Exactly kind of my point. That adds a bizarre level of ambiguity to the whole thing. Is player X excluded because of an evaluation or because of intel? Those are very different things. I didn’t read the whole article, maybe he states the player pool he’s using or excluding.
That ain’t near “Nuf sed”. There’s an obvious reason Beilein runs all those late shot-clock 3s for Poole.
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You could be right – it’s seemed to me that he looks the part of an NBA SG in terms of his physical ability, but I will watch closer for that.
Do enlighten us. And tell us why Poole is a “terrific shooter”, despite appearances to the contrary.
I think people need to realize the vast disparity in shot difficulty between Poole and Brazdeikis. Admittedly - choosing your shots is part of being a good shooter, but one guy is taking a ton of off the dribble, difficult shots, and the other is largely taking catch and shoot threes he gets off Simpson’s action.
When NBA scouts get wowed by a guys shooting, they are generally talking about a guy who can take and make off the dribble threes. Right or wrong, I think the NBA has succeeded in turning enough non-shooters into serviceable catch-and-shoot from the corner guys that the ability to do that doesn’t wow them that much.
Poole, to use a hacky analogy, is the stallion that hasn’t been broken yet - he’s athletic, he’s an under-rated defender (something I think many here have ignored this year, because he does sometimes make a dumb mistake), he has a solid handle, he can create off the dribble. His biggest problem is judgement, but he has the contours of an NBA player.
Ignas is refined, he knows the shots to take and mostly what not to take. I think he’s prone to defensive lapses just as bad if not worse than Poole. I don’t think he’ll be able to drive in the NBA, because he’s not very explosive, and not very shifty. I don’t know he can physically guard the wing. Poole isn’t a great passer, but Ignas’ game here is non-existent. None of this is to insult him - he’s a mentally tough kid and a hard worker.
Ignas is a better player right now. But I see how someone could look at Poole and see the raw clay of an NBA player. Not sure with Ignas.
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I did—the coaches perspective trumps yours, despite your paying fast and loose with stats. Poole has been a 37%+ 3 point shooter last year and this year.
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I think it’s fair to note that against the best competition (Big 10 season), Poole shot 33%, Brazdeikis shot 43%.
However, what’s interesting is that due to being superior inside the arc (Brazdeikis quietly was a very poor finisher in-conference), getting to the line more, and making a higher % from the stripe, Poole’s TS% (how efficiently he scored) is nearly flat to Brazdeikis.
Poole justifiably gets a ton of stick for bad shot selection, but I’m mystified at how some at this board obsess over the final possession of the game (where he WAS fouled), and forget the absolute dogshit airball Ignas floated with 15 seconds on the shot clock - possibly the biggest example of hero ball we had.
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Small quibble, but Poole shot 5-8 from 3 against UNC, which is a decent team. He shot 35% from 3 against top 50 teams. And for what it’s worth, even in the B1G he had many of his best shooting games in the tougher games - e.g., PU, @Minny, @MSU - and his worst against the lower tier of B1G teams. Last year he shot 42% from 3 in conference, worse in the nonconference. I’d say he’s more streaky than unable to shoot against top competition. But there’s no doubt he struggled at times this year, particularly in January and February.
All of our top players have had very good seasons but have come up short at crucial times. Poole had to save the day at Northwestern because X was shooting them out of the game. Iggy went O for Wiscy. X played poorly at PSU. Teske fouled out in 13 mins at Iowa and had 5 points against PSU. Matthews had 6 points at Iowa, 5 points and 3 TOs at Wiscy. As great as X has been this year, a reason he’s so ball dominant is that he’s a liability off the ball. And he struggled mightily @MSU. Not to pick on X, he just seems to be receiving the reverse kind of treatment at the moment - though that can change quickly.
The team has had a very good year. They’ve won 28 games before the NCAA tourney and are fifth on kenpom. A couple different bounces or calls and they might be B1G regular season and tourney champs. They’re not perfect, none of them, but there a lot of silly narratives floating around.
And for whatever reason – maybe you’re right it was expectations or the possibility/promise of the Stauskas jump, maybe it was the perception of the home game against MSU – Poole seems to be on the receiving end of the most irrational vitriol for a guy who was honorable mention all-B1G for a 19-year old first year starter. Just seems kind of lame to me.
I’ll stop ranting (geez 
).
