@4547Lambeth found an interesting article on bench minutes:
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Yeah, either/or. Felt like we should just leave the “Praise Tony!” thread alone, especially since some of the discussion might turn critical.
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Man, now I’ll really be upset if Igor moves on. Found his lack of PT among all the M’s the most perplexing. Felt like he rarely looked out of place and could’ve been used in more creative ways. Just really hope he doesn’t head back home as I think we’ll look back on that as a big loss
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This is quite a magnum opus. I like delving into the details, but this is a lot. I’m just up to the point where he’s talking about Taine’s Navy minutes, and I’m like “Taine didn’t play against Navy” but nope there it is on KenPom - Taine played 2 minutes… Maybe it’s coming, but if you are analyzing this, and your first takeaway is NOT “I don’t have much data…” (even eye test data) then I’m already skeptical… Okay, okay, but I will stick with it.
I also like that the 2020-2022 UVa hoops fan version of “We don’t talk about Bruno” is “We don’t talk about the fact that our PGs play 35+ minutes together” (unless you want to take fire from all sides…).
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That’s why I was surprised that Maine responded so quickly. I assume he read it previously because it took me a solid 15 minutes to read it and I only watched a couple of those videos.
I wasn’t exaggerating when I said it was almost a minute by minute analysis of their playing time.
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Haha, I had seen it posted elsewhere. Although I will admit, I skimmed. Pretty much skipped the McCorkle part because, well, I’ve seen him play enough to get it, and I only read a little of the Taine section because I could tell what the central takeaways were. Mostly just read the Igor parts closely and watched his clips, and then read the end where they sum up all of their central arguments.
These were valuable skills I learned at UVA. When I started my first year and got assigned all my reading I nearly killed myself actually trying to do all of it for about a month. Then I realized that it’s actually a skill to selectively read and figure out what is actually essential to get the information you need. So… thanks UVA!
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Lol! Ironically, the way I approached the material is also how I approached the reading for my UVa classes. [Reads a few pages … sees how much is left …] “Wow, that’s a lot! Maybe I will come back to that.” Ha ha!
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Thanks. Lots of off-season reading.
Okay, @4547Lambeth , @MaineWahoo and whoever else enjoys this stuff, I’ve given this stuff a heavy skim. A few reactions, probably a bit rambling. And first, the link:
- The author convinced me that Taine and Carson aren’t good at defense. That seemed to be the main point of most of the words and most of the clips. But… I didn’t need 10,000 words and lots of embedded videos to be convinced of that. I mean, he definitely backed up his point well, but I don’t know that there was much debate, tbh.
- Some of the issues are awareness issues. “Where did my guy go?” type stuff. I can forgive that stuff a bit, because I think most guys are going to get better with more PT.
- But probably a good bit of them are just physicality / athleticism issues. Taine can’t defend 4s. That was an odd idea and toward the top of my frustrations with the way we played early on in the season. Carson just doesn’t look like a high-level ACC athlete to me. It is what it is.
- The most troubling thing is seeing Taine get beat at the point of attack on the perimeter. But (1) it’s a fairly small amount of data; and (2) I have some hope that more time, more maturity, and more time with Curtis will help him a bit. The most likely positive outcome is that more time in college hoops gives him better awareness / better instincts so that a lack of quicks is somewhat compensated for…
- Kody has long arms and he’s tall and he can slide his feet decently well for being that size. I think all those things make him an adequate defender. But that’s it. I could put together a long clip show of plays where Kody gets worked on defense, too.
- Is Kody better on defense than Carson and Taine? Yes, I don’t remember much controversy on those points.
- Despite the length of the piece, the author doesn’t really seem to engage with the tradeoff discussion, except superficially. I’m just going to start cribbing his conclusion here:
- “playing Kody Stattmann the amount of time that he got was absolutely the correct decision.” Me: absolutely correct? Oh, well, pardon me. I mean I guess if you’re gonna write 87,000 words on the topic, you better believe it!
- “[Kody] could hit a three, he could finish the occasional drive and/or leaner” Me: Kody hit 20 threes over 35 games. He hit 19 2s. 19! He hit one 2 pointer every other game or so (FG% was about 34%). That is a very loose use of the word occasional.
- “His offensive efficiency rating was ALSO ahead of Murray and well ahead of McCorkle.” Me: That’s incorrect. I see 101 v 92 on KenPom.
- “This was not a situation where CTB failed to give CMC and Murray chances and their offense was more valuable than what Stattmann was offering. Stattmann’s offense was actually more valuable …” Me: A few things. I wouldn’t call what Taine and Carson were given chances. Taine played ~10% of minutes, many of them garbage minutes. He was a DNP in like 16 games. He got double digit minutes in non-cupcake games three times. THREE TIMES! (4 if you count JMU, 5 if you count NIT). That’s a chance? That’s not a chance, IMO. As far as the value, I think we just went over that.
- Then he has this odd throw-in about Igor and how he’s okay at defense. It was a bit of a B plot and probably not worth too much thought.
- Oh, and even in the conclusion, he just really goes after his odd passion project of demonstrating something nobody was really arguing: that after 4 years playing in the UVa defense, Kody competently plays UVa defense for the worst UVa defense in ~10 years. Hooray, I guess.
- And he ends the whole thing with this fakey fakey nice sendoff about hoping guys that transfer thrive in a less challenging environment. Please
- Ha ha! I realize I’ve gotten very negative.
- Ultimately, the piece didn’t dissuade me from my basic view that we weren’t very good this year and trying something, anything would’ve been better than trying nothing. Which is what we tried.
