After reading some comments on the blog about people being hopeful about the 2014 class eventually being good, it got me thinking about what it will take for these kids to be good. My main concern is DJ Wilson and will he be misused? This reminds me of Evan Smotrycz. They brought the kid into play the 4 and really only used him at the 5 and then he transfers.
Obviously its way to early to tell what will happen, and the injury sucks but to me as much as they get credit for developing guards, I sometimes question how they approach other positions.
Beilein himself said that Wilson in the future will be playing a wing position. If that is the main position he will be playing then why have him play the 5 at all? Especially this year when they have 3 bigs on the team. He should have been learning the 4, an area they need help. After he grasps that then slowly plug him into the 5. I understand it is hard to judge a freshman, especially after 1 month he gets hurt, but who else feels they do some crazy things sometimes? I also realize that sometimes its out of necessity, but wilson at the 5 was not.
These are the things that concern me on the occasion that they don’t utilize people’s strengths correctly. I look at Chatman, and maybe he is not mentally ready yet, but i don’t know why he can’t come off screens like caris and look to create. They never even attempt that for the kid and is he known for be a great creator/passer?
Interesting thoughts… I’ll jump in with a few comments.
On Wilson… He was getting some time at both the four and the five position, but I think the decision to have him play at the five was essentially: ‘Wow, we don’t really have ANYTHING at the five, if you want to play minutes this year then we’ll have you learn that spot.’
I also think generally the five position is easier to learn than the four… And they always really hesitate to have people learn two positions at a time as a freshman, so I’m sure it’s not something they are aiming for.
Basically development is important, but helping the team now is always more important.
The tough thing with DJ is he’s been hurt twice and missed so much practice time. Missing the summer hurt him in the fall and now he’s just missing all of the time. So far behind the curve at this point.
On Chatman… Tough situation I think. They want to just get the kid comfortable. Seems to me his favorite shot is the mid-range jumper at the top of the key. (He’s 10 of 21 in that area and 13 of 53 everywhere else.)
It’s also tough to experiment with a guy and call his number specifically when he is shooting 31% from the floor.
Bottom line is that the game moves too quickly for Kam right now and he’s going to have to make major improvements. Camp Sanderson will be key for him, even if it means spending the summer a couple timezones away from his home in Ann Arbor.
Darius Morris looked lost as a freshman and dominant as a sophomore, so we’ve seen a similar transition – with another west coast guy.
Smotrycz is a bad example. Beilen was forced to use him as a back up 5. And I saw Smotrycz play the other day for Maryland. Same guy, different team. Saw him give his coach lip when he was taken out of the game. As for bigs development, JMo came a very long way. Mitch struggled for most of his freshman year and then broke loose in the post season. Doyle has already made great strides. I think Wilson’s value as a 5 is shot blocking and the ability to hit a jump shot. Who knows where he’ll be in a year or two?
Smotrycz is a bad example. Beilen was forced to use him as a back up 5. And I saw Smotrycz play the other day for Maryland. Same guy, different team. Saw him give his coach lip when he was taken out of the game. As for bigs development, JMo came a very long way. Mitch struggled for most of his freshman year and then broke loose in the post season. Doyle has already made great strides. I think Wilson's value as a 5 is shot blocking and the ability to hit a jump shot. Who knows where he'll be in a year or two?
Biggest concern for DJ is probably whether he can stay healthy at this point… The pinky, then the knee and then he had all of the back issues in high school.
I don’t think the problem is with the coaching staff placing the freshman in spots conducive to success, those players simply aren’t talented enough to be impact contributors at this point regardless of position/scheme.
Every freshmen’s development is drastically different and very rarely do you see consistency (exceptions to this but not much) from them. Kelly Oubre was barely getting minutes as Kansas and he was considered a can’t miss prospect coming out of Findlay. He finally “got it” and is now starting. The same can be said for Svi Mykhailiuk, in the opposite direction. He started early and was playing a good amount of minutes. Now, he can barely get off the bench.
With all of that being said, at some point the freshmen will get it. It could be this year, it could be next year, or even the year after. As fans, we want instant success with freshmen. It’s just not realistic with all of them. Doyle has done a great job so far and I expect him to have some ups and downs as the season goes along. Chatman was clearly the highest ranked (which seemed justified at the time) and just isn’t getting it. I have to think most of it is mental at this point. He is thinking too much. Talent doesn’t perform when always thinking. The thinking part isn’t unusual for freshmen that have played for Coach Beilein. Joe Alexander was a lottery pick and didn’t see the floor his freshmen year. He felt handcuffed by all the new lingo, different offense, different drills in practice, etc. Have to think this is problem for Chatman.
Back when Coach Beilein first got the job and the team was struggling, Jay Bilas was ripping him because he was backing his boy Amaker. He said, “It isn’t like these guys are learning a new language.” It really is. It’s also one of the reasons why Coach’s teams tend to do well in the postseason. His guys finally get it and they are out there “just playing” within the structure of what is trying to be done.
