Nate Latsch
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Posts posted by Nate Latsch
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>Nate - Do you think he would be a candidate to redshirt his
>first year?
I think he'd definitely be a candidate to redshirt.
Look at how many players the Billikens will have for the shooting guard/small forward spots that season. I think a couple of these guys could be redshirt candidates.
Going forward with the program, if you're having recruiting success, it would be great to be able to redshirt a player or two here and there.
- Nate
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I think two things are certain in this debate:
1) Based on RM's recruiting success early on, it's going to be difficult to earn playing time on this team in the future. There will be more depth and everyone will need to prove they deserve to see the court.
2) Some players will leave. Every school loses players for one reason or another — even McDonald's All-Americans transfer schools. We can all speculate about what players will not stay around for a few more years. I know I have. It may be because they aren't good enough to contribute, but it may also be because they are more likely to get significant playing time somewhere else.
If Majerus signs six players for the Class of 2008, what are the odds all six will finish their careers at Saint Louis U.? Probably not good.
- Nate
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>Does Roth have a formal offer from Majerus? This has never
>been clear to me.
Yes.
- Nate
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Rick Majerus has already called Bryant Allen, the PG from Maplewood.
I talked to Allen today and I'll have a story on him on my site sometime tomorrow probably.
Allen also plays for Corey Frazier at Maplewood, with John Redden as an assistant coach.
Southern Illinois and Missouri State are also in the picture.
I liked what I saw from Allen at the Hoop Jamboree, even going up against Michael Dixon.
Allen is about 5-11/6-0, lefty, good shooter and a good athlete (plays football and runs track). I was talking to someone recently and we both agreed that Allen is like a cross between Dwayne Polk and Kevin Lisch, if you can picture that kind of player.
Majerus will watch Allen in July and could offer soon.
- Nate
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>so when i recently questioned why you only showed concern
>about all things billikens and only posted on the
>billikens.com message board, there actually was an ulterior
>income generating motive to be all about the billikens in he
>works.
Actually, that's not true.
I saw a need for this kind of site, so I decided to pursue the idea.
It will be a long time before I make any decent money off the site.
- Nate
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>Nice job on the site. Just a quick question. How often are
>you going to update the site? Obviously you are only going
>to report when there is news but does scout.com have any
>guidelines saying you have to update?
There are some guidelines in place about how much content I'm supposed to provide on a weekly basis — which can also include photos, interviews or videos in addition to stories.
That said, I am going to try to update the site as often as I can. That could mean daily, or twice a day, or every other day.
Right now, there's a lot of information out there that people don't know about. I'm trying to track down that info and also catch up with what has been going on since Majerus took over.
There's not much money to be made from the site for a while, so I'm doing a lot of work to try to build up the site. I'll need to get a couple hundred subscribers before I see much financial return. Right now, I think the site has less than five subscribers.
For several years the site was just there and didn't have anyone generating original content for it. All the stories on there would come from other sites that just happened to mention SLU.
I'm trying to build this thing, and I'm going to work very hard to do so. Like I mentioned before, when people subscribe to the site I'm going to do everything I can to make that expense worthwhile to them.
- Nate
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A few people on here already know about this, but I've taken over as the publisher of the Scout.com site that covers St. Louis University athletics.
The site, formerly St. Louis Insider, will now be called BillikenReport.com (though the name and logo has yet to change) and will contain both free and subscriber-only content regarding all aspects of SLU sports, including recruiting.
I'm working on several different stories right now, trying to keep up with the latest in recruiting, but I have the first story (a free story about signee Barry Eberhardt) published on the front page right now at www.saintlouis.scout.com.
I really want to make this site a great resource for Billiken fans, who don't have many options when it comes to finding news and feature stories about their favorite teams.
There are three different options for subscriptions and I will do everything in my power to make subscribers' visits to the site both enjoyable and informative. I will also provide information on the message boards that fans will not be able to get from other sources.
I also encourage any kind of feedback people have in terms of what you would like to see on the site and how I can make it better.
Thanks for your time and I hope you enjoy the site.
- Nate
ps: from here forward, I will post on the board under the name "BillikenReport"
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>Anthony? Seems that is the kid he is able to actually talk
>about.
Majerus mentioned Anthony Mitchell at his introductory press conference and said meeting him reminded Majerus of meeting guys like Andre Miller when they were in high school.
He wasn't talking about Mitchell's basketball ability, because I doubt he'd seen Mitchell play at that point.
- Nate
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>did rachel ever decide where she is transfering to after
>leaving iowa state?
Rachel Pierson is going to DePaul next year.
- Nate
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>Thanks. Any chance we'll be hearing some news soon?
Yes. Soon.
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>I saw Kyle Kirk's little brother, Christian, play for the
>first time at last night's seventh- and eighth-grade
>all-star games at Whitfield School.
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>He's already somewhere in the 6-foot-5, 6-6 or 6-7 range and
>can really jump.
I just looked at the roster.
Kirk was listed at 6-7.
- Nate
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>"He may have landed a player or two because of his
>appearance last night."
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>Care to elaborate? Were you referring to anyone in
>particular?
I can't say much more right now. Sorry.
On the general side, there were some players there who could be Billiken recruits in the future. One was Ryan Pierson, brother of Rachel, who was a 6-8 freshman at CBC this past year.
- Nate
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The Kunz kid was not there.
- Nate
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>I'm thrilled that he's going to 8th grade all-star games.
Not sure if you are being sarcastic or not, but don't underestimate the importance of the new coach getting out in the community and getting in front of people.
