Review of hopes heading into the season vs. how it all played out. If you don’t care as much about the “self-assessment” part, still might be worth a read as it looks back at the preseason lens as well as gives some thoughts on roster utilization.
Whoa, did you really get your own custom shoe?
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Yessir - Lindsay Huff special.
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Interesting take on Rohde. I kinda liked him as a 3 positionally in the preseason, but I hadn’t really noticed that he’d played better as a guard. I think he’s probably better suited as a wing defensively, though.
Maybe having some ?? at the lead guard spot next year will open some time for him at different spots. I also don’t think him as a small ball 4 in certain spots is the craziest thing either. Two of my bigger takeaways from Tommies tape was (1) he needs to have the ball moving to the basket, and (2) he needs to be exploiting mismatches. He can’t exploit any mismatches in the ACC as a SF. He’s only being guarded by guys who can swallow him up.
I kinda think all the secondary facilitator stuff and feel for the game stuff (and yes I had fun with that, while crying) is sorta true but none of that matters on a bad (offensive) team. Those characteristics can make a good team better, but they’re wasted on a bad team.
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Now you just need a Good Feet™️ insole in there.
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Yeah, I liked him as a 3 to start the season as well… and then it dawned on me throughout the year that he was really playing out of position at this athleticism level and, like you said, getting swallowed by ACC SFs.
He’s a better on-ball defender than off, although sometimes those limitations come to a head (I’m thinking of watching him try to guard Morsell right now); but if you watched him against Nembhard or Massner last year (Abmas was too quick for him) he kind of did the same thing to them that’s being done to him - he swallowed them up with his size and then used his own size to score over them comfortably (and had the volume and rhythm to do so).
I’m not sure he ever gets that here (either the volume or the ability to play a position where he’s not just out-athleticism…ed).
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It’s all coming together!
That was some good stuff. I’m one of the few who have really got down on Rhode. At times he looked great but as is the case with others on the team his offensive game got worse as the season wore on.There were times when I felt he was being lazy .He also got lost occasionally . I may be too harsh on him but he’s talented and it was frustrating to me
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What are you expecting from Rhode next year? (assuming he will still be here)
Depends on how we use him… but most likely a slightly better shooting version of what he was this season…
I’m hoping he’s not a starter once everything shakes out. We’ve had a real problem with finding the right guys for the SF position really since Trey.
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Great stuff, as always. My only beef is the use of 1-5 to describe positions as if every lineup uses those classic positions (PG, SG, SF, PF, C). Modern basketball largely moved away from lineups like that a long time ago. I feel like PG, SG, Wing, and Post are better descriptors of positions today and teams usually use some combinations of those. (And most PGs these days are really combos). Very few classic Cs in college (or even pro) hoops any more.
For example, Rohde is a SG to me, regardless if he’s playing with McKneely or not. And since most teams play 3 guards these days, that’s fine.
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While you’re right that “guard, wing, post” are more accurate in the broader sense, the traditional positions are still important, IMO, because they indicate how they fit into the players playing around them and who is matching up with them on the other team (and who we’re guarding). Rohde isn’t the SG when IMK is in because he’s almost always taking/being taken by the bigger player, with some exceptions, sure (and his role also isn’t to shoot in the way iMac’s is).
I use center to designate who is going to be matched up on our opponent’s biggest player (and be guarded by them) which is still a key role in college hoops as that’s where most of your 7 footers are, etc.
It helps add a little more nuance to the discussion around how all of our pieces come together when playing together.
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Sure, it still works, but most teams we’re matching up against aren’t running out classic lineups. Take Carolina, who probably has the most traditional lineup (because of Bacot as the C). Would you really call Cormac Ryan a SF? And I know RJ shoots and scores a lot, but he’s as liable to be labeled a PG as a SG.
To be clear, it doesn’t really distract from your analysis. I just disagree that you need to have a classic 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 lineup or designation to match opponents. As likely, the other team’s running out a 1, 2, 2, 3, 4 or 1, 1, 2, 2, 4.
I like splitting up offensive from defensive roles.
Some good examples from the NBA world that apply conceptually:
It’s fine to discuss more advanced roles or to go more generic but I still find that talking about traditional roles is most understood by the most basketball fans and you can add color to it re: “stretch 4” “small ball 5” etc.
For example, people often asked me why I said that Armaan Franklin was being played out of position at SF as opposed to playing his more natural SG when, in reality, he was coming off of screens in Sides just like Kihei or Reece were. And the reason was, because of who was guarding him and who he was guarding. Across the ACC last season there was a big size difference between a team’s second smallest starter and their third - and it was the difference between Armaan often being as big or bigger than the player he would have been guarding/guarding him vs. almost always being undersized by 2 inches, up to as big as 4.
To your example, Cormac Ryan might be more traditionally a SG in the sense if we describe his skillset - but on that team he does start at the SF and, depending on how we started could have been guarded by anyone from Rohde, Murray, or even Dunn - but almost never by iMac (unless Harris and Beekman were both playing too, which we rarely did).
Re: forwards - it is important, IMO, to differentiate Center from PF because centers in our league were Bacot, Reid, Hall, Filiposwki, Burns, Federiko, Post, etc. which were all significantly bigger differences than the alternatives playing alongside them. Same reason Groves was pretty well-suited defensively at the PF but terrible at the C, and calling him a “forward” gets lost in that.
Now, there are teams like Miami, for example, whose center Omier is more of a small ball center but also a more physical one, but that’s still the role he’s playing and then you can speak to the nuance of the matchup he presents vs. someone like Post. Maybe you can play Dunn at Center in those matchups and get away with playing smaller or maybe (like we did this year) Buchanan is just the better fit.
The reason I like the traditional role descriptors isn’t necessarily because they describe HOW the team utilizes those players (I try to do that through the writing - although PG is a little more linear when another team has a clear primary offensive initiator and then just more speaks to size when they don’t) but it describes how our team aligns size-wise internally and then match-up wise with who we’re playing.
The more complex roles I find tend to be more variable using them instead of just explaining what’s happening on the court/showing video would be more confusing for most readers.
Anyway, mostly just my own preference when it comes to being able to communicate ideas about the team and feel like the point is being understood as I intend.
For example: if I say that “Leon Bond isn’t a good fit as a SF in Sides, but we could use him in that role to exploit mismatches within the Inside Triangle in the post while adding his defensive benefit.” that’s much more efficiently communicated than saying guard, wing, or forward.
Using “SF” automatically places him on your roster where the assumption is that there are exactly two bigger (or at least inside-oriented) guys on the floor and you also know that I mean he’s one of the movers in “Sides” without really having to spell any of that out each time you introduce an idea.
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