Just out of curiosity (and you certainly don’t have to answer if you would prefer not to), but where does your basketball knowledge come from? Did you just do a bunch of research on the topic? Have you coached at all? Apologies if you address this on the pod, I am catching up on the moving screen during my commute before I get to this.
Excited about this podcast. Really like going deep and keeping a narrow focus.
Just finished it Dylan. Morning commute and then closed my office door so I could finish it in peace. Well done - it’ll definitely be a regular listen.
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Really enjoyed this podcast and looking forward to this weekly!
(Also, sorry in advance but had to make this…)
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I think most of that gets coached out. The final clip did make me LOL though. The ultimate “I’m the best player on my team by far but we’re losing by 20 points with 10 minutes left” play. That I am confident won’t be an issue, the reaching could be an issue that springs up from time to time for sure though.
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LOL 
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Absolutely, Devante’ will be coached harder and more thoroughly than he ever has been in his life. Then, too, in listening to him he seems to embrace the notion of setting up his teammates and the fact that he will be surrounded by more talent than he ever was. The fact that he “chased offensive rebounds” or gambled too much on defense at Coastal will not, in my opinion, be something that he will be doing to a large extent at Michigan under Juwan and Howard Eisley. Some gambling? Yes, but the 80-90% variety, not the shot in the dark variety. And, at Michigan he will have really good defensive rotation behind him if he gambles and misses.
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Similar to how I would do after watching a player for NBA draft scouting, here are some of the open DeVante’ Jones questions I’m interested in tracking as the season starts:
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Do teams start to go “under” on him in ball screens? Is he vulnerable to switching defenses?
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Does he pose enough of a threat as a spot-up shooter that teams don’t frequently use his man to help on Hunter post-ups?
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Does his floater translate w/ efficiency in the Big Ten?
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Is his one-on-one, point of attack defense still a big strength against better athletes and competition?
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Can he become a more consistent off-ball defender in a better scheme and with less offensive burden? Can he shake some of his gambling tendencies in this more conservative scheme?
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OT: I like those teal jerseys (and their football team broke out some teal helmets a few weeks back that were nice.)
A most excellent pod, Dylan and Eric! Can’t wait to hear more throughout the season.
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I thought the point was handled really well in the podcast in noting Chaundee, UCLA, how it all ends, etc. Not to say that that’s what’s going to happen here, but coaching 99% of it out means the 1% could be crucial. And as much as we often make fun of Izzo for incoherent rotations or giving players a comically short leash, that’s what he’s addressing there. When he has a great team, it’s team where stuff he doesn’t want them doing happens 0% of the time, and that’s a significant advantage against a team where it happens 1% of the time.
Thought this related to the discussion on “paint touches” in the podcast.
I will add a couple of things…
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How are his post entry feeds? A sneaky good part of last year was how well Smith and Franz could feed Hunter on the post. Both are gone and we’re replacing them with Jones and Houstan.
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How does he operate in ball screens and facilitate for his teammates? There’s no ideal ball-screen person on the team right now if Jones isn’t very good at it. Whatever you thought of Smith before last season, it was obvious he knew how to run ball screens.
Wonder if they are doing any drills to hone his ability to decide when to use the floater and when to lob it to the roll man.
I don’t think he threw a single entry pass in all 6 of the games I watched, lol. Definitely an open question.
Not saying this because of the first half, which I caught a little more than half of live, but I trust his ball screen ability as a passer. Talked about it a bit on the pod – he isn’t going to manipulate defenders, but he makes the right read on time a lot of the time.