Nothing against the guy personally, but in hindsight losing Traudt was probably a very good thing.
It means we likely donât go after Groves, who has been better than expected.
Probably would have played even less than he has at Creighton, if defense/rebounding is a problem there.
The âHuff isnât playing enoughâ screams from us from a few years ago would have been nothing, compared to how it would have been with Traudt. Especially with the struggles of the last few weeks. It would have been worse than the Kihei division among the fans.
I agree generally with most** of the âwe are better off with XYZ having transferredâ statements. The problem is that I think we are worse off with having lost ALL of them, and that we are low on continuity and system understanding because of it.
At some point, our system relies on convincing guys to stay, and in order to convince guys to stay, you have to actually do it (which to be fair, seems like we are doing more of this year)
** exceptions? Almost certainly Kadin and maybe Igor. 5th year Casey might be nice too, but maybe coulda been a recruiting blockerâŚ
I like this assessment (woof agreeing with a @haney post to start my day⌠jk). Itâs easy to pick out individual transfers and say âyep we lucked out on that oneâ but eventually the sum total does hurt the bottom line.
Itâs also the difficult nature of the current system that every program has to figure out how work that delicate alchemy of losing guys to the portal but not losing too many pieces.
I think overall the Hoos are surviving managing the transfers out, but it would be great to start thriving.
I certainly agree with most of this. The only quibble I have concerns what I donât know. WRT to the issue of playing time (which isnât the only cause of transfers): I subscribe to the notion that it is not the lack of playing time which motivates a player to leave. Rather, I think it is his perception that there wonât be significant playing time in the future. Since I donât attend team practices, and I am not privy to conversations between the players and staff, I have no idea what is happening behind the scenes. I donât know what expectations are held by players on the bench. Or, for that matter, what the expectations the staff has for any given player. I imagine knowing what those expectations are would go a long way to determining whether the program is better off without âXYZâ or not. It is my opinion, though, that many of the struggles Virginia is working through today are the result of missed recruiting evaluations during the covid shutdown coupled with the new transfer regs. Continuity has been severely disrupted.
I disagree completely. Actually, I donât, but I wasnât going to be the next guy to agree with you.
I think the new reality with transfers is that you are going to have a certain quantity of transfers out to deal with, and that certainly throws a wrench in Tonyâs historical model, but it isnât insurmountable. While I agree Kadin (and I think he was a bit of a special case) is probably the only guy weâve lost where the next season you say âdamn weâd be much better with him on the team,â there is truth to the thought that we lost out on what an Igor or a Traudt could have been. But again, the reality is youâre going to have to deal with both those types.
Our biggest issue in the transfer era, IMO, is that our transfers in have not been that successful as of yet. Weâre really dealt with transfers in 2 big waves, this year and the JG/AF year. Not that JG/AF were bad players, but they werenât big hits. This year, Minor looks like a miss, and Groves looks like JG/AF level. Rohde Iâm willing to wait on passing judgement, because heâs our first guy that is essentially a high school recruit delayed a year (a type of transfer I think has a lot of value). I think itâs fair to say heâs not a home run this year, but he has 2 more years and I like the raw material we got.
The transfer era is going to introduce a lot of volatility in talent levels for teams that arenât either blue bloods or major bag droppers. Duke/Kansas etc. will be pulling in the picks of the litter every year. Other teams are going to have big hits with mid major guys (like say Miami with Miller and Ormier), but those same teams might miss with the next crop. The same logic applies to us. Just because we havenât knocked it out of the park yet, doesnât mean we wonât next season. But there is a lot of randomness to the outcome. What do we need? Who is out there? Will they be receptive to the âUVA/Tony way?â
Itâs interesting that no one we were really âinâ on during transfer season has been all that impressive. In hindsight I wish weâd targeted Will Baker harder but not sure we ever had a chance there.
Minor was a whiff no doubt about it and hopefully something we learn from in the future. I still contend that Rohde will be a great piece for the future of this team but he admittedly looks a step slow and the shot hasnât translated like I thought it would.
Next year we likely lose Dunn to go along with Minor, Groves, and Reece. Tony need to limit additional attrition because we otherwise return more than enough from a continuity standpoint. Can we land the right piece to fill in at the 4? Do we look to add a PG?
Will be very fascinating to track. Going forward we just canât have any unexpected attrition. We got to build off of who we have in the system now and hope itâs a good enough core with the proper development.
