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Dewey Kalmer Retires

"Kalmer??™s 842 wins at Bradley represent exactly one-half of the 1,684 wins in the program??™s 108-year history and are 142 more than the 3-sport combined total of Bradley legend A.J. Robertson, who accumulated 700 victories as the baseball (244), men??™s basketball (312) and football (144) coach from 1920 to 1948."

Those are some pretty impressive numbers. Congrats to Dewey on a fine career and here's to a long and happy retirement at his new home.


 
I think baseball is a program that has a chance to get back to national prominence. We have an outstanding ballpark, good local talent and tradition. I am very interested to see who the coaching candidates are.
 
Lakeview Brave said:
I think baseball is a program that has a chance to get back to national prominence. We have an outstanding ballpark, good local talent and tradition. I am very interested to see who the coaching candidates are.
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We have virtually no local talent under Dewey. He a fine man and been a great role model and ambassador for BU...Congrats and best wishes. Lets hope the national search brings in some high calibur candidates and the next hire taps into some of the local talent
 
We do have a great ballpark but trying to get great baseball players to play in the conditions BU has to play in is very difficult because of the cold weather and if they go south or west they get to play so many more games; recruiting for baseball is harder then basketball because of the playing conditions.
 
real fan said:
We do have a great ballpark but trying to get great baseball players to play in the conditions BU has to play in is very difficult because of the cold weather and if they go south or west they get to play so many more games; recruiting for baseball is harder then basketball because of the playing conditions.
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Why is it then that almost every other Valley school, who all have very similar weather to Peoria, finish ahead of Bradley every year? Dewey is a nice guy, but he hasn't been a very good coach during the last 15 years. He's won a lot of games, but he's lost a whole bunch, too.

Besides men's basketball, and the occasional women's golf performance, BU's athletic department is really performing very poorly.
 
Disturbed said:
Why is it then that almost every other Valley school, who all have very similar weather to Peoria, finish ahead of Bradley every year? Dewey is a nice guy, but he hasn't been a very good coach during the last 15 years. He's won a lot of games, but he's lost a whole bunch, too.

Besides men's basketball, and the occasional women's golf performance, BU's athletic department is really performing very poorly.
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Dont forget about soccer they are the best the school has. Baseball should be a sport Bradley excells at hopefully with a new coach we will.
 
Disturbed said:
Why is it then that almost every other Valley school, who all have very similar weather to Peoria, finish ahead of Bradley every year? Dewey is a nice guy, but he hasn't been a very good coach during the last 15 years. He's won a lot of games, but he's lost a whole bunch, too.
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I agree 100%. Yes Bradley baseball plays in colder weather, but so does Creighton who has been to a college world series, UNI, who for just an example knocked this years team out of the MVC tourney. College baseball now has a uniform date for starting the season so the southern teams do not have quite the scheduling advantage as they have had in the past.

Regardless, Kalmer if you look at his numbers at BU, is if anything, average yes he won 842 but he lost 772, you do anything for 29 consecutive years you are going to put up big numbers. But you also do something for 29 consecutive years you should also produce a winner occasionally. When was the last time BU won or even finished top 3 in the conference, what is his overall record in the Valley tourney, my guess it is well below .500 and did BU baseball ever once go to a post season tournament while he was head coach?

He stayed in the job way to long. BU, and this is just my perception, never made him accountable for all the losing that the baseball program did, especially in the last 5 to 10 years. They are doing the same with Womans basketball, there is no way in the world that Buescher should still hold the head coaching job at Bradley, her numbers speak very loud about how poor of a head coach she is.
 
I don't like to see all this railing on Dewey. He's a great and classy guy. I recall hearing in an interview with him.... he wanted to coach - basketball or baseball. He chose baseball but also loves basketball. I think the laughing part of the interview was that his wife wanted him to be a basketball coach. I could be wrong about that - but I remember something funny in the interview surrounding him choosing baseball over basketball and his wife wanted him to be a basketball coach. Anyway - They go to all (or almost all) the games. They are permanent fixtures with Bradley. So he spent 29 years at Bradley and lost a lot of games. Yet he also won a lot of games. I am sure he touched a lot of people's lives in a very positive way that isn't reflected by W's and L's.

Thanks Dewey for everything you gave to the Bradley program! Enjoy retirement! And visit us often!
 
MacabreMob said:
I don't like to see all this railing on Dewey. He's a great and classy guy. I recall hearing in an interview with him.... he wanted to coach - basketball or baseball. He chose baseball but also loves basketball. I think the laughing part of the interview was that his wife wanted him to be a basketball coach. I could be wrong about that - but I remember something funny in the interview surrounding him choosing baseball over basketball and his wife wanted him to be a basketball coach. Anyway - They go to all (or almost all) the games. They are permanent fixtures with Bradley. So he spent 29 years at Bradley and lost a lot of games. Yet he also won a lot of games. I am sure he touched a lot of people's lives in a very positive way that isn't reflected by W's and L's.

Thanks Dewey for everything you gave to the Bradley program! Enjoy retirement! And visit us often!
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Thank God somebody had the brass ones to say this! BU's baseball facilities were absolute CRAP for most of the years Kalmer was at BU. If I recall, he reserrected (sp) an almost dead program when he came to the Hilltop and created some instant excitement with Dunne, Pucket and a few others (as well as a winning brand).

Sure the program fell into mediocrity but Kalmer did things the right way - The Bradley way- by running a clean and competitive program that produced good kids. He did it the "old school" Stowell way. He's a big reason the facilities are what they are today............and he will be missed.
 
