2018 - Wing - Ignas Brazdeikis (Commit)

He’ll be 19 in January. He’s about six months younger than Livers. Livers of course will also have the advantage (over Iggy and Johns) of a year in the system and in a college weight training program.

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For comparison, Mitch McGary was 20 before his Freshman season at Michigan and Stauskas was 19 before his Frosh season. We saw the growth in their games come March of their first year in Ann Arbor. And Stauskas still made a huge development leap between his FR & SO seasons.

MAAR was 20 before his Frosh season started. DRobinson was 21 before his first game with UM.

Heck, if Brazdeikis is 3/4 as impactful as McGary in his Freshman year, UM will be a fun team to watch next season.
(I use the McGary comparison because Mitch was docked by recruiting analysts for being older & stronger than his prep school opponents; many pundits wondered if that would translate to college against older stronger competition)

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Ha! If it would translate… Mitch has left a lot of his basketball life on the table, sadly, but that boy was a FREAK when he stepped on the court for us for the first time. Rampaging young bull.

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Mitch was downgraded because he didn’t even start on his loaded Brewster team and put up so so numbers.

Mccgary was a decent pro! If he would’ve avoided being suspended I think he would’ve had a relatively successful pro career.

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NCAA and pro leagues need to lose the stupid weed rule. It’s by no means a performance enhancing substance. McGary’s M career should have played out. Anyway, wish we could have seen him in maize and blue a little longer.

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Yes the rule is stupid. But the stupider thing is McGary not telling the coaches that he had used it. The coaches can do a test and he fails and suspends him for 3 games or whatever that rule is. He knew that players got tested at the NCAA tournament and I am pretty sure it is made known that any player on the team (healthy and injured can be tested).

Look I am not going to be naive and pretend like everyone that passes these tests doesn’t partake in this activity. I have no knowledge of the substance or how or what needs to be done to pass the tests despite use, but somehow these players know when to stop and still pass the test.

Honestly the NCAA rule is so strict on failing their test because it is really, really stupid to end up failing their test. Its like being given the answer key to a test and still managing to fail.

He knew he could be tested and didn’t care enough to stop using it. Unfortunately, that’s the rule in place and you have to follow it to be eligible. Its very simple thing to follow and he selfishly wasn’t interested in doing so.

I feel bad for the guy because he was a great player for us, but just making a few very easy decisions could have prevented this.

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Yeah, I sympathize with him.

Can we get back on topic here?

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Has anyone been able to see Iggy live this year? Film don’t count. I watched him in Indianapolis in EYBL session 2 back in April, but a lot of time has passed and he physically looks a lot more explosive and mobile now.

Iggy is 5* now according to Rivals. It should be noted that the top 28 players that are ranked in this class are 5*.

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I read an article a day or two ago saying Iggy was in consideration with 5 or 6 others to be given a 5th star. So if he was added into the rankings it likely means he falls in the 25-30 range.

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I think he’s going to be given a “generic” 5 star because Rivals won’t rank him as a canadian

Yea I know but in theory he would be top 25-28 because the five stars stop at that point. Rivals doesn’t rank non American based players

Ignas just randomly fell to 91 on the composite after Rivals gave him the unranked 5 star thing. They need to find a way to deal with International guys.

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So much rankings angst! Iggy is an incredibly productive kid who is older than most kids he’s playing against. He can get buckets and I think he’ll get buckets early in his career at Michigan. Does it matter what his composite ranking is?

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They have a way to deal with international guys…they give them a star ranking.

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Obviously nothing will change how he plays… I think it’s fair to say as fans we can’t scout all 300 noteworthy players so it would make sense for us to want ratings systems that most accurately reflect ability level so we can be as knowledgeable as possible. Nowhere did I say “Ah man, Iggy fell? Our class sucks now!” I just pointed out that a system that drops someone who gains a 5 star rating on one site is broken.

And it dropped him 50 spots on the composite. It’s pretty obvious it doesn’t work very well.

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I don’t see angst, I see wonder and discussion. Recruiting is a big business, fans pay a lot of money for recruiting info alone. It’s 2018, why not make it as accurate and legitimate as possible? One thing if a site just has differing opinions but Canadians coming here to play isn’t new and most play here plenty. No reason not to have an appropriate way to rank them. It’s not like the different services are going into all the nooks and crannies in the states watching and evaluating Americans every night.

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Rankings are fine at a very high level and for classifying kids into very basic categories. I just always find it funny when people get so hung up on particulars like so and so fell from 65th to 95th or rose from 28th to 23rd when at the most basic level that just means that one guy saw him play a good game somewhere along the line.

Personally I’d rather read updated in-person evaluations from national guys because they do have a good perspective from watching a lot of different players, but that sort of content is more and more rare.

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