Hardball

Be careful the faithful will tell you BS has recruited TL,KL and IV. That has always been my point. Three recruits in four years. The good programs get three good recruits EVERY year.

Are we the only team in the nation scoring 30 and 40 points in a game and still wondering about taking a player based on whether a he can play defense or not. Defense is not the problem. The object is to score more ponts that the other team. Really the only issue is how you get this accomplished. I am pretty sure we will not hold people to the 20's and 30's therefore we better get shooters that will help us score in the 60 and 70's.

Some posters can be ridiculous in their reasoning. The two recruiting situations are mutually exclusive of each other. SLU needs more shooters and SLU need’s a power forward. Waiting on a PF while LS goes by the wayside is a bad decision but one that SLU seems to make more often or than not. Once again SLU finds themselves in the fight of their lives for a player they could have had wrapped up a long time ago. Just think if we could have wrapped up LS way back when we could be 100% focused on getting the much-needed PF. That gentlemen would be a plan. It makes me sick when I hear people say our guards are good enough. SLU has the same guards that could only score in the 30's against St. Joe twice last year. We should never feel we are good enough at any position. Our goal should be to get better every year. That is why I found BS promise to DM to not recruit anyone else for his position questionable to say the least. Where on earth could DM have received such a promise other than SLU? The plan should always be to get better players every year not promising players that we won’t even try. SLU will not get any better by making promises to players but rather getting players that understand and are willing to accept the fact they have to compete every single year for their playing time. Adding more offensive minded players will only make our current guards and whole team better. It really is a simple concept but one that our staff fails to comprehend.

How about getting someone who can teach offense?????

My point on DM is that when Soderberg has time to make an offer he doesn't take it. And when he doesn't have time to waste he wants his seven evaluation periods. It's all about how smart you are with your offers and to date I think the jury is stll out on Soderberg. Does the name Shaw mean anything to you? He told Shaw the same thing he told Stemler we need to see you more. I know he was holding on for Grimes but how about this Question "Kalen you have two days to accept our offer or we are going elsewhere". Coaches do this all the time. If he had done this we would had Shaw here for two years now. Major mistake that he didn't learn from. History has a way of repeating itself and apparantly that is why we are in a fight for Stemler when we really shouldn't be. I know when DM accepted SLU's offer he had no other D1 offers. So why the rush? I'm sure he would have recieved some D1 offere but from whom? Would any of them be better than SLU? Do you think Marquette, George Mason, Hawaii or Nebraska would have recruited DM much less offered as early as we did? Hindsight a funny thing. No one ever gets to use it but it is the reason why schools change coaches. Soderberg is paid to be right. The responsibility to effectively judge talent go's along with the $400,000 annual salary. It is difficult to be right all the time but is it to much to ask to at least learn from you past missteps. TSEUG, you miss the point on judging Talent. Everyone knew and could idetify Lee as a Talent but Donovon proved that you do not need a roster full of All Americans to win. What you do need is a eye for identifing talent when no one else see's it. Heck after watching George Mason for three weeks I still can't name their starting five. But someone at GM recognized the Talent on their rostor. Donovon had more All Americans on previous teams but it took him taking a flyer on Noah when no other comparable team would. Soderberg has proven he can not get the Top 100 recruits so he better be good at seeing Talent where others do not.

Roy to be quite honest I am tired of all the defense talk. When do we start to think about offense. The defense issue has been an excuse for missing on players for four years. Heck Syracuse won the national title playing a 2-3 zone and I saw Florida playing a zone alot in the most important game of the year. If we are truely looking at the same player why the indecision. Can this staff make a decision and move on. How about reshirt DM and play Stemler. How long did that take. Sounds like a reasonable plan and it addresses your problem of needing more shooters and provides long term depth. It is this staff's recruiting thought process that has allowed Marquette and Nebraska to get in the game with Stemler. Do you not see a pattern from year to year on the the lack of ability to make a quick assesment when necessary. And we are only talking about situations that we know of. How about the ones we do not. I am not saying we have to buy two of the same. What I am saying is what is our PLAN? This thinking over process is mind-boggling. After four years do we have a plan or not? If Soderberg was still in the frame of mind in November that we were set on the wings he was wrong. So who should we blame for the faulty thinking? I am not worried about Stemler's feeligs being hurt because an offer from SLU should be good enough for any recruit. I am worried about the effects of such indecision on recruiting. It is hard enough on this staff that they do not need to give the competition any more ammunition.

tseugnekillib, I think I understand what you trying to say with the other coaching references but what other coaches are doing should have no impact on what Soderberg should do. All programs have different needs and ours is lack of outside shooting. For this reason alone we should not have made a late offer. What is so confusing is that here we wait, wait, wait on offering Stemler and then we offer MQ early when he had no other D1 offers. Just does not make sense. Also I would hope Soderberg would have enough confidence in his ability to identify a talent for his system and not be influenced by what other coaches are either thinking or doing. Rick Pitino had a great quote about Billy Donovon and his Championship team. Rick claimed it wasn't so much his coaching but his ability to recognize Talent that other coaches couldn't as a major reason why Florida won the National Title.

