Random ?s
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@icthawkfan316 I promise I won’t take your Frank comments as nitpicking. Don’t take my nitpicking Devonte on his last game as I’m down on Devonte. I think he’s still getting it together, and by tournament time, he’ll be able to run the team in his sleep. He’s very, very close now.
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@jaybate-1.0 said:
part of a broader effort by ISU to physically degrade KU
Wow, that would really suck if true. It’s a sick but possibly effective strategy that should be recognized and penalize if at all possible.I wonder how much of that stuff goes on.
In football it happens all the time, but jeez this isn’t football… yet!
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@jaybate-1.0 I can’t think Fred would intentionally do that. I know he’s sick of losing in AFH, but it seems he and Self have more respect for each other more than the rest of the coaches. Jmo
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@globaljaybird @REHawk @icthawkfan316
Self wants to rest Frank more than all three of you combined and raised to the tenth power, but…
Defending leads requires shortening possessions AND maintaining a 1 PPP average, while the opponent plays BTWs and shoots treys every which way but loose and gets to 1.25 to 1.5 PPP.
To achieve that measly 1 PPP the ball has to get across mid court, then be held, for 30 seconds, or so, and driven to the rim and either shot in an inside trey, or dished to an open look trey. Doing all this against a pressing, scrambling, pressuring defense,can easily result in TOs.
It also requires keeping 3 70-80% FT shooters in the game for ball handling in the press.
It also requires guarding hard without fouling on the other end to keep the clock going and prevent a lot of freebie baskets.
So: who among KU’s perimeter players can:
–shoot the trey;
–make 70-80% of his FTs;
–protect the ball during a press; and
–drive it.
Self thinks Frank and Devonte can do all of the above.
And he needs a third.
He hasn’t got a third.
But he does have Mr. Lack of Conscience from trey and the FT line: Brannen Greene, who, suprisingly, is a decent dribbler when not trapped.
So his choice is Brannen, who is money at the line, but shakey on D, or Wayne, who is shaky at the line, and Svi, who the last time he took a trey accidentally banked it in.
Self is making a choice: he is reasoning that when an opponent is down 10-15 and closing with threes, Brannen can guard the trey stripe as well as Wayne and shoot FTs much more accurately. If the game gets within 1-2, he brings Wayne for D and brings Brannen for O. Svi is in the Absolute Zero Cooler with Hunter.
So: since Self is strategically committed to the build a lead/defend a lead model, there really is no time with a lead that he can take Frank out, except for the most minimal breather first half or mid point second half, and then it is a huge risk to the PPP needed for the defend a lead strategy to play out favorably.
So: what does Self do help Frank through this ordeal.
Self always uses the weave to let our guys jog around, rather than go directly into explosive mode driving the ball. Three man weaves are a relative breather, when Frank does not wind up driving the ball. And they force a lot of sliding by the defenders.
Self knew he had a VERY tired team, and a nearly spent Frank vs. ISU.
So: Self went to his first ever (that I recall) use of the four man weave. It forces the opponent to slide even more. And it makes Frank only have to jog one weave out of 4, instead of one out of three.
Isn’t Self thoughtful.
Its like Frank Merrill telling his Marauders on the way to Myitkyina that they don’t have to run their they can weave there on a jog. Its not much, but its something…maybe just enough to get them to their objective.
Self this season is about “just enough.”
He is about: if you can’t win, don’t lose.
Find the moment to build a lead that can be defended.
This is not about stepping on people’s necks.
The Nike stacks we are up against are too big to step on their necks and win.
Self and is team have to be about “just enough” this season.
He and they are trying to figure out how to beat UK with 10 OAD/TADs and Duke with 9.
Self only has 3…about one game in 3. More often he has 1, or 2. Sometimes just one. We have to hope that gets better, that we get to three, but “let us not talk falsely now/the hour is getting late…”
Self can’t develop a strategy based on a deeper bench, or even a shorter bench. He doesn’t have as much depth, or a first five with as much talent. Period.
But what he does have are the Jarhead Jayhawks, or for you Army fans, Merrell’s Marauders.