He may have landed a player or two because of his appearance last night.
- Nate
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>Just curious Nate, did the entrance of Majerus at Whitfield
>cause a buzz in the stands? We all look at Rick as a
>celebrity but I'm wondering how the average kid / parent
>sees it.
I don't know that there was a buzz.
I don't think a lot of people noticed him at first.
There were definitely a lot of people who came up to him to say hello.
- Nate
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I saw Kyle Kirk's little brother, Christian, play for the first time at last night's seventh- and eighth-grade all-star games at Whitfield School.
He's already somewhere in the 6-foot-5, 6-6 or 6-7 range and can really jump.
He reminds me, in that sense, of Tyler Griffey at the same stage.
I didn't get to watch all of his game, but he looked like he spent a lot of time on the perimeter handling the ball. He has a nice-looking (smooth) mid-range shot and made some nice passes.
Depending on how much he grows, down the road he could be a face-up power forward who can extend the defense or a taller small forward who can shoot over people.
Rick Majerus and Angres Thorpe were in the house, so they already got a look at him.
I also found out that St. Louis U. offered Kyle Kirk a scholarship when he was a freshman at Zumwalt West. I didn't know that.
- Nate
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>Sunday May 20
>7th Grade Games 3:30 and 4:45
>8th Grade Games 6:00 and 7:15
Bump.
This is a good event and worthwhile for local high school and college basketball fans.
They always have some past, current and future Billikens involved with coaching the teams, as well.
I've missed the last two years, because the games are usually earlier in the day, but I should be able to make it tonight.
If anyone goes, please stop and say hello.
- Nate
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Your point doesn't matter ... because even though you won't acknowledge it, Brandenburg is interested in St. Louis U.
- Nate
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>actually, it is my opinion that soderberg's recruiting
>targets were off last year. in previous seasons he closed
>the players he wanted to get (except maybe grimes).
That's good to know.
- Nate
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Nice spin job.
As for this ...
>we have yet to hear bradenberg say anything positive about slu so one would assume he >has star eyed acclike aspirations that even majerus cant overcome. fine for john. i hope >he is very happy on the east coast. dont ask me to compliment him after he makes
>that commit though. once he is done with his home town, he can write off st louis as far >as i am concerned. and i believe most of st louis will treat him the same way.
It has been posted several times here — and in the Post-Dispatch — that Brandenburg had positive things to say about SLU after the hiring of Majerus. As usual, you only hear what you want to hear.
But nice of you to bash a high school kid for saying months ago that he wanted to play in the ACC — something probably Tommie Liddell and Kevin Lisch would have liked to do had they had the opportunity.
Its good to know "most of St. Louis" will "write off" a kid if he chooses not to play basketball at St. Louis University.
Wow.
- Nate
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Roy,
When I asked Femi about his recruitment during the playoffs, he said he was going to wait and take time to evaluate all his options.
I know Channel 5 made it look like John was ready to become a Billiken, but I've also had people tell me he wasn't interested in SLU.
I honestly don't know which scenario is more accurate. All I know is what John told me.
The truth about Soderberg's recruiting the class of 2008 was that he didn't land any of those players. None of them committed to SLU when Soderberg was the coach. I'm not taking a shot at the coach, because he was certainly recruiting them and might have gotten commitments from some of them, but he didn't close any of them.
Now that SLU has a high profile coach, the Billikens are going to get better players. Majerus already has as many early commitments as Soderberg did in his last two recriting classes.
- Nate
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>I know you have seen him play far more than me, but when I
>have seen John his mid-range shot has looked really good.
>It was when he got outside of 15 that his shot struggled.
>Am I right about his mid-range game or did I just see some
>games when he was hot?
>
>There is no doubt from what I have seen that Suggs is the
>far superior player, but I really like John's game.
I've seen John when he was on and when he was very off (vs. Gateway Tech, he was four for 12 shooting, including 0 for 5 from 3-point land).
I think John has the potential to be a very good shooter, but he's not there yet. He's streaky.
John's a nice player. One of the underrated things about McCluer North winning the state championship was how John played unselfishly and deferred to Torres Roundtree in the title game. That helped get the team rolling.
- Nate
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Femi John has decent size, athleticism and a good basketball body.
He's got a nice looking jumpshot, but he's not a great shooter. It definitely has potential and he'll definitely get better. John could be a nice player in a few years with some good coaching and once his jumper is more consistent.
Suggs is a couple inches taller, more versatile and a much better shooter. Suggs can play the point, which I haven't seen John do, and has a well-developed mid-range game. He's also a good passer, though his high school teammates don't always shoot when he gets them wide-open shots.
Suggs is just at a higher level right now. I don't know all of John's scholarship offers, but he's more of a mid-major type prospect while Suggs is a high-major prospect.
Maybe the best way to explain this would be to call John a Danny Brown type player while Suggs would be a Tommie Liddell type player.
That's not to say John won't be better than Brown. John has a lot of potential and could be a nice college player.
- Nate
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Dave,
I'm not sure how that worked, but that Eagles team also had 7-foot Illinois signee Mike Tisdale.
As for the other thing, Courtside or OJ can help you out.
- Nate
Second PG 2009/2010 Season
in Billikens.com Main Board
Posted
>He plays bigger than his size. I think he's 6'1 at the
>shortest Nate, but you could be right. Can we both agree
>that the big 4 in MO class of 2009 are Griffey, Anderson,
>Dixon, and Allen.
I have the Nike Hoop Jamboree roster in front of me.
Each player is measured.
Bryant Allen measured at 5-11.
- Nate