for 28 years, worked with the best in the business such as John Smith and Art Venegas and has an extensive knowledge of jumping technique in all aspects. ALL OF THE ATHLETES PR'd the year Curran became head jumps coach. Before there was some other schmuck who just couldn't cut it. Plus they didn't have any mind-blowing jumper recruits so he took an ordinary athlete and made them score in almost any meet.

This new guy will come in, probably get a ton of new super duper recruits from Europe who jumped 57 feet in the triple and won't improve over the course of 4-5 years they are at UCLA but will dwindle between 51-54 feet and still be considered "good".

vaultpurple wrote:

guess there is no such thing as loyalty anymore..

people talk about how he was just a good vault coach and they were risking it having a vault guy over all the jumps. I like how people think it is ok to have someone that knows nothing about the most dangerous event coach it, but a vault coach should not coach the long jump. But according to recent results, the UCLA jumpers were not too bad, having a freshman girl long jump close to 21' , a freshman triple jump 42', and a sophomore over 5'11 in high jump.

It cracks me up how "informed" people are. All it takes is for someone to hangout at a local track meet to see who coaches what. Someone else mentioned it in another post, that anyone who went to a track meet could have seen that the volunteer's handled the jumps other than PV (ie LJ, TJ, and some cases HJ). Curran did however coach the women's HJ mentioned in this post and has done a great job with the soph.

It is my understanding that the two freshman female jumpers, the 21' LJ and the 42' TJ, were both coached by vol coach Jonathan Clark, the post-collegiate TJ from UCLA who is still training there (he's being coached by the men's multi/jumps vol coach Rob Jarvis).

That being said, there is no denying that Curran is a great PV coach. His development of men and women is second to none. There is no argument that numerous athletes have made it to Pac-10's and NCAA's, but to the Bruin track faithful that's not what wins NCAA championships; the sprints do like under Bush.

But that is not the issue here; the issue is that Maynard needs a jumps coach...not a PV guy with volunteers filling in the gaps. He had to obviously make a difficult decision.

Let me pose a question to you and the other people up in arms about the decision: how many jumpers (LJ, TJ, or HJ) have scored at NCAA's in the past 10 years? How many have even QUALIFIED for the meet?

Unfortuantely, a coach can't really prove himself as a coach until he gets to display himself with Blue chip talents.

Now if he implodes the program then the outrage is justified

However if he throws a top TJ/LJ into the top 3 of NCAAs the move will look justified as getting 6 or more points twice is better than 10 points once.

You're right, Curran never coached me because I'm not a jumper. But you have no idea what you are talking about. I was a member of the team before and after Curran took over and he farmed out most of his other jumps work to volunteer coaches during that time.

This is not supposed to be an attack on Curran. I like him. But I don't think he was the right person for the job and I think replacing him was the right call especially if he was willing to return to only coaching the vault.

Recruits go to UCLA for being part of history and to be coached by the best in the nation if not the world. Getting rid of Coach Curran is a final distruction of the UCLA legacy that was built up. He is the last of the wise men to get kicked out (so kind of them to offer a volunteer position...).

Yes, I agree that it was a bit much him to do both tasks. He did them extremely well but probably should have stayed as just a Pole Vault coach. Getting rid of him completely for God knows what reason (could it be that UCLA is paying their football coaches to lose so much the problem?) is the real issue and is a slap to his face not only as a Coach but as a Bruin. Best of luck to this new UCLA greenhorn coming in. Hope he gets the best recruits he can and get some points.

Recruits go to UCLA for being part of history and to be coached by the best in the nation if not the world. Getting rid of Coach Curran is a final distruction of the UCLA legacy that was built up. He is the last of the wise men to get kicked out (so kind of them to offer a volunteer position...).

Yes, I agree that it was a bit much him to do both tasks. He did them extremely well but probably should have stayed as just a Pole Vault coach. Getting rid of him completely for God knows what reason (could it be that UCLA is paying their football coaches to lose so much the problem?) is the real issue and is a slap to his face not only as a Coach but as a Bruin. Best of luck to this new UCLA greenhorn coming in. Hope he gets the best recruits he can and get some points.

Watching Coach Curran and his vaulters at meets all these years you see he not only loves coaching but he is above and beyond one of the most positive, disciplined, motivating, articulate and decent coaches out there. He is hugely respected, has a deep reservoir of energy and his athletes shine. And he goes out of his way to encourage athletes in the other events.

What a shock for the program that was on its way back to prominence. Anyone can understand removing a negative individual/influence but to gut a healthy and thriving force is bewildering.

There are 21 events outdoors. 21 opportunities to score. How can any rational person think it is a good idea to have one of your six full-time coaches coaching only one event?BTW, most recruits don't know jack about the history of the program they sign with. UCLA hasn't been relevant since John Smith left. Get over yourself. A true Bruin fan would be rooting like hell for the new guy to be successful.

Great job jumping 18' 7" Jon! So impressive!

Has Curran ever won any Regional Assistant Coach of the Year awards? If not, then it is not the greatest around. Good but narrow, and maybe not effective in recruiting except for vaulters. Who knows all of the pieces that went in to the decision.