RJ Cole Expectations | Page 4 | The Boneyard

RJ Cole Expectations

I think the 2016 team majorly underperformed its talent level, but that’s not really relevant to the discussion here.

I'm not sure how this has anything to do with RJ Cole, but I'll chime in. Under Calhoun, 2016 is an E8 team at a minimum. Sterling Gibbs, Rodney Purvis, Jalen Adams, Omar Calhoun, Daniel Hamilton, Shonn Miller, Kentan Facey, Amida Brimah, Steven Enoch. Talent galore.
 
Gibbs was a 1.5, a "second" point. Like Chris Smith next to Tate George. He was never a pure 1. That's not a knock -- just the way it is.
If Jalen was given PG from day 1 and Gibbs a shooter off the bench the last 4 years could have been different. Of course the assumption at the time was Sterling was promised he could run point to improve his pro stock if he came here.
 
From what I’ve been told and read RJ is a scorer. Always has been. I expect at least 14 & 4 from him
 
I'm not sure how this has anything to do with RJ Cole, but I'll chime in. Under Calhoun, 2016 is an E8 team at a minimum. Sterling Gibbs, Rodney Purvis, Jalen Adams, Omar Calhoun, Daniel Hamilton, Shonn Miller, Kentan Facey, Amida Brimah, Steven Enoch. Talent galore.

No. Not even close. No pure point guard, and we always had a pure point to win (even if, in Taliek's case, he didn't score as much as the Boneyard wanted). No go to scorer, and when we won we always had a go to scorer. And third, that's a roster deep with fair talent, but how many of those players had more than a cup of coffee in the NBA? How many even had a cup of coffee.

The '16 team was much better on the court than our first round exit '12 team, and that team had Drummond, Oriakhi, Lamb, Shabazz, Boat, Daniels and others. Could the '16 team have won a few more regular season games? Probably, but if you're outside the Top 20 that's always the case. Elite 8? That's absolutely absurd.
 
No. Not even close. No pure point guard, and we always had a pure point to win (even if, in Taliek's case, he didn't score as much as the Boneyard wanted). No go to scorer, and when we won we always had a go to scorer. And third, that's a roster deep with fair talent, but how many of those players had more than a cup of coffee in the NBA? How many even had a cup of coffee.

The '16 team was much better than our first round exit '12 team, and that team had Drummond, Oriakhi, Lamb, Shabazz, Boat, Daniels and others. Could the '16 team have won a few more regular season games? Probably, but if you're outside the Top 20 that's always the case. Elite 8? That's absolutely absurd.
Sterling Gibbs was the pure point guard and Adams was an excellent backup. That team drastically underachieved in the regular season. Should have been at least a 6 seed or higher. Got an unfortunate matchup against Kansas otherwise I could've seen them winning a couple more games. That team had no major holes, we'd do backflips for that roster rn.
 
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No he will need some back court guys next year. His 2 starters are gone and so far he hasn’t landed a true point guard. Plus it isn’t the First of daddy’s guys he brought in. The last one was “the best player in New Jersey” too. It’s fine but does anybody actually believe a guy was so incredible that nobody, not Seton Hall, no Rutgers, not Temple, not UConn, not St Joes, not Fairfield or Manhattan, or Central Connecticut or Robert Morris...nobody in the entire country saw his talent and he landed in a league that is ranked lower than any of the ones those schools are in. Only Hurley Sr saw it? Is he better than most MEAC players? Sure. High Major level? I am skeptical.
You really do post some dumb stuff.
 
Yeah the MEAC is the lowest rated conference in the country. It is generally among the bottom 3 or 4. It’s possible but unlikely that a kid who starred there will star in a major conference. More likely he will be a back up. The gap in level of play is huge. He is playing against teams we would crush night in and night out. If we get competent play from him that would be a huge bonus.

I know guys I grew up playing with who played low level D1 and D2 who made the NBA G league.

That means they made it further than a lot of great UConn players.

There are great players at all levels.

A lot of schools look over great 3 dimensional players like RJ bc of size or other physical qualities.

