early saturday rambling roy in all lower case, no initials, who couldn’t care less about spelling and grammar errors.

[billiken_roy]

it sure didn’t take long. this is week three of the comeback and i definitely didn’t enjoy reading the responses to my post last week. no wonder we are called message board morons (mbm), my self incuded. amazing that only taj got the analogy i made of crawford to troy robertson. the point was that i believe crawford is not a difference maker. he is a role player that has had some neat moments, but the chances that he becomes a billiken star or even a starter might not happen.

a number of the mbm chose to link to old posts about something totally different in an effort to discredit myself or taj rather than have the honest debate about crawford. some of it just turned into a week long personal attack against myself or taj. ( of couse we had to be subjected to the out of context quote I made years ago defending kyle cassity by saying kyle might have nba potential in size and fundamental skills to the mbm that always wanted to attack him.) some of the mbm wanted to change the discussion to how good (or bad) troy robertson was as a billiken. it is a shame that the mbm saw the need to discredit a fine past billiken that did his job and was a fine student athlete at slu. while he might not have been an all american, troy robertson was a zone buster. was a good teammate and many close games when the opponent was in the need to foul mode at the end of a game, spoon saw fit to get troy in the game to shoot free throws as troy was a career 73% free throw shooter. i didn’t include troy in my analogy to take a swipe at crawford. i included troy in my analogy to show that like troy, crawford can be a valuable role player for the billikens.

moving on, i am amused by the mood swings on the board of player opinions based on the most recent game. one of my favorite fellow mbm, skip (and folks, I love skip. I consider skip a great friend. He came to visit me in the hospital while I was recovering. more than can be said about most of you. so don’t read into this more than it is.) didn’t like my view that maybe jolly isn’t long for the billiken world last week. of course it was after jolly had a decent game the other night vs st joe’s. not after the games he was driven by umpteen times or had 4 stupid fouls in four minutes. as i said, in last weeks post, from what I have heard, both he and Reynolds appear to be good people, good students etc. i hope they indeed do get their chance to improve and stick around. i just don’t think when you consider the whole body of work thus far they have shown they belong. now last game they both did well. here’s hoping they continue to play well and prove me wrong.

i was glad to see someone post last week the point about the billikens having to inbounds the ball from under their basket by throwing it all the way to the backcourt every time. i understand the need for a safety valve when the out of bounds play breaks down, but are we saying all our out of bounds plays break down? it seems like we throw the three quarters length back court pass nearly every time. i don’t see many college teams having to do this. how can this practice be defended? over the course of the game that is precious time wasted. well unless that is our plan. shorten the clock. why would a program do this? the only think I can think of is the coach doesn’t think we are as good.

i have had a few discussions with posters via pm about yarborough’s insistence on getting a rebound or steal and taking off with it. there are occasions i don’t have a problem with it. there are times I think he indeed would be better off giving it to our point guard and letting them bring it down. i think a lot of that is left over aau basketball mentality. You see it more and more in high schools now adays than we used to see it. those of you heading to ofallon today will indeed see tatum doing it. althoff does it all the time. i would bet that either yarborough will improve his out court skills and it will become more exceptable, or the coaches will reign it in. i personally think yarborough has decent out court skills. i also see him 45 minutes before the games working on his shot. him and roby. not many of the others. (amazing. the two best freshmen on the team putting in the most extra work before each game. wonder if there is a connection? ) if we had crack players at all our other positions and yarborough was taking off with the ball and shooting every time he touched it, i might have an issue with it. but we don’t and yarborough is our closest thing to a standout. don’t think we are going to win the national championship this year anyway, so let him grow. i am sure the coaches talk to him about shot selection and when to and not to take off on those situations. the point is he will learn.

i am heading to ofallon illinois today to watch that shootout and see tatum, see the fine althoff kids like goodwin, ferguson, gooch and bateman, see jerimiah tillmon from east st louis and see donovan franklin from ofallon and more. there are a lot of local kids that are underclassmen that will be at this event that would be fantastic billikens. hope to see some of you there. i will be wearing billiken attire. you should as well. let these kids know by us wearing billiken blue and being there to cheer for them that the billiken fandom wants them to be billikens. J

[slu72]

B'Roy, you know of any east side players we have on our radar? With a few exceptions, TL and KC, we don't do very well on your side of the river.

