I’m with this guy. Hunter is wayyy to high
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I encountered some Illinois fans on Twitter calling Jett Howard trash and a clown and other names, and they were tagging him directly. It was tasteless
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I like Cliff for what he is - dunks, putbacks, rebounds, and blocks. He’s not taking a three, he’s not going to dribble, he’s not going to try a bunch of post moves. But understanding what you’re good at and not doing the things you shouldn’t is a very important part of basketball.
I think the question with Cliff is more about what’s around him. I do think they’ll continue to miss a lot of shots that he can slam home with a putback…but they might struggle on both ends of the court and expose him a bit.
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So I am an asserted Kohler fan. I tried to get the Field of 68 guys to put him in the Top 10 impact freshmen and everyone laughed at me. Jim Root from 3 Man Weave said and I quote “Kohler could be awesome but Izzo will still play him 18 minutes a game while praising how hard Sissoko rebounds in practice” and that was that LOL
But I don’t think it’s that crazy to think he will be really really good. He’s probably a revolving door defensively (but so are Hauser at the 5 and I don’t have any faith Sissoko will ever be playable at the Big Ten level). I buy his offensive game immediately. Not just footwork, although he definitely has every trick in the bag with that, I buy his shot from outside and I think he’s come a long way in a year with his body physically. He strikes me as a kid who sees the massive opportunity and is busting his a$$ to claim the spot for himself entirely.
My baseline for him is basically Nick Ward year one. He averaged 14 PPG as a true freshman on a team with Cassius Winston and Miles Bridges and Josh Langford and Eron Harris despite being horrendous defensively because they had nobody else at center.
I don’t think personally that thinking Kohler could be like a 14 and 7 guy as a freshman in 25-28 minutes per game also means MSU is a good team. I think Hall/Hauser are average not great starters with no all conference ceiling. I think Tyson Walker is a net negative standing in front of a higher ceiling player. I think Sissoko and Brooks and Holloman will all be unplayable leaving them with 6 decent players total. I think their guards as a whole are severely overrated if anyone considers them the best in the Big Ten.
So hopefully that helps. It’s more that I believe in Kohler’s talent and ability to fill a scoring role more than anybody else on what should be a bad team.
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how bad is bad in this year’s B1G? not in the top 5?
Yeah I think they have a long way to go to reach Illinois/Indiana/Michigan level and a slightly less long way to go to reach Iowa/Rutgers level. I’d throw them in with Purdue and Ohio State in the 6-8 range, conveniently right where they’ve been the last two seasons when Aaron Henry has been the only all conference player on the entire roster.
Except I trust that Edey + Painter will figure it out more than AJ Hoggard + Izzo at this stage.
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Everytime you guys say “Tony Perkins” I think Psycho.
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Hopefully our guys use that as motivation. And maybe finally beat illinois instead of getting beat every time.
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Thanks for the explanation. It all makes sense and is consistent. I guess I have a hard time seeing 14 and 7 as a baseline. Nick Ward did that by putting up 30% USG. If Kohler is putting up those stats in 20-25 MPG then I assume you see him at like 25% USG or so which seems wild to me but if your opinion is basically every other msu player is mid at best I see where you’re coming from.
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He’s the D2 transfer, right?
Yes and I was quite curious to watch him play. He’s like the wing version of Dwayne Cohill. Foul magnet at a lower level. He somehow averaged 22ppg but 18% on 3s. No idea how it would have translated.
I do think working in his favor is the fact that Hoggard and Walker are both pretty elite assist guys (while not being scorers themselves). Last year’s team wanted to score through Christie and Gabe Brown…this year’s team wants to score through Malik Hall and….Kohler hopefully? He’s gonna get looks and opportunity even if he can’t defend cuz the whole team around him wants to play set up to somebody and Mady Sissoko / Pierre Brooks aren’t those guys.
How much of their elite assists thing is just a home scorer effect
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It’s also a product of their offense to some degree.
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I could buy that with Walker but I think Hoggard is a very legit assist guy who can’t do anything else except play successful bully ball once every five games
Hoggard averaged 5.67 apg at home and 3.82 on the road
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I think they are both good passers but the degree to which they appear to be better passers than comparable players is overstated by a few factors like MSU’s offense and MSU’s home score keeping.
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Yeah that’s fair. I think the presumption is that Hoggard is gonna be the full time point guard this year and that should bode well for him regardless of what people think about scorekeeping. 3.82 assists on the road in 20 minutes a game would look pretty good in a 35 minute role. But as much as I think Hoggard could give them some positives, I think Walker gives them nothing so I’m not that worried about it.