[LOOKAYANNER]

I agree with most of your post praising Mays.  He was the best coach our area has seen with regards to leadership, culture, and legitimate contacts to help kids play in college.  He exposed the other area coaches for being what they are for the most part, lazy gym teachers who are picking up an extra check.  He brought in big time teams to play in our area and even hosted an NCAA sanctioned recruiting event where ALL area teams were invited to play in front of big time college coaches.  Look at the success of Zander Carter.  He’s a sophomore with D-1 offers already.  He would not have had those offers had he stayed at Greenup.  He has them now, though, because he chose to come to Ashland to play under Mays, go through his practices, play with better players, and learn from his culture.  Carter is a different player for having come to play for Mays.

You are wrong, however, that there weren’t some questionable things going on.  The boy from Cabell Midland didn’t even graduate at Ashland but rather moved back as soon as the season was over.  There would also be many question how a 6-10 player goes from the Sudan to Bath County to Ashland, even though that player displays no discernible basketball ability.  Obviously, Mays had talks with Bell, Deboard, and Spurlock as he revealed in the call.  You say 4 transfers in 4 years, but there have been many more than 4.  You’ve seen the 4 that have been on the floor in varsity games.  Ashland has gotten a few other younger transfers, though, mostly from Boyd, in the past few seasons.  Mays messed up by not leaving the recruiting to parents and henchmen as other schools do.  That’s all.

Some small town high school hoop dreams might be fulfilled for some county kids now, but the area is worse off for losing Jason Mays.

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I will add…Randall Anderson is about to be crucified this season if he does not win the region after his parents have removed the main obstacle.

My main emphasis in my post was to point out that 16regionballer’s comments that Mays was “not a good coach” are outrageous and self-serving comments. The guy can coach and works twice as hard as most coaches. He is organized and knows how to develop kids. His in-game decisions and changes and adjustments with defensive  and offensive strategies are top notch. Not every coach can do that. He sees developments during games and reacts quickly. There are some of these posters who have a personal issue with Mays, probably a relative not playing or whatever, and so they come up with goofy and outrageously biased opinions of his coaching. My guess is there are few who agree with him about Mays’ coaching skills. I’ve seen quite a few coaches over the years be loaded with talent and still can’t win. Jason knows how to mold teams into winners and he does it by making them go the extra mile in practice, a strong conditioning program, and promoting confidence in all his players. The fellow knows basketball in and out. He spent 7 years at Georgetown College, 3 at Valdosta State in Georgia and was coach at Kentucky Wesleyan. His proof is in his success at Ashland and his players successes, particularly the ones able to secure a college scholarship to play beyond high school. For anyone to say Coach Mays “isn’t a good coach and doesn’t develop players” is totally ludicrous and makes the person look basketball ignorant and shows they are not saying it for legitimacy but because they simply personally don’t like the coach. That statement has no basis in evidence.