Yes, we are trying to win an eleventh conference title, but this whole conference round robbin is really an exercise in learning how to play this way–a way NO other team in the stacked category tries to play, or has to play. Self is trying to turn a vice into a virture, which is what Marine Corp strategy is all about. It can be done. It is what George Washington did in the revolutionary war. It is what Ho Chi Minh did first against the French and then against the Americans. Claire Chenault did it with the Flying Tigers in China before WWII. Chenault: we don’t have as many planes as the Japanese and our planes aren’t as good as theirs in a head to head dog fight. What do we do? Answer: First we pick where we engage and when. We decide when we fight, not them. Second, we attack from above, out of the sun, where they cannot see us, and where our overweight obsolete planes use gravity to accelerate our attack to speeds that the agility of their planes cannot be an advantage against us. We are flying at high speeds in straight lines and their agility no longer matters…if we shoot accurately. It worked. It worked magnificiently. It worked throughout the war, when we had better planes. It even worked in Korea some with propeller planes against jets briefly. Then we got faster jets and just went after them anywhere from any direction and forgot the strategy. Then we got our asses tagged over North Vietnam and had to create Top Gun School to relearn the strategy and tactics of dog fighting.
The right strategy and tactics can overcome an enemy for brief decisive engagements.
The tournament is that kind of warfare–a series of two game tournaments–6 single decisive battles.
There is a slim chance it will work, and Self has found no alternative that he believes fits better.
So: he has to out-efficient and out elegant our opponents (even when elegance involves ugly-ing things up) with his best guys shortening games, building leads, and defending them and hope to force them into keep their best guys on the floor too, only less efficiently.
It is a brilliant idea.
It might even work.
But sooner or later its going to come down to a near death march by KU’s best players, and an opposing team’s best players, and most likely they are going to have one or two footers.
And our very own Frank Merrill believes that when that moment comes, his guys used to playing this way all season, will hold a slight edge over a more talented team that is not used to playing so many minutes per game…in a decisive engagement…once.
Like you only need to win by one point in any game, you only need to beat UK once. You don’t have to be better than them seven times. Just once. And that’s good, because 3 OAD/TADs don’t beat 10 OAD/TADs in a best of seven. Ever.
The mission of this team is to drag opponents, especially superior ones, in defensive straight jackets into close games, then build a slight lead outside in, then play cat and mouse about when they will start defending it, and then draw the opponent into a kind of long possession quick sand and ugly hand to hand combat as each are sinking, and hope that they and not our Jarhead Jayhawks drown first.
This is the mission.
Who is willing to go to Myitkyina?
Think of Frank Mason, as our Frank Merrill on the wood.
God help me, I do love it so.–George Patton
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@jaybate-1.0 Well jb, if they are in fact the JarHead Jayhawks, let’s hope they don’t go through the mine field with both fingers in their ears on tip-toes !!!
No malice intended, only humor !!
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@globaljaybird
Let’s ask the Japanese soldiers on Iwo Jima how the Jarheads walked through Cushman’s pocket.
Um, well, we can’t, because they did not survive the battle.
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Joe Ross just posted a long post on the other site. Interesting article! Mr Page Butler said that Joe could be the new Jaybate.
Good to have you here at KU Buckets. Totally no sarcasm. I enjoy your posts.
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@Shanghai_RCJH …LOL, first thing Joe ain’t new, just a retread many, many times over. Second thing. let’s just say ole JR ain’t the sharpest tool in the shed either…
no malice intended, just the facts…
And for heavens sake let’s hope he stays over there & enjoys his new found fame.
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Criteria for being the next jaybate 1.0:
1.) graduate of KU;
2.) love The Game and The Legacy;
3.) have at least a thimble full of brains;
4.) make the length fit the content;
5.) never participate in organized iLynchings of football or basketball coaches;
6.) be amusing at least sometimes;
7.) do it for free to give back to the game, the school and the state that helped you grow up “the right way”;
8.) encourage interactive journalism;
9.) don’t forget who your Daddy is;
10.) love the players; and
11.) support limited identity posting.
Good to hear from you.
Rock Chalk!!!
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- Quote Bob Dylan
13.Quote Steven Stills
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Quote Chester Nimitz
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Quote George Patton
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Have a photographic memory of all things Basketball from the Late 50’s up to 5 years in the future.
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Make obscure references that have readers googling to understand the post.
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Must be able to defend Bill Self from intermittent detractors that emerge after a loss or a close win.
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Instruct younger readers on who real heroes are in combat and in the vast history of Roundball.
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Be a defender of a Jayhawk player that is being criticized by others and be vindicated within two games.
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sometimes be politically incorrect.
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@jaybate-1.0 #3 just as well be chlordane for board (or boring) rats. It eliminates the entire colony.
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- Be willing to dunk readers into the fast-moving rivers of your imagination, but always throw out a lifebuoy to save them.
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@jaybate-1.0 Recognized that patch. I have it on my grandfather’s WWII uniform.
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@wrwlumpy This is a very good list for the pre-qualification.
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Lucas is now a 6’10, 245lb ENFORCER (who simply needs to finish his bunnies). Tell me he cant do what frosh Cole did as the 4th big in March…
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@ralster Yeah, if we could get him to shoot better than Yosemite Sam !!
