Would you trade their natty for us losing early year after year like he did?
A natty does trump all.
1 Like
And he just missed the tournament. A year after losing to ohio. 2019 was an outlier.
I love tony Bennett
2 Likes
I don’t know. It’s an interesting trade. Personally I associate him with the first and only 16/1 upset rather than the natty
5 Likes
maybe u should smooch him!!!
5 Likes
Makes more sense for those who criticize self not bennett.
I totally agree with your take regarding the year to year basis and how you have to look at a long period of time. And I think what’s crazy about Beilein is when you really start thinking about it, the “luck” factor in the tournament really evened out over the course of his career:
The Lucky Moments:
Burke vs Kansas
Poole vs Houston
The Other Moments:
Morris vs Duke
Harrison sends Kentucky to the F4
Walton vs Oregon
M very obviously had some good fortune in 2013 and 2018; they also very easily could have won it all in 2014 or 2017. Both those teams were without a doubt good enough.
3 Likes
I am trying to rank the top 8 of a few of the teams based on this scale and it’s really hard. I think I might be getting caught up in your descriptions too much. Cause the difference between a ‘meh starter’ and a ‘bad backup’ could just be opportunity.
2 Likes
| Illinois | Rank | Michigan | Rank | Indiana | Rank | MSU | Rank | Purdue | Rank | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Skyy Clark | 3 | Jaelin Llewellyn | 4 | Xavier Johnson | 5 | AJ Hoggard | 4 | Braden Smith | 1 | ||||
| RJ Melendez | 4 | Kobe Bufkin | 3 | Tamar Bates | 3 | Jaden Akins | 4 | Ethan Morton | 3 | ||||
| Terrence Shannon | 5 | Jett Howard | 3 | Jordan Geronimo | 2 | Malik Hall | 4 | Brandon Newman | 2 | ||||
| Jacob Grandison | 3 | Terrence Williams | 3 | Race Thompson | 4 | Joey Hauser | 5 | Mason Gillis | 5 | ||||
| Coleman Hawkins | 4 | Hunter Dickinson | 7 | Trayce Jackson-Davis | 7 | Jaxon Kohler | 3 | Zach Edey | 7 | ||||
| Jayden Epps | 3 | Tarris Reed | 3 | Miller Kopp | 2 | Tyson Walker | 4 | Fletcher Loyer | 2 | ||||
| Dain Dainja | 2 | Dug McDaniel | 2 | Malik Reneau | 3 | Mady Sissoko | 1 | Trey Kaufman | 2 | ||||
| Luke Goode | 2 | Isaiah Barnes | 1 | Jalen Hood-Schifino | 3 | Pierre Brooks | 2 | Caleb Furst | 4 | ||||
| 26 | 26 | 29 | 27 | 26 |
Well here’s my attempt at it. Didn’t think too hard about it but overall I’d just say I’m not terribly impressed with any of them and the winner will be whatever team can get a star leap.
MSU obv benefits from only using 8 players since well that’s all they have. They also will likely be playing the guy I have listed as a 1 up to 20 MPG so can probably discount their score a bit.
Even Indiana. They have the most talent for sure. But they’re gonna have to be a better offensive team and I’m not sure their path there. A Bates leap? JSH is immediately good? Xavier Johnson 5th year jump? They have a few possibilities so I’m fine with them at 1 but I wouldn’t necessarily feel good about that.
Also I’m way out on Illinois. Their roster stinks. Clark is coming off a big injury and is a freshman PG. Melendez was good but he barely played so its super small sample. No idea what they’ll get out of Epps as I just don’t know much about him. Grandison had really good numbers but what does it look like for him in a post Kofi and Frazier world? Idk I just think losing the guys they did could make some guys look worse without them. A shame Shannon had to end up their because if he were at M he’d be on the best team in the conference
3 Likes
I associate Bennett with forcing people not to take Virginia in the tourney the next year and people who believed in Virginia to clean up.
Would it be more clarifying if I said “if you played this guy starter’s minutes, he would play at X level?” Is there something more intuitive? The idea is that you’re not being careful to put him in the best possible situation or keep the training wheels on or what have you. This is just how good this guy is if you gave him a lot of burn.
That said, if you’re getting caught up between a 3 and 4 or 2 and 3, I think those can be difficult distinctions and in a lot of cases we don’t have a ton of information anyway, so it might feel too precise. Flip a coin if it’s real close, imo.
1 Like
Ty for going through the exercise, I’m sure that wasn’t easy. The thing I would add tho is MAYBE you could add a minutes projection? Weighting by that might make a big difference.
Yeah I think it’s just like you’re saying, the difference between a 3 and 4 or a 2 and 3 is really tough especially for CBB guys we know varying amounts about.
1 Like
Yeah I think if we did this for everybody one of the fun things that we might find is there’s a couple guys the community kind of can’t decide on and then guys w about the same projection that everyone is like “this guy is perfectly fine who cares”.
A thing we could add to deal w that is, like, your confidence interval or something like that? Do it as a 25th/50th/75th or whatever. But it’s hard enough to rate 10 dudes on a team let alone do a minutes projection let alone that baloney. Or I dk, maybe people like having that ridiculous level of granularity.
JMO but college hoops is very much about team structure and fit compared to individual players being above or below average.
4 Likes
Colin def disagrees there. But yeah I think it’s both of course.
2 Likes
(1) I think it’s obviously true that team with 5 Zavier Simpsons won’t work as well as other teams. But coaches know this stuff and they try to make teams that mesh together. And there just aren’t that many different kinds of players. Is this guy a creator? just a shooter? 3 and D? Rim protector? the way we describe players suggests that we’re drawing from a set of types that can be compared. And most teams that are bad or struggle are so bc their players are bad not bc they can’t get the ball where they can be effective.
(2) I don’t think this exercise can’t accommodate that mindset anyway. The idea is to grade them like you think they’ll actually play on the team they’re on. I think this is works best when you go with whatever comes immediately to mind. The goal isn’t to make people think super abstractly about this.
I will say that if Kris Murray is coming back I’d put Iowa up there with any non Indiana team. Murray and PatCaff might be the best combo in the conference.
2 Likes
Two points here:
-
Fit and structure are important, that’s a great point. Clark and Shannon would be absolutely killer pickups for Illinois if they still had Kofi. Now it’s meh.
-
The one exception is a team with five Zavier Simpsons. That team would never lose and win every game by 20 points, save for the second night of back-to-backs against five LeBrons, which they would win by 30 points.
3 Likes
Kofi is insanely good and their 3’s would be more open. And now some of their usage that would’ve been more open 3’s will be late clock isos that they’re not super good at. If you went to the weirdo universe where Jaden Ivey came back and transferred to Illinois instead of the draft, then all of a sudden they’re open again and they don’t have to take those late clock shots. Good creators take different shapes but they are super valuable and I don’t see how that makes Shannon worse or better. It changes the rate his shots go in but those extra makes aren’t Shannon’s as much as they’re Kofi’s.
It does mean not having a star on offense makes everybody else look worse but to me that’s a Coleman Hawkins or whoever is starting at the 5 problem. It also means Shannon himself isn’t a star.
…you’re not wrong about Zavier tho. That’s on me.
1 Like