Game 5: Ohio at Michigan Open Thread

As much as I like Martelli, I hate it when he uses negative language about the players to the press. It is not productive and does not help to teach 18 year old kids to become better by humiliation.

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Ok so he has some time. Also the foul machine comment was about Tschetter. He said somethings about Youssef but I don’t remember exactly what, but implied he was really struggling shooting the ball at one point

Don’t know what this means but he wasn’t in the French league. He was essentially in a French college league and the competition there is well below major D1 ball

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i feel the opposite, and being walking foul is pretty light humilation. if you foul alot, you need to be accountable to that. i appreciate candor in the days of participation awards and coddling

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Well, we’ll see. I personally think that statement falls very squarely in the categories of “you’re not the coach and they are so let’s trust they know what they’re doing,” “recognize that what’s common sense to you may not be common sense to all”, “spending a few years playing in Europe is not a reliable predictor of all behaviors” and also “the coaches know yo-yo personally and you do not, so they have a better feel for the mental aspect of development and what specific tricks are more likely to work for him”. But the results will eventually speak for themselves.

On the one hand, I get your point. But this isn’t a Franz situation where the kid was playing meaningful minutes for a good national team. Yo-Yo was closer to Moe, who barely played as a freshman and stayed for 3 years. I think there are plenty of examples of European players coming to the NCAA and sticking around for a while before heading back to a pro league overseas. I think the issue is that Michigan fans like us talked him up into being a 2-and-done pro when he’s probably not that.

We’ll see where things go and I’m still optimistic about Yo-Yo. What continues to perplex me is that Juwan keeps building his roster on forwards, most of which are years away from being a good B10 rotational player and most of which currently have freshmen eligibility. I like each of them in their own way, and I know the Shannon thing threw us off a bit…but it is concerning. Look at next year, when we may need to dip into the portal again for guards and our roster is full of forwards who aren’t currently in the rotation (Barnes, Jace, Tschetter, Yo-Yo, Glenn). I trust in Juwan, and these things tend to work themselves out…but guard recruiting and guard roster management is an area of mild concern for me.

All good points.

Our free throw shooting is atrocious to say the least, and our rebounding (or rebounding effort) is not where we want to be. We have seen Juwan sending a message to the starters, by letting the subs run for a while. is Baker the answer at the 4 to improve upon our deficiencies? I do not know, but the stats, if you can trust Limoges U21 competition, show a respectable 4-year improvement in free throw, rebounding and scoring for Yoyo. If this team does not show improvement, maybe the coaches need to at least consider Yoyo.

Barnes is backing up the two right now.
Khayat is basically a wing, I don’t really see him as a combo forward at this point.

Khayat was a pretty bad rebounder on film and got pushed around in the paint at Limoges U21 (which isn’t professional and isn’t comparable to D1 basketball). If he were to factor in, it would be with his movement and shooting on the wing. The problem is that reports are he struggled with his shot since arriving and it’s hard to be a great defender when you are learning what’s going on.

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For the 21-22 year in the U21 league, he averaged 17.4 points, 7.7 rebounds and 1.8 assists. I am not sure if that compares favorably against a high-school senior, but if not, then why on earth we are recruiting these folks?

I understand the numbers, I watched film from many of his games. There’s a large leap from playing with a youth team in France to playing Division I college basketball.

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Also, didn’t Moe love his time on campus? He convinced Franz to come pretty much just pushing the campus experience more than playing for a coach or playing against other college teams. I’m sure it varies person to person, but I don’t get the Euros won’t stay in general point.

Looking at what next years team looks like has no value at this point anyway. No way to predict what happens with major pieces let alone which benchwarmers could be rotation players next year.

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Because he would be a pretty good US high school basketball player?

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Who hasn’t?

(Sigh)

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Khayat’s numbers were better than Gianni’s numbers who never even played division 1 in the Greek League, and never played college. He just played for the u21 youth national team. He was not exactly destroying the completion in division 2, which I would argue is at the same and even worse level as in France.

Recruiting is about potential, and what a team can do to help a player realize his potential. Apparently Khayat checked a few boxes to be recruited at Michigan on potential alone. He struggled with his shot, but who didn’t?

i dunno if comparing Yo-Yo to a singular, NBA MVP talent is really fair. sure, Giannis did really well given how he started; that doesn’t mean you should auto-take every player who averages 9.5 ppg in the Greek second division and immediately play them no matter how they look in practice.

if anyone’s curious about current greek second division stats, uh, here!

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You’re still misunderstanding the level Youssef and Giannis were playing. Giannis was in the second league, yes. But Youssef was in a U21 league. It essentially was not a pro league.

And yes using Giannis as a reference for anyone is just setting up for disappointment

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Fair point on Barnes, though he’s barely playing at this point. My real message was that next year’s roster is essentially “full” right now and it still only includes 3.5 guards, one of whom is a project freshman and the 0.5 is Barnes. But we have six other forwards looking for time so Yo-Yo will have his work cut out for him even if he’s the most wing-shaped option of those non-Jett options. Maybe the real point I should have made is having TWill, Jace, Glenn, and Tschetter as essentially PF guys is a lot.

I guess you could say that Yo-Yo is in line to take the Baker role next year. That’s not a bad projection as a scoring/shooting spark off the bench.

I would think Barnes is a greater flight risk than YoYo, but that’s obviously just wild speculation. Still if B essentially sits the bench for a second year and remains blocked by Kobe and Jett, it wouldn’t be crazy for him to want to see if there are more minutes elsewhere.

So I really hope he gets enough minutes this year to get comfortable and show what he’s got. I recognize it is probably quite hard to manage minutes for future rosters when you’re struggling to beat Ohio.

With the benefit of hindside, we know that a comparison of Giannis and Yoyo is unfortunate. But, if one looks at the competition level, age, height, weight, stats, etc, will find many similarities rather than differences. Giannis technically came from Saragosa Spain, after the Bucks purchased his contract, so he can play straight at the NBA at 18 years old.

What I am trying to say is that recruiting is all about future potential, eye for a talent, and player development. Apparently both, Giannis and Yoyo were recruited based on what agents and coaches saw THEN (and not now), considering the competition level, their vitals ( age, height, weight), and what they thought they might have in their hands without looking at any crystal ball.

Giannis was thrown to the inferno as a sub his rookie year and he was bullied to the max. He got a taste of what it is to play at the NBA level, and that affected his future development as the player he is now. If Yoyo does not see the floor this year, do not expect him to develop, or stay in Michigan for 4 years.

If Michigan had the number of games the NBA does, Khayat would get some run. They aren’t going to throw someone who isn’t ready out there unless they have zero options

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Yo-yo is a not a physical freak like Giannis, and far from it. His best asset was probably his defensive awareness. IMHO, it will take at least year for him to be physically ready and I have no illusion that he will contribute in a signifiant way this season.