Durham transferring

[shizzle787]

I recruit for summer college baseball (not the same, but still) - and while I don't want to talk about myself that much and recognizing it's not anywhere near the same - but I can tell you from having spent more time than any human should have to ever spend on top 100 recruiting lists - they're usually steaming piles of crap. Go through any of them the last four years and tell me how accurate they are. In some cases (Perfect Game), they're almost paid services with some goofball high school sophomore just regurgitating scouting lingo that can be gobbled up by people who want to know, but don't know what they're talking about.

You can watch 60 videos with stop watch on your own and know a kid doesn't run a 6.5 60. Or they'll take his best 60 time or his top velocity and put that on the report page. They overreport height, weight... They mess up handedness, etc. And you'd be surprised - college coaches spend plenty of time getting burned by them all the time.

Given the number of complete and total idiots circling like buzzards around the AAU scene and the like these days, I would actually expect hoops to be substantially worse.

Scary.

 

[tzznandrew]

And that's exactly what I'm afraid of. Trying to fill out the roster this late with 3, 4 or 5 more players is going to kill them in the next few years. And since the roster has some risk with 3 guys coming off season long injuries I think Ollie is going to try to fill out the roster. I highly doubt he wants to be left shorthanded like he was this year. Ollie is in quite a bind here.

You need balance in your classes, too.

There are no seniors and now only one sophomore. Also, dangerously, there are 4 players who will technically be freshmen. They can't have a 9 person freshmen class. We've more or less done that before (Dyson-Edwards-Sticks-Kelly-Wiggins-Eaves-Mandeldove) and the logjam and fall out was a major reason we ran into APR issues.

They need a 2-3 freshmen (more than ideal, but nothing here's ideal), 1-2 grad transfers (ideally someone like Cam Johnson who'd come in with 2 years left from what I've read) and maybe a high-end transfer who would sit and play with the team.

 

[pj]

Alright, let me shed some light that will hopefully calm everyone down. As @fleudslipcon said, I've known this was coming for over a week, but because of speculation rules I couldn't say anything on the board. Here's some info from the same source that told me Juwan was leaving that I hope will calm everyone down.

1) There is no team chemistry/hate KO mentality in the locker room
2) Both Vance and Juwan leaving were PRIMARILY because of being homesick. I know that a lot of us don't want to believe that because of what VJ Sr was tweeting.
3) Admittedly, there was some griping by the players that left over playing time (more so by Enoch and some by Vance I would assume), but it was mostly playing time. I know I know I know - "but there was going to be so much time open." That's true, but between a perceived lack of 'proper use' and missing home, 2 of these guys wanted to head back closer to home for that 'home cooked meal.'
4) MAL leaving was primarily because of Miller being let go - not because he was nervous about stepping foot onto a sinking ship
5) This is it. There isn't anyone else leaving. If I end up being wrong on this, I'll take whatever heat you guys can throw at me.
6) Morale is VERY high with the players that are left

This isn't a great look for the UConn Men's BB program right now, but it's not nearly is chaotic up in Storrs as many seem to think it is. Ollie has not lost control of this team.

If MAL decommitted because of Miller, then I hope KO and Chillious are re-recruiting him. MAL isn't going to play for Miller regardless so he could still find KO, Chillious, Killings, and Moore his best bet.

 

[Towney007]

And not to run this thread off the rails, but:

Our RFer doesn't even have a PG profile and he goes to Morehead State. He's a finalist for the Golden Spikes award.

Our SS was a preferred walk-on at Marist. He's been player of the week in the MAAC three weeks in a row and arguably the best prospect in the conference right now.

I had Max Pentecost - who was National Player of the year and got drafted 11th overall a few years back - no one had even heard of him and he wasn't even rated as a top 50 player - IN HIS OWN STATE.

Chris Sale's pretty good, right? Guess where he fell on a top prospects list out of high school - on none of them. He went to Florida flippin' Gulf Coast.

We have a two-time all Big East Catcher from Xavier... rated #200 in his state. He'll probably be a top-5 rounder.

We had a kid from Texas - Travis Jones, who can literally play anywhere and for my money - is the best player i've ever had when you put the whole enchillada together and after hitting .334 and 11 bombs here, he was rated #99 on the PG top 100 draft prospects list.... 44 spots below a kid who I also had that hit a .167 here, is built like a pipe cleaner but runs 6.3 so auto-prospect. Kid #2 couldn't lace Travis' cleats.

