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Who Is In Your Rotation


HoosierPal

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Today's PD article has already been mentioned in another thread.  But it brought up an interesting quote from Roby about having 12 to 13 players in the rotation last season.  Well that problem has been solved as we only have 11 warm bodies on the bench.  So who gets the minutes?  If Ford is intent on playing 94 feet of pressure, we will need everyone.

My breakdown of the squad is this:

Power players limited to the paint:  Agbeko and Neufeld (can't play them both at the same time for more than a few minutes, as they clog the paint.)

Ball Handlers:  Bishop, Hines and Roby

Shooters:  Crawford and Moore

"Stretch 4" Power Players:  Elliott, Johnson, and Gillmann

Unknown:  Markos the Greek.

With certain teams, we could play with no "Stretch 4".  But that puts either Reggie and Matt on the floor together, or Crawford / Moore guarding the opponent's Power Forward.    

So for lack of a better agenda for a starting five, I'm going with Agbeko, Bishop, Roby, Crawford and ? (probably Gillmann initially but subject to change to either Johnson or Elliott) Then I'm seeing the other five (Neufeld, Hines, Moore, Elliott and Johnson) getting plenty of minutes during OOC.  Markos is TBD.  

 

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It will be interesting to see how quickly Ford moves away from the Seniors.  I am really hoping that the younger players provide enough spark off the bench.

For this first few games, It will be hard to get away from Roby, Crawford and Reggie being heavy on minutes. 

I know that everyone thinks we will be dreadful, but I always have that sliver of hope.  I am starting to feel that way right now as the season approaches. 

Bishop, Crawford, Roby, Welmer, Reggie....with Neufeld, and the Frosh coming off the bench. 

What if we do take to this new system and the guys start playing loose and get a couple wins under their belt.  We are not that young of a team so inexperience should not be an excuse.  Maybe we surprise to the upside....

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I think ideally for a coach (and unfortunately for the seniors), he would play the seniors big minutes early in the year and then phase them out towards the end as the frosh get up to speed. However, we have a short bench this year and we'll see at least some minor injuries/tired legs so I'd expect the seniors to get big minutes most of the season barring injury. Crawford is picking up the intensity in practice after his injury but he still may be brought on slowly to start the season I would guess. The bench could be especially short early in the year which will only increase in the chances at injury.

My honest opinion is that Ford will "reward" the seniors and play them all year and that if he has to phase guys out, it will be the guys he's going to try to convince to transfer after the season. I know we still have 2 scholarships to fill, but I think Ford is going to want to make this completely his roster as soon as possible so I could still see a transfer or two after the season. Simple probability shows that too. There are hundreds of transfers every season anyway. 

My guess at the "regular" rotation: Bishop, Roby, Crawford, Agbeko, Neufeld. Johnson playing big minutes off the bench. Welmer and Moore coming in next. Hines and Gillmann after that. 

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With 9 scholarship players and 2 walk-ons, we can play everybody and still have a shorter rotation than Crews did during this past chaotic season.

I tend to agree with @slufan13 on this, in terms of Agbeko and Crawford (if healthy) a lot early on. Roby and Gillmann probably more then, too. I'm hoping Neufeld had a big offseason because we look pretty weak underneath otherwise. Johnson might have to play up a position. Hopefully Welmer's frame doesn't prevent him from being a useful defender and rebounder.

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As with Pistol, I think 13 is on the right track. Neufeld and Gillmann need to step up. Otherwise, we might see more Reggie at the 5, with Johnson shifting to play more 4 than 3. I think Welmer will begin the season as Reggie's back up at the 4. 

Of the bench guys, Johnson will likely get the most minutes by virtue of his versatility. He's skilled enough to play on the wing and long enough for the post. Him, Welmer, and Neufeld will be the players most worth watching closely, as we still don't know who will pair with Foreman moving forward. Ideally it's Welmer or Neufeld so that Johnson can be a mismatch and scoring option off the bench. 

