str8baller

I’d bet against it for a couple reasons. 1) our alumni is way more fractured. Even if Knight were alive, it’s not like he’d be calling Dusty saying “ hey you were always my favorite manager, we need you to come home and fix this” like Dean did. 2) Roy was really kind of getting to the point of “can’t win the big one” with Kansas. They would’ve never got rid of him, but the narrative was out there. He went to 4 final fours, bunch of 1 or 2 seeds, and a bunch of teams that ranked number 1 during the season. So I guess we need to root for Dusty to go to a bunch of FF’s but never win one, and in about 15 years we make our move!

A common refrain from coaches is that they feel in previous roster builds, money has been spread around too widely. They’d prefer, starting this year, to spend big on two to three top-tier players and fill in around them with cheaper role players with more defined roles. In NBA terms, those are your max contracts, a few middle-market players and then a bench filled out with minimum contracts. That’s something I pointed out last spring. I’m not sure why it’s taking college guys so long to catch on. All you had to do was look at other pro leagues. I suspect this is something a guy like Carr will have a good handle on.

lol…I don’t even remember the exact line…might’ve been something else. Either way I think the programs that give the guys a little direction will separate themselves from the ones just splashing cash.

I’m a big fan of Wilkerson so I hope this is taken in with the spirit it’s intended. If college athletics are to mean anything in this new era, I hope it at least means they get a little help in financial management. We have the KSOB. I saw Dusty May sit on a podium and when his players were asked what they we’re going to buy with their NIL he chimed in “annuities.” Funny but probably apropos. I don’t know Wilkerson or his mom’s financial situation, so I’m not making a judgement here. But if college athletics are to mean anything in this age of NIL rosters they should endeavor to help these 18-22 year olds make wise financial decisions.

Oh yea…definitely. Have him in, have an assistant show him around, and throw him an offer that makes sense for everyone…that he’ll 99% turn down. But by no means factor him into your plans. Don’t waste any more time than the 2hr dinner with him. And if he and Wilkerson miraculously commit then drop someone else and just deal with having two of the best portal guards commit. Very sad about Dix, btw. But spending any time besides a meet and greet on campus with those guys was a waste given what you’re saying (which I believe). And that’s going to be true of lots of players going forward. A lot of agents will waste your time with no intention of sending a player your way just so they can bid up the price or show off their connections or whatever. I hope Carr helps there.

That reeks of amateurism. You have to know when to hold ‘em and know when to fold ‘em. Thank goodness Carr is here. If the same thing happens this year, then we have a problem.

We have Alexis who has done a yeomans job as a traditional post. And despite floating the idea earlier CDD has not played those two together with Bailey as the stretch 4. Unfortunately, I think he was just a stone cold miss by the scouting dept.

Going with my heart on this one…. IU 74 OSU 73

I would guess that kind of increase will be par for the course for most of the teams in the top 25 of spenders. Who knows though? It is a moving target. I do think IU thought they were at the top at $6mil with Woody and that giving CDD 10 was generous. It seems though that the market exploded and at least 10 (maybe more) other teams went to 10+ million. My personal opinion based on nothing is that an additional $2mil next year is more of an “inflation tax” than a substantive bump.

No, Wilkerson presents the opposite problem: he’s producing more than he’s paid. You get his production we’ll likely have to spend more. But that’s fine, some guys will pan out better and some worse. I listed him because realistically those our are main guys money-wise (as reported) who represent the biggest pool of money we have to replace. It’ll be easy to replace the other guys and hard to replace Wilkerson. But he still has to be replaced and it could cost serious money to replace that kind of production.

I think you’re closer to the truth. You save money by retaining big name guys. By most accounts Edey and Braden smith could’ve got a little more by going on the open market but Purdue ponied up enough that they were happy to stay put with the coaches, teammates and situation they knew. If say Wilkerson were coming back, Duke or somebody might offer him 3.5mil but he’d stay with us for a small bump to 3 mil. But we have role players, at best, coming back. I can’t see them taking any less money. But realistically who is going to offer a Sisley or Miles a big contract? We just have to make much better use of the Wilkerson-Tucker-Bailey-Conerway pool of money.