D1 Baseball.com has half of its stories about Rice baseball because one of the guys lives close to the field and covers them like crazy. But their prospect lists are just built on glances. Or 'oh he throws hard' or 'oh he's got a good body' or 'oh short, compact wing' or whatever tool there is. There are guys we call 'showcase players' who go to scouting combines and throw well, hit BP into orbit, run super fast, catch on the run... but in a game they're useless. They're physical freaks with no feel for the game.

Sorry to drive this into oblivion, but I know there's even more idiots in basketball than there are in baseball - which is saying something - and when you read scouting reports on kids online, it's usually written by some other kid, aspiring to be a hoops scout who doesn't have any idea what they're talking about at all. I read about 2-3 scouting reports on Enoch and he was literally, actually none of the things in his report. And like I just said - you'd be amazed at how many lazy upper echilon college coaches just go 'oh ok, top 40 guy speaks for itself just offer him' without doing much of any leg work on them. It happens ALL THE TIME in baseball. I wouldn't be surprised to see it be that way in hoops in many cases as well.


Prospect lists are total and complete garbage. Star ratings WTH is that anyway? What makes a guy a ****3/4 different from a guy who is ****1/2? It's just stupidity. Dumb content for dumb people to gobble up. Get on the court and play.

 

[BLUEDOGHOUSE]

If those guys were "top-40 type players" then the folks handing out the rankings don't know what they're doing.

These 3 eventually could be top 40ish players somewhere else (in their class). That is a real possibility.

 

[djct1999]

These 3 eventually could be top 40ish players somewhere else (in their class). That is a real possibility.

Or they can suck. Another real possibility. In this case, I'll trust the guys who see them every day.

 

[FartMan69]

I recruit for summer college baseball (not the same, but still) - and while I don't want to talk about myself that much and recognizing it's not anywhere near the same - but I can tell you from having spent more time than any human should have to ever spend on top 100 recruiting lists - they're usually steaming piles of crap. Go through any of them the last four years and tell me how accurate they are. In some cases (Perfect Game), they're almost paid services with some goofball high school sophomore just regurgitating scouting lingo that can be gobbled up by people who want to know, but don't know what they're talking about.

You can watch 60 videos with stop watch on your own and know a kid doesn't run a 6.5 60. Or they'll take his best 60 time or his top velocity and put that on the report page. They overreport height, weight... They mess up handedness, etc. And you'd be surprised - college coaches spend plenty of time getting burned by them all the time.

Given the number of complete and total idiots circling like buzzards around the AAU scene and the like these days, I would actually expect hoops to be substantially worse.

PG is the absolute biggest scam in HS sports. It made me cringe when some of my teammates who were 4th outfielders/pinch runners parents would spend oodles of money on batting practice and a youtube video.

 

[Jimdish255]

I do. There is no way he's getting 5 more kids. He shouldn't even try to. I'd be happy if he can get three more players that aren't scrubs.

Heck 2 or 3 would be solid and a guy like EJ Harrison who we plucked from WesConn worked out pretty good. Look under all rocks.

 

[T-Squared]

Prospect lists are total and complete garbage. Star ratings WTH is that anyway? What makes a guy a ****3/4 different from a guy who is ****1/2? It's just stupidity. Dumb content for dumb people to gobble up. Get on the court and play.

^^^ This. Times 10.

 

[AZHuskiePop]

We will have a BB team next year
If Gilbert and Larrier are healthy
It's going to be a good one.
In 2012
We lost
Lamb
Drummond
AO
Roscoe
JC was gone ,we were suspended ,and life as we knew it was over

Compare that to The fearsome group
SE
Jackson
and a guy that couldn't get on the floor when we only had six healthy players
Listen you bunch of wimps
Was it over when the Germans Bonmded Pearl Harbor ?

PS We won 20 games going 10-8 in the BE and the year after that we even did better.

Next year is my 63 season as a UConn fan and I look forward to a great year.

 

[Dove]

KO's image of being a great recruiter has crashed. So many transfers by candy-asses is atrocious. Those empty seats Benedict saw last season are not going away for a while. Wicked Tuna better be a big-time recruiter as many have described him here.

This program will not win 20 games next year or the next. fml.

Whate we're seeing now is us having to accept a three year rebuilding project. Adams has to be upset just a bit. He will be tied to this period of mediocrity.

 

[nomar]

KO's image of being a great recruiter has crashed. So many transfers by candy-asses is atrocious. Those empty seats Benedict saw last season are not going away for a while. Wicked Tuna better be a big-time recruiter as many have described him here.