He will surprise you. He’s going to be a better starter for us then CV and Gilbert. Calling it now
 
Yes, we would. But having a roster better than what we have right now has literally zero to do with having a roster that can challenge for the Elite 8.
Think the team had the talent and depth to be an elite 8 team. Wasn't well coached from the beginning. Had Enoch been better developed early on and KO put Gibbs in a better position we could've made a run. We were most effective when DHam was at the high post making 8-10 footers, then drawing the defense for Brimah/Miller oops and 3 pt kickouts. DHam in the high post was a FORCE. For some reason we didn't do that all the time, KO had DHam run point and Gibbs on the wing a lot which made little sense.
 
No. Not even close. No pure point guard, and we always had a pure point to win (even if, in Taliek's case, he didn't score as much as the Boneyard wanted). No go to scorer, and when we won we always had a go to scorer. And third, that's a roster deep with fair talent, but how many of those players had more than a cup of coffee in the NBA? How many even had a cup of coffee.

The '16 team was much better on the court than our first round exit '12 team, and that team had Drummond, Oriakhi, Lamb, Shabazz, Boat, Daniels and others. Could the '16 team have won a few more regular season games? Probably, but if you're outside the Top 20 that's always the case. Elite 8? That's absolutely absurd.

So 2nd team All-Big East Sterling Gibbs and top 25 recruit Jalen Adams weren’t adequate at PG? Come on. IMO Shonn Miller was the default “go-to guy.” If we needed a bucket I’d go to him. But this team had plenty of scoring options. They just weren’t coached properly. We had Gibbs, Purvis, Hamilton, and Miller to distribute lead scoring duties.
 
I know guys I grew up playing with who played low level D1 and D2 who made the NBA G league.

That means they made it further than a lot of great UConn players.

There are great players at all levels.

A lot of schools look over great 3 dimensional players like RJ bc of size or other physical qualities.

He will surprise you. He’s going to be a better starter for us then CV and Gilbert. Calling it now
LOL well that proves it then. Some message board knucklehead knows some guy who played D2 but made the G league so that proves that Coles will be a great player. He was putting up great stats playing the likes of Coppin State and Florida A&M, not Villanova and Duke. There is a modest difference in size speed strengh and talent. But just explain to me how the best player in New Jersey, a state that produces it fair share of talent was passed over by virtually everybody? And why you think star quality in the worst conference in the country equals staring in one of the best? Is it possible? Sure. But probable is a completely different thing.
 
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So 2nd team All-Big East Sterling Gibbs and top 25 recruit Jalen Adams weren’t adequate at PG? Come on. IMO Shonn Miller was the default “go-to guy.” If we needed a bucket I’d go to him. But this team had plenty of scoring options. They just weren’t coached properly. We had Gibbs, Purvis, Hamilton, and Miller to distribute lead scoring duties.

I'm not interested in the overall argument, but if you told me today Freshman Adams and GT Sterling Gibbs would be our starting PGs next year I'd be depressed

Jalen not ready, and Sterling miscast
 
Hoping he can be the next Khalid El-Amin
You must be kidding! Khalid was a McDonald’s all American. He destroyed anyone he played against head to head.i hope Rj can average 10 points a game with 4 assists. That would be wonderful!
 
I'm not interested in the overall argument, but if you told me today Freshman Adams and GT Sterling Gibbs would be our starting PGs next year I'd be depressed

Jalen not ready, and Sterling miscast

You can do A LOT worse than a 2nd team all-Big East GT and top 25 freshman PG.
 
You can do A LOT worse than a 2nd team all-Big East GT and top 25 freshman PG.


That's one of those things that sounds good in a vacuum.

Neither of which were suited to running the point. It was clear Gibbs was a scoring guard. And Adams wasn't remotely ready to play point...he was a combo we were converting.

Happy to have them on the team. Rather have a real PG running it
 
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Neither of which were suited to running the point. It was clear Gibbs was a scoring guard. And Adams wasn't remotely ready to play point...he was a combo we were converting.

Happy to have them on the team. Rather have a real PG running it
This is hindsight/revisionist history. Jalen was a point guard and when he was coming here people thought he had a chance to go to the NBA as an underclassman. Gibbs was a point guard and a pretty darn good one at SHU.
 