It’ll come together, just might not be quick enough for everyone.
It'll come together, just might not be quick enough for everyone.
This is generally the approach I take. All first-year college players have different learning curves, and when you hear “curly fry” as a type of motion in Beilein’s offense, I’m sure it takes some getting used to.
While I think HfH has some valid points, and I agree to a certain point…not all players eventually get it. Quite frankly, it’s not always about getting it, for some players they simply don’t have the physical tools or skills that will allow them to be impact players regardless of schematic knowledge or familiarity. If that were the case, literally anyone could be a lottery pick. Some traits are immutable to a certain extent.
I don’t think we have seen enough of Wilson yet to know what he is or where he fits best. Thankfully with Doyle’s emergence we need less help at the 5. Unfortunately Chatman has been almost useless so the 4 is still a major question mark. It’s too bad DJ wasnt healthy all season because he could have maybe helped at the 4. At this point though it probably makes sense to redshirt him assuming no injuries in the front court.
I see a ton of POTENTIAL in this class, but the question is are we going to be able to squeeze it out of them in time. I still have hope for Kam and Wilson, as both of their struggles have to do with being completely lost out there. Doyle is already becoming a solid Big Ten Center, and Dawkins shows flashes of greatness, even if it is sprinkled into a lot of badness. I think the biggest disappointment has to be MAAR. We thought that he would be able to get into the lane and draw fouls, make layups, be a solid PG, etc. but with his lack of doing any of that, there are no offensive “creators” in this class.
They're barely 1/8 of the way through their playing eligibility.
There’s a lot of new guys. I think it will take some time to sort itself out.
If we just had 2 or 3 new guys, then that’d be a different scenario.
An offseason should help a lot for some of these guys.
Excuses, excuses, excuses. If you want to be an elite, national contender, you simply don’t have 2-3 years to develop players unless you already have 2-3 elite players on the current roster. To say otherwise is just not realistic.
They're barely 1/8 of the way through their playing eligibility.
There’s a lot of new guys. I think it will take some time to sort itself out.
If we just had 2 or 3 new guys, then that’d be a different scenario.
An offseason should help a lot for some of these guys.
Excuses, excuses, excuses. If you want to be an elite, national contender, you simply don’t have 2-3 years to develop players unless you already have 2-3 elite players on the current roster. To say otherwise is just not realistic.
We’re talking about the players we have…do you not understand that?
Sure, we could use some better players. But that’s not the topic. lol
We’re not talking crazy theories and strategies here…
They're barely 1/8 of the way through their playing eligibility.
There’s a lot of new guys. I think it will take some time to sort itself out.
If we just had 2 or 3 new guys, then that’d be a different scenario.
An offseason should help a lot for some of these guys.
Excuses, excuses, excuses. If you want to be an elite, national contender, you simply don’t have 2-3 years to develop players unless you already have 2-3 elite players on the current roster. To say otherwise is just not realistic.
We’re talking about the players we have…do you not understand that?
Sure, we could use some better players. But that’s not the topic. lol
We’re not talking crazy theories and strategies here…
Exactly…the players we have are not currently capable of getting the job done. And you offer “it will sort itself out”…talk about profound wisdom. Guess what, things don’t magically sort themselves out
They're barely 1/8 of the way through their playing eligibility.
There’s a lot of new guys. I think it will take some time to sort itself out.
If we just had 2 or 3 new guys, then that’d be a different scenario.
An offseason should help a lot for some of these guys.
Excuses, excuses, excuses. If you want to be an elite, national contender, you simply don’t have 2-3 years to develop players unless you already have 2-3 elite players on the current roster. To say otherwise is just not realistic.
We’re talking about the players we have…do you not understand that?
Sure, we could use some better players. But that’s not the topic. lol
We’re not talking crazy theories and strategies here…
Exactly…the players we have are not currently capable of getting the job done. And you offer “it will sort itself out”…talk about profound wisdom. Guess what, things don’t magically sort themselves out
lol clearly you can’t comprehend this thread. It’s NOT about recruiting theory.
JB - I understand the thread is about development, but baseline talent and/or recruiting are inherent in the discussion. The more talented/athletic a player is coming in, the less development is required, and years won’t be wasted on a kid taking a scholarship while providing no on court production.
JB - I understand the thread is about development, but baseline talent and/or recruiting are inherent in the discussion. The more talented/athletic a player is coming in, the less development is required, and years won't be wasted on a kid taking a scholarship while providing no on court production.
Yep many things are related. But again, this thread is about a class of kids that we already have and their development.
JBlair, MattD isn’t dumb. He knows full well what this topic is suppose to be about.
I could make a thread about peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and MattD would turn it into a discussion about how Beilein’s recruiting sucks.
“Beilein only stocks the clubhouse wih creamy peanut butter, but it’s common sense that high profile recruits yearn for crunchy. Michigan will never be Duke or Kentucky as long as Beilein uses creamy peanut butter.”