FAYETTEVILLE — Corey Beck doesn’t pull punches.
So it was no surprise when he offered an immediate prediction for the returnees on the Arkansas basketball team hoping to play for new coach Eric Musselman.
“These baby (expletive deleted) kids won’t play with Coach E,” Beck said Monday morning.
“He don’t play that crap. What we needed, is what we got, a tough coach with a mean spirit.”
That’s on the court demeanor, Beck said, not off the court.
“Don’t mistake me, he’s a real good guy,” Beck said. “But he’s like Nolan (Richardson), as soon as he steps on the court, Coach E’s demeanor changes. And, he’s really tough, like Nolan.”
Beck told Musselman the program won't be easy to fix.
"I told him part of it would be that he needs to get to Memphis for some tough kids," Beck said. "Now, (Memphis coach) Penny Hardaway is getting the good ones there, but there are a lot over there. I keep hearing from Dwight Stewart and so many others that there are plenty of good ones there now."
Beck was delighted to get a phone call from Musselman late Sunday night after the new Arkansas coach had visited with his players. They were old friends from many battles in the Continental Basketball Association.
Musselman phoned Beck sometime after midnight. Asked if that was an odd time to reach out, Musselman said, “You’ll find out I do a lot of odd things. I think it was around 1:15 a.m. when we finished talking.”
It followed some text exchanges with other former Razorbacks, including Corliss Williamson and Patrick Beverley.
“Corey was a guy that I had a lot of respect for as a player,” Musselman said of their CBA days. “He was a incredibly fierce competitor.”
That’s Beck, the inspirational captain of the teams that went to back-to-back title games in 1994 and 1995, and won the school’s only national title. Beck provided a similar scouting on their new coach.
Now the owner of Corey Beck Commercial and Residential Painting in Northwest Arkansas, there couldn’t be anyone better to provide the scouting report. I consider Beck a good friend and a straight shooter.
“I was at Sioux City and Coach E was at West Palm Beach with the Beachdogs,” Beck said. “I think it was like three or four years and our teams were always the two at the top, playing at the end.
“I know him real good. I can tell you he coaches the game like he’s playing it, real intense. He’s like a playing coach.”
Beck laughs about those rivalry games with the Beachdogs. He said it wasn’t anything that ever came into his mind.
“First, I tried out with an NBA team, then next thing I ended up in Sioux City,” he said of his time with the Sky Force. “I can tell you that no way I knew where that was until I got there.”
The CBA was a mental and physical test with far more games in a season than Beck played in college. There was little time for any nightlife.
“And, if you did do some of that, I learned you didn’t do it before you played Coach E’s teams,” Beck said. “You better be resting the night before and ready to play. That team he had always worked so hard.
“I’m telling you, I would love to play for him. He is my kind of coach.”
Beck said Musselman is the right coach at the right time.
“We’ve had some good coaches (since Richardson),” Beck said. “But it’s a tough job to follow him.
“I liked Stan Heath, a great recruiter, but maybe not (the coach) that you need. Then, you had John Pelphrey. I think he did bring in a few good ones, but never had that backbone player you needed.
“I am a huge Mike Anderson fan. He had the right DNA for the program, but wasn’t fortunate to get the right kids.”
Beck points to toughness as the central issue, something that he thinks Musselman will fix.
“What you know about Coach E, he’s been in the game all over the basketball world, from the NBA, to the CBA, the D League and now college,” Beck said. “And, he knows it takes toughness.
“I played his teams and they were tough, tough, tough. They were amazing teams.
“He’s got the right coaching strategy. You saw him come out of timeouts with great sets. He always has well-coached teams.”
That’s the same report from the same general time frame from another friend, former radio host Bo Mattingly. It was Bo who told me Sunday to phone Beck.
“I saw Corey play against the Beachdogs (and Musselman),” Mattingly said. “Corey had some amazing games.”
Mattingly worked at a radio station that handled Beachdog games and eventually did the public address at the games.
“I think I was 20 or 21,” Mattingly said. “I did a lot of things for the radio station and their relationship with the CBA team got me involved.”
There was a night that the regular radio play-by-play voice was gone so Mattingly handled the broadcast solo.
“Their best player was Shelton Jones and for some reason Eric took him out early in the game - no foul trouble, no apparent reason - and I commented that it was a weird substitution,” Mattingly said. “I didn’t think much about it.”
The next day there was a meeting to go over that, with Musselman in the locker room.
“I’d heard about people being called to the locker room to meet with him,” Mattingly said. “They were usually not much fun.”
This one wasn’t so bad, but there was a sharp point.
“I came in and the first thing he said, ‘Hey, do you want to coach the team?’" Mattingly said. "And, then, he said he wondered why I was questioning his decision to sub out Shelton Jones?”
It was quickly explained that there was always a plan behind everything.
“That was my first introduction to the coaching world,” Mattingly said. “You learn, sometimes there are things that don’t make sense, but there is usually a plan.”
Mattingly said Musselman’s plans were in great detail.
“He had his hand in everything to do with the franchise, A through Z,” Mattingly said. “And, yes, there was a fiery side to him. I think he is the coach who invented stomping on the floor to get the attention of the players.
“The character trait that was obvious to me was that everyone knew who was in charge. He was the leader and ran the entire organization. If there was something he didn’t like in the arena, it was changed.
“The other thing that stood out, I knew he was good. I followed him through his stops and always saw success.
“The head coach made the difference in the CBA. It makes a difference everywhere. He’s always had that fiery intense motivation. You felt it and everyone else did.
“He had important qualities that demanded hard work and his players competed hard.”