I was early money on this. He’s just not a smart player. We play better without him. And once injury cost him his spot it became evident to the coaches and he hasn’t been able to earn his spot back. Gotta wonder how the season would’ve played out if him and Bailey came off the bench from the beginning. Might’ve taken a game like Kentucky or Iowa.

Great take. Wilkerson leads that group for me. Talented but just puts his head down and works. Alexis and Enright with an honorable mention in that regard, too.

This lineup will need to work hard to score

Reed Bailey drive to bounce pass for a Tucker dunk won’t even be believed by AI when the play-by-play comes out.

Alexis is around a league average-ish big. Devries just insists on playing Bailey 15+ mpg who isn’t even an average-ish backup in the B1G.

Why does he need to play so little?

But that was Kelsey last year too. And you just said they were big spenders this year. How do you think that happened? Their alumni and donors were happy with his turn around from the previous two years and opened up the check book. Getting into the tourney might be the difference between $12mil and $14mil next year. Maybe not. But the people he needs to win over aren’t us metric nerds on a message board. They’re people who might like to hop on their jet and spend a few nights in San Antonio or Atlanta watching us in the tourney for the first time in 3 years. If they wanted to throw money away at a guy who could reliably land on the wrong side of the bubble they could’ve kept Woody.

And Tang is out. McCasland is excelling. Byington too. But Devries has some peers in guys like Odom and Archie's brother and Jai Lucas. There’s some data points out there for comparison. Honestly, if he can make the tourney, even the playin game like Woody, he has a chance to flip the narrative. He’ll have some missteps, but he’ll be close enough to other coaches in his situation and have enough legit excuses, most people will be excited about the future. I think.

Not if you’re comparing CDD to what those coaches did in their first year. Like we’ve discussed a bunch before, if CDD can at least get into the dance this year he’s roughly on a Pat Kelsey/Lville path. Obviously guys like May and Pope and Cal were able to do a little more their first year. I think that’s where the “new coach/new team” cap comes into play. A 4 seed and a S16 would put you into that best performance you can expect with a brand new portal team territory. It might not mean much, but at least the optics of always being 2nd rate compared to your peers isn’t great.

They’re one of the ones I was thinking of. I didn’t name them because UK spent more and they lost last night so their fans were extra mad online. Also, I don’t like thinking about Lville because if I had to pick one coach/program comp for Devries it would be what Kelsey is doing at Lville. I see some similarities anyways. That isn’t going as well as intended so I’m ignoring it. Lol

If you pit those metrics against a 3rd one—money spent—then IU would look bad. Maybe one of the worst in the country. We’re basically getting average results, both in roster construction and coaching, for a premium price. That’s not good. It’s why UK fans aren’t happy—they reportedly had an ultra premium budget and neither their roster or results are better than “pretty good.” The question is: can we leverage more time, more money, and more staff so that we get premium results for a premium budget?

His son is a 5th year senior. Nobody in that position is going to burn the year rebuilding with young guys like Todd Golden or a couple other coaches did.

Kind of funny…I had a reply earlier to Pagoda that I apparently didn’t hit submit on, saying most elite coaches are kind of domineering or big personalities or both. The one counter example I could think of was Mark Few. Still as good as Gonzaga has been I would guess there is less pressure and scrutiny, day in and day out, than a job like IU’s. Which may explain why he’s never jumped at any of the numerous opportunities over the years.

That was obviously a huge miscalculation. No idea why you would get roster filler from Europe other than you didn’t spend your money wisely. Other teams like Illinois, Virginia, Louisville among others went and got real talent from Europe and most of them are impact bigs. Just a new era that some coaches were positioned for and others weren’t.