AJ at the 4

[Dream Jobbed 2.0]

Has anyone made the Draymond Green comp?

 

[WhereistheDove?]

Yes. And he can defend 1-4, and he rebounds better than most 4's , and he also would be the best passing 4 in the country. It doesnt mean he will see 30 minutes a game at 4, because of his flexibility he can shift through virtually 4 positions. But if we put him at 4 with Adama at 5, and surround that with a couple shooters and ball handlers it will be our best offense in years.

I expect to see a lot of minutes with him and 3 other guards and I expect to see a lot of minutes with him, AK/Samson and two other guards. It's hard to overstate how important his positional versatility is for this team's depth because of the options it gives Hurley to mix and match.

 

[MexicoHusky]

One of the most important things a coach does at our level is prepare his best players for the next level. Contrary to popular belief on the Boneyard I will be very surprised if we see much of AJ at the 4. That is not a position AJ will play after his college experience. Playing AJ at the 4 would be a disservice to him I believe.

JC handled similar situations like you suggest. He developed players like he was prepping them for their pro career. Caron and Rudy Gay were the best examples. Kinda big and athletic players that could probably handle themselves down low. But Calhoun ran plays for them on the perimeter. Essentially played them as guards. Which I always thought was cool. I thought it would of been easy and maybe good for the team to play those guys as a four. Gay in particular. He was a good shot blocker. But JC didn't do that. He let them handle the ball a bit more. Ran them through screens for shots. Etc...

That all said, there's a rather large group on this board who think AJ is a point guard. Maybe some have a slightly different definition for pg. To me that means primary ball handler and also can guard the opposing primary ball handler. I don't think AJ is either of those things. He's a decent ball handler for a bigger guy. Also a decent passer. But still not a pg.

 

[ucp990411]

My point is that I would love to see AJ have the ball in his hands often. Also, if he plays the 4 with let's say Newton, Hawkins and Alleyne we would sacrifice rebounding, particularly offensive which is a big part of DH's philosophy. For those that are implying I don't watch the NBA, offensive rebounding is at a minimum in the league.

 

[WhereistheDove?]

My point is that I would love to see AJ have the ball in his hands often.

He will have the ball in his hands at the four. It has a negligible impact on his role offensively.

 

[Candyman]

It's the position he is best suited for on this team. He is a handful of a 4 man.

How so? He is not a stretch 4 as he cant shoot. So they double down on Sanogo again.

 

[navery12]

Ignoring that I don't believe this would actually negatively impact our rebounding, do you not see the contradiction between these 2 statements?

Also, if he plays the 4 with let's say Newton, Hawkins and Alleyne we would sacrifice rebounding, particularly offensive which is a big part of DH's philosophy.

For those that are implying I don't watch the NBA, offensive rebounding is at a minimum in the league.

 

[Candyman]

He will have the ball in his hands at the four. It has a negligible impact on his role offensively.

His man sags off him daring him to shoot. Knowing he is most def passing takes away this advantage.

 

[JT55]

Any potential issue with Andre at the 4 has very little to do with what his role will be on offense. He will have a very similar role to what he did this year. It has more to do with how will be be able to defend guys who are 2-3 inches taller and 15-20 pounds heavier. If he played the 4 this year he would have been going against guys like Hawkins from Creighton or Dixon/Samuels from Nova who absolutely would have attempted to post him up. His success at the 4 will come down to does his athleticism on defense over come his size.

 

[HuskyHawk]

Has anyone made the Draymond Green comp?

Draymond Green is built more like Sanogo.

Andre is a long wiry guard with great hops. I am sure he will play some at the 4, but it shouldn't be most (or even many) of his minutes. There are still 4's that are too big for him to guard, and the 4 in our offense is usually along the right side, not up top.

Johnson and Karaban need to play. People keep complaining about our lack of guard depth, and then proposing lineups where we start all 4 of our guards. There is no reason why a team like UConn would play that small. And no "the game has changed" isn't the answer. Big skilled players >>> small skilled players.

 

[RIP Wendys]

I think the ideal situation for Andre would be for him to take on a role similar to what Daniel Hamilton had in 2015-16. In a perfect world we wouldn't have to have him be the leading rebounder, but just the concept of getting aggressive on offense, looking to shoot and/or facilitate off the drive.

 

[MexicoHusky]

My point is that I would love to see AJ have the ball in his hands often. Also, if he plays the 4 with let's say Newton, Hawkins and Alleyne we would sacrifice rebounding, particularly offensive which is a big part of DH's philosophy. For those that are implying I don't watch the NBA, offensive rebounding is at a minimum in the league.

