Some good stuff from Duncan in here. Talks about Charles Matthews’ wrist injury that kept him at Michigan, NCAA run, real rivals and mentions the plan before the season was for him to come off the bench.
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Also that Michigan players thought Jaren Jackson Jr. would have been an All-American at Michigan. (Tough to argue that one).
He was pretty candid about how confused Livers was early in the season as well. Thought that was interesting because we debated him quite a bit back then.
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Funny to hear Duncan bring up how few pick-n-pop possessions Jackson Jr had last year – he might just be a umhoops twitter follower.
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The back and forth about Livers was pretty funny too.
Duncan: “I was actually supposed to come off the bench all season”
Titus & Tate: “why”
Duncan: “well Isaiah Livers who is a great great player…”
Titus & Tate: (laughing hysterically) “are we sure…”
Duncan: “he just had absolutely no clue where to be offensively”
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Great listen! It was cool hearing Duncan talk so candidly. That podcast actually makes me think we might see an unexpected Isaiah Livers breakout season - sounds like Beilein thinks Isaiah is really talented, but he just never really picked up Beilein’s offense as a freshman, which probably caused a lot of his passiveness on that end.
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It seemed right from the open practice when Coach B stopped practice specifically to coach Isaiah, one on one, that he believed Isaiah was going to be special, but that he also needed to give him some special time, some extra time to help that along. Some, “Come here, son, let me show you where you need to be and what you need to do” time. I noticed right then Coach B really wanted Isaiah to be able to play right away as a freshmen. I’m personally looking for a really good year from Isaiah after a year in the system. Having said that, he IS going to be pushed by some younger guys!
Sorry, didn’t mean to change this thread and make it about Isaiah!
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That podcast was a tough listen, imo… Titus and the other guy wouldn’t stop talking and spewed a bunch of inaccuracies about the Michigan team this past year. You have a guest you are interviewing – let him talk. Some cool tidbits from Duncan, though. So awesome for him that he got a two-way deal with Miami.
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Was gonna say exactly this. In fact, IIRC, the only time coach turned his live mic fully off at that practice was when talking to Livers about something. I think he really sees something in Livers and we saw flashes of that.
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Excellent stuff from Duncan, but I don’t think Simpson’s name came up at all. Would have liked some insights there. Nothing on Teske and Davis either.
I think Matthews/Livers combo is going to be fantastic. Especially defensively with what they allow M to do on that end of the floor.
The Divencenzo stuff was hilarious.
Safe to say, barring injury Matthews is gone gone gone. Not that it was much in doubt anyway.