With all that is being said about current transfers, it is worth remembering that there have always been a significant number of players leaving the program since Coach Bennett arrived. Even before the portal was created, I have a suspicion that he had more players leave, per annum, than any other coach since Iâve been following the program (which is well over 50 years). And, that isnât a bad thing. Heâs taken chances on a number of recruits. When things didnât work, they left which opened up scholarships for other prospects. Whatâs changed is that since the championship, many of the recruits, who were thought to be âsure thingsâ by internet forums, have not worked as well as they might. I think that Morsell, Abdur-Rahim, Milicic, Shedrick, and Traudt were all expected to contribute more. The same might even have been said of McKoy and McCorkle, but to a much lesser extent. (I also think it is instructive to note that both signees in the 2021 class were foreign players. The staff was unable to conduct live evaluations here in the summer of 2020 which is having repercussions today.) Virginia has always had transfers under Bennett, but recruiting has been an issue since covid. Personally, I think with the last three classes, things are back on track, but it is going to take a while to re-establish the continuity which is so essential to UVaâs success. Itâs also worth remembering that Virginia is still winning, or sharing, ACC regular season championships. Itâs not as though the program has become a cellar dweller.
Yeah, I mean, in the CTB era, how many transfers have we landed who ended up as even average ACC-level starters? I can think of 3: Gill, Hauser, and TM3. Part of it is that the portal 10 years ago was a mere sparkle in the eye of what it is today so there hasnât been time, and Iâm hopeful Rohde grows into one before too long. But, yeah, I havenât checked, but it feels like Wake gets someone at that level every year. Not that I want to go that route overall, but itâd be nice to get a little more mileageâŚ
Armaan and Braxton. Jayden a starter on a team that won a share of the acc title. Were never in the lower half of the acc with these players. If you mean bonafide NBA players then that makes more sense.
Ahh yes had forgotten Handlogten but seems like we never got any traction there. He wouldâve been a huge get for us.
We got pretty close to landing Robert Jennings who may have helped with rebounding but is getting minimal run at Texas Tech. Other âbigâ I remember being linked to is Robbie Beran who kinda stinks and I believe we chose Groves instead which worked out.
Which is why Iâm concerned (and HGN echoed it yesterday) that Dunnâs likely portal replacement wonât be a much higher level player than Groves or Beran. That would still of course give us a pretty good team assuming current guys growth curves accelerate. Oh and Bliss needs to be a hit right off the bat.
Background issue with any big weâd have brought in is that we need both a true big with rebounding and some offensive post skills, but also a stretch the floor big. As much as I like RD (and I think I like him more than most), he distorts what we need and how we play around him.
As far as actual targets, I think Will Baker is probably right at the sweetspot of what we need, but frankly Iâm not sure if he was an actual target.
The problem is that if you look at the best posts in the portal, we just were not in on any of them. As discussed in this or some other thread this morning, something about us or the current rules or NIL or something, is really constraining our options in the portal. Dickinson, Jesse Edwards, Graham Ike, Grant Nelson, Aziz Bandaogo, Kelel Ware, Udeh, Cisse, Aimaq (was always gonna follow Mad Dog, I guess), Batcho, Tre Mitchell, etc. Nope, nope, nope, and nope.
In terms of Groves/Beran, we def. seem to have gotten the better one, but I also think we went through a nice period where Grovesâs strengths showed up in spades, and weâve minimized his weaknesses, but ACC play might not be so kind, and weâve already seen some of those issues cropping up (like him getting ragdolled by Zona on the boards).
Traudtâs slow feet trying to hedge shooting like 20% from 3 in non-garbage opponents⌠hard pass.
How we counteract the limitations for UVA and the new portal is maybe taking a chance on the pool of portal players who are former top 50/75 kids but barely have any stats because they were bench warmers to 5 stars and covid 5th years and portal acquisitions. Or kids who we have a strong connection with that are on shit teams.
TJ Power, Cam Christie, Little Peja.
Im not as worried at center cause Buchanan and Robinson will be more than enough in a year or two. Buchanan just needs weight, and even though Robinson was raw out of HS he will make an immediate impact on the boards and just energy/intensity/physicality inside.
We just need this young group to become veterans and develop chemistry with eachother.
Im also still pretty high on Ezra Ausar and Cade Tyson as portal candidates. Pitch them Gill/Hauser.
Probably just coincidental, but the guys weâve done the best with from the portal, esp. immediate success, have mostly been 4s. Gill, Brax, Hauser, Gardner, BVP, Groves. TBD if Rohde gives us a new model of portal successâŚ