I also wonder if there is a possibility Nunez gets nervous. Maybe he shuts down when the lights turn on. I like his shot form. It just misses from what I have seen.
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If mop-up time is easy, why did Nunez look completely lost in mop-up time as a freshman?
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It absolutely is troubling that he couldnât beat out Nunez. But at the same time, it was reasonably predictable that Bajema could have been a guy who would take longer to adjust to the college game given his physical stature and the caliber of competition he played in HS. So in projecting Bajema as a college player, you likely had his long term development in mind, not what he looked like a freshman.
Would he have been the odds on favorite for the rotation next year? No. But who would have been the favorite? I would have given him at least the same odds as Nunez and possibly even Zeb.
And you didnât specifically say him leaving is meaningless obviously, but it is implied from the relative âmehâ stance on him leaving.
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Frustrating to âdebateâ with people who just respond to one comment I write in this thread rather than read the articles I write on the site (leaves me to just repeat myself after I write a 1000 word article), but the obvious clarifying point here is that Juwan Howard â the guy who knows more about basketball than you or I â had access to hours and hours of practices and didnât play him despite a need and despite Nunez struggling.
What is the argument as far as why Howard wouldnât play Bajema if he could outperform Nunez in games?
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Adrien Nunezâ minutes in conference play in games without Isaiah Livers:
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17 (in the infamous Nebraska game in which CJ Baird played 8 minutes and Bajema played 0)
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No - I do not think there was an âobvious need for bodiesâ. Also this is an odd point to fixate on when Iâve already stated I donât even think Bajema deserved to play over Nunez. Iâm much more interested in answers to the questions Iâve asked that are being ignored:
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do you feel the staff has appropriately gone after transfers to fill the need that they should have obviously seen coming from these transfers
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do you think Bajema, a scholarship player who happens to be 6â7â with a reasonable possibility he could be a long-term asset and shot 10-13 from the floor in garbage time really deserved to get passed by CJ Baird at any point last season?
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He did outperform Nunez in games. Hence the mystery, and the assumption we all naturally make that Nunez outperformed Bajema in practice. Maybe Howard needed to see it in practice from Bajema and it just wasnât there.
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Sorry. I donât want you to feel frustrated. I was just expressing my own general opinion based upon what I saw. I was not referring to anything you said.
And how many minutes did Nunez play in Big Ten games when Livers was healthy? Not sure Iâm fixating on a point, I responded to your post that said Livers had no impact on the situation.
Michigan clearly needed another wing last year and was never quite comfortable playing DDJ as a 3rd 6-foot guard.
I think prioritizing Mike Smith from the jump was smart given the DeJulius situation. I think the staff probably feels better about Austin Davis than I do but Iâm a bit surprised not to see more (any?) attention on any sort of post prospects.
Overall, it is really hard to judge the pursuit of transfers. Situation is very fluid in any transfer recruitment and there are academic, team fit, etc. issues that always have to get worked out.
Again, it is impossible to say without knowing what happens in practice. Bajema was 4-of-7 from three and stepped out of bounds on two 3-point attempts. I wouldnât judge him differently if he were 6-of-7 or 1-of-7.
If Baird was 50% more likely to make the right rotation on defense, wouldnât you choose him to play those minutes in that situation 10 times out of 10?
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My issue with the way everyone frames these debates is as if it is a one-sided choice like a general manager in professional sports.
Juwan Howardâs job is to play the players he thinks are most likely to help him win during the season. He didnât think Cole Bajema was that guy (and had a lot more to evaluate than we did).
Cole Bajema has a choice to either come back to a situation where heâs presumably at the bottom of the depth chart and has to play his way up for a coach who didnât recruit him, or go somewhere else closer to home for a coach who recruits him.
They are two different decisions. This doesnât just apply to Bajema but any transfer situation.
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CB must be the most talked about one year non-rotation player in the history of Michigan basketball.
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My âfixating on a pointâ comment was directed to Dot, my apologies. I left a long comment and the only piece that was responded to was the need for bodies.
My post was not the post that said Liversâ injury had no impact on the situation. However, it seems clear to me that Bajema and Nunez were fighting for 4th guard minutes off the bench, and that Liversâ injury impacted Johns, Wagner, DeJulius in that order much more than any impact on the Bajema vs. Nunez competition. No one is arguing that a 6â7â rotation level player would have been a great addition with Livers out. Bajema is not that, and we didnât need him to be that with Johns, Wagner, DDJ still healthy alongside Brooks/Simpson playing damn near 80 minutes a game.
I just think Bajemaâs future potential alone should be prioritized over anything Baird could have provided.
I donât have a grand argument that demonstrates Howard was wrong to play Nunez over Bajema. I only have access to what I saw at games and I am left to speculate the rest. Pure speculation but I assume Bajema played worse than Nunez in practice and maybe there were reasons for it? 1) Maybe Nunez gets nervous in games? 2) Maybe Bajema gets focused in games? 3) maybe Bajemaâs tailored training schedule made it difficult for him to perform in practice?
I donât know. I only know that imo Bajema performed better in games. Small sample size for sure.
Generally speaking I think Juwan is doing a great jobâI am very happy to be along for the ride. I also look back at what I wrote and I definitely hope what I wrote was not interpreted as me not liking Nunez. I like all of our players. I think his shot form is beautiful. There is a real potential there. Same with Bajema.
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Taking out the Nebraska game which was clearly an outlier, Nunez played 1.9 minutes per game in 11 games with Livers healthy. He played 2.6 minutes per game in 8 games with Livers out. Iâm sure Johns, DDJ and others saw a more significant uptick.
Howard put Franz in the starting lineup right away so heâs clearly not gun shy about playing unproven freshman. So it stands to reason that Cole and Franz were far apart in terms of readiness.
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I wouldnât dispute any of this, nor, I suspect, would anyone else here.
Iâm guessing he decided he needed to see something consistently from Bajema in practice if Cole was going to crack the regular rotation (regardless of game performance), and he didnât see it.
Coaches can be a stubborn bunch (Beilein certainly was) and each have their own policies which they believe are conducive to winning. Generally, I would say what I described above is a good policy. Occasionally a player might slip through the cracks. Maybe this was one such case, maybe not.
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In one day, this already has more comments than the Castleton thread and nearly as many as the DeJulius thread.
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Quarantine fever: whatâs fun is that I think people most agree and are arguing about marginal points.
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It seems weird that you get frustrated with people debating things on your site, when it is, you know, designed for that very purpose.
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My point was just that people snipe one line that I write in a comment but donât think it is worth subscribing to the site to read the articles that I write. (And that keep things like this message board running)
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During my coaching days I had some players who would think of themselves as gamers. Often I would bump their minutes or rotation spot in practice the next day and they STRUGGLED. My take is that âGamersâ are often inconsistent. As a coach I wanted to know what to expect. The players who made the âI do it when it mattersâ argument often missed that it ALWAYS matters.
This is not to malign Coleâs effort or talent, just to point out that coaches may look for consistency. It can be hard as a freshman, with strength training and scout team work living across the country to deliver consistency. I wish him well, I think heâll be a really good player soon.
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