He'll definitely have the ball in his hands plenty.

 

[AntG168]

Draymond Green is built more like Sanogo.

Andre is a long wiry guard with great hops. I am sure he will play some at the 4, but it shouldn't be most (or even many) of his minutes. There are still 4's that are too big for him to guard, and the 4 in our offense is usually along the right side, not up top.

Johnson and Karaban need to play. People keep complaining about our lack of guard depth, and then proposing lineups where we start all 4 of our guards. There is no reason why a team like UConn would play that small. And no "the game has changed" isn't the answer. Big skilled players >>> small skilled players.

Where your logic is falling short is thinking AJ is small for the 4 position. He isn’t by any means. Remember those “bigger 4s” will have to guard him as well

 

[superjohn]

Draymond Green is built more like Sanogo.

Andre is a long wiry guard with great hops. I am sure he will play some at the 4, but it shouldn't be most (or even many) of his minutes. There are still 4's that are too big for him to guard, and the 4 in our offense is usually along the right side, not up top.

Johnson and Karaban need to play. People keep complaining about our lack of guard depth, and then proposing lineups where we start all 4 of our guards. There is no reason why a team like UConn would play that small. And no "the game has changed" isn't the answer. Big skilled players >>> small skilled players.

We need 2 more guards, I don't think anyone on the board thinks we're done bringing in guards.

We won our last 2 championships with small skilled players being better than big skilled players and the guards we have so far for next season are tall.

 

[ucp990411]

Ignoring that I don't believe this would actually negatively impact our rebounding, do you not see the contradiction between these 2 statements?

Don’t see the contradiction. DH values offensive rebounding while in the league know as the NBA offensive rebounding is not emphasized. Getting back to my point, I expect Johnson to be the primary 4 with Karaban as backup.

 

[navery12]

Don’t see the contradiction. DH values offensive rebounding while in the league know as the NBA offensive rebounding is not emphasized. Getting back to my point, I expect Johnson to be the primary 4 with Karaban as backup.

I don't think it's a case where Hurley values offensive rebounding, his teams at URI were routinely in the 100s. I think we just played a strong defensive lineup that happened to have big players who could rebound. My point on the contradiction was teams don't value rebounding so don't think that would be a reason to not play Jackson at the 4

 

[HuskyHawk]

Where your logic is falling short is thinking AJ is small for the 4 position. He isn’t by any means. Remember those “bigger 4s” will have to guard him as well

He is small for a 4. He's not even big for a 3, about average. And because he can't shoot like a guard, he makes it easier for bigger guys to guard him. His ability to get to the rim is going to be most effective against smaller guards.

We need 2 more guards, I don't think anyone on the board thinks we're done bringing in guards.

We won our last 2 championships with small skilled players being better than big skilled players and the guards we have so far for next season are tall.

Of course. But here is my prediction: whoever those transfers are, they will be a worse players than Johnson or Karaban, probably by quite a bit. I think Samson gets most of the backup 5 minutes anyway.

2011 team wasn't small 3-5. Never played a guy as small as AJ at the 4. Daniels was a lot bigger than AJ in 2011. Closer in size to Johnson. That's exactly the kind of impact I think Johnson can have. Yes, the guards were small by comparison. They were so good it didn't matter.

 

[BleedHuskyBlu]

Think of AJ as Draymond Green lite

 

[WhereistheDove?]

His man sags off him daring him to shoot. Knowing he is most def passing takes away this advantage.

I don't really understand your point here. What does this have to do with him playing the four? He has not shown the ability to shoot off the dribble, so defenders will sag off (until he does) whether he's at the 2, 3, or 4.

 

[PAHusky]

Think of AJ as Draymond Green lite

He's sort of the opposite of Draymond, no? Draymond is a (by NBA standards) sub-standard athlete who makes up for it with outrageously high b-ball IQ and positional awareness on defense. AJ is a phenomenal athlete but isn't quite at the same level of quarterbacking a defense (he's a great individual defender but nowhere near Draymond).

Offensively, AJ is a better passer, Draymond a better rebounder, Draymond a much, much better shooter (and he's not a good shooter).

 

[AntG168]

He is small for a 4. He's not even big for a 3, about average. And because he can't shoot like a guard, he makes it easier for bigger guys to guard him. His ability to get to the rim is going to be most effective against smaller guards.

