Some Thoughts on Horns Hoops

“The reason is that the Wildcat staff found out that Joseph really isn’t all that fond of being reunited with his old teammate Avery Bradley on the basketball court for whatever reason.”

Only ransomstoddard can fully understand this.

Our depth at the 4/5 next year is downright hideous. We’re effed, no matter how you look at it.

After watching the tournament, I’ve been thinking for awhile: is depth overrated?

In the NC game, Duke played 8 with no bench points. Butler also only played 8 (but with 15 bench points).

Is chemistry and total minutes more important, and you only need 8 players to play in a game?

They went for broke to win the game. They couldn’t keep up that pace all year.

It’s akin to shortening your rotation/bullpen in baseball.

It’s a great feeling heading in to a season with only 2 frontcourt players that are capable of contributing on the roster. Especially so when one of said two is undersized and the other is a freshman.

Elaborate on Balbay’s situation please. “Gone”, as in pro ball in Europe?

I’m hearing there’s a little turmoil within the Villanova program…late season benchings, pregnant girlfriends, conflict amongst teammates. If I’m hearing this, surely it’s in Joseph’s ear as well. That’s bound to be in our favor, right?

That proposed lineup for next year is scary talented, and I mean scary in the bad way.

Joseph, Hamilton, Williams, Johnson, and Thompson is a nice starting 5. Unfortunately, that’s all there is. A couple of injuries to any of them and we’re 14-18.

But hey, Rick got a million dollars the other day. So that’s cool.

I would say we would have a tough time making the tourney next year but with 96 teams getting in we should be fine. I have the lowest expectations since RB got here though.

Hey Trips,
Long time no hear you, just got back from Mesilla and took the back road to EP. What a great view going down to El Paso.
Anyway , Did this come out of your crystal balls ? Or Did you pull this out of some junkies ass?

Have not heard that CJ had issues about PT or shots with AB here, I do think that AB will be a late 1st rounder or early second if he stays in.
If Bradley returns, if the assumption is correct then CJ is a Wildcat, that might be even true if AB leaves. Every thing I am hearing is that Texas is falling behind due to a lot of negative recruting .Barnes is blowing in the wind.

My understanding is that Dog is staying to complete his degree this year.

Lead Guard: Cory Joseph My take is Dog/Ward/ JCovan
Two Guard: J’Covan Brown/Jordan Hamilton J’Covan minus 25 lbs./JH
Small Forward: Jordan Hamilton/ Shawn Williams Jordan Hamilton / Shawn Williams
Four: Gary Johnson Gary Johnson
Five: Tristan Thompson Tristan Thompson

If Ward is ready plug him in at the 2 spot or even the 1 if Dog is not ready.
“Wangchaphill continue to be a combination of Roberto Duran, hypo-glycemic, and white.”
Great one from the Master…..
Joseph is going to wait is what I am hearing and that we might be 3rd inline !

Barnes is not going to a full time match up zone not in his bag at this time but I hope he talks to Coach K about pulling his M2M back to the ARC and make teams beat us over the top.

Rebounding will be by the team concept as you stated above this is the area that bother me the most after Barnes erratic coaching, our FT’s, lack of depth in our bigs, foul trouble, ect……

Our top 6 can score points but again what will Barnes do for defense?? Balbay,Ward best on ball defenders could be another Mason/Dog combo.
Joseph would solve that problem but I really am not holding my breath on that.
Its going to be a tough year anyway you cut it.
Good to see Trips again.

Some thoughts:

1) So we’re rooting for Bradley to stay in the Draft? Will there be any negative repercussions from this? “Kid, Barnes took the #1 recruit (ESPN rankings, obviously) in the nation, ran him ragged, lost in the first round of the tourney, then let him jump to be picked in the mid 20’s? Yeah, he’ll do wonders for your talent development.”

2) If Joesph picks Texas, does he move off-ball when Kabongo shows up? Does that then mean that we’ll have two consecutive years of relying on a freshman point? That might be exciting, but it ain’t winning any tournaments.

3) Following next season, GJ is gone, and Hamilton and Thompson are likely possibilities as well. That leaves us with Shawn Williams and Lexi (and that’s it!) at the 3-4-5. If we’re assuming Bradley is leaving and Lucas will pick up a scholly, why isn’t Barnes using scholarship #13 to recruit a 3/4-year big man?

4) Given 1, 2, and 3, looks like our next realistic title shot is 2012. Yikes.

