Taj79

These aren't grades but what I've seen so far: JJ: as I've said defensively and rebounding-wise he is a warrior. I admit to being frustrated with him once again first half last night but he redeemed it in the second half. It became very evident as the second half progressed that his shot is dependent on the rhythm of a catch-n-shoot mentality. Otherwise, his defender sloughs so far off that on-ball picks for him are compromised. I think the team will benefit a lot from him going to sixth or seventh man when Mitchell returns. He still need to refind his foul shooting touch because he will be in there late and he will be target #1 on fouls. I believe that's why he was inbounding to Cody and Mike late last night and not on the floor receiving the pass. Him not starting will add a dynamic that I see as a positive for this team. MM: he is better suited as a two guard in my book. He can and does create with the ball but it is usually more for himself, which is okay on one hand but not so good on the point guard hand. I think he will be better able to spot up and drop open jumpers accepting the pass from Mitchell and Jett. He is explosive and I have yet to see anyone really stop his first step but he is more the jump shooter type than the drive type in my book. Plus, 6-foot guys should usually stay out of the trees under the basket. DE: has to let the game come to him. He is making mistakes by commission rather than omission as the old saying goes. I think he's trying too, too hard and thereby getting into dumb foul situations. When we lose him, not only do we lose about our only interior scoring threat, but we lose tremendously on the boards at both ends as well. He needed to flash to the middle of the key and receive the ball last night. That North Texas defense zone would have caved quickly. CE: has been a nice surprise. I am curious however as to when the flopping will be ignored. Does that happen in the conference play? I am certain this is coming based on some of the things I've been hearing on national broadcasts --- league instructions and all that. I have been impressed with his leadership and his willingness to get into the paint and mix it up on the defensive end. He takes the tough shots and wants the ball in his hands at the end which is great given his foul shooting effectiveness. Will never dominate on the defensive boards but if he blocks out as Conk did, Evans will clean up. CR: better than any other version of CR. Offers the defensive shot swatter we haven't had since the late Willie Reed. Needs to be more of anoption on the offensive end. Just not there yet and is still an offensive project in the works. JB: Has had some moments but is unpredictable as to being an asset or a liability. Made a nice run with a three and a drive/goaltending last night. Seems hard nosed and tough when fighting on the defensive end but is always fighting which is both good and bad. Good that he doesn't quit but bad in that he seems to be fighting to catch up to his man. Likely candidate for Cassity-like minutes but seems at least a little better in that he's an offensive option whereas Kyle was not. JM: yep, a work in progress but with some hope. From what little I've seen of him, he seems to be better able to provide something more than RL in terms of a low post presence whereas RL is an outside shooter no doubt. RL is no center; JM might be. RL: see above. He is purely dictated by matchups. You get a running mobile team, not him. You get a beast of a team on the interior, not him. He is what he is, a mobile, outside shooting soft Euro big. Next year, he becomes CE. Guys expecting him to go inside even a little, looks like it won't happen just yet. GG: so far, the second coming of JJ ---- as in Justin Johnson. Having had three shoulder seperations myself, I doubt we see much of him for the rest of this year. If we do, he will likely get hurt again and then have to succumb to surgery ala CE his second year. Tension and torque in athletics is amazing. And fighting for rebounds the major cause of it in basketball. There will not been enough to grade GG the rest of this year so he will be next year as he is this year, a complete unknown. KC: on one hand, we made it. Ten days off allows JJ to heal, KM to get better, GG to heal and especially here, KC to get over the leg problems. JJ and MM are dragging. I think that led to MM's careless misstep at the end of the half last night. We need bodies and help and the calvary can't come too soon. Crews: because of his location close to Rammer and Earl, I heard a lot of him yelling out instructions at least last night. So far, he's an interim and acting like one. Nothing more, nothing less. I really don't get the warm and fuzzy that he wants anything more either. If he did, I think he'd act somewhat differently. And I don't really want him with the program moving to the next level, whatever it may be. Overall, I thought we would lose the same two larry72 did. So we are one down. Cannot afford to lose any more in this OOC schedule. I still don't see an inside presence developing yet and our outside shooting is flirtatious at best, inconsistent for sure. Our defense does not seem as intense as last year and our offense appears to be searching itself out just yet. Mitchell and Carter's returns will help but are not the answer as far as the interior is concerned. Lots of teams in this year's A10 are good ---- VCU, Butler, Umass, St. Joe's, Temple --- so it wil be another lunch-pail year for our squad. Going to be fun yes but not anything easy given what I've seen so far. But there is still time and it is still illegal to use "easy" and"Billiken basketball" in the same sentence. I'd offer we are C+ right now with up the only way to go.

Dodged one tonight my friends. Game ball to JJ and Cody with a nice assist to Cory.

Of all the shots to bury JJ that was it.

RL should take a seat for the duration. How come we shoot and four guys all run the other way?

This second half JJ I really like.

Okay --- I am self-correcting. JJ DOEs have a shoit, it must just come in rhythm. As long as he catches and shoots, I'm impressed. A simple solution.

As long as JJ can catch and shoot a jumper in rhythm, he has a shot. But his defender is so far off him thta when Remekun went to screen JJ with the ball, there was no one to pick because he's seven feet away.

Our last field goal was a three by Cody at the 7:58 mark.

UNT = 52% from the floor, 80% from three and 100% from the line. Does this happen every game or is it just me?