[Billfan78]

I enjoy reading the weekly missive. However, I must say that you have to expect much discord when you post such a blunt and sanctimonious ramble on a messageboard.

I have read the board forever and always thought you would make a fine talk radio type given your belief in your opinions.

Could the inbounds heave be due to JCs desire to form habits? Why work on an inbounds play if we dont have full grasp of the offense -- lets just get into the offense and work on that. It maybe that and he doesn't think inbounds plays make much of a difference much like he doesnt think Much of having players try to rebound our own free throws.

I thought I also read or heard JC say that he wants players other than the pg to bring the ball up as it puts pressure on the defense. MY just needs to learn that he cant dribble into trouble and back off when need be. Hes a freshman he has time.

[kmbilliken]

On the inbounds play, any time you are that predictable you are setting yourself up. It is only a matter of time until the other team acts uninterested then shoots somebody out and picks one of those off at a crucial time. I don't have a problem using the long pass as a safety valve, but they need to mix it up and try to make some other inbounds plays.

I plan on seeing Tatum tonight too wearing my Billiken blue.

[almaman]

Not to hurt your feelings but i think you are way wrong about Crawford. If he's not a star is senior year it will because we've become so good from this year's freshman and incoming 2 studs and pray to god FBJT that he will be over shadowed.

[slufanskip]

it sure didn’t take long. this is week three of the comeback and i definitely didn’t enjoy reading the responses to my post last week. no wonder we are called message board morons (mbm), my self incuded. amazing that only taj got the analogy i made of crawford to troy robertson. the point was that i believe crawford is not a difference maker. he is a role player that has had some neat moments, but the chances that he becomes a billiken star or even a starter might not happen.

a number of the mbm chose to link to old posts about something totally different in an effort to discredit myself or taj rather than have the honest debate about crawford. some of it just turned into a week long personal attack against myself or taj. ( of couse we had to be subjected to the out of context quote I made years ago defending kyle cassity by saying kyle might have nba potential in size and fundamental skills to the mbm that always wanted to attack him.) some of the mbm wanted to change the discussion to how good (or bad) troy robertson was as a billiken. it is a shame that the mbm saw the need to discredit a fine past billiken that did his job and was a fine student athlete at slu. while he might not have been an all american, troy robertson was a zone buster. was a good teammate and many close games when the opponent was in the need to foul mode at the end of a game, spoon saw fit to get troy in the game to shoot free throws as troy was a career 73% free throw shooter. i didn’t include troy in my analogy to take a swipe at crawford. i included troy in my analogy to show that like troy, crawford can be a valuable role player for the billikens.

moving on, i am amused by the mood swings on the board of player opinions based on the most recent game. one of my favorite fellow mbm, skip (and folks, I love skip. I consider skip a great friend. He came to visit me in the hospital while I was recovering. more than can be said about most of you. so don’t read into this more than it is.) didn’t like my view that maybe jolly isn’t long for the billiken world last week. of course it was after jolly had a decent game the other night vs st joe’s. not after the games he was driven by umpteen times or had 4 stupid fouls in four minutes. as i said, in last weeks post, from what I have heard, both he and Reynolds appear to be good people, good students etc. i hope they indeed do get their chance to improve and stick around. i just don’t think when you consider the whole body of work thus far they have shown they belong. now last game they both did well. here’s hoping they continue to play well and prove me wrong.

i was glad to see someone post last week the point about the billikens having to inbounds the ball from under their basket by throwing it all the way to the backcourt every time. i understand the need for a safety valve when the out of bounds play breaks down, but are we saying all our out of bounds plays break down? it seems like we throw the three quarters length back court pass nearly every time. i don’t see many college teams having to do this. how can this practice be defended? over the course of the game that is precious time wasted. well unless that is our plan. shorten the clock. why would a program do this? the only think I can think of is the coach doesn’t think we are as good.

