My All Baggage Team
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Baggage is slang for problems that plague a player, prevent him from being all that he should have been, and causes Bill Self headaches.
Starters 1 Nadiir Tharpe–the selfie
2 Ben Mac–financial “need”; the world’s most circuitous high school transcript; his parents and him reputedly flying with an “advisor” to a seminar
3 Merv Lindsay–Merv had no baggage, rather Merv himself was baggage that came along with Kevin Young
4 Cliff Alexander–his mother and her mortgage
5 C.J.Giles–his reputed unpaid serial child support
Back Ups
Brannen Greene–baggage between his ears
Billy Preston–his car; and whatever is yet to come might move him into a starting role
Cheick Diallo–his ego, his absence of basketball skills, and his transcript
(Note: just kidding around here.)
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@jaybate-1-0 Honorable mention…Michah Downs dad?
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Tyshawn deserves at least an honorable mention.
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Fun topic. So I’ll add my baggage list. I’d go with a starting 5 of Tyshawn, Tharpe, Preston, Cliff, and Diallo.
Pure drama. Tyshawn was a never ending source, from the fight (football team), to the bang (AFH with female hoops player), to his selfish and sporadic play. My least favorite Jayhawk, I have to admit. Tharpe was a pouter, and the info about how he had to be coddled was always unsettling. The next three (and we’re playing big), are all post players. All major time missed. All major drama. All guys who we spend way, way too much time talking about the what ifs, and how good they could be. I also think Self created a lot of the drama with Diallo and Alexander by unwisely limiting their roles. Ah, what life would have been like without Traylor and Lucas. We will never know. What other player might we have acquired? What talent might have had the opportunity to shine through if given a real opportunity? Both too much drama on both Diallo and Alexander, regardless of Self’s contribution. Both had outside issues that far outweighed their contributions, and coupled with the hype, it was at times untenable. In sum, we all argued about them way too much.
My second team would start with Andrew Wiggins. Really, he should be a starter. But the first team implies a contribution level that was perhaps not outweighing the baggage. The baggage for Wiggins? The over the top, unreal, unfair, and never ending hype. Nothing about him, once he finally dove on the floor. All about the stuff surrounding him. When SI had the Wilt to Manning to Wiggins comparison, it was puke time.
The full second team: Andrew Wiggins, Carlton Bragg, Brannen Greene, Anrio Adams, Zach Peters.
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JR “the samurai” Giddens and Josh S(h)elby belong in there somewhere.
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@HighEliteMajor Still not accepting the medical report on Zach Peters despite the fact that UAriz retired him on medical disability midway through his year there, on full scholarship due to his concussions? You are either stubbornly insistent on pushing the “there is more to this” narrative you urged from the time he left, or, I hope, you missed all the updates.
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My nominee is The 'Stache, who apparently never brought his baggage and went somewhere to get it, but hasn’t been seen since.
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Last year was the All time baggage team, if you can have a collective team. Talk about drama! There were cars also, women, pot, fights, and whatever I’m forgetting, but goodness, they were in the headlines all year it seems.
And the unfortunate part is that it may have cost them a national championship. An engaged, interested, sober Bragg just may have been enough to get us past Oregon, particularly because we lost Doke. That team was so talented, a consensus national player of the year, a top 5 draft pick, but they couldn’t overcome the adversity from all of the drama. And I’m pissed about it. We should all be chillin this year over a two game losing streak with comforting thoughts of the reigning national champ. Instead we’re all freaking out over our thin bench and getting blown out in AFH and already looking forward to next year because there isn’t much hope this year. Except had Preston been cut from a different cloth, then maybe we’re still dreaming about a championship this year.
Baggage costs us championships.
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Tyshawn. That was a great half year, wasn’t it? It only took 3 1/2 years of the human turnover machine to get it right. The sex in the gym incident reminds me of the sharp mental focus he displayed for most of his career. Still like the kid, though.
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Haha. I’d say a spot could be put in for Micah Downs, Conner Frankamp and Xavier Henry dads. If you read the book beyond the Phog sounds like all 3 dads were pains in Selfs ass (outside of Conner who came later). A case for JR Giddens bar fight could easily be made same goes for Rio Adams, Josh Selbys prom money and Carlton’s Mary Jane smoking. Tyshawn was at an All American level his last semester here but he made us all pull our hair out on and off the court several times.
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We need an all Lavar Team. You’ve started it!
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@HighEliteMajor PHOF
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Blown said:
JR “the samurai” Giddens and Josh S(h)elby belong in there somewhere.
Omg yes. Forgot Giddens.
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He goes on the All Lavar Team!
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Xavier goes on the All Lavar Team.
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I don’t know what is worse for a coaching staff: dealing with wayward athletes or coping with interfering parents. In my years of public school coaching I faced my share of both. I found that I could do much to affect change in the difficult athlete; but the parent thing was a much more difficult matter.
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So all Lavar team so far Frankamp, Downs and Henry. Let’s add Cliff for his moms deal lol.
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@kjayhawks just add his mom! Once a Jayhawk…
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@mayjay Hope is a personal thing. You can have hope.
There was more to it. But that doesn’t mean the kid didn’t have a concussion issue. If fact, before you were posting here (or maybe it was before this site was in existence, thus at kusports.com), I was strongly against Peters playing HS football his senior season because of the injury risk. My opinion was not a popular one – “Let the kid enjoy high school” , “… do what he wants.”, “… do what he loves.” Etc.
Regardless, that has nothing to do with whether he’s on the all-baggage team. Injury issues can certainly be baggage, and certainly if you bring them with you which he did. He sustained a shoulder injury, too, that he got in practice at KU.
As you may or may not recall, Zack left the KU program to “focus on his health.” He then began engaging in the recruiting process almost immediately, and a few months later, committed to Arizona. It was reported just after he left that he was intending to “transfer.”
It was reported before Peters transferred that he was going to redshirt his first season at KU anyway.
As was obvious, he could have stayed at Kansas and “focused on his health.” The logic made little sense as he was going to redshirt anyway if he wanted to be here. So why not stay, get healthy here, and play the next season? Someone who wanted to be here would have made a different decision. There were other considerations that made his departure more sensible – the strong rumors in the pre-twitter days. By staying, he would not have lost a semester of playing time.
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Xavier Henry, David Padget, and Hillary Clinton’s diaphragm.
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The Peters situation never smelled right at all.
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@HighEliteMajor Way back when, I felt that he shouldn’t play fb, but as a tight end on a ranking team, it seemed very unlikely he would decide not to. And I think he might have changed his commitment if pressured.
When he left KU, he went home to rehab and enrolled in a local small college or Juco. He did say he was going to take a year. I don’t recall him opening a full recruitment, just the AZ enrollment in the Spring, I think–as you say, ahead of schedule.
I guess to be fair I should agree that his stubborness was his baggage. First, in playing fb without considering the risk. And second, in believing that just feeling better after going home meant he was recovered, which is what I think explains his AZ fling.
I never saw any reason to be suspicious of his motives–just a kid chasing two dreams that were not as compatible as he thought.
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Not all parents are a problem… should we do a “good baggage” list too? Starting with Angel Morris.
Kief/Marcus
Perry
Tyler
Evan
Brady
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@DanR mario
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I seem to recall that Micah’s father wanted him to stay at KU and was upset when he chose to leave because of the girlfriend; I would nominate the girlfriend rather than the father but if we are talking about fathers, Carl Henry is a shoo in.
