JMM28

1/11 transfers went up in level. The rest went down or the same.

Damyean Dotson had a career game that night. Ridiculous. Draymond Green tried to be a literal Billiken killer the tournament game against Michigan State too. Turns out he just keeps being a dirty player but Cody Ellis (should have been 2 shots and the ball) knew it before most anyone.

Well I’m going to just say I’m kinda good at this NIL stuff. Probably more knowledgeable than anyone running the BVF, frankly Who is the judge on what $100,000 gets you of Young Curcic’s time? (Not saying that’s what he got.) It’s not as if there’s a salary structure to any of it. What is an hour meeting or appearance from Yuri Collins worth? It’s worth whatever someone or some ‘group’ is willing to pay.

It doesn’t matter where they are paid from. It matters where they “earn” the money. A guy can do any number of things while on non-US soil to earn an NIL payment. Video conferencing is an easy one. This is basic stuff. A school doesn’t need a booster in the home country to be able to pay them. They just need to not be on US soil while earning that money.

Illinois State should be really improved next year and the following year. Last year was Pedons first year and had a mishmash of a roster this year. He also had the misfortune of his top assistant going on paternity leave and taking off at the beginning of the season and never returning even though it was a perfect normal and healthy baby. I’d hope the return game next season would be an opportunity to get a Q2 win in the 24-25 season.

And who knew that ridiculousness was nothing compared to the ridiculousness of his post-basketball life.

NIL is just as strong for international guys, if not stronger. These guys usually have agents built in that help them make the connection in the NCAA. This notion of “oh we should just recruit international guys because our nil program sucks and they don’t get nil money ” is another one of those “it was said on Billikens.com once and stuck for some reason” not based in reality kind of things. Serbia plays a high level of basketball. It’s hard to get correct info for younger dudes but there’s plenty of guys out of Serbia peppered throughout college basketball. Florida Atlantic had a Serbian big guy who sucked his first couple years and turned into a big contributor.

Exactly. "Pay on graduation" is a losing proposition. It turns out when you used to have a bag man but no one else had a bag man, you looked like a good recruiter. Now that everyone has a bag man, it looks like maybe you weren't a good recruiter after all?

A contract with a guy saying "We will give you $xx,xxx if you graduate from this institution" would land SLU in an NCAA investigation. It is what it is. You can't pay an athlete for their name, image, or likeness based on them attending a certain university. You now can't put a residency clause in contracts - the previous work around to give collectives some security in bigger investments. You can't put a stipulation on anything academic. You can't put any sort of stipulation or bonus clause for winning an award, scoring a certain level, making an all-conference team, etc.

Except that is totally against what few rules there are regarding this stuff. That is pretty much a definition of "inducement to attend a university" just on the back end.

It appears that Ford, May, and that slapdick Pestello are going with option 6. Doing the same thing we've been doing and expecting different results.

“He just wanted a payday” is to Travis Ford as “Tool. We stopped recruiting him” is to an MBM.

The transfer portal includes walk ons and guys using their "covid year" so they are a little inflated.

I'd put him in the tool column and pull any offer out there at this point. He isn't a guy who is good enough to play the late night booty call role. He is a defense only guy who has a real problem with fouls.

At some point it has to get to a sh!t or get off the pot moment. The majority of the roster is on campus. He’s either in or out. Nothing is going to change between now and August 20th.

You're obviously a SLU hater. Ridiculous take, all around.

This is just wrong all over. Drew Timme was an all american. Played for one of the top teams in the country. Had a GREAT year. Didn't get drafted. Oscar Tshiebwe had a great year. Played at THE college basketball program - Kentucky. Didn't get drafted. "Stepping up" isn't going to make Yuri Collins lead the nation in assists. It isn't going to make him grow 3 inches. It isn't going to make him a better prospect going back into the draft at age 23. All that you say could and did happen at a "mid major." Signing a 2 way deal or whatever deal with a GLeague team is his best path to pursuing his NBA dreams. No school and other crap to interfere with developing his skills. Professional level coaches that can develop talent. SLU is a major player in college basketball. Some folks in these parts have apparently forgotten that. Enough of this "we're not good enough, but we tried!" biddy basketball mindset bullsh!t.

Agreed. Some of the best college basketball players in the country on blue-bloodish power programs didn't get drafted at all this year. Meanwhile Belmont and Santa Clara had guys drafted in Round 1. The "I need to go play at a Big## school to prove I belong" doesn't actually work. It hasn't for years. The NBA spends tens of millions of dollars to find dudes. They will certainly find any D1 player capable of playing in the NBA whether he is playing at Chicago State, SLU, Alabama A&M, or Duke.

Spot on. Matthew Dellavedova turned an undrafted spot with a championship Cavs team into a 40 million dollar sign and trade contract where he was traded for a 1st round pick too. A bunch of dudes on the Jordan teams turned that into signing large contracts (for their day) after that era. Luc Longley, Jud Buechler, Steve Kerr, etc.

Hugs didn't learn after his first DUI cost him his job at Cincinnati. But he had a nice insulated spot at WVU the last 15 years where I am sure he got away with a lot that wasn't reported. Probably time for him to move onto a studio job.

I wonder if this is an option to skip the prep year and bring him in this coming year? The offers say otherwise so I wonder if the prep year is a little bit on the academic side as well.

I'd venture to guess that Goodwin is of great value to the Suns. They are going to have a pretty top heavy cap situation. I believe they are well over the cap with just Beal, Durant, Ayton, and Booker. Any potential rotation guy at a minimum-ish salary is a huge get for them.

I appreciate that all of these places have opted against the dumb "United", "Inter", "Sporting" monikers in their names. If soccer wants to ever hit big-boy status in the USA, they'll start opting for American style nicknames.

Oh Team Blue. I'll always remember that generic moniker as the most disappointing time to be a Billiken fan.

Foreign guys with national team commitments don't come until later. But those without national team commitments should be on campus no different than the rest of the roster.