Lot of good stuff in there. I wouldn’t get your hopes up about yet another savior in Joseph. He’s a very good player, but look at the impact Bradley and Hamilton had here (minimal). They were both higher recruited players than Cory. Just saying, if the highly thought of trio of Hammy, AB, and JCB can’t save this team, not sure how Joseph is going to do it by himself :-/

That said, if AB does come back and Joseph still decides to come here (lot of ifs), I will be cautiously optimistic about our expectations this year. If you remember Auburn 2003 (football), they were ranked number one by some services and ended up getting smoked by USC at the beginning of the season in route to a mediocre year. The year after that, they had essentially the same players, but Jason Campbell and the defense both were able to put it all together and the team went undefeated. I can kind of see that from this team for next year, but only if Bradley returns.

Oh, and where did you get this info about Bradley, Cory, and Nova?

Trips Right gets all of his basketball information from Kevin Berger.

http://marchtomarch.fantake.com/2010/04/09/weekly-whispers-april-9-2010/

Good stuff, Trips. And by good, I mean shitty news well presented.

So…Cory isn’t going to get shots because of just Bradley (who is essentially the most deferential player of all time), but he’s gonna get his with two PGs and shot mongers in Corey Fischer and Malik Wayns? Not to mention Corey Stokes, and Dominic Cheek to an extent? Hell, who would want to play on a team with two guys that already have your name? Especially when it would just lead to everybody spelling yours like theirs (as opposed to just half the people, like now).

Gotta be something else he doesn’t like about AB other than not getting his shots. Heck, I watched Findlay last year and Cory had as many, if not more shots than AB then.

I wouldn’t be surprised if he we outdid expectations next year. I don’t really have a reason for that, besides Joseph aiding us in that area where we need most help, but I feel most fans aren’t going to give a shit about next year’s team anyway and will probably expect it to suck as much or worse than this years.

If we get Joseph, I think we improve somewhat, maybe we even go 10-6 in conference.

Trips -
 
Thanks, man. This is a great write-up. Lots to think about.
 
A couple of questions:
 
1. I’d love to play Jordan Hamilton at SG ala Chris Douglas-Roberts, but I don’t see any way that Hamilton can check a 2. I know we could zone, but is that really the identity we want? Barnes doesn’t teach it all that well. Combining a zone D with our offense screams lethargy on both ends of the court.
 
2. Is it absolutely inconcievable that we could get some play out of Matt Hill/Clint Chapman/Lexi Wangmene? Why am I holding out hope for the idea that Clint Chapman will get better simply because we have no place else to go and the minutes will force development?

“I wouldn’t be surprised if he we outdid expectations next year.”

I agree, but only because they will be so low. I’ve seen a few early preseason polls and Texas doesn’t even sniff them. Not even the “Other considered” honorable mention section making it a top 30. Ouch, Rick will have the team be a top 25 team that makes a little noise, pulls off an upset or two and helps him keep his job for awhile longer. Preseason expectations do a lot to team perception.

This team will go as far as Alexis Chaphill will take us. We need one of those guys to step up each game, unless Tristan Thompson turns into a 35-minute a game manbeast.

I guess there’s some hope with Chapman as he does have some skills, but he hasn’t made much progress in the strength department. No chance from Hill and probably no chance from Lexi. He looks the part, has a nice aggressive streak and has hands so bad I can’t even come up with an analogy that captures how bad they are. He can’t even hold on to rebounds.

Wangmene has what we used to refer to in beer league baseball as the Ejecto-mitt.

That’s the best description yet, Juice.

Kevin Berger’s an idiot. So is Trips. Does he just pull this stuff out of his ass? First it was Gary pushing Jordan against a wall during halftime of a game. Then it was the players slamming each other in “twitter code,” and now this?

Interesting that Cory and Avery don’t get along, since Avery was Cory’s host during his official visit to Texas! And Dogus isn’t going anywhere. He said in an interview that he was coming back and they expect him to be ready by the season opener. And Varez will be back much sooner than January, too.

combo guard huh? Do those work out well? we need a true point guard not a combo avery bradley 2.0

JD, I hope you’re right about Ward and Balbay.

As for Cory Joseph and Avery Bradley, let’s just say you’re way off base.

How many assistant coaches recruiting CJ have you talked to?

Why does combo guard always mean a player isn’t really good as either a 1 or 2?

Blake, assistant coaches at Villanova, Texas, and some AAU folks that have spoken with CJ. As for the shots and minutes, I agree with you, it shouldn’t make a difference, but it does in CJ’s mind.

Sky, thanks man. You’re right about playing some pack line defense with that kind of length instead of a zone. Still, our kids would have to buy-in on help and recover.

Scipio, 1) perhaps with the right matchups we can find Hamilton someone to guard, but the reality is we’ll have to zone if he’s to play any two.

2) Chapman has athletic ability, certainly a shit ton more than Matt Howard, but he needs some confidence and some deca durabolin. Magnus can get him deca, but is he in the right program to get a shot of C.

kevwun, Alexis needs to be in a system where he can roam block to block, surrounded by shooters, then rebound and dunk. That ain’t us. A juggs machine wouldn’t hurt either.

jc25, yes, Bradley and Joseph are probably mutually exclusive. Kabongo gets Joseph off the ball because he’s that good. I don’t like thinking about our frontcourt.

