That is all correct and I would never commit the folly of saying JD's career was without its low-points. However, I think that his stretch of games from late 2021 through mid 2022 are important enough to make him a legend. In the 2021 season we had not been decent for over a decade. But the last three games of that season, something seemed to change. There was the win over Texas, of course, but we followed that up by close losses against TCU and WVU, suggesting the Texas game might not have been a complete fluke and that Kansas might have actually developed into a decent Big 12 team. Those three games were the springboard to our back-to-back bowl seasons and Jalon Daniels played very well in all of them.

https://www.sports-reference.com/cfb/schools/kansas/2021-schedule.html

Early 2022 was another key moment in Kansas football history. Starting 5-0, being ranked, appearing on college gameday, and setting ourselves up for a bowl game appearance were huge for our program, and I don't think that 5-0 stretch occurs without Daniels. He played great football and some of those close games (West Virginia, Duke) might have gone the other way without him.

https://www.sports-reference.com/cfb/schools/kansas/2022-schedule.html

I agree that Bean is more of a KU legend than Daniels. The way Bean stepped up when Daniels kept getting injured, played well, and was the starter for almost all of 2023 (our best season since 2007), and won us a bowl game puts Bean ahead of JD. But none of JD's flaws and nadirs can take away what he did for us from late 2021 to early 2022.

With our roster full I put together a wee chart of how I see our lineup playing out in a typical game:

position - starter (minutes) - backup 1 (minutes) -backup 2 (minutes)
1 ----------- Council (28) -------- Kinney (6) ---------- Blyden (6)
2 ------------ Blyden (22) --------Kinney (10) ---------- Stokes (8)
3 ------------- White (20) ------- Rosario (10) ---------Stokes (10)
4------------- Stokes (16) --------- White (12) --------- Dawes (12)
5 ---------- Dawes (20) --------- Mbiya (20)

minutes leaders: Stokes (34), Dawes (32), White (32), Council (28), Blyden (28), Mbiya (20), Kinney (16), Rosario (10)

I went with a small starting lineup because that seems to be our most talented group. Plus this would still be a good rebounding team despite being small. I guessed Rosario and Mbiya would beat out Parker Jr, Barnett, and Reeves due to experience in the system, but it would not surprise me if any of those three guys beat someone out to get minutes.

I understand that game scripts will change lineups and minutes. This is just a sample of what I think minute distribution could look like in a typical Big 12 game.

I think whether someone is a legend or not depends on context sometimes as much or more than raw data. Climbing out of the deep hole of depravity in late 2021 and early 2022 is one of the most important accomplishments in KU football history and JD was a big part of that. I think that cements him and Devin Neal as KU legends.

It might depend on how long Baker Mayfield is out

That is only a problem if Council is the go-to guy on offense. He mostly was last season because Darryn didn't play and White and Flory aren't very good at creating their own shots.

@DCHawker That is probably true, but it doesn't mean that Council limits the team'a ceiling

Tough break for JD. His center failed to snap the ball correctly and JD took a huge loss as a result

I could get behind the feeling that Melvin does not raise our ceiling, but to say he lowers it is categorically false. Many many great teams, including some that have won national championships, have started guards who are not good 3-pt shooters.

For added context, last night Melvin Council posted on social media that he would announce his choice this morning between Kentucky, LSU, and "Mitchigan". There was some suspicion at the time that he may have been trolling.

On a more positive note: I am glad to see we played well today and got our first shutout since the stone age. But I will have to see us convert our good mojo into a quality win or two before getting my hopes up

I have a bad feeling Utah will remind us just how sucky we are

I am rooting for Jalon Daniels. He has been through a lot the past few years and it would be great for him to win an NFL game and make the doubters look silly

I can see why people say Melvin would be perfect as a 6th man. He certainly would be. However, I think that's unlikely to happen. If Melvin were to join the team, he would start unless Blyden turns out to be really really good right away and takes the starting point guard role from him

Melvin Council has seemingly confirmed his intent to return to Kansas on his Instagram stories. He seems very happy to get the chance to return.

I am guessing that this hypothetical would mean Atticus Richmond or Grant Mordini getting the boot? Or perhaps someone like Christian Reeves or Dennis Parker decommits because they don't like getting recruited over

I was actually thinking about how Tre White's addition could give us a lineup similar to our 2022 team. I made a chart to prove it:

position - 2022 player - 2027 player - rationale

1 - DaJuan Harris - Leroy Blyden (or Taylen Kinney) - the one point guard and small player in the starting lineup

2 - Christrian Braun - Tyran Stokes - oversized two guard who can handle secondary ball-handling duties

3 - Ochai Agbaji - Tre White - veteran wing who can shoot

4 - Jalen Wilson - Keanu Dawes - bigger guy who can rebound and score from anywhere

5 - David McCormack - Paul Mbiya (or Christian Reeves) - the one true big guy in the lineup

And as a bonus the guys who do not start between Blyden/Kinney and Mbiya/Reeves can slide into the Remy Martin and Mitch Lightfoot roles of the 2022 squad.

My guess is

Kinney
Blyden
White
Stokes
Dawes

I assume this means we are going small this year?

That was the most intense football game I've seen for a while. The offense was great. The defense struggled, but the Colts had a great gameplan. Hopefully the defense looks more like it did against Denver in their next game

Marshall was not great. But he was not awful either. He played okay, which is more than we can say about many other players.

In the first half he and our offense couldn't do anything, but in the second half Marshall made some great throws and was consistently moving the ball. He threw one pick, but that was in a 4th and 10 desperation situation that he was put in by the failures elsewhere on our team.

Outgaining them by 200 yards and still losing is something you just have to admire. Nobody loves losing as much as Kansas football and we are damn good at it