I did mention he’s sneaky strong. I think he’s going to be a “situationally good” defender, again. And we need to make more of those situations!
(for real, though, he’s pretty good on ball, has quick hands and good anticipation, is a great rebounder for his size… but he’s shot over easily, concedes too much to the back down far too easily, and gets buried on ball screens and really struggles to get back into the play. He needs to be flanked by good defenders and athleticism in the pack line and leaned on offensively).
Nice. I liked this snippet and the following thoughts:
But, with Mallory, you aren’t going to have to make as many trade-offs for the offensive side of the ball because he’s the tradeoff. He should be able to carry a lot of that load himself. So, what does that mean? It means that we’re going to want to prioritize defense, and size, to pair with him.
Also, when was the last time we’ve had a player this willing to take off-the-dribble 3s? Ty? Maybe I’m missing someone since then.
Good stuff Cuts. In the most simplistic terms i think Mallory’s PT his first year will track very similar to Jerome’s. He’s just going to bring certain things to the floor that will make it very hard for CTB not to be giving good mins as the seasons rolls on. Even if that is at the expense of DD or Bliss. If the ‘style’ and pushing the ball changes are real, then guards that can really shoot and/or really attack the bucket are going to be what we need. Who (projected) is gonna be best at that next season? Shooting - iMac, Sharma (projected), Chance (projected). Attacking the bucket/transition - Gertrude, Dai Dai, Chance (projected). Who is on both lists…?
Not sure how this will hold up to time, but personally I’d put the odds of Dai Dai sticking around after his third year at 50/50. Maybe 65/35 after this year. Sort of a gut thing - a little bit of what HGN mentioned when staff were deciding whether to offer + the young talent coming in.
I suspect any concerns about Mallory and Dai Dai will have a way of working themselves out.
Yeah, Dai Dai is sort of the piece that doesn’t really fit IF we’re going to be playing Chance right away (which I think we will). You can play both together but you better be stacking your 3-5 with defense… and there’s no way we’re doing that at any length with iMac (and probably Sharma) on the roster still.
You can play Mallory as Ames’s pure back up but then Bliss and Rohde will probably not see a lot of time.
Some amount of roster churn at the G position this coming offseason will probably be for the best.
Maybe. We’ll have to see how the new frontline guys look and how much Blake has progressed.
The Kihei/Kyle/Ty grouping worked because you had NBA level athletes/defenders in Dre, Braxton & Mamadi, along with the ultimate blue collar defender/rebounder with Salt.
His ability to stretch his range beyond the normal 3 and hit floaters feel like the biggest keys to his success at the college level to me. I’m glad people are feeling good about those.
This might be the NBA fan in me talking, but I am pretty skeptical of him as a “build-around player.” I agree to some extent in terms of putting him on the floor with guys that can complement him defensively, and god knows that I have no affection for our current offense, but I am pretty skeptical of building an offense around a short PG. It is a notoriously hard thing to win a championship with in the NBA, and the college sample isn’t great either.
I think the best version of him is as the second best player on the team with someone bigger than him being the true alpha of the team. I really fear him working into doubleteams late in games if he is our primary offensive engine.
Perhaps that was confusing. “Build-around” player in pro sports probably more commonly means you go and get that player and they’re great no matter what and you just put pieces around them.
What I meant and mean when I use that term is that you have to build your roster to be mindful of the fact that you’re going to have them in it. i.e. not any old normal thing will do - you need to tailor to the fact you know you’re going to have him out there.
*Edit - I added this thought in the article just in case that was confusing for others - good feedback.
Thinking about this more - perhaps if Sharma ends up being a positive defender then you could do something like Mallory/iMac/Sharma and go more defensive with your 4-5 and that could be fine/really good.
But I’m doubtful that guys like Ames/Bliss are going to be good fits there alongside both Mallory and iMac/Sharma such that they’ll be able to do enough offensively (or will even need to) such that it won’t just make more sense to play better defensive players like, theoretically, Gertrude or perhaps more hopefully a transfer wing or a Saunders at the SF or options like that.
Even just playing Power at the PF with a defensive/athletic SF and Mallory and either iMac or Sharma is probably better both offensively and defensively than running any three of those guard combos.
Dai Dai’s role on this team is a bit of a wildcard. Both this coming year and in future years.
I think it** makes sense in light of Gertrude’s injury and Bliss having had two surgeries in the past several months. But yeah, Bliss, DD, Mallory, and Gertrude mostly competing for the same pile of minutes, while iMac will be getting 30+ at SG is a bit of a pile up, for sure.
Would help if Elijah can play the 3, but let’s just hope he comes back healthy in the first instance.
I feel like Bliss being good would be the ideal outcome.
Basically, if Bliss could be the floor general/distributor and also be able to knock down catch and shoot 3s would be fantastic. It would let him carry the weight of passing and dribbling and allow Chance to hunt shots etc. And Bliss + IMac would be tall and strong enough.
The concerning case is where Bliss and Eli are misses now and then we have a guard room of Dai Dai, Chance, Imac which is
Certainly an option - and there’s merit to occasionally playing Chance off the ball - but in terms of bulk minutes, I’d want him to be our PG, not our SG.
Have him have the ball in his hands as much as possible. Force defenses to stretch to guard him by the logo or wherever he is. Utilize his quickness and his handle.
Playing him off the ball feels like more of a change of pace/alternate look to throw at defenses that nerfs some of the unique challenges he poses to a defense if we stick with it for long.
It’s just tough roster construction in that you’ve got Ames, Bliss, and Mallory all in subsequent classes, all better as a 1 than as a 2, something has to give.
Hmmm, interesting. Your take on Bliss is different from mine. I know that Bliss was apparently originally recruited as a 1, but the vibe I’m getting is that he is developing more as a Bennett- like 2 ( I e., good handle but more of a shooter.) I see Bliss as an IMac replacement right now. I guess that the problem with any take on Bliss by those of us outside the program is we have zero recent film/ game footage of him . I’m basing my take on snippets of comments by JWilly and some of Bliss’s teammates describing his game. In any event, he sounds like another versatile piece of the puzzle.
Years ago I used to vigorously beat the 2-PG drum. There was run of a few years in the mid-teens where 2-PG lineups won natties for like 4 or 5 years in a row, starting in 2013 with Louisville’s Russ Smith / Peyton Siva guard pairing.
But know a few things need to be true for it to work, things that worked for Kihei-Jerome but didn’t for Kihei-Reece. On offense at least one, preferably both need to be equally dangerous as an off-ball scorer as an on-ball facilitator, something Jerome could do that neither Kihei nor Reece were suited for. On defense, either one needs to be a jumbo PG who can defend bigger shooting guards, or they need to be backed up by long athletic defenders.
Tony is going to have to see if he can make those elements work with Dai Dai - Bliss - Chance, either by having some rise to the occasion as off-ball scorers, or prove able to defend bigger guards, or have a carefully crafted and deployed lineup 3-4-5. That or either someone is the odd man out and doesn’t get PT, or we force it and the team’s upside is capped.
