Buddy system not all bad for UNLV

This time of year arrives and Buddy Gouldsmith takes a stroll across hot coals, a tradition becoming more and more hazardous with UNLV's latest losing baseball season.

What was an alarm clock sounding concern about the program's future two years ago is now a blare louder than those Phoenix church bells that got a bishop convicted of two misdemeanors.

Gouldsmith coached the final home game of his sixth season Saturday, and the odds of him being around for a seventh likely rival those of Manny Ramirez never again being drug tested by Major League Baseball.

Gouldsmith's record at UNLV (173-186) is in the neighborhood of dead-flat average. The Rebels are a matter of days from their fourth straight losing season, and they haven't had a 30-win season since 2005.

If the decision to change coaches is based solely on wins and losses, the meeting might take five minutes.

But if you consider other elements that should define nonrevenue sports at the Division I level, firing Gouldsmith shouldn't be a clear-cut conclusion.

At least for anyone with a brain.

Throw out football and men's basketball. They are different animals in the world of collegiate athletics and how programs should be fairly judged, because if you truly believe a nonrevenue sport such as baseball is only about what a record says, take a moment and get a grip.

"I promised myself this year I wouldn't think about my (job status)," Gouldsmith said after a 10-3 loss to Texas Christian at Wilson Stadium. "I was just going to work these guys the best we could and try to show progress.

"If I don't have a job here next year, I will have left doing it the way it should be done. One hundred percent."

His kids go to class, proven by one of the athletic department's highest Academic Progress Rates, the tool used by the NCAA to measure success or failure of teams in moving student-athletes toward graduation.

Twenty-five baseball players had at least a 3.0 grade-point average entering the fall semester. You don't read about them in police blotters. They represent the university and athletic department in a positive manner.

That stuff matters in any sport, but particularly in those under the nonrevenue umbrella.

Maybe the decision to fire Gouldsmith has been made. Many around town think so. Names of his possible replacement are widespread in local baseball circles, which I assume would excite some of the 400 or so who bother to show up for home games.

But such a choice would be based only on winning, and any UNLV administrator who would explain it otherwise would appear nothing short of a bumbling buffoon.

(Although the latter would allow for a wonderful column opportunity.)

Is achieving a balance between winning and taking care of business elsewhere important? Of course. UNLV hasn't gotten it done on the field under Gouldsmith.

It should be much further along in a sixth season than having beaten just four teams with winning records and owning eight victories against two opponents (Maine and St. Peter's) that might struggle to finish second in the Sunset Region.

There isn't a coach alive who couldn't list for you injuries and top prep and junior college recruits who chose to turn professional as reasons for substandard results. That's the college game. Everyone has those issues.

It's true Gouldsmith won his first two seasons (a combined 72-53 record with consecutive NCAA regional appearances) with players of former Rebels coach and now TCU boss Jim Schlossnagle. But it's also true Gouldsmith recruited many of those players.

"I guess that means if someone else is coaching here and wins next year, he'll be doing it with my players," said Gouldsmith, who has been working on a one-year contract.

This shouldn't be as easy a decision as everyone wants to believe. Maybe it has been made. Maybe he's gone following the Mountain West Conference Tournament. Maybe his successor has been identified. Maybe all the whispers are true.

Maybe whoever the next coach might be should realize this: You might be following a guy who didn't win enough games to keep his job, but you'll be hard-pressed to match Gouldsmith everywhere else.

"He's a good coach who knows the game," senior pitcher Marc Baca said. "We've had ups and downs every year, but the experience overall playing for him has been great. I wouldn't trade it. He is always on us about education coming first, always telling us that to play for him, it has to be that way.

"I'd like to see him have the chance to continue here. Everyone wants to win, but we're going to look back and be very grateful for the kind of people he made us."

That stuff matters, particularly in a nonrevenue sport.

At least to those with a shred of common sense.

Las Vegas Review-Journal sports columnist Ed Graney can be reached at 702-383-4618 or egraney@reviewjournal.com.