“Magnus can get him deca, but is he in the right program to get a shot of C.”

There seems to be some misnomer that I’m a weight lifting ape. I assure you I’m not. That said, if it helps the program, I’ll get him some of that Lyle Alzado shit. Chapman’s confidence should come from playing Hill everyday in practice. Sure it would be false confidence, like when Alex Smith beats out David Carr, but confidence nonetheless.

Twice in two weeks I’ve seen “juggs machine” mentioned. I know exactly what it is, so why do I automatically picture a set of hammers?

Chapman would be an all american if he played at Butler.

JD, as in JD Lewis?

What am i off base on? Was Avery Cory’s host or not?

And can i get a follow up on that Gary and Jordan “fight” that you said happened?

JD, could it be possible that they are friendly, and yet Cory still could think that Avery will take shots and minutes from him?

No matter, if Joseph commits or not at the end of the day Rick Barnes is still the coach. You people do realize that Rick Barnes is the problem right???? The majority of the time Texas loses games because Rick Barnes gets out coached Texas had twice the talent of Butler but the only difference was that Bulter was “well coached”. I said it 3 months ago long before Butler reached the title gameTexas should fire Rick Barnes and hire Butler coach. People please don’t get your hopes up if Texas does land Joseph; Rick Barnes will destory his confidence in a matter of weeks and still get out coached every game. By, the way to the ppl saying “Rick Barnes built Texas” thats crazy T.J. Ford built Texas basketball and made Texas basketball relevant. Almost 10 years later the program is still reaping the benefits of T.J. Ford; he’s the reason Avery Bradley commited to Texas; because he was a huge T.J. Ford fan. I can’t wait until next season Texas probably won’t even make the tourney and if they do they will lose in the first round. By, the way Joseph will commit to Minnoseta recruits always choose to play with their relatives ;Texas and Villanova doesn’t have a real chance regardless of what you hear.

Hey Vash, “JD, as in JD Lewis?” No way its Just Dumb.

JD ,“What am i off base on?” Depends on whos’ on first base?
 Calling Trips an idiot is like saying Picasso is not a great artisan. Kevy Berger not so much.

“next realistic title shot is 2012.” I really do like Barnes but is he up to taking us to a title shot in any year ? Maybe not so much.

Where are you reading that Ward won’t be back until January? He seemed to be walking around without a limp relatively sooner than I imagined he might, though that is certainly no medical prognosis of any kind. Ward coming back will push back PT for Brown and make us more aggressive on the floor. I just hope he has been working on his shooting while injured, we can use more than 15% on 3’s from him.

I’d love to see Bradley come back, even at the expense of getting Joseph. With James gone, Bradley would be our most consistent player we have back, edging out Johnson.

As far as rebounding, I don’t think we will struggle as poorly as people think. Look back at our starting five for much of the season:

Pittman
James
Mason
Bradley
Balbay/Brown

Pittman gave us 2 to 5 boards a game for most of conference play, with the occasional double digit rebounding day. Swapping out rare for occasional might be more accurate. Either way he average just short of 6 boards a game, with most of that production coming in the early part of the season with the easier schedule. Many of his rebounds were his own misses he kept getting back. It wasn’t uncommon for him to get half of his rebounds on one trip down the floor and still end up without points. Can we drop in Wangmene/Hill/Chapman and get 6 boards out of them. I say yes. You might even get less traveling calls in the meantime. Hopefully Tristan Thompson can be at least an average rebounder and get 6-8 boards a night for us.

James was a monster rebounder for us, and there is nobody who is going to pick up that slack. Net loss. Mason’s per minute rebounding rate was less than Pittman, James, Johnson, Hill, Wangmene, Chapman, Hamilton, Ward, Balbay. It was about even with Bradley and Brown, and slightly better than everyone’s favorite garden gnome. We will get better rebounding from the 3 spot. Huge net gain.

If Hamilton and Williams are seeing 50- 60 minutes a game combined, that will tremendously help our rebounding, and it might be enough to offset what we lose in James. Between James and Mason, they averaged 50 minutes and 12 boards. Can Hamilton and Williams get 12 boards in 50 minutes? I don’t think that is asking too much at all.

Jesus Christ. Just a few months ago we were #1 in the country. Things have gone way south and I don’t see any end in sight. Ugh— when can we get some good news?

im late to the party here, but TRIPS, any thoughts on putting a 100% Ward at PG, moving CJ to the 2?

Scag, I’d love it. Ward could have saved us this year. I’m not sure CJ is coming, though.