I’m with you mattd. I really really liked young. Fell in love with his game. If you go back to my posts I was advocating for him early as a must. I still like him and hope we land him. That being said imo Tillman is as good, with advantages in areas we need help. He really creates for himself well and has great handle. He’s also a beast to the rack.
I think with the added added attention to young that we need to turn up the heat on other prospects. Tillman being one of them. If he is a realistic get and he is interested he should be one of the next offered. I’m not going to say I prefer him per say but I would take either. young is still one of my favorite 2017 kids and I think he’s a top 75 kid all day. He’s also a great fit for what we do. But Tillman is not a drop off by any means and his skill set at the four would be a tough match up. He reminds me of a better version of Matt jones for duke. Not surprised coach k likes him.
Young
Tillman
Livers
That should be who we are after hard. I’m assuming Williams and Wilkes are long shots.
Also I really hope we add Roberts as I keep preaching. Guy is a baller. Underrated. I really hope we stay after him. I think we have at least four spots for 17. Poole, Cain, one of those pf and rovers would be our best class since stauskas and crew ( obviously) I see a lot of success with that type of class.
I definitely like strong, PF types who can handle the ball and create. Give me a Draymond Green any day. I don’t see the Matt Jones comp, though, as Jones is pretty much just a shooter IMO.
I agree that Tillman is better than Young as a general high school prospect. However, in our offense I would prefer Young due to the fact that having 4 plus shooters on the floor at a time (5 if Donnal can find some consistency) opens up the pick n roll so much more since they’re more hesitant to help off their men. So much of our offense relies on pick n roll that I think it’s worth the drop in athleticism, specifically due to the lack of a dominant guard (a la Burke and Stauskas) who can run it to perfection regardless of how crowded the lane is.
Where are the offers? Where is the excitement around the program? JB approaches recruiting like he’s strolling down the sidewalk on a beautiful spring day whistling his favorite tune.
Matt, has Donnie heard from the staff recently? He is the type of 4 we have sorely missed but we all know how much JB values shooting. Any chance we could take both?
Don’t think Donnie has heard directly from the staff, but he did notice JB at his game in Indy, that he did confirm to me. Don’t think there is any way we take both Donnie and Kyle. Personally, I’d love to have either
I was in attendance the first 2 games - he caught an elbow vs Team Final and had a noticeable lump on his head during the 2nd half. There were a handful of plays that game and the next where he had issues just catching the ball and was off balance a few times as well. Whether the elbow influenced his play, I can’t really say, but he did pick up his play the last 2 games of the weekend.
Thanks, going to be an interesting summer and what we do with the current 4 ships especially with time passing on the 16 class. Really hope if the staff is going to take a PG that we look at some better prospects. Maybe Cummings from All Ohio or Davison from Pulley.
For better or worse, this has always been JB’s style - he targets a few key guys early, keeps scouting, then moves on to Plan B guys.
We have offers out to Cain, Young, and Jaren Jackson. He probably wants to see what happens with those before moving to the next group of targets.
Burke was a Plan B to Pangos, whose recruitment dragged on. Hardaway was a Plan B to Ziegler and Casey Prather. We didn’t really pick up the McGary recruitment hard until after Costello committed to MSU.
Outside of Crean, I don’t see other coaches putting out a ton of offers. Beilein has three offers out plus Poole in the fold. He might offer a PG in '17, but there are several that he is evaluating. Just because he only has a few offers out doesn’t mean that he isn’t working.
Jones is a tweener 3/4. He can pass, shoot and handle the rock fairly well. You’ve never seen his handles? Jones can be crafty. TillMans are much better and he’s pretty much better athlete/creating for himself and passing. I think Tillman reminds me of a better version of him. Maybe a draymond comparison works better? Although I haven’t seen that level of craftiness/ back to basket on those videos.
I feel like these stats are pretty indicative of Jones’ game - some decent assist numbers this past year (but about 1 per game less than Zak Irvin, for example), but on the whole, he’s a shooter first and foremost IMO:
With respect, offering only three guys at the (modest) level of Cain/Young and then moving a rung down to look for Plan B would be a weak showing even by JB’s standards. I appreciate that you qualified your comment with “for better or worse” but if this is how the 2017 class shakes out, it would definitely be “for worse.”
(Caveat: Even though I don’t like the pace of things at the moment, I am not sure that things will unfold this way. Heck, we may yet land Cain and Young (I didn’t include Jackson… haven’t heard much lately, so I’m not sure if he’s a real “target” despite holding an offer). Personally, I’m still holding out hope for guys like Williams and Tillman. But if things unfold as you suggest, I don’t think we should shrug it off with “well, I guess Coach knows what’s best for his program.” 2017 is a critical class and we should recruit like it.)
Just to chime in a bit - I think JB works as hard as anyone during live evaluations periods, and quite frankly, probably outworks other coaches. During the EYBL sessions in NY and Indy, JB was there damn near all day, and viewed entire games and took notes throughout. Contrast that with many other coaches, who viewed partial games, and took 1-2 hour breaks, and I think its safe to say JB is working hard with respect to evaluation, which is probably why he’s landed under the radar types that have worked out in the past.
Where JB leaves a bit to be desired is the contact portion of recruiting, he simply doesn’t contact recruits/families as much in relation to other coaches out there. Kids want that sort of constant attention, for the most part anyway. If JB improved that portion of his recruiting approach, I think it would help tremendously.
Cain is up to 33% for the EYBL season after that slow start. I’d like to see what kinds of threes he’s making before passing final judgment on his shooting ability, but either way it’s a nice showing. And even if he’s only taking wide open catch and shoot threes, there’s a big place in Michigan’s offense (and on other teams) for a guy with his other abilities who can shoot open threes at a good clip. Good for him.