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If that patch is on his uniform, he was remarkable.
Learn everything you can about your grandfather’s life before the war, his war service and experience good, bad, or indifferent, and how he dealt with it afterwards.
He was probably an absolute man, whether he viewed himself that way or not. Based on what little I know–not the movie, but what little I have read–what he experienced was different than most of the rest of American combat soldiers of World War II. In some ways, it foreshadowed the warfare of Vietnam.
Don’t let where he went, and what he did, die, even if it seems inaccessible to you, or others in your family. It wasn’t and isn’t, if you try. Write as much of it down as you can. Ask everyone that knew him about what he was like before and after he served. Search on line for his service records at DOD, or the Army. In time, if you look long enough and deep enough, you will come to know him, and through him know your father and yourself, and much of what effect, good and bad you have had on your children. War is trans-generational in its effects on families. And what it did to men, whether known about, or forgotten, understood, or not, continues to echo down the generations, for better and for worse. You owe it to your family to find out what you can and use what you can learn to help you family keep getting better.
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@icthawkfan316 said:
Being drafted on potential is almost always better than being drafted as a known quantity, because almost no one lives up to the hype
An important insight.
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Damn, coach, your molars must be getting round as cue balls!
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Unfortunately I never met him. It is a sad story that I won’t go into but I do know he suffered from PTSD after the war and did not return to see my father.
I’ve read one book on Merrill’s Marauders and just started another called Spearhead. The mortality rate was something like 80%.
I have a email from someone at marauder.org that gives some details about the men in that unit and how much they suffered and accomplished. I also have his medals including Purple Heart, Bronze Stars and a presidential citation given to the unit.
In my office I have laminated posters with pictures of medals and info on the Marauders (and other relatives who served elsewhere). I made it with my children for school assignments on Veterans days.
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You are way ahead of me then. Hat’s off to ya and your gramp.
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You forgot Marvin Gaye.
Also, must HOWL!
Howling!
But not Kaddishing.
Only Allen can do that.
T. S… Eliot. Click!
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Actually I appreciate your counsel. Not that I’m ahead of you-When I finally grew up and got some sense of what others have done for this country I’ve always had a thirst to learn this stuff.
My father and a family genealogist did all the heavy lifting. Dad even went to a Marauder’s reunion to research. As a result of those two I’m in a position to keep passing it along to our descendants.
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@jaybate-1.0 in 1962, the Movie of Merrill’s Marauders came out. My father worked for Warner Brothers and I was able to meet the cast of that movie. With all my siblings grown and in College, I became a child prodigy in Contract Bridge. At age 14, the TV Show “Sugarfoot” was on and it featured Will Hutchins who played the title role. He was also in the film. I played Bridge with he and other cast members. I recieved a Xmas present from him that year and all my classmates thought I was cool.
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@JayHawkFanToo Whatever pro league Svi was playing in, there are many overseas. He is not in the same Pro level league that Sasha is in.
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Cool, thanks for sharing that bit of childhood.
You were most fortunate to hang around the fantasy factory at that time.
Sam Fuller could make war movies move.
And Ty Hardin should have been bigger.
And Claude Akins in any 1950s pic is worth a look.
Remember also Jeff Chandler played in The Jayhawkers. Good movie idea wrecked by Fess Parker, who later put a lousy piece of architecture down on East Beach in Santa Barbara and called it a hotel. Its still there stinking things up.
(Added subsequently for following comment.)
Cherkaski Mavpy? Is that the phonetic spelling:-)
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Svi played for Cherkaski Mavpy of the #13 ranled Ukrainian Basketball Super League from 2012 to 2014. Kaun plays for CSKA Moscow of the #2 ranked VTB United League ( formerly Russian Premier League). They both also play for their respective National Teams. I understand that Svi could play for just about any League in Europe, including the #1 ranked Spanish League.
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@JayHawkFanToo But in the Big 12 he sits on the bench.
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Much like the NBA, Euro leagues also buy potential. He played in one of the bottom teams in one of the bottom leagues, and if he were to join one of the top leagues/teams, he would also ride the bench until his game has developed. Ricky Rubio started the same way and was locked into a long term contract that kept him with Barcelona of the Spanish League for a while and he had to eventually buy out of his contract (with a little help from the Wolves). I see Svi pretty much the same way. If colleges could lock players in long term contracts, don’t you think KU would sign Svi even if he would not initially play much? Kid is only 17.
I would encourage you to watch some Euro basket sometime (lots of on-line streams); I believe you would be surprised.