i have had a few discussions with posters via pm about yarborough’s insistence on getting a rebound or steal and taking off with it. there are occasions i don’t have a problem with it. there are times I think he indeed would be better off giving it to our point guard and letting them bring it down. i think a lot of that is left over aau basketball mentality. You see it more and more in high schools now adays than we used to see it. those of you heading to ofallon today will indeed see tatum doing it. althoff does it all the time. i would bet that either yarborough will improve his out court skills and it will become more exceptable, or the coaches will reign it in. i personally think yarborough has decent out court skills. i also see him 45 minutes before the games working on his shot. him and roby. not many of the others. (amazing. the two best freshmen on the team putting in the most extra work before each game. wonder if there is a connection? ) if we had crack players at all our other positions and yarborough was taking off with the ball and shooting every time he touched it, i might have an issue with it. but we don’t and yarborough is our closest thing to a standout. don’t think we are going to win the national championship this year anyway, so let him grow. i am sure the coaches talk to him about shot selection and when to and not to take off on those situations. the point is he will learn.

i am heading to ofallon illinois today to watch that shootout and see tatum, see the fine althoff kids like goodwin, ferguson, gooch and bateman, see jerimiah tillmon from east st louis and see donovan franklin from ofallon and more. there are a lot of local kids that are underclassmen that will be at this event that would be fantastic billikens. hope to see some of you there. i will be wearing billiken attire. you should as well. let these kids know by us wearing billiken blue and being there to cheer for them that the billiken fandom wants them to be billikens. J

Roy ... you never have to worry about soft shoeing it for me. I enjoy our back and forths and disagreements as much as our agreements ... and because I know it's not personal ... I don't care if you say that fouking Skip is an idiot and has no clue ( hard to argue with that anyway )

My only point on Jolly isn't that I believe he does belong or will be good ... it's that you don't judge frosh bigs, be patient and give them time.

[VeniceMenace]

Praising the performance of Ryan Robertson who had years to develop and then proceeding to trash a couple freshmen who have had months as Billikens?

[Box and Won]

it sure didn’t take long. this is week three of the comeback and i definitely didn’t enjoy reading the responses to my post last week. no wonder we are called message board morons (mbm), my self incuded. amazing that only taj got the analogy i made of crawford to troy robertson. the point was that i believe crawford is not a difference maker. he is a role player that has had some neat moments, but the chances that he becomes a billiken star or even a starter might not happen.

a number of the mbm chose to link to old posts about something totally different in an effort to discredit myself or taj rather than have the honest debate about crawford. some of it just turned into a week long personal attack against myself or taj. ( of couse we had to be subjected to the out of context quote I made years ago defending kyle cassity by saying kyle might have nba potential in size and fundamental skills to the mbm that always wanted to attack him.) some of the mbm wanted to change the discussion to how good (or bad) troy robertson was as a billiken. it is a shame that the mbm saw the need to discredit a fine past billiken that did his job and was a fine student athlete at slu. while he might not have been an all american, troy robertson was a zone buster. was a good teammate and many close games when the opponent was in the need to foul mode at the end of a game, spoon saw fit to get troy in the game to shoot free throws as troy was a career 73% free throw shooter. i didn’t include troy in my analogy to take a swipe at crawford. i included troy in my analogy to show that like troy, crawford can be a valuable role player for the billikens.

Understand that by starting off saying that Crawford "is probably on par" with Troy Robertson, you kind of muddied your point.

[Duff Man]

I enjoy reading the weekly missive. However, I must say that you have to expect much discord when you post such a blunt and sanctimonious ramble on a messageboard.

Exactly. If you make polarizing declarations that turn out to be dead wrong in a public forum, those statements are fair game in future discussions.

"It's all in the game"

re: Jolly

All it took was an injury to one of the other bigs (in this case Manning), to demonstrate why you have a guy like Jolly around. At this point he's not exceptional at anything, but he never looks lost out there. As far as I can tell, he's comfortable with his role, as he can go extended periods without playing, then step in and provide useful minutes. He's got size, plays with a chip on his shoulder, and makes a nice play every once in a while.

re: Reynolds

As Winston Wolf would say "Let's not start sucking each other dicks just yet"

