Here's Merriam-Webster's definitions.
1: a deranged state of the mind usually occurring as a specific disorder (as schizophrenia)
2: such unsoundness of mind or lack of understanding as prevents one from having the mental capacity required by law to enter into a particular relationship, status, or transaction or as removes one from criminal or civil responsibility
3 a : extreme folly or unreasonableness
3 b : something utterly foolish or unreasonable
Based on Merriam-Webster's definitions, I would say no although a case could be made about 3b.
Albert Einstein had his own definition of insanity. His definition is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
By Einstein's definition, I think there could be a very strong case to conclude that Bill Self is indeed insane.
Bill Self is loyal to his system to the detriment of KU's personnel. Bill Self is also trying to fight the embargo to the detriment of KU's recruiting instead of being the king of the 4 stars that he was for a long time.
KU's personnel is in now way, shape, or form capable of running Bill Self's system against elite level programs. We saw MSU take it away from Ellis and KU was helpless to do anything else other than let Mason and Graham drive the rim and try to draw fouls. KU has 5 guys on the roster that shot at least 37% from 3 last year and 4 of those players are starters this year. Mason and Graham were both 43% shooters, Greene was 40%, Ellis 39%, and Selden 37%. This goes back to the fools gold statement of Bill Self not wanting to live and die by the 3. KU was top 50 nationally last year in 3 point FG% and was one of the worst in 2 point FG%. With the roster as constructed, KU's real fools gold appears to be within 5 feet of the basket. Using last year's stats, KU averaged 92 points per 100 two point FGA's. KU averaged 114 points per 100 three point FGA's
Over the summer @jaybate-1.0 hypothesized about what a team would look like shooting a ridiculous number of 3 point shots. This is a KU team built to do that. You put a line up of Ellis, Graham, Greene, Mason, and Selden on the floor, you a line up that shoots a little over 40% from 3. Run a bunch of ball screen, pick and pop, and the chop play, and KU would get a lot of good looks from 3. This would also ideally help the rebounding issue as well because KU can't rebound under that basket and long shots create long rebounds and gives KU's shooters a better chance at getting rebounds and quickly find an open shooter.
As for recruiting, the down turn started with the 2011 class when Self went all in on Kaleb Tarczewski and whiffed and combined with him not anticipating the possibility of the Morris twins jumping early, killed KU's momentum and we're now really seeing the fruits of that class today. This is why landing the top 50-75 guys are important. They cushion the blow of having less than stellar recruiting classes. That 2012 Final Four team was mostly 4 star players. KU's current roster goals tend to be OAD caliber 5 star kids and low 4 star, and 3 star kids to fill in the gaps and almost ignoring the 25-75 kids that were long the backbone of Self's team. This is largely the fault of the assistant coaches. They now tend to target 1 or 2 OAD caliber kids, spend years recruiting them and when they don't sign, they're left scrambling to sign 3 star kids and convincing other players to reclassify other kids to move up a class to fill in for those misses.
It's not the embargo itself that's killing KU's recruiting, it's Bill Self trying to fight the embargo at the expense of the recruiting strategy that got KU to the level they were at several years ago of picking and choosing the kids rated just low enough that the shoe cos. didn't care about them because they didn't have the potential to be the new face of whatever company at the next level. Bill Self needs to get back to building his teams around the 25-75 players with the occasional 5 star player. The recruiting game changed big time in 2007 after the OAD rule was instituted. Since 2007, I would argue that KU has only had 1 true elite recruiting class and that was the 2007 class that had Darrell Arthur and Sherron Collins. If Bill Self is going to insist on running his system, he needs to model his recruiting on the 2008 and 2009 classes. That 2008 class had the Morris twins, Tyshawn Taylor, Travis Releford and Mario Little. 5 guys that contributed significantly during their time at KU and two more guys in Tyrone Appleton and Quintrell Thomas that were recruited over in favor 2009 additions Thomas Robinson and Xavier Henry. 2009 also featured Elijah Johnson
Bill Self doesn't run an offensive system that allows freshmen to shine unless they are a truly transcendent player like Andrew Wiggins was so because shoe co. wants the chosen ones to thrive in college and start building their exposure and brand in college, they get steered towards programs that are more conducive to allowing freshmen to shine from day 1. Bill Self needs to throw up the double bird to shoe co. and tell them he's going back to 2008-09 Bill Self recruiting mode and that he'll see everyone in the Final Four.