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Starting 5 Bishop, PG, Roby, SG, Johnson, F, Agbeko,F and Neufeld, C.

Bench Gillman back up C/F, Moore G/F, Crawford G/F, Welmer, F and Hines both guard positions.

For the season to be fun to watch Neufeld must be able to defend, changes shots and rebound and be able to play 20 minutes.  Reggie has to be Brian Conklin in his senior year.  The turnovers must be 12 or less.  All players must stay healthy.  My definition of fun to watch is seeing better execution and fundamentals. 

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16 minutes ago, Zink said:

As with Pistol, I think 13 is on the right track. Neufeld and Gillmann need to step up. Otherwise, we might see more Reggie at the 5, with Johnson shifting to play more 4 than 3. I think Welmer will begin the season as Reggie's back up at the 4. 

Of the bench guys, Johnson will likely get the most minutes by virtue of his versatility. He's skilled enough to play on the wing and long enough for the post. Him, Welmer, and Neufeld will be the players most worth watching closely, as we still don't know who will pair with Foreman moving forward. Ideally it's Welmer or Neufeld so that Johnson can be a mismatch and scoring option off the bench. 

 

9 minutes ago, CBFan said:

Starting 5 Bishop, PG, Roby, SG, Johnson, F, Agbeko,F and Neufeld, C.

Bench Gillman back up C/F, Moore G/F, Crawford G/F, Welmer, F and Hines both guard positions.

For the season to be fun to watch Neufeld must be able to defend, changes shots and rebound and be able to play 20 minutes.  Reggie has to be Brian Conklin in his senior year.  The turnovers must be 12 or less.  All players must stay healthy.  My definition of fun to watch is seeing better execution and fundamentals. 

I suspect Neufeld's health issue will hinder his reaching his potential this season.  It seems to take folks a while to recuperate after a bout with mono.

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My guess is that we will struggle defensively no matter who we play up front. Just like Crews was forced to eventually play Bishop starter minutes because he was one of our top offensive players, I think Coach Ford will have to make a similar decision in the frontcourt.

Amongst Neufeld, Gillmann, Welmer and Johnson, Welmer is the toughest cover IMO. He's a natural stretch 4 with good size and has a decent first step to get to the rim if you run him off his shot. I know Coach sang JJ's praises in the press release announcing his signing but I think he's going to have some growing pains. He looks only 6'6 and appears to be an average athlete. If he's not hitting his jump shot he may struggle to score. Because we're shorthanded at the 3 and 4, he'll still get a minimum of 20 minutes a game.

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I will go Bishop, Roby, Crawford, Agbeko, Gillman to start the season, assuming they are all healthy.

Gillman finally looks like he added weight and muscle base on the team photo.  I think that Ford will want to find out if Gillman can contribute or if he needs to utilize that senior graduate transfer rule.  If Gillman has had a Conklin summer, he may contribute for the next two years.  If not, I bet we stop seeing him much after the non-conference schedule and see a transfer after the season.

I would bet that Ford eases Welmer, Johnson, and Moore into the rotation, letting them learn mostly from the bench at first.  They'll get time, certainly, just based upon the  numbers game.  By conference schedule, whoever of those three earned more playing time will get it.

Neufeld and Hines will play more than the new guys, but less than the starters.  Neufeld getting more than Hines.

Again, once guys show Ford if they can play or not, this all will change.  I just think that Ford will start with the veterans and then go with whomever is playing the best down the stretch, because his competitive juices will cause him to want to be able to prove to everyone that he can get more out of the same guys that his predecessor did.  I think he believes doing so, if it can be done, will build confidence in him inside the fan base.

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51 minutes ago, hsmith19 said:

The roster's thin enough I don't expect a need to cut Crawford's and Agbeko's minutes late in the season, unless it's because they're hurt again. Maybe cut Gillmann's late if he doesn't improve.