This program will not win 20 games next year or the next. fml.

Whate we're seeing now is us having to accept a three year rebuilding project. Adams has to be upset just a bit. He will be tied to this period of mediocrity.

Dove, have a Snickers.

 

[Chin Diesel]

Yeah, but are you gonna give KO the rope to do that?

I mean, if this many people are abandoning the program, maybe it's fair to question if there's a reason.

I've said in other threads underperforming organizations need change to isolate variables. If team is in disarray next it eliminates this year's batch of players.

Same thing if coaching staff is still a mess.

KO has squarely gone all in on himself and his vision of a program.

He's betting on himself to succeed.

Let's see where it goes.

 

[pj]

This one hurts, we have nothing left at the big spots, and he's going to be great. Good luck Juwan.

If he's going to be great, he probably puts basketball first, ahead of playing close to home.

I've heard a number of great players speak of how they got homesick and wanted to go home, but fought through it. Priorities predict success.

I wish Juwan the best of luck but this decision suggests he won't be great.

 

[pj]

It's insane.

We're basically returning Jalen and Christian.

Then three kids coming off season ending injuries, a JUCO and a couple of three-ish star recruits.

We have five open scholarships in April!

I'm stunned someone could look at this and think this is the best we can do.

The pessimistic view is that KO has made a lot of mistakes, and the recent changes are more mistakes.

The optimistic view is that KO made a lot of recruiting mistakes, and the recent departures are purging them and creating room for something better.

We'll see which it is. Either way, we have a young coach, I guess we were bound to have a learning curve.

 

[pj]

“At first, it was mainly because of Coach Miller leaving that made me think about it,” the 6-foot-2 guard told ESPN.com’s Adam Finkelstein. “But as I started to do that, I realized I kind of made my first decision spontaneously right after my visit.” -MAL

I hope they are re-recruiting him and bring him back into the fold. If this is really why he de-committed, then UConn should still be his leader.

But if he's scared of competing with Jalen, Alterique, and Christian for minutes, he's a prima donna. Minutes are there, if he came he'd be getting 20+ if he's any good, plenty of 3-guard lineups. A guy who fears competition doesn't belong here.

 

[Dove]

Dove, have a Snickers.

Better!

 

[hardcorehusky]

This thread reminds me of the Randy Edsall return thread. People either loved it or hated it. Here it is Ollie good people vs those who think this is a dumpster fire.

If this was a dumpster fire, would Chillious have come here? Why go to a dumpster fire when you were fired from a dumpster fire? That sounds like career suicide. So no, I don't believe the program is on its way down. Is it concerning right now? Yes.

Durham has upside- if he wants to be closer to home, if he wants a reset to his career, it is his prerogative. Do I think he owed KO a little bit more for standing by him? Yes. But in today's world, people are in kids ears and they I wish him luck.

Let's see who comes in and what they look like before we reserve judgment. I still think a 3 guard lineup with Gilbert at Point, Vital and Adams as wings can pressure and run. Larrier at the 4 and Cobb/Carlton at the 5 and Diarra as a change up. This team needs to up tempo and run. We will need more depth and better rebounding from the 4 and 5 spot, and if we do we will finish Top 3 in the conference(including Wichita St) and will make the NCAA Tourney next year. Book it!!

 

[BUConn10]

This thread reminds me of the Randy Edsall return thread. People either loved it or hated it. Here it is Ollie good people vs those who think this is a dumpster fire.

If this was a dumpster fire, would Chillious have come here? Why go to a dumpster fire when you were fired from a dumpster fire? That sounds like career suicide. So no, I don't believe the program is on its way down. Is it concerning right now? Yes.

Durham has upside- if he wants to be closer to home, if he wants a reset to his career, it is his prerogative. Do I think he owed KO a little bit more for standing by him? Yes. But in today's world, people are in kids ears and they I wish him luck.

Let's see who comes in and what they look like before we reserve judgment. I still think a 3 guard lineup with Gilbert at Point, Vital and Adams as wings can pressure and run. Larrier at the 4 and Cobb/Carlton at the 5 and Diarra as a change up. This team needs to up tempo and run. We will need more depth and better rebounding from the 4 and 5 spot, and if we do we will finish Top 3 in the conference(including Wichita St) and will make the NCAA Tourney next year. Book it!!