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People are looking for scapegoats and Poole is the current student-designate, another in a long line of very talented ones. He has bailed us out with a pile of late-clock threes season-long, sometimes creating when there was nothing. And although Beilein obviously wants the ball to go in–and it’s indisputable that he takes his share of inadvisable shots–he also pretty obviously has, as a shooter, authorization from Beilein to shoot.
Poole will be a guy like D.J. who a certain kind of poster rags on and who will be collecting a big check while they move on–unashamedly–to their next cybernetic victim. Hopefully Jordan is oblivious, keeps up his (reportedly amazing) hard-working routine. If he stays I think he’s a first team B1G all conference player and big time star.
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Not sure about Vecenie’s most recent Mock draft but in the past he said he left Iggy off for that exact reason. He just believes Iggy was staying.
I looked at another forum and was pretty shocked at the extent that people are down on Poole. To be honest, I think it is a lot of crazy talk. Poole is one of the best recruits JB has ever had. He is young. He is putting it all together. When it is all comes together for him he is going to be one of the best in the country.
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I used B10 season as quick shorthand. I think Poole is the guy the team looks to for tough shots late in the shot clock just because he can get them off - against better teams it would follow there are more of those. Poole can obviously make shots when he gets good looks. My main argument through this thread is that he’s struggling a bit with increased usage and the increased difficulty of shots that brings - which is completely understandable.
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I think it has been a difficult year for Poole and JB and the offense in general at times because this is a complex team to identify offensive roles with. Zavier Simpson has to have the ball in his hands, and wouldn’t be nearly as effective if he played off ball. Poole has a lot of the skills to be that lead, high usage guard and at times has excelled there, but the responsibility to be that guy won’t ever be there with Simpson alongside him in this offense. Part of why Stauskas (and Levert) were able to make major leaps quickly IMO is because Walton was very effective off ball and frankly wasn’t ready to be the lead ball screen guard. It’s probably a luxury for Poole to not be forced into that role since he hasn’t looked entirely ready, but I think it’s a difficult thing for a player of his skill set to figure out when to assert himself and when to be a complimentary piece.
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I reserve most of my frustration for the defensive end, where he’s great when he wants to be but just somehow isn’t really there for a few possessions every game. I think he’s really tried to be a lead guard in those situations on offense, and stepped up bigtime in the @Maryland came during X’s foul trouble. But by the end of that five-minute stretch his decision-making had seemingly deteriorated, and it ended with one of those awful forces. Although for most future NBA wings that part of the game has probably developed by sophomore year of college, it hasn’t for Poole yet and that’s no great shame. It would be no big deal at all and we’d be hardly discussinng it, IMO, without the 3-5 plays on defense. That amount of plays is the difference between 0-3 and potentially something else.
Great comment.
IMO Poole taking on some of the lead guard role that would simulate the Stauskas/Walton dynamic, which was so effective requires one of X, Brooks,Matthews, or DDJ being a decent 3 point shooter. Not having a ton of confidence in shooting from X I had my fingers crossed that Brooks would be able to take on that role so that our offense could at least have a different look some of the time but so far it has not happened.
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The Brooks story has been a huge element of how the season’s gone. It’s not too late for him to find his shot and his voice within the offense.
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yep.
I have noticed improved self-confidence with his shooting. I am very glad he is letting it fly recently. It just hasn’t dropped much for him though. My fingers are still crossed.
Also, he has been playing excellent defense. It is great to see him evolve. I believe in him for sure.
Yes, and to be fair my annoyance carries over from mgoblog; I wouldn’t deny that the criticism is more measured here, and better argued.
I just want to say that I am so pleased that I came back to this thread a few minutes ago. There is so much positivity over the last 8 or 10 or 12 comments that I’ve read. gtfomycourt, Mattski, buckets, mgl, UMHoopsFan, hack, mazs, love your comments and your positivity. THIS is why I come back to the forum time and time again.
To those who critique (criticize) our players, I DO support your right to the opinion you have. Many of you are very knowledgeable, some are extremely knowledgeable, more so than this old coach! But let me just leave this thought here. After the last game vs. MSU, we were all upset. I told my wife I was VERY depressed (I wasn’t, but I wasn’t happy, either) and then I went to play with my “special” needs grand daughter. I’ll not go into detail, but she completely changed my mood in less than five minutes. I went from being disturbed at our loss to being incredibly grateful that I had this amazing little girl in my life.