I agree that it will be all hands on deck.  Crawford averaged 26.9 mpg and Reggie 24.3 mpg. I don't see those going down. The five departee's played 2701 minutes, or 42% of the total team minutes.  There is plenty of PT to go around without cutting Crawford's and Agbeko's minutes.

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What I am going to say comes from a knowledge base that does not include the technical aspects of coaching basketball.

I think it will be an iffy season for Crawford because of his health issues, I really cannot see him being able to maintain a really good level of play for the whole season. I hope Gillmann is fully recovered by the time the season starts and is able to play well, but we will see if he can do so since he never played that well when he did play before his injury. As far as Neufeld goes, with the recent mono bout he is a wild card in my mind, he may be able to play reasonably well but I would not bet on it, and playing reasonably well will again require him to play better than he has done so far. I expect Reggie to play as he did last year with some improvement. This accounts for 4 our of the 9 players on Scholarships. My expectations for these four are not bright.

The remaining returning players are Roby and Bishop. I would expect to see improvement in both of them. Particularly Roby would be able to play more of a position and know what is expected of him, something he apparently had trouble with last year. Bishop was a freshman last year and played reasonably well. I would expect him to be better this year and perhaps become the main point guard this season. I do expect these two to even surprise us in a positive manner, at least occasionally.

As for the rest, Welmer we has never played in competition, so he is a question mark, and he does not appear to have bulked up yet. I know a lot is expected of him, and we will certainly see what he manages to do. Moore and Johnson will have to rise up to the occasion and impress everyone with how good they are if we are going to have a semi decent year. However we must keep in mind that this will be the first time any of these three play competitively at D1 level.

Finally I expect to see Hines and Psimitis playing this year. I do not know how much they will play or how well they will play. I think Hines will try his best, he has always done so, and we will see how good that is. The other kid is a total question mark.

Overall, from my point of view, a lot will depend how how good  and for how long Crawford, Neufeld, Gillmann, and Agbeko manage to play this season. If they can manage to perform well for most of the season despite their issues, then the season may be OK to better than what we think, if not I think it will not be a good season. This does not mean to say we physically cannot improve our current standings, only that it looks like a difficult thing to do and depends largely on health issues.

Finally, I think this season will give us some information as to how much lemonade Ford can make out  of lemons. The team he has is far from being a championship team, we will see how he manages to do this year with this team. This is what I really want to see, as a sort of a preview or trailer for future years coached by Ford.

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I dont know enough at Johnson. I hear he can score really well, but if he can rebound well I wouldnt mind Seeing:

 

Bishop

Roby

Crawford

Johnson

Agbeko

 

Small line up, but it might just be the only way to get enough points to win. 

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I think there are only three sure things in the starting line up right now if they are healthy.  Those would be Bishop, Agbeko and Crawford.  I think we will see different combinations used early in the year for the other two starting spots.  A lot will depend on how well and quickly Johnson and Moore adapt to the college game on both ends of the floor.  That you never know until you see how they do against actual D1 competition. Who knows what we will get from Gilmann, Welmer and Neufeld or how many minutes those three can play effectively.

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8 minutes ago, brianstl said:

Welmer's weight is listed a exactly the same on SLU's website this season as it was last season.  Did he gain weight since last season? He could have, but you can't make that conclusion by looking at SLU's website.

That's a decent point, but SLU's website also listed Jordair Jett as an Undeclared major at the end of his senior season (he wasn't). Point being that SLI's website might not be the best source for updated information.

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15 minutes ago, DeSmetBilliken said:

That's a decent point, but SLU's website also listed Jordair Jett as an Undeclared major at the end of his senior season (he wasn't). Point being that SLI's website might not be the best source for updated information.

Which was my whole point in my original exchange with Hoosier when he tried to use it as source for Welmer's weight gain. Don't expect anything on that site to be accurate.

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31 minutes ago, brianstl said:

Which was my whole point in my original exchange with Hoosier when he tried to use it as source for Welmer's weight gain. Don't expect anything on that site to be accurate.

What I gave you was his weight gain since he entered Prep School.

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