by Alex Abrams
Longtime Track Assistant Parts Ways With Hogs
Posted on 09 July 2009
Turns out, there’s more Arkansas news to report, this time involving the men’s track and field team.
Dick Booth, Arkansas’ longtime field events coach, will end his run with the Razorbacks and not return for another season. Judging by the statements in a press release sent out a few minutes ago, Booth’s departure comes as a result of Arkansas coach Chris Bucknam’s decision to shake up his coaching staff.
Coincidentally, Arkansas’ track athletes lobbied for Booth to be hired last summer as John McDonnell’s replacement before Bucknam was hired away from Northern Iowa.
“I recognize the head coach of any program has the right and ability to shape his coaching staff as he feels is appropriate,” Booth said in a statement released through the university. “In this instance, coach Bucknam felt like a change on the staff was the direction he wanted to move.
“I have been blessed to be a coach in the Razorback program for 27 seasons. In that time, I have had the privilege of working with hundreds of Razorback student-athletes whose hard work and commitment resulted in extraordinary team and individual success. I am proud to have been a part of the great tradition of Razorback track and field.”
Booth spent 26 years as an assistant under McDonnell from 1978-84 and 1988-2008, helping turn Arkansas into a track powerhouse. Bucknam retained Booth when he was hired, and in their one season together, they won both an SEC indoor and outdoor title.
“When I first was hired at Arkansas and was assembling my staff, Dick and I talked about his future with Razorback track and field,” Bucknam said in a statement. “We decided that as we moved forward we would evaluate if our coaching philosophies and approaches were a good fit for each other and our transitioning program.
”Following the season, as I considered the continued evolvement of the program, I decided this would be an appropriate time to move in a different direction within our coaching staff.”
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July 9th, 2009 at 10:57 pm
You have to begin to wonder if the word loyalty exist anymore and if it does, is it a word to be used in the same breath as “Razorbacks?” How do you take a man who has given you 27 years of his life, pass him over for a head job that is rightfully his and then fire him after one year, in the middle of July?
In todays or any days economy, do you really wait until the middle of July when everyone has found jobs, to fire someone? Yes, if they were derilict in their duties, poor in character or simply not performing. Yet, here we have Dick Booth who, without him we would have not won either the indoor or outdoor SEC titles, a man who could have been bitter about not being given the chance to lead the program he gave 26 years of his life to, and he is simply swept out the door.
You have to ask yourself what is really going on inside the track program at the University of Arkansas? Is this what we have come to? Are we teaching the athletes that if we do not feel comfortable with you, we will simply replace you? Because, if they can so easily get rid of a man who has in the past and currently, given his all for us what is to stop us from getting rid of you as an athlete whom we hardly know?
If I was a coach recruiting against us I would repeatly use this as a weapon against us. I would remind every athlete I recruit that Arkansas recruits about how they treated a man, a coach who had devoted his life to them! It speaks volumes about the Athletic Director, the head coach and everyone involved in Arkansas athletics that allowed this to take place. It is hard for me to imagine that former Arkansas Track athletes who knew and respected Dick Booth would not be ashamed at the way he was treated by the so called razorback track office. Maybe that is the way things are done in Northern Iowa, I hope it is not a trend that is developed in Northwest Arkansas.
July 12th, 2009 at 6:02 pm
This is tragic for arkansas track and field and the legacy Coach Mac and Booth created. Everyone who supports Arkansa track should organize against this.
July 15th, 2009 at 11:28 pm
Bucky is NO John McDonnell or Dick Booth. He can’t even wash their jocks. The dynasty is over. The Razorbacks will now go back to where they were in the old Southwest Conference which is garbage. Bucky and Case are way over their heads and obviously do not know how to deal with the biggtime.
Texas A&M, Oregon, LSU and Florida are going to kick thier collective butts back to Iowa.
Long needs to have his head examined for this fiasco. I know of 400K that will not go to the university now because of this and OTHER screw-ups by Long. He’s an idiot and he hired an equal idiot to replace McDonnell.