Braves4Life said:
Thank God somebody had the brass ones to say this! BU's baseball facilities were absolute CRAP for most of the years Kalmer was at BU. If I recall, he reserrected (sp) an almost dead program when he came to the Hilltop and created some instant excitement with Dunne, Pucket and a few others (as well as a winning brand).

Sure the program fell into mediocrity but Kalmer did things the right way - The Bradley way- by running a clean and competitive program that produced good kids. He did it the "old school" Stowell way. He's a big reason the facilities are what they are today............and he will be missed.
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I dont know the man but being a nice or even great guy has nothing to do with how you coach. Should he not be held to a high standard because he is nice? I appreciate all he has done and his long time loyalty to BU. However as someone who wants Bradley to succeed in all things, I cant say Im sorry to see him leave, its long overdue. The "Bradley Way" should be clean program, good kids and winning on occassion. It seems we are happy with two out of three to often. Maybe we can switch to the "Creaighton Way"
 
I am sure all of us posters that support the Bradley programs and want them all to be highly successfull attend many home games for the Bradley Baseball team (and all the other sports besides just Mens hoops).
 
MacabreMob said:
I am sure all of us posters that support the Bradley programs and want them all to be highly successfull attend many home games for the Bradley Baseball team (and all the other sports besides just Mens hoops).
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Is attending home games a requirement for being a fan or wanting a team to be successful? If it is a lot of posters on this board wouldn??™t be fans of even the basketball team.

I want the speech team to be great, I want our engineering program to be the best in the country, I want our intramural men??™s volleyball team to win every match and I haven??™t seen a game of theirs in 9 years.
 
In full disclosure I played for Dewey in the early 90's, and wish him nothing but the best in his retirement. BU is a very unique place that obviously, all of us as either fans or alums hold very near to our heart, but I'm not sure most of you understand how hard it is to recruit baseball players to BU.

If any of you have talked to Dewey about recruiting, I'm sure you've heard the Private school vs. public school issue. Since baseball has roughly 12 scholarships to spread around a roster of close to 30 kids, no one gets a full ride. So BU offers a kid 1/2 a ride, the parents still have to come up with the difference. If ISU or SIU or UofI offers the same kid 1/2 a ride, the difference the parents have to come up with is pretty significant (Since I don't have any kids, I can't quote current tuition rates, but I'm sure the difference is still pretty significant.)

So recruit some smart kids that get academic money to make the difference? Logical solution, except we are talking about one of the stupidest rules the NCAA has, in which a student athlete's academic money is counted against the scholarship limits of the sport, even if the dollars don't actually come from the budget of the scholarship pool from the sport. (It's possible this rule has changed, but it was in effect in the early 90's, I know that for sure.)

I could go on and on and on about issues facing college baseball and BU in particular, but actually I've gotta get back to work. (Ok, it TRUE full disclosure, I have to get to the golf course) Frankly I've been disappointed in win-loss record over the last few years as well, but I know I'll never be disappointed in the student athletes and how they represent my university.
 
Lakeview Brave said:
I dont know the man but being a nice or even great guy has nothing to do with how you coach. Should he not be held to a high standard because he is nice? I appreciate all he has done and his long time loyalty to BU. However as someone who wants Bradley to succeed in all things, I cant say Im sorry to see him leave, its long overdue. The "Bradley Way" should be clean program, good kids and winning on occassion. It seems we are happy with two out of three to often. Maybe we can switch to the "Creaighton Way"
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Lakeview, I agree with everything you have stated on this thread. I think that BU baseball has the potential to be a very good program with the right coach. I know some former baseball players who think this as well.
 
Lakeview Brave said:
The "Bradley Way" should be clean program, good kids and winning on occassion. It seems we are happy with two out of three to often.
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From today's PJS:

"For the first time in seven years, Illinois State has captured the MVC all-sports trophy. ... Bradley finished 10th."
 
Lakeview Brave said:
Is attending home games a requirement for being a fan or wanting a team to be successful? If it is a lot of posters on this board wouldn??™t be fans of even the basketball team.

I want the speech team to be great, I want our engineering program to be the best in the country, I want our intramural men??™s volleyball team to win every match and I haven??™t seen a game of theirs in 9 years.
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You are right Lakeview.

I suppose my point is something like living in a community like let's say Chillicothe. You want it to look nice and be successful. But you don't spend a dollar at any the businesses except for an emergency 1/2 gallon of milk at Short Loin.

I am not accusing you of not "shopping at your local stores". I was just trying to make a statement about how it is easy to be a "lip-service" supporter.
 
Scouter said:
From today's PJS:

"For the first time in seven years, Illinois State has captured the MVC all-sports trophy. ... "
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Since the MVC release listed only the top 5 finishers, I can't find any other confirmation that BU finished 10th.
Anyway....this is unfortunately a bit misleading....

The reckoning of the winner of the All Sports trophy depends a ton on how many of the 18 sports each school competes in, and since most of the schools that are state schools have bigger athletic department budgets (thanks to the taxpayers), then it is a slam dunk that a couple of state schools are the only ones with a prayer of winning this title.

For example...either ISU, SIU, MSU, or Wichita have won every single All Sports Title for the past 13 years.
In fact, no private school has ever won it, due mostly to the fact that the smaller, private schools don't compete in as many sports.

ISU competes in 17 sports, MSU in 14, SIU in 16, WSU in 16, but BU in only 13.
BU did win the Men's Soccer Championship.


To me it is a bit like saying Deron Williams (who by the way had a tremendous season
and was talked about by some as having an MVP type season)
actually finished 12th in the voting for MVP. This is by no means derogatory, since nobody ever votes
for a Utah Jazz player anyway, and actually 12th ain't so bad.
He certainly had a better season than a few of the players who got more votes than Deron did.
 
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