This post isn’t about analysis. This post is about enjoying a basketball game for being great. This will be long, so feel free to skip it if you don’t have that kind of time.

My perception of several guys was altered last night watching that game. Credit has to go to every single guy for playing their butts off last night, on both teams. The action wasn’t always perfect, but guys played extremely hard on both ends.

Both Kruger and Self squeezed every ounce of effort out of their guys. Both drew up some brilliant plays and made some questionable decisions, but they got everything out of their players.

Pack up the Big XII POY trophy and send it to Norman. Deliver it to a Mr. Hield. I went from thinking Hield was a fringe NBA prospect to being sold on him as a first rounder. Dropping 46 in AFH and playing 54 of 55 minutes, basically not letting your team die until exhaustion compromised his talents in the 54th minute of action (after playing all 40 in a wild game against ISU on Saturday). Hield was the best player on the floor. I wanted to shake his hand last night. As Vitale said last night, it wasn’t just that Hield made plays and dropped 46, it was that every single play he made was during a crucial moment. Every play was a must play. And he wasn’t just scoring. He had crucial assists, grabbed some big rebounds and played some tough D. Just incredible in every aspect.

Perry Ellis played his best game as a Jayhawk. Not best because he has never played better. He has. Best because that was the type of game that you need to play if you’re going to be a top player on a top team. He battled in a way that I had never seen him battle. He had his problems against Lattin (I will get to him in a second), but Perry just kept plugging away and made some HUGE plays down the stretch.

Isaiah Cousins has some stones. He was awful Saturday against Iowa State, until he wasn’t and keyed the win down the stretch. He struggled again last night, but then still hit a couple big buckets. He’s slumping right now, but once he gets going again, this OU team will be even more dangerous.

Frank Mason changed how I feel about him as a defensive player. I have no idea how many points he scored, or how many assists, or anything like that. I watched him get into Buddy Hield’s space last night and take on the challenge of defending a top notch player that was red hot (and stayed hot). But Frank stayed right in Hield’s space, and ended up making the two biggest plays of the night to seal the win. I said Frank was an average defender at the beginning of the season. I stand corrected. Frank is above average, maybe well above average. I can’t even describe how impressed I was with his performance on that end.

Kadeem Lattin was big time last night. He kept that game alive with his presence in the middle. He and Spangler are basically OU’s only useful bigs, and I think they both had double doubles last night. Spangler showed me more shooting than I knew he had. I was afraid he was going to be our undoing. The single biggest moment last night may have been when he left the game briefly due to injury. He wasn’t the same when he came back in. Those two are irreplaceable for the Sooners.

Devonte Graham has some Mario Chalmers in him. He wants to be the guy that has to make plays. I hadn’t really gotten to see that attitude until last night, but he wants to be in the BIG moments. It’s clear that Self realized that before I did and that Graham will be on the floor at the end of every close game from now until he graduates. He was relentless last night.

I didn’t even really think Jordan Woodard was that good until last night. He was, to me, the third of the three guards. I was so completely wrong. Woodard was in on everything. He handled the ball. He hit six threes, and I think four of them were on enormous, game altering possessions. Like Hield, he made several must plays. So very impressed.

And finally, Wayne Selden, who has morphed from a running disappointment into a legitimate NBA level performer. Wayne Selden is different. Last year, in the type of game he was having, Selden would have finished with five points on 2-6 shooting with 3 fouls in 26 minutes of a KU loss. The foul trouble would have robbed him of his aggressiveness and he would have just disappeared. Last night, Selden saw Hield going absolutely bonkers and rose to that level. No, he didn’t drop 46, too, but there were moments where Selden saw Hield making plays and went and made a play, too. That’s what the greats do. Hield and Selden raised each other’s level of play last night, and it was a joy to watch.

That was some great basketball. We will do this again in Norman in a little over 5 weeks.

I’ve been gone for awhile. I’ve been okay, though. Part of it was being fairly busy with work and family things.

The other part was frustration with some of the topics/commentary that was going on that had shifted from enriching debate to something else.

I saw a particular topic that bothered me. I was about to respond, but I happened to be at home at the time and caught a glimpse of a picture of me and my wife. I looked around the room and saw pictures of family and other reminders of how much I have been blessed and it reminded me of all of the good things going on in my life despite that topic being on an internet message board. I decided not to respond and logged off.

I hadn’t logged on since then for a lot of reasons, not really related to this board or the people on it. Moreso related to being busy, a couple of health scares in the family (all good now, but a bit concerning at the time) and the normal things in life.

I will admit that stepping away from the board helped me gain a bit more perspective.

I probably won’t engage in the political stuff much on here, but I should be back on about basketball more consistently.

@wrwlumpy

There’s a concept in basketball called gravity. It is basically an offensive player’s pull to keep defenders close to them. Brannen Greene has gravity because he’s an incredible shooter. He spaces the floor because if he is outside the three point line and there are no defenders around, you might as well just put the points on the board and run to the other end.

Landen Lucas has no gravity. We saw on Monday against OU that they did not guard him. Lon Kruger actively strategized to leave Lucas open, even near the basket, recovering to him only when he had the ball. That meant that Lucas’ man (Lattin for most of that time) was standing in the middle of the lane, clogging it for any drives. After Spangler picked up his fourth foul and Lattin (OU’s top shot blocker) had to switch to