Of course. But here is my prediction: whoever those transfers are, they will be a worse players than Johnson or Karaban, probably by quite a bit. I think Samson gets most of the backup 5 minutes anyway.

2011 team wasn't small 3-5. Never played a guy as small as AJ at the 4. Daniels was a lot bigger than AJ in 2011. Closer in size to Johnson. That's exactly the kind of impact I think Johnson can have. Yes, the guards were small by comparison. They were so good it didn't matter.

6’6 -6’7 with his build is not “small” for a 4. ESPECIALLY in the collegiate game. We’d all love a 6’10 4 man who could shoot and put the ball on the floor. The issue is Kevin Durants don’t really exist in the college game. AJax will more than hold his own defensively against college 4’s. And whichever 4 is guarding him will get abused on defense when he’s the ball handler on pick and rolls. If he can hit around 32-36% on set 3’s our offense will be hard to stop.

 

[Beowulf]

He's sort of the opposite of Draymond, no? Draymond is a (by NBA standards) sub-standard athlete who makes up for it with outrageously high b-ball IQ and positional awareness on defense. AJ is a phenomenal athlete but isn't quite at the same level of quarterbacking a defense (he's a great individual defender but nowhere near Draymond).

Offensively, AJ is a better passer, Draymond a better rebounder, Draymond a much, much better shooter (and he's not a good shooter).

yeah i'm not really sure why anytime someone is an undersized 4 and can't shoot they have to have a draymond comp. what draymond does defensively is generational and what he does on offense is a blend of his own insane iq mixed with two of the best shooters ever, who also move off the ball in cohesion like something we've rarely if ever seen before.

At this juncture, draymond is all around better than jackson obviously. he sort of started piecing it all together his junior year when he was handed a little more responsibility on those michigan st teams...similar to what we should see with jackson this year. jackson does have a little knack for anticipatory passing that draymond shows off for his buddies klay and steph, but obvi on a much smaller scale....and it certainly doesn't help that uconn last year wasn't a very great at "catching" some of these passes. there are certainly times when jackson outkicks his coverage with some of his passes...gotta know your personnel.

1-4, it shouldn't matter. Jackson just needs to have some touches and stay on the floor. let him run a little, let him use his vision, let him use his size to go at smaller guards and speed to go at 4s trying to guard him. we just have to live with some turnovers. surround him with 3 shooters and sanogo is probably the best way to maximize what he can do. there really aren't too many 4s that aren't going to big boi him as someone mentioned above...those days are over. he might be outsized every now and then but sanogo/johnson/clingan should be able to assist on the help side.

more than anything i'm curious to see the jump shot growth. it was nice seeing him knock down 37% on what were basically set shots....hope he can build on it. if newton/alleyne/hawkins shoot as advertised, he should be seeing a LOT of draymond-esque wide open threes

 

[HuskyHawk]

6’6 -6’7 with his build is not “small” for a 4. ESPECIALLY in the collegiate game. We’d all love a 6’10 4 man who could shoot and put the ball on the floor. The issue is Kevin Durants don’t really exist in the college game. AJax will more than hold his own defensively against college 4’s. And whichever 4 is guarding him will get abused on defense when he’s the ball handler on pick and rolls. If he can hit around 32-36% on set 3’s our offense will be hard to stop.

He's 6'5"-6"6" with a lot of hair and not what I'd call an overly muscular build. There is a 6'9"-10" 4 man who can shoot and put the ball on the floor on our roster. The #56 composite recruit last year. And a 6'8" 4 man who can do that as well. We have exactly the kind of guys we need at the 4.

Everyone here penciling in Hawkins to start. I think Johnson is as good a player, he simply was playing a position where we had a super senior (two) and a junior ahead of him. Hawkins on the other hand was playing a position of great need. If no Covid year for Whaley, Johnson plays 20+ last year and you'd all have him as a lock at the 4.

 

[Candyman]

I don't really understand your point here. What does this have to do with him playing the four? He has not shown the ability to shoot off the dribble, so defenders will sag off (until he does) whether he's at the 2, 3, or 4.

Exactly so how does this help us at the 4? Another Whaley. Don't see what the advantage is of a non shooter as a 4.

 

[BlueMAB]

there's a rather large group on this board who think AJ is a point guard. Maybe some have a slightly different definition for pg. To me that means primary ball handler and also can guard the opposing primary ball handler. I don't think AJ is either of those things. He's a decent ball handler for a bigger guy. Also a decent passer. But still not a pg.

Your definition is stuck in the 20th century. The game has changed. AJ's best NBA prospect is as a PG.