You can say all you want and argue the other way but does anyone see how far off JJ his defender is playing him??? They are begging him to shoot and he ain't there. Then when he does make his break to the rim, he misses a layup. This guy is a tremendous defender and rebounder and freaky athletic but skills will come into play eventually. We are not good enough to take any team or our talent for granted. We didn't score a field goal in over 8 minutes. Evans scored one bucket. This is exactly what is missing from last year and tht tis everyone having a role and understanding what it is. That is the missing Majerus factor.

For as good as we looked going up ten, we look just the oipposite as lead is cut to four. We need to get the ball to the center to DE and let him operate. We cannot live off the three with these guys. Make them pay for a zone.

How come our guys can't shoot to open the game? UNT 5 of 6 from the field.

Jeez ----- there is like no one in the Fetz. Bonowicjh? You there?

I don't believe roy said anything about naming anything for Romar, he just pointed out that Romar and Majerus made exactly the same number of Dances ---- one. I might also offer that Grawer left Spoon a nice little duo in Claggs and Hmark when he went out the door. Is that the same as now? Probably not. But short of that, Spoon's greatest legacy was getting Hughes here for one and done. I think it speaks volumes to the lack of substance in this program that we are talking about Majerus ( to some an interloper) in the same vein as Grawer (savior to many) and Ferry and MacCauley (when dinosaurs roamed the earth). The kids left seem to have come here to play for this legendary coach. What else is there to play for here? The so-called foundation created by Douglas/Gray/Bonner crumbled only to be reborn by Claggs/Hmark/H. Then it was crumbling until the Legend arrived; then it and he were one and done. Then it fell on to the broad shoulders of Majerus who I believe used his sizable rep to get the kids he wanted and knew that in order to become competitive and be in it every night, they all had to buy in to his system and make it work. We saw that last year. I still believe that his death notwithstanding, he was gone this year because he and Biondi could not co-exist. And what a way to go out ---- resurrecting a brain-dead program, making it a winner despite internal issues, and moving on, legend intact and amplified. My focus on sustainability is still unresolved. Obviously, it does not appear to be Crews or Whitesell. Next year does not appear to be much of an issue if we open with Loe, Evans, McCall, and Jett. What I don't like about that is that we obviously need a fifth starter and I prefer JJ off the bench. JJ is still not an offensive option to me right now. To those who still believe Manning and Glaze are going to come on and "get it," I say we'll see. Majerus said a lot of good things about Manning true,but without RM there to teach him what he knew, will it come to fruition? Good news in that the jury is still out on that and could come home a winner. Glaze? Have no clue -- just not enough in term sof a body of evidence. Carter and Drew had high preseason praise so there is still time to see that develops into. I am still skeptical on McBroom only because of what I have seen from our other MAC transfer. Locally, the Orioles, who had not had a winning record in 14 years and did not expect to make this year's playoffs (but did), ran a once-a-month promotion where they unveiled bronze statues in the centerfield court for each of their hall-of-famers. Palmer. Weaver. Brooks Robinson. Frank Robinson. Eddie Murray. Why not do something similar for Billiken basketball? Create a Hall of Fame. Induct one guy a month for the duration of the season. Start with Easy Ed. You coudl easily include Ferry. Harry Rogers. Monroe. Larry. Grawer and so on. I don't think you start with Rick but he's in there. Spoon? Maybe. Romar? No way. I believe that, in a way, Rick's illness gave the University an out. I really don't believe they were going to rehire him or extend him and it was going to be a messy divorce --- reality-wise or perception-wise. I think he had had enough of the good father and vice-a-versa. Guys like Bernie and Burwell would have been like "what the hell were you thinking,Larry?" I have long called Saint Louis University a "graveyard" for coaches. Rick's death takes that to a whole, new and likely uncalled for level. The man was truly a basketball genius. I'd like to see a picture of him and the telltale black sweater promitnently in Chaifetz' main entrance. His history here was unfortunately too short to emulate "Coach K court" or "the Dean Smith Center."

People rave over 6'8" forward Tony Mitchell. Rammer called him "an NBA player" on last night's game feed. I think he was supposed to go to Mizzou originally. They are young with Mitchell only a sophomore and three others in double figures --- two more sophomores and a junior. Typically, 6'8" mobile bigs give us fits. Delray James at Rhode Island comes to mind. The only real person available to cover Mitchell is Evans and we'll be giving away three inches or so there. Alzee Williams and Jordan Williams are listed as 6'4" and 6'6" guards. Matchup problems seem to be looming.

I had Rammer on the internet feed.

Rammer is a homer extraordinnairre but he is right on in what these refs are allowing. I am sure we are doing it too but Valpo looks a hell of a lot more obvious with their pushes and hand checks and grabs.

If Valpo is the best ther Horizon has, yikes. Of course, we are at home. Valpo 5 and 1 beating the likes of GA Southern, Northern IL, Kent St, Chicago St., and Bethune-Cookman. Not a real 5 and 1. Loss on road by two to Nebraska.

Weren't we once in the recruiting hunt for Bobby Capobianco?

It helps that Valpo is running the Rich-Grawer-settle-for-an-18-footer offense. Great D. Looksliek 31 to 24 at half. SLU.

8 to 0 run puts us up 23 to 19 at the under 4. Playing Remekun and Ellis on 5'9" point guards Buggs who refuses to shoot. Loe and Remekunwitgh twofouls. Manning doing well.

We look like sh*t. Good defensive stand blown by questionable decisions on offensive end. The ball goes through the net so often each make is like a once-a-year celebration.

i can't tell from the internet feed if there is anything on our unis or not.

13 to 12 w/Cody at line for two under 12 TO.

7 all at the under16 TO. A real emptiness for me today.