- Okay, I will end on a more simpatico note with the whole thing. I agree with a lot of this: "So here’s the scenario: with about 10:20 left in the first half we’re down 11-8. Clark gets two fouls and has to sit and we roll out a line up of Beekman, Franklin, Stattman, Milicic, and Caffaro. About 6 minutes later of game time, we’ve gone on a 14-5 run and lead 22-16. "
- Yes, that gets closer to the sacred cows of this season’s lineups. We had a mediocre at best guard trio and shaking that up should’ve been tried earlier and more often. And playing a 6-5 or whatever guy at the 4 in the ACC was going to be problematic. And yes, Franklin is more like a 2 than a 3. Maybe we should have actually tried that a bit. But we didn’t. We just kept doing the same thing and got the same outcome.
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Agree with pretty much all of what you wrote. Nobody argued that Kody wasn’t a better defender (if he wasn’t, then I’d question what he spent the last 4 years doing). The argument was over whether or not, on net, giving the other guys more time would have made us a better team by the end of this year.
Just as you can’t argue that Taine or Igor were better defenders than Kody, I don’t think you can argue that Kody had anywhere near the offensive ceiling that Taine and Igor have. And that’s not even me saying Taine and Igor are great - Kody’s offensive ceiling is just incredibly low. Look at his career stats - they’re basically the worst of any guard since Jontel Evans. Yes, he’s had health issues which are in no way his fault, but we are where we are.
And as somebody said earlier, Tony could see all same things we saw and made the judgement he did. He knows basketball. So maybe there is something to it. But I just really struggle to believe that we wouldn’t have been a better team on the court at the end of the year if Igor had played all of Kody’s minutes. Would it have messed up some culture thing I don’t know about and consequently been a bad long-term choice? Maybe. But my head cannon is that we would have been better. So it is.
And you know, if we end up replacing Igor with some beast athletic wing out of the portal, maybe it all ends up great. But right now - today - it kind of sucks.
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St Lou Hoo/Hoos Place had another interesting data point
I’ll break it down player-by-player next week, but here are some summary HS recruiting results for Tony since 2011.
2011-2016 classes:
20 Signees (3.33/class)
12 Earned All-ACC Honors (60%)
3 More were multi-year rotation contributors (counts Shayok)
5 Left before cracking the rotation (25%)
2017-2021 classes:
13 Signees (2.6/class)
2 Earned All-ACC Honors (15%)
4 More were or project to be multi-year rotation contributors (counts Morsell)
6 Left before cracking the rotation (46%)
1 TBD (Murray)
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I’m looking forward to St Lou’s Part 2 and 3 next week. His recruiting breakdown a few years ago pretty much led to him disappearing from UVa message boards. Hopefully this one doesn’t get him banished from the internet. 
Yeah, high school recruiting has been close to a disaster in recent years. Thank god for Reece and Kadin. Because that is it.
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We just need a culture reset. I dont think it has as much to do with NIL and the transfer portal, although they are factors.
You have kids like Trey Patterson at Villanova and Hunter Salis at Gonzaga who are bought in completely while barely playing any minutes.
We have just not looked like typical UVA basketball the last 2 seasons (2019-2020 I think did at the end).
We need a vocal leader when we have none. We need players who fit our system: Im a hypocrite here because I was all about needing offensive fire power. And Hauser and Gardner are amazing individual talents who are top 5 in my Fan favorite hoos because of just how amazing people they are on and off the court. But they don’t fit what we need at the 4 and most likely next year as well it will be 3 years in a row without a true packline defense.
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My favorite part of the recruiting discourse is when you’re like “Our recruiting has been terrible from 2017 through 2021” and people go “Over that stretch we won a championship you idiot”. It’s like…do you… do you not understand that the games are won by recruits landed in the past, or just generally how time works? Drives me insane.
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Completely agree. Once Mamadi and Key left, something broke. I can’t pin it down exactly, but something has been wrong. Multiple Bennett coached teams with mediocre defenses is like the biggest cultural red flag that could exist.
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What I would do (thank god Im not coach but I think there is some validity in my complaints)
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Cut off connection with the 2017-2018 recruiting classes. The plan already falls apart here because Tony isn’t the type to force someone out. But both those guys have been 4 years here now, and our lockerroom needs life. Also as state in other threads, no real veteran leadership from this group.
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Bring in an instant impact 3 and D wing like Ali Ali while Dunn and Bond develop.
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Bring in Norchard Omier the Arkansas state transfer. He fits picture perfect into that Wilkins/Atkins/Hunter/Braxton versatile defense 4. Try to convince him that he will have a heavy 6th man role for us. When he comes in for Jayden at the 4, we will look like old school 2014-2019 UVA basketball. When he comes in for Kadin, Norchard and Jayden = Wilkins and Gill. Also sell him that we put a lot of our 4s in the NBA (he has 3 years left)
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Maybe bring in a Sean McNeil type but I honestly think McKneely can fit this role and would rather just develop him
The roster would be
Starters:
Reece Beekman
Armaan Franklin
Ali Ali
Jayden Gardner
Kadin
Bench:
Norchard Omier
Taine Murray
Isaac McKneely
Isaac Traudt
And Bond and Dunn redshirt like is being rumored.
I think these moves can get us back to being UVA. And it sets it up for ample playing time for the 2022s without letting anyone transfer out.
But these moves won’t happen. Instead it will be year 3 of the Reece/Kihei fan wars and year 3 of Reece not being the triple double machine I know he can be.
If I am truly bummed out about anything, it’s the increased likelihood of not getting to see Reece play with a proper shooting guard next to him until his last year. It just feels criminal. But hopefully he’ll just ball out regardless.
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