All KO good or bad talk aside... basing whether the current situation is an upward or downward trajectory for the program off of the logic behind Chillious accepting this job is asinine.

 

[Huskygamble19]

Too bad

they can take this goshdarn season and shove it up their AZZZZZZ!!!!!!

 

[Fishy]

The pessimistic view is that KO has made a lot of mistakes, and the recent changes are more mistakes.

The optimistic view is that KO made a lot of recruiting mistakes, and the recent departures are purging them and creating room for something better.

We'll see which it is. Either way, we have a young coach, I guess we were bound to have a learning curve.

The "optimistic view", as you present it, is insanity.

It's like MetroNorth crashing all their trains because they're thinking about buying new ones.

At this moment, we don't have enough players to have a blue-white game. Four players in the past have decided not to play for UConn next year and right now, it doesn't look like they're going to replace them with players of similar ability. That staff has to pull more than one rabbit out of a hat or they're going to bury themselves.

 

[Danzz]

We will have a BB team next year
If Gilbert and Larrier are healthy
It's going to be a good one.
In 2012
We lost
Lamb
Drummond
AO
Roscoe
JC was gone ,we were suspended ,and life as we knew it was over

Compare that to The fearsome group
SE
Jackson
and a guy that couldn't get on the floor when we only had six healthy players
Listen you bunch of wimps
Was it over when the Germans Bonmded Pearl Harbor ?

PS We won 20 games going 10-8 in the BE and the year after that we even did better.

Next year is my 63 season as a UConn fan and I look forward to a great year.

I don't believe that the Germans ever bombed Pearl Harbor. But since you are an old fart like me you are forgiven.

 

[Towney007]

PG is the absolute biggest scam in HS sports. It made me cringe when some of my teammates who were 4th outfielders/pinch runners parents would spend oodles of money on batting practice and a youtube video.

It's brutal. It's happening everywhere though and in every sport. You get these pay-to-play schemes where kids can play for guys with a little background who know some guys politically and they sell them on skill show bullshit. It's always amazed me - but that kind of stuff is like taking players based off of their dunk contest performance. And a lot of that is BS too. That whole site is staffed with guys who want to play Theo Epstein dress-up and barf out scouting lingo on a glorified baseball FB page. It's just bad information. It can kind of give you a run down of their peak raw skills, but that's about it.

Again - my recruiting is a lot lower level - but I've always relied on data, track record, coaches opinion, opposing coaches opinion's and then former players. In baseball I guess it's a little different, but at the end of the day - it's all relationship-based, ultimately. I say 'yes' a lot more to .290-ish hitters who are good kids, learn and their life is nothing but baseball than I do to studs in waiting from big schools. I guess my point in my me-centric baseball rant is that it's not about the best players so much as it's about the right players. There are certain recruiters at mid majors who have a really well defined culture, go after specific kinds of kids - and they have to totally bust their backsides to get decent players. So everything they do impacts their reputations as coaches, so I know when i"m getting a call on that particular guy - I can trust the tip or give them the benefit of the doubt. Funny enough - Buffalo is shuttering it's baseball program and announced it today -and they were a pretty good feeder for us. One of our major leaguers came out of there. But when I call - if he's got dudes, I get the dudes and they're dudes. If I call and he doesn't have any dudes, he won't just send someone for the sake of it.

I mean Ollie knows more about his sport in the tip of his pinkie finger than I probably do in mine - but I guess as my marginally informed opinion is concerned - I notices he really likes athletic tool boxes and kind of hopes for the best - in spite of having a rather extensive of not developing guys like that all that well. And guys with pro backgrounds in my league do the same thing. They recruit based on pure physicality as opposed to actual, developed ability. I mean when you're peeling off the absolute top... there's no question those guys are monsters. But after that, you get into pretty nuancey stuff. And i've noticed that can be a problem with more pro-based background coaches. They go for that super high upside project and hope the physical tools just work quickly and expect their background to be enough to develop it and they're rarely well equipped to do it. Primarily because when they've gotten those guys in the past - or played with them or coached them at the highest level - they're more developed. So building that bridge to success is a lot shorter. I guess what i'm saying is - they're sensational at getting guys over the finish line, but forget their ability to get them off to a spectacular start and pace themselves. And when you look at Ollie's track record, i've seen a lot of that. I guess i'd rather see him chase somewhat highly rated, skilled, but clearly flawed players who have a precise purpose than I would watching him paint the wall with Top tier-ish tool boxes. Just less worrying about OH WHAT ARE MY MINUTES and MY NBA CLOCK IS TICKING type stuff. And when you look at what's historically worked here and/or been useful, those are the guys who've always developed into real difference makers when put around 2 or 3 stars.

