If we go and get a transfer PG, weāre just going to start the Kihei-Reece cycle again. I say we let Bliss take his lumps and supplement his time at the point with Gertrude, Harris, and Rohde.
I know people want to send Harris and Rohde packing, but I just donāt see that happening.
Not if its two pgs who can actually shoot and score and hit floaters and arenāt cowardly.
Can Bliss actually shoot? Iām yet to be convinced if that
In Peach Jam, Bliss shot the 3 well but at low volume. No idea at his prep school. Some think heās got funky form. I think itās okay, for whatever that is worth to ya.
I only want to send Harris packing. My expectations for Rohde are massively lower than pre-season, but I can see a path to him being a plus rotation player. He needs to improve his aggression and shooting. Not easy, but plausible.
I just donāt see Harris leaving, Tony isnāt the type to force guys out of the program for the sake of roster building and there isnāt really any handwriting on the wall that could sway him to find a better situation. Heās already got a great spot here relative to his talent, realistically all heās gotta do to earn a ton of minutes next season is beat out a redshirt freshman coming off of a pretty significant foot injury. Thereās a very real chance of Bliss not being up to speed defensively and Tony deciding to go with the veteran who understands the packline better.
The best case scenario is someone else transfers allowing us to take a grad transfer PG that can come in and relegate Harris to 2nd/3rd string minutes instead of being a starter, but then that means youāre likely not filling a need at another position.
I didnāt notice anything funky about it during a session I watched. Heās not lights out but hit at a good clip and is clearly working on it
Iām already that Tony has a hard conversation with Dante this off-season that leads to him moving on, then we get another PG, preferably one that is more seasoned and can shoot so thereās not so much pressure on Bliss to come in and do so much right away.
Weāll see. Idk, next year doesnāt seem very encouraging.
Offer Reece $500K to come back for his Covid year and extend a similar offer to Eric Dixon to come over for his lol now Iām starting to think like @Hooandtrue
Pay cut for Reece!! Yoy?
back up the truck for Reece and Dunn to come back. Go and get one more transfer shooting forward and maybe a center (or get Dixon who can be both potentially). Then politely ask Dante to go to VCU or something.
Obviously people donāt really want to run it back with this team but we won a lot of games and if you think that IMac, Dunn, Rohde, Taine, Buchanan will all improve by next year, that Bliss would be a big step up from Harris, and that we can find a Minor/Groves level transfer again (or even better) then the team would be quite good.
Just imagine:
PG: Reece, Bliss
SG: IMac, Eli
SF: Taine, Bond, Rohde
PF: Dunn, Cofie
C: Dixon, Buchanan
Thatās a final four team
Lol! I meant $500K on top of whatever he gets now
He is the type to give the hard talk to though that has caused others to transfer out. He can be pretty blunt Ive heard (and Dante not playing in the second half could be a sign of things to come).
He doesnāt force anyone out but from what has been shared over the years it sounds like Tony can be blunt in the end of season meetings. Would not surprise me at all if the Dante meetingās message is something along the lines of āyou are welcome back but we are going to add another veteran guard in the portal and we can only promise you the opportunity to compete for a spot in the rotation next yearā
i think we have to accept dunn and beekman are done
And I donāt think the Dunn loss is that monumental. Dunnās greatest value will be him getting drafted and helping our recruiting through that. He could be a monster down the line but itās not going to happen in college (a la Trey Murphy).
Hereās the harsh speech transcript I get when I query Hane-GPT for what Tony would say to Dante:
Words words words Words words words words pillar pillar you failed the pillars and thatās what really makes me sad words words words SO THEREFORE [Dante starts listening] youāll have to earn your PT next year by words words words words.
And Dante hears that and says āwell I earned about 10 minutes backing up an All ACC first teamer this year and 5 minutes playing with him so I feel pretty good getting all that and more playing with a first year PG.ā So why would he move?
And this even assumes that Hane-GPT Tony agrees with those who say Dante gets the harsh speech.
Yeah I hear ya, and I basically have. But why not? Bacot came back for a 5th year after not even making the NCAAT and look at them now, gonna be a 1 seed. I bet you theyāre gonna back the Brinks truck up for RJ Davis too this off-season and it wonāt shock me at all if he doesnāt run it back with them again (unless they win a title). Reece isnāt in hardly any 2 round mocks that Iāve seen. Another year in school aināt gonna help or hurt him, but I bet heād make more money playing at UVA another year than bouncing between active and G-league rosters on a two way.
losing dunn isnāt even that bad go out and get a shooting 4 to replace him
Iām not worried about losing Dunn, though Iād be thrilled to have him back AND another player like Eric Dixon on board. That would be excellent.