Yes, I have watched Stemler play 4 or 5 times this year. While I do not think he is the answer at the four he does provide something we need more of and thats the ability to shoot the ball. IMO that was our number one problem this year. One more shooter will make everyone better. That is why I would have offered him early with the notion that I would redshirt MQ.Unless you are prepared to give MQ 12-15 minutes I would not waste a year on him sitting the bench.

I will attempt to change the coarse of the conversation. I believe there are still two important areas of concern that need to be answered regarding Soderbergs tenure at SLU. This is not a bash Soderberg post but an effort to have an honest discussion regarding SLU’s future. One can Soderberg recruit. Please, I am not talking about getting KL and TL because to be honest with you I believe they were both coming regardless if Soderberg was here or not. Does anyone really believe that Romar would not have convinced both of them to stay? IMHO both TL and KL wanted to come to SLU so this was more of a "don't mess it up type" of recruiting. Here is the $64,000 question though...Can Soderberg compete for and win a recruiting war for an impact player outside of the St. Louis area? As much as we want to have all local players to be successful we have to have the ability to recruit and win battles outside St.Louis. I will say Soderberg has finally learned the concept of "closing the borders" but we still hear crazy concepts that have failed in the past and are repeated like "we are going to use all seven of our evaluation periods". This phrase kills me because he has used it for both Shaw/SIU and now Stemler/SWIC. This really brings me to my second question. Can Soderberg recognize talent? He has been associated with Basketball for the better part of his life therefore he shouldn’t he know whether a player is acceptable in his system without having to use all seven evaluation periods? Duke and NC can use seven because kids will wait for a chance to play there but SLU has to be smarter and faster with their offers. How come he can't recognize a player’s talent? Why should he need to take the seven evaluation periods for Shaw and Stemler? I can’t imagine coaches like Knight, Crean, Huggins, and Gillespie and Self needing seven evaluation periods to decide on a player. For SLU to be successful they have to be able to move faster and be right more that they are wrong. I am afraid after four years I think we are still too slow to react and still struggle with identifying first line talent.

I am not sure you can read anything into Washington's only D1 offer being WIU. How many offers to Polk have. It is my understanding Polks only other offer than SLU was Valpo. Also if we are gong to start ratng players by what D1 schools have offered how many D1 offers did McQuire have other than SLU?

Way to keep your head in the sand. I bet Missouri is in the Big Dance before we are. But then again, give Brad some time he has only been here four years.

AMEN!!!!!

I love the attitude of well BS did get KL. Gettig KL is great but move on we need 3 or 4 people like KL who can shoot the ball. Three offensive recruits over four years does not cut it. This is a new philosophy suggesting BS can teach anyone to play defense. How many kids have we passed on who BS claimed could not play defense. BS only knows one way and that is the Bennett way and it is hard for him to change. Lets hope the saying that you can't change the stripes on a Zebra are not true.

Four years later and BS finally understands we need more shooters. And who says we are not making progress. You can not make someone a shooter in a summer but you can improve their percentages. This is why we need to sign LS immediately. Forget about his rebounding ability let him play the 2 and move KL to the one when TL is resting. We have to be able to score to win. It is not rocket science.

I hope you keep your thoughts consistant when it comes time to sign other 5'9" guards in the future.

BradFan "Someday" I would understand that statement three years ago but Soderberg has been here for FOUR YEARS. That argument is acceptable in years one and two but not the fourth. As for as the mugging comment I agree the A10 is physical but who is charge of getting the right players for the league? Four years and Soderberg has not secured ONE PF. Ultimately who is reponsible for not having the right players? Playing in the 30's and 40'e does not happen to good teams. I do not buy the argument that other options are limited. You can not say on one hand we have two great freshman and an All Conference type center then turn around and claim we don't have options. A more accurate statement would be we do not have options playing the style Brad wants to play. If Brad needs shooters for his system then he better recruit shooters. I have seen MQ play and he can shoot but Brad will be tested with his defense in guarding the wing in A10 play. My gosh I can not believe the KL 8 shot statement. We just lost to St. Joes by 20 at home in January and KL had only 8 shots in that game. And oh by the way we only scored 39 points in that game. We had the same dismal performace yesterday. Is it to much to ask Brad to come up with Plan B the second time around? He had almost a month and a half to come up with an alternative plan. What is he getting paid for? Hey I know the A10 is not the WAC therefore Brad better be getting some PF's and quit counting on LM at the four. Your right Fans will come if we win. But players will not flock to SLU playing Bennet Ball. If you don't get the players you will not win

Bradfan I do not agree. Many teams allow 70 points in a game and still win. Why can't we be one of those teams. That is not asking for a National champioship just score in the 70's and win some games. One more thing about the willingness to accept more games in the 30's and 40's so long as we win. First good players don't like to play in the 30's and 40's and recruiting will become harder and harder. Secondly, you will not create much excitement from the fan base playing this type of basketball. Yesterday there were 54 D1 games involving 108 teams. Do you know how many of the 108 teams scored in the 30's? ONE, St. Louis University. I will take this argumentone a step further. Forty womens teams played yesterday and ALL OF THEM scored more than 37 points. That is unaccetable in my view. The reason this worries me is that this is the Bennett way and Soderberg is a disciple of who...... Finally I know we ask alot of Kevin but if Soderberg can't figure out how to get KL more than 8 shots in a tournament game for an NCAA birth than let's find a coach who can.