 

[Danzz]

The "optimistic view", as you present it, is insanity.

It's like MetroNorth crashing all their trains because they're thinking about buying new ones.

At this moment, we don't have enough players to have a blue-white game. Four players in the past have decided not to play for UConn next year and right now, it doesn't look like they're going to replace them with players of similar ability. That staff has to pull more than one rabbit out of a hat or they're going to bury themselves.

Except for Mal and we don't even know for sure about him, we lost depth and no stars. There is no way to put a positive spin on this. We were under .500 with these guys so how much worse will it be without them? On second thought it could be a lot worse.

 

[uconNYC]

Our best hope next season is to have a season like 2010-11 with Kemba and the kids. Adams doing Kemba like things. Just getting to the second weekend of the tournament (ie Sweet 16) would be massive success in my eyes.

 

[Deadrody]

This UConn off season is one of the record books. Unreal.

It's more than just the offseason. The season began as one for the record books and only went pretty much downhill from there.

 

[willie99]

why are we getting upset about someone who showed us nothing to date and honored our loyalty by transferring? Another kid evidently unhappy with playing time.

does anyone think he's going to a better program? I don't, he's more likely he;s going to the A-10 than a P5

moving on, hard for me to pretend I'm going to miss him, He must think he's blue blood, we're blue collar

 

[JSM1970]

Yes, Vital was better than Fultz, Fox, Ball and Smith. How was he rated lower? Makes no sense.

I recruit for summer college baseball (not the same, but still) - and while I don't want to talk about myself that much and recognizing it's not anywhere near the same - but I can tell you from having spent more time than any human should have to ever spend on top 100 recruiting lists - they're usually steaming piles of crap. Go through any of them the last four years and tell me how accurate they are. In some cases (Perfect Game), they're almost paid services with some goofball high school sophomore just regurgitating scouting lingo that can be gobbled up by people who want to know, but don't know what they're talking about.

You can watch 60 videos with stop watch on your own and know a kid doesn't run a 6.5 60. Or they'll take his best 60 time or his top velocity and put that on the report page. They overreport height, weight... They mess up handedness, etc. And you'd be surprised - college coaches spend plenty of time getting burned by them all the time.

Given the number of complete and total idiots circling like buzzards around the AAU scene and the like these days, I would actually expect hoops to be substantially worse.

 

[djct1999]

The "optimistic view", as you present it, is insanity.

It's like MetroNorth crashing all their trains because they're thinking about buying new ones.

At this moment, we don't have enough players to have a blue-white game. Four players in the past have decided not to play for UConn next year and right now, it doesn't look like they're going to replace them with players of similar ability. That staff has to pull more than one rabbit out of a hat or they're going to bury themselves.

No it's not. To use your analogy, metro north decided to crash the trains prematurely because they knew that in a few months time the trains will crash anyway, maybe with people on it. This exodus isn't about filling a roster next year. It's about looking into the future and valuing the open scholarship more than marginal talent. Vance played to his ceiling, Durham- hurt or not, showed very little, and Enoch was flat out bad. You don't hire Chillious to coach up recruiting misses. You open as many scholarships as possible and let him get to work. It's obvious that is what's going on here. Who knows what next year brings. I know that if we kept the same roster, the team wouldn't have been as good as people on here thought. We need to be realistic. Why waste a year or possibly three to rebuild?

 

[3rdbass]

No it's not. To use your analogy, metro north decided to crash the trains prematurely because they knew that in a few months time the trains will crash anyway, maybe with people on it. This exodus isn't about filling a roster next year. It's about looking into the future and valuing the open scholarship more than marginal talent. Vance played to his ceiling, Durham- hurt or not, showed very little, and Enoch was flat out bad. You don't hire Chillious to coach up recruiting misses. You open as many scholarships as possible and let him get to work. It's obvious that is what's going on here. Who knows what next year brings. I know that if we kept the same roster, the team wouldn't have been as good as people on here thought. We need to be realistic. Why waste a year or possibly three to rebuild?

The nonsense people on this board spew to rationalize when the program is at a serious crossroads. Vance was a top 100 recruit who was acc American first team and becoming a really good shooter with some nifty post moves. You really honestly think he wouldn't improve and was at his ceiling? Lol!