What They’re Saying: Preseason magazines weigh in on Michigan’s 2019-20 outlook

Lindy’s looks off their rocker. I don’t think it’s crazy to predict Michigan to miss the tournament. If we shoot poorly, we are probably going to miss. And your 3 point % can shift year to year even if you have some solid shooters on your team.

But they have EJ Lidell in their top 30 players in the country when he wasn’t even considered a top 40 recruit in his class. And he’s a freshman. It is criminal to have him that high and have Ayo outside the top 50. Just comparing their rankings to the other magazines, they are the outlier on a couple things.

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A lot of feedback on our list about where Cowan was ranked. Seems notable that he was a consensus first team pick. So it isn’t just Alex and I who are crazy.

I agree about Liddell/Ayo. I’m curious about the Liddell hype train… Seems like someone in Ohio State’s camp must really like him if he received two nods for frosh of the year. He wasn’t even really on my radar before a couple of weeks ago.

Has to be someone talking him up. But even then, can’t take offseason hype seriously enough to bump up a player that much. Every offseason we hear about players putting in a great offseason, how it’s night and day compared to last year, really added to their game etc etc. Only for that player to improve only marginally or not nearly as significantly as was expected.

But how is EJ Lidell going to be Freshman of the Year when OSU already told DJ Carton that he’s going to win that award?

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I consistently underestimate how bitter people are about the Carton recruitment. I tweeted something out about CJ Walker recently and it was just a wave of Carton venom.

With JB leaving and the Howard hire not being immediate, he might have left even if he did sign in November.

I don’t get all worked up about losing a recruit to OSU like some others do. Holtmann is a very good coach and someone I would have been more than fine with taking over for JB. If we were to lose a recruit to someone like Cronin, I’d be a bit more miffed because I just don’t enjoy watching his teams play at all.

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Torvik is the only straight-math projection here, right? I’m pretty interested in his system’s relative affection for PSU - he’s projecting a pretty sharp upgrade in their offense (3 ppp), and a slight improvement on D despite losing Reaves. I get that they were one of the least lucky teams in basketball by his FUN metric, but…

PSU’s offense is weird - it ended up ok in aggregate despite not having a favorable shot mix, shooting badly on that shot mix, not assisting on made baskets, not particularly getting to the line, and not shooting that well from the line.

I guess they board ok?

Also, I find the National rating of X to be a bit criminally low.

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I think X is the type of player that you have to watch alot to appreciate. His numbers - other than assists - don’t jump out to the average person. But he doesn’t put up double digit points, doesn’t shoot well and isn’t making crazy plays up and down the court with athleticism. Isn’t on the NBA radar from what I can tell. He’s just incredibly disciplined and intelligent. These types of lists often don’t factor in defense all that much either.

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I’m sorry but who is their right mind would say Matt Haarms is better then Teske.

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I think it’s closer than you’d think - Haarms is a better offensive player, worse defensively despite the sky-high block rate.

Again, I think you need to see it to see the difference - Purdue regularly survives without Haarms on the floor (partially because Williams, their backup, was good) and his minutes are lower than Teske as a result. Michigan, due to not having a reliable backup, obviously needs Teske far more than Purdue does Haarms (and his minutes are accordingly higher).

I think Teske has provided more overall value, but I think their quality is pretty close?

I think I agree with most of that. I just think teske’s defense is good enough to where he is just better overall. Like if ncaa basketball still existed teske would be at least 3 to 4 points higher overall.

BPM (for what that’s worth, but I think it’s a good starting point) has the two almost even last year, just distributed differently across offense and defense. Teske played more, so he was obviously “more important”.

Am I crazy for thinking that Purdue has a comparable amount of question marks on their roster as we do? Yeah, the coaching staff is the same and Painter has proven himself to be a pretty good coach, but in terms of the guys on the floor I don’t know who you pencil in as the guy or the two or three guys. I’m not saying they are going to be a bad team, but it seems to me like they are just as likely a candidate for having a lower floor this season as we are but none of these mags are recognizing that potential.

That’s correct.

The answer to this question is Matt Painter, IMO. Yes, there are a lot of questions but Painter is elite in my eyes.

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I would take Teske on my team 10 times out of 10.

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“I would take Teske on my team 10 times out of 10”

Same number of times I would take X over Cowan.

I really think UM is being underrated. I know the predictions reflect a Beilein >> Howard as a coach, however, I really think UM is going to be a top 4 team in the B1G this year, possibly top 2.

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I think UM is getting very appropriately rated. We have two big time knowns - X and Teske. We have a floor for Livers, but unsure about what his real potential is. Everything else is a pretty big question mark IMO. Can anybody say with much confidence about what they think Johns, DDJ, Brooks, Nunez, Bajema, Franz, Castleton etc are going to do? Of that group I feel fairly confident that Franz is going to contribute and Castleton will be a good backup C. But there’s very little hard facts to confidently expect much more from there. Throw in a first time HC and I think the questions are very warranted.

Now, Howard could end up being a phenomenal HC, Franz is ready to go from day 1, Livers expands his game and Johns plays to his potential and all of the sudden we’re in second place. The range for this team is very wide.

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