That said, he showed something against St Joes and at least played himself back into the conversation. I'm convinced his extended FG drought (he was 0-11 in 53 minutes spread over 7 games from mid-December through January) caused officials to not give him the benefit on the doubt when he drew contact going to the basket. There were 2 separate instances (I believe against Duquesne and Dayton) where he was fouled in the act of shooting (before SLU was in the bonus) and the refs curiously denied him 2 shots in each case. 14 minutes, first made FG in a month and a half, 3 assists (including a slick no look to Agbeko in transition), hit 3-4 from the line, 1 steal, no turnovers. I like his defensive intensity and quickness, if he continues to improve on the offensive end there's real upside there.

re: Crawford

Good player. Not the savior. Knows how to score when given an opening. Sometimes tries to do too much (taking on taller more athletic players in transition), but most of the time he's shows good basketball instincts. That said, he doesn't possess the individual skill to score against a defense that is determined to deny him. It's on his teammates to find Crawford when he's open and it's on Crawford to dish when he's not open.

re: Yarbrough

I thoroughly concur with Broy's assessment of Yarbrough this week.

i have had a few discussions with posters via pm about yarborough’s insistence on getting a rebound or steal and taking off with it. there are occasions i don’t have a problem with it. there are times I think he indeed would be better off giving it to our point guard and letting them bring it down. i think a lot of that is left over aau basketball mentality. You see it more and more in high schools now adays than we used to see it. those of you heading to ofallon today will indeed see tatum doing it. althoff does it all the time. i would bet that either yarborough will improve his out court skills and it will become more exceptable, or the coaches will reign it in. i personally think yarborough has decent out court skills. i also see him 45 minutes before the games working on his shot. him and roby. not many of the others. (amazing. the two best freshmen on the team putting in the most extra work before each game. wonder if there is a connection? ) if we had crack players at all our other positions and yarborough was taking off with the ball and shooting every time he touched it, i might have an issue with it. but we don’t and yarborough is our closest thing to a standout. don’t think we are going to win the national championship this year anyway, so let him grow. i am sure the coaches talk to him about shot selection and when to and not to take off on those situations. the point is he will learn.

Couldn't have said it better.

[For-DaLove]

Roy, I'm glad you're back posting. And most importantly I'm glad you're in good health.

However, there is quite a bit of hypocrisy when you bash players and then post things like "I definitely didn't enjoy reading the responses to my post last week." Not everyone is going to agree with you, but that's the beauty of a public forum.

I hope you give us a report on the guys you see in the shootout today.

[jbizzle09]

Praising the performance of Ryan Robertson who had years to develop and then proceeding to trash a couple freshmen who have had months as Billikens?

I think you may want to edit your post.

[slu72]

As for our bigs, both AG and BJ are going to take time to develop their bodies and the nuances of being a big at this level. AG's ahead on the savvy part, and BJ on the physical part, but both still a long way from being finished products. Most important is building up their bodies to withstand the pounding. Then D, which both have a long way to go. Also, we're adding another big in Neufeld, so the competition for playing time should be speed up their development. I don't know which coach on the staff is responsible for developing the bigs, but let's hope we have one or will get one. The lack of JM's development has me a little concerned as to what's being taught at the 5. Can't we bring in AB on a consulting contract to work with them over the summer during the allowed practice times?

The one thing that has bothered me all year has been AY and MY's slashes to the hoop. Now, granted both have had their moments with that, but more often than not their shot's getting blocked or forced. MY says he's never missed so many bunnies. Well, MY you've never played at this level where help defense is practiced. Just wish they'd learn to recognize when the wall is collapsing on them and kick it out to someone who's got to be open.

[Basketbill]

Jolly had a solid game, his screen were very useful for AY, and overall he avoided the stupid fouls. He drew a Cody on the big guy which was key. In many ways he reminds me of Conklin as a freshman, he does not get to play as much though.

Re: Reynolds he is playing within the offense, had some play that did not show up in the box score. One in particular, he was in position for an O-reb, but just tipped the ball, but it was enough redirection that St. Joe's did not get it and it bounce around for MY to pick it up and score.

he needs to put on weight if for nothing else to Not look like Herkel!!

[bonwich]

he needs to put on weight if for nothing else to Not look like Herkel!!

You'd object if he ended up with a body like this?

[JohnnyJumpUp]

You'd object if he ended up with a body like this?

[jimbofive]

wahahahahahaha

[ACE]

That sums up this thread.