About a half an hour later the Selection Show came on TV. I watched, of course, but without quite the same level of enthusiasm with which I watched it last year. Then I though about our kids, our MICHIGAN basketball players. I thought about how they must be FEELING in that locker room. Like all of you I waited and waited for our seeding and pairing to be announced.
Finally, they went to the West Regional and they announced Michigan as a 2 seed playing Montana. When they showed our players, a few of them bravely put a smile on their face, but there was no excitement, no real joy. Those kids were hurting. They were in pain. And suddenly I realized my disappointment over that loss to State was NOTHING compared to the hurt those young men were feeling.
As fans we LOVE the kind of feeling we got after the Iowa game on Friday or the Minnesota game on Saturday. “Oh, my gosh! We are MICHIGAN!” We walk around strutting our Michigan garb, sticking our chests out, acting like we’re “all that” because we just annihilated two solid B1G teams, and “man, we’re gonna beat State today!”
We act as if “WE” did something special. “WE” did nothing. We didn’t make the shots, or play the defense, or coach the kids. We didn’t work our tails off in practice EVERYDAY. We didn’t spend time in the cold tub. We didn’t study and study and study the other team’s tendencies, all the while being full time students…at Michigan for gosh sakes! Most of us just sat in our easy chair in front of our TV set and cheered, and yelled at refs, and drank a few beers. And we felt really good…after Iowa and Minnesota. We experienced such joy and pleasure from watching “our” team. But, frankly, that’s all “we” did. We didn’t play. We didn’t coach. We didn’t practice. We didn’t bust our butts.
Then Sunday afternoon came. And we sat there and drank a few beers, and we cheered, and we thought, OK, we’re ahead by 13…FINALLY! And then Cassius Winston, All American PG, B1G POY and a possessed Matt McQuaid, an outstanding shooter under normal circumstances, and a man on a mission (Kyle Ahrens, by the way, is his roommate) took over. They refused to lose. Our kids may have helped them a bit with a poor decision here or a missed assignment there, and certainly not purposely, but make no mistake, Winston and McQuaid with a little help from their friends, like Tillman, and a maniacal coach just took the game away from us. And so we felt really bad.
No one feels worse than our players. NO ONE! After that game they were hurting, they were in pain. There was no joy in that locker room. They had worked SO hard and had fallen short. I’m sure the players were devastated. I am sure there were some tears. Those 18-21 year old young men hurt badly.
I don’t know what the team did yesterday, film, treatment, individual workouts, fundamental work, some counseling from the coaches? I don’t know. But I DO know they are back at it today practicing their tails off preparing for Montana. I guarantee you, they are TOGETHER. They are NOT pointing fingers or scapegoating. They are a TEAM. They know that they win (28 times so far!), and sadly, they lose (only 6), TOGETHER.
So, I will watch our young men with pride for who they are, how hard they work, how much talent they have, how they represent our university, what great coaches we have, I will watch our team with pride. I will WANT us to win. I’ll puff out my chest when we do. But if we lose, I’ll still be proud of our kids. And I KNOW, EVERYONE on this forum feels the same way. We are ALL proud of “our” guys. That’s why this is a special forum. So, if anyone does feel the need to scapegoat, or point fingers, or to negatively criticize our players, just think first. Just think…first. And maybe wait…a bit.
Finally, I’ve coached for 67 sports seasons. I coached basketball for 29 years. I have NEVER had even one player with the talent these young men have. They are all GREAT kids just like my players were, but they are SO much more talented. What they CAN do amazes me. So, rather than critique them (or criticize?) I just want to enjoy them and to feel a great sense of pride that have chosen to play for MICHIGAN.
My “special” needs grand daughter is (almost) always so happy, so giving, so loving, and her life is VERY HARD. She will most likely never be a “normal” or “typical” child or adult. So, believe me, I KNOW there are things far worse than losing to an OUTSTANDING, well coached, mission driven Michigan State basketball team…as much as it may hurt.
If I’ve offended ANYONE with these remarks, I am sorry, because that was absolutely not my intent. I’m just trying to put things in perspective, and give thanks to some of our posters and to all of our kids! Go Blue!!!
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Fast and loose? Bullshit. Poole was 33% in the Big Ten this year. Simple fact. That’s against competition more like he’ll see in the NBA, and with him having to play a more complete game and not just come off the bench and shoot.
And in any case, 37% on threes is not “terrific” by any stretch of the imagination.