Brad has missed on more recruits that he has identified and is still playing games in the 30's four years after getting the job. I think every coach can see the value of TL and KL but what about the ones Soderberg has consistantly missed year in and year out. His ability to be a good recruiter is nullified if he can't identify the talent. For SLU to be succesful he will have to find players that are not perceived to be Top 100 but have Top 100 talent. Then develope these players into strong contributors. I love AD but he should have been no more that a role player at SLU. Secondly, the fact that we are still playing games while scoring only 37 points in Soderberg's 4th year is very troubling and should not be accepted. It amazes me that most everyone is still willing to accept a game in the 30's much less the 40's. If Soderberg can't come up with a way to get KL more than 8 shots in a game he should be questioned.

TL will never get the exposure he deserves unless SLU becomes a better than .500 team.

SLU beat a 3-19 team that was 1-10 in the league before the game last night. I thought the three you mentioned played an outstanding game last night, but the Dukes were awful. Maybe if SLU beats someone half way decent we can get some airtime.

We will run we we have the athletes. What a bunch of %$%*$%#. Who's fault is it that we don't have the players to run? I will give you two guesses and the first one doesn't count. What do you call TL,DB,KL,DP and JJ. Heck for that matter all Meyer did at Borgia was run for four years. Soderberg will never run it is not in his nature. It's all about defense he said so again last night on the radio show. What is the saying about changing the stripes on a Zebra? Ulimately were this hurts is in recruiting. What kid today wants to play for a team that scores in the 40's? Something else makes me made as a SLU fan. Does Brad owe the people that come and support the Bills an explanation on JJ? It's Brad's right to play whomever he wants but as fans when we lose games because of no strong PF presence and we have one sitting on the bench...Can we at least have an explanation?

Ask Brad if anyone on his staff knows of a good offense SLU can run. If they don't ask Brad to ask one of his assistants to go to the School library and check out a book on How to run a Division 1 Basketball Offense. SLU won't beat any good teams scoring only 44 points in a game. Heck they won't beat any bad teams(Dayton)either scoring only 44 points. And another thing if JJ was good enough to play against Gonzaga and NC surely he is good enough to play against Dayton. Thats why this experiment with Meyer at the 4 is a farce. He can't play the four against anyone with any size. So quit the La Russa like experiment and start playing JJ so when we play games against lower division teams he is prepared.

Roy name one successful program that holds onto three scholarships like we do? Ace, I think the jury is still out on Brad's ability to build a program. I just try to watch what other successful programs do and I can't think of one that holds three scholarships. Also do you really think Brad is going to redshirt McQ? I definitely think he should but SLU is so starved for outside shooting I don't know how he can. But this proves my point in a way because a Red Shirt on McQ would be perfect. Let him settle into the program and the speed of D1 ball and then bring him in ready to go when Polk graduates.

This is my big problem with Sodeberg. He has NO CLUE on how to build a program. He worries about the wrong stuff. Worrying about the guys sitting at the end of the bench and how they feel about not getting minutes is absurd. This is a real crazy thought, how about getting players who can compete for jobs annually who don't want to sit at the end of the bench. This original idea (HAHAHA) would force any returnee to win their job back every year. It is no accident that AD is having a good year since he worked his butt off last summer. Why did he work so hard? Maybe he knew that KL and TL were coming in and were going to try to take his minutes. That's one way to build a program, Here's another. Look at how SIU has built their program. They have been successful for the last 5/6 years and a Tournament mainstay over the same period. They have used ALL their schollies but have red shirted on a consistant basis. Therefore as one player leaves another one is ready to step in. That's how you build a consistantly successful program. SIU wasn't worried about the last 3/4 guys on the end of the bench. This also works because then you don't have to rely on true freshman to perform. Darren Brooks was a red shirt, Randall Falkner was a red shirt and the list can go on and on. Weber started the philosopy at SIU because Gene Keady thought it was the best way to build a consistantly successful program year after year. Brad has been here too long to still be holding onto schollies. Hopefully the plan is not holding on to Schollies every year because your worried about the the guys at the end of the bench. Have a Plan Work a Plan.

Roy,I guess the same agenda you've been pushing regarding Lisch for god knows how long. Bay Area is 100% correct UB made a mistake on Ahearn but we all know Roy will never admit it. The bigger issue is who is evaluating the talent. I am not talking about lisch and Lidell but Polk, Newbourne,Brown,Meyer,Husak,JJ.