Former Duke Assistant A.D. will land on his feet
In a bit of downer news, St. John’s and Mike Cragg have agreed to part ways. Cragg, who cut his teeth in athletic administration at Duke, is a good guy and someone we like and respect.
Having said that, we never saw the fit at St. John’s. He’s a West Coast guy by birth and spent a significant amount of time in Durham.
He got to St. John’s just in time for Covid though and Mike Anderson, his first hire as basketball coach, didn't work out. And at St. John’s, much like Duke, basketball is the primary focus. There are suggestions of a power struggle between Cragg and Rick Pitino. We don’t know about that.
What we do know is Cragg is a good man with a great skill set and he’ll find another position, assuming he wants to stay in the field.
By the way, Pitino, now 71, apparently wants his son Richard to succeed him at St. John’s. That’s not a great idea.
The younger Pitino has been a good but hardly great coach so far. Succeeding a legend is a very difficult thing to do, even if he’s a short-term hire, which Pitino inevitably will be. Father-son handoffs generally don’t work. You can ask Pat Knight and several other coaches about that. Genius is rare. The elder Pitino has it; there’s no sign yet that Richard does. Best to let him build his own reputation out West and out of his father’s shadow.