This is hindsight/revisionist history. Jalen was a point guard and when he was coming here people thought he had a chance to go to the NBA as an underclassman. Gibbs was a point guard and a pretty darn good one at SHU.

It's not revisionist history. It's observation of exactly how they performed on the court. I don't care what people thought ahead of time.

I think it was evident to anyone who watched that season that Gibbs was miscast.

And what does it matter if people thought Jalen was going to the NBA. They were all ridiculously wrong.

If you told me these two are our starting PGs next year....I'd be depressed.
 
It's not revisionist history. It's observation of exactly how they performed on the court. I don't care what people thought ahead of time.

I think it was evident to anyone who watched that season that Gibbs was miscast.

And what does it matter if people thought Jalen was going to the NBA. They were all ridiculously wrong.

If you told me these two are our starting PGs next year....I'd be depressed.
Well I assumed you were talking about Jalen coming in as a freshman (one of the top point guard recruits in the country) and Gibbs as the top transfer point guard in the country. We all know it didn't work out, that's why I said hindsight/revisionist history.
 
LOL well that proves it then. Some message board knucklehead knows some guy who played D2 but made the G league so that proves that Coles will be a great player. He was putting up great stats playing the likes of Coppin State and Florida A&M, not Villanova and Duke. There is a modest difference in size speed strengh and talent. But just explain to me how the best player in New Jersey, a state that produces it fair share of talent was passed over by virtually everybody? And why you think star quality in the worst conference in the country equals staring in one of the best? Is it possible? Sure. But probable is a completely different thing.
Alright man. Chill out. Time will tell. I’m just saying a lot of great players get passed up by high majors every year. And I’ve known a lot more than one player throughout my life that fits that bill. No need for the knucklehead comment though. Overly defensive. Maybe bc you’re questioning your original point you felt the need to call me a name. Not sure
 
Also they know each other from Jersey. Chief00 knows the Grind.
 
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I'm not sure how this has anything to do with RJ Cole, but I'll chime in. Under Calhoun, 2016 is an E8 team at a minimum. Sterling Gibbs, Rodney Purvis, Jalen Adams, Omar Calhoun, Daniel Hamilton, Shonn Miller, Kentan Facey, Amida Brimah, Steven Enoch. Talent galore.

This seems like a stretch. That was a real solid team, and I wish we were that good right now. But as someone pointed out, there was no NBA talent on that roster. So unless Calhoun could have somehow molded some of those guys into pros, I don't think that team had the firepower to be a surefire Elite 8 team.

The thing is, that team was better than people think. We ended the year as #26 in KenPom. I know the non-UConn universe thinks we needed Jalen Adams's miracle shot to even make the tourney, but had he missed and we missed the tourney, it would have been one of the biggest oversights I can remember. We were #29 in KenPom going into that game, with wins over Michigan (50), Ohio St. (76), Texas (39), Memphis twice (75), Houston (61), Georgetown (62), Tulsa (65), and SMU (16), and not many egregious losses. I know those are a lot of bubble teams, but it's also plenty of top-75 wins. After winning the AAC tournament, we should have been a 6 or 7 seed. I'm willing to say we should have been a little better; I think we had top-25 talent, and with a better draw, could have very well been a Sweet 16 team. Just not a top-10 team.

Anyway, back to RJ Cole. I think he'll be good. He might very well be an upgrade. I'm not quite ready to say he'll be better than Sterling Gibbs, though. But I hope I'm wrong.
 
The other thing to remember about Cole is that he was only a sophomore last year. Our two best point guards of all time were flawed players as sophomores and improved significantly as juniors. I would expect someone with the talent of R.J. to be much better in his 3rd and 4th season, especially when you factor in the redshirt year.
 
He is yet another short pg who played in the worst league in college hoops. I’m hoping he will be adequate, which honestly we haven’t had since Napier left.
 
He is yet another short pg who played in the worst league in college hoops. I’m hoping he will be adequate, which honestly we haven’t had since Napier left.

I'm glad we agree that Napier was adequate. If RJ is also adequate to lead a team to a championship, I'll be happy.
 
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