It’s just frustrating to see time and time again JB’s players develop at a crazy rate and then have a chance to leave early (that they usually take) when MSU reels in McDonald’s all Americans and somehow gets the benefit of them staying more than one year. Gary Harris, Bridges, Dawson, Payne, Appling, Langford, many were 4 year guys.
If Wagner and/or Wilson go pro I’ll be kicking myself again at how stupid this all is
All this hand ringing over whether Bridges returns or not i don’t get. Mich beat them soundly in AA and lost to them in EL but the game in my view was competitive. I like our chances next year if DJ and Wagner come back and even more if Mo Bamba comes or a good grad transfer hops aboard. They will have a lot of talent but some of it will be young and some of the experience does not scare me (guards). Like any other year better be ready to scrap period! So put on your big boy shoes.
I think there is a lot of sanity to that response (a sentiment the board often needs), but my view is less about how we fare against them head to head and more to do with the high % of national narrative they receive. This leads to this cycle where they get a high percentage of recruits to consider them within their top 5 on reputation alone, which if you put more recruits in the funnel you end up getting more, which leads to more success on court, which continues the cycle. When they land someone out of their league (doesn’t happen often) or if someone they land stays longer than projection (bridges), or when one of their garbage teams makes a F4 (2015) these support the “MSU should be ranked top 5 no matter what” narrative that honestly seems someone inflated and gives them tangible benefits.
In short, my view is anything surprising that helps them stay above a full-on rebuild/multi-year correction is bad for Michigan’s recruiting… my attempt to logically defend an emotional stance and maybe not the most important thing to care about. Though if you only worry about head to head, the issue is never relevant b/c we will never play them in the tourney and the worst damage they can do to us is 2 (maybe 3) losses in any given year.
Because I have to ask, we still won’t get in on Bowen will we? C’mon Jordan. Get in his ear now.
It’s frustrating at one level but it says about Beilein’s abilities. I really don’t understand how Izzo, with his record of stunting the growth of top ranked players, continues to attract them. Between that and his sideline antics I don’t understand how he recruits as well as he does.
I posted this in the College basketball reddit and got a ton of shit from MSU fans, but yeah… he’s terrible at getting top players into the NBA.
“Percentage of Izzo top 100 recruits since 2003 , when the composite starts, and stopping at 2012 (With credit given to people after this who are doing well in the NBA such as Harris) who had or look to be having sustained NBA careers: 15% (3/20).”
For those wondering, the three are Green, Harris, and Shannon Brown. The other 17 are Drew Naymick, Marquise Gray, Drew Neitzel, Maurice Joseph, Raymar Morgan, Tom Herzog, Isaiah Dahlman, Kalin Lucas, Durrell Summers, Chris Allen, Delvon Roe, Korie Lucious (He ended up getting kicked off, right? I included him because I don’t think he was gonna be an NBA player), Derrick Nix, Garrick Sherman, Adreian Payne (A Timberwolves fan actually commented saying the entire fan base basically thinks Payne is the worst player in NBA history), Keith Appling, and Branden Dawson. 3/20 is embarrassingly bad.
Beilein over the same time period is 3/7, with the hits being Burke (tentative, but I mean he’s averaging double digits in the NBA), Robinson, and Stauskas, and the misses being Vogrich, I guess Smotrycz and Brundidge, but neither stayed in the program for long, and McGary (Although Beilein did everything he could to set up McGary for a long NBA career…). I didn’t count 2012 for either team but you can probably throw Walton and Irvin in there too eventually. So with 13 less top 100 recruits, Beilein has the same amount with somewhat stable NBA careers (Again, Burke is ehhhh).
What about Paul Davis? I recall that he was ranked in the top 10 leaving high school and had a short NBA career. Marcus Taylor is another one who comes to mind.
They might have been before 2003 when the composite goes back to. I just used the data from there. It really is crazy how awful Izzo has been at getting top players to have good NBA careers.
Maybe the feedback he’s getting from teams in the 10-15 range is more tepid than the draft projections? Just because Draft Express or ESPN or SI have a player projected in a certain range doesn’t necessarily mean the scouts of those teams feel the same way about the player. NBA “sources” and scouts have reason to be coy with Draft Analysts; act more intrigued by common names to help under the radar options slide through. Those same scouts have less reason to be coy with players & their “family advisors”
Or maybe some NBA Execs have hinted at DLeague time to develop his game ---- at which point East Lansing probably sounds better than life in the DLeague?
He was hurt for several games last year. He should take the hint.
Maybe this helps us sign bamba? That would be a legendary match up if Ws return.
Bridge’s biggest risk might not be injury but shooting the ball worse. He shot 39% from 3 last year, quite good, but was fairly inconsistent and didn’t strike me as necessarily a pure shooter. In theory, you might think he’ll have better shots next year if MSU is better, but he may also not have as much freedom to pick and choose what shots he wants to take or just shoot worse. When Bridges is “projected” as a top 5 pick the following year, that’s projecting he’ll improve. But that’s not always the case, and some might argue that Izzo doesn’t have the greatest record developing players by year 2. Gary Harris shot 6% worse from 3 his sophomore year. And ask Melo Trimble what a drop in 3 pt shooting can do to draft stock.
But whatever else we might think of him, Izzo seems to do a good job of creating an us against everyone brotherhood vibe. And it’s hard for me to get too worked up about a guy wanting to stay in college longer. As long as I’m happy with what Michigan is doing and feel like we’ll have a potentially top level team, what’s happening elsewhere doesn’t bother me.
I am not sure that I would use Gary Harris as the example here. He is one of the few (the only one that I can think of actually) MSU players who was a projected first round player that came back and actually improved his stock. That aside, I think we will definitely see a regression in Bridge’s 3pt%. Doesnt have a great looking shot and his AAU and high school stats would suggest that he is just a chucker.
Interesting point. Along those lines, Bridges is going to play 3 for the first time in his career next year. I have no doubt that he has the skills and athleticism to do so at a very high level, but the switch to guarding (and being guarded) by smaller, quicker players and spending most of the time on the perimeter will be an adjustment.
Man, you guys nailed it: I would not bet on Bridges shooting 39% or better next year. His shot is not pretty–looks like a a 28-32% shot to me. His stock won’t improve, I think.
Yeah, we’ve seen on our own team guys succeed going against bigger players in small ball lineups but then struggle or at least take time to adjust when facing even smaller lineups/players.
Sign me up for some CM guarding Bridges, rather than DJ. DJ will probably get better at on-ball 1v1 defending against quicker players, but there’s no way Bridges gets a step on Matthews; Id much rather see Bridges try playing on the block and baby hooks. DJ vs J. Jackson is also a pretty interesting matchup; Leaf took DJ to town, but Leaf looked so incredibly fundamentally sound and UCLA was ridiculously hot.
It is insane to me that Bridges would come back. He is a sure fire lottery pick. What kind of voodoo does Izzo do on these kids? Contrast that with JB who clearly has the kids’ best interests at heart.
Don’t think it is fair to say that Izzo doesn’t have best interests at heart. Maybe Miles just really wanted to come back to school for another year. Sort of like Mitch McGary did for example when his stock was never going to be higher.
On the MgoBlog roundtable segment of The Michigan Insider radio podcast, Craig Ross said Izzo should tell Bridges that there isn’t a scholarship for him, that Izzo should simply not let Bridges return because it is clearly the wrong decision. I’m not sure I’d go that far, because the kid should allowed what he wants to do. But, with his track record of convincing guys to come back, it just seems hard to believe that Izzo did everything ‘but’ tell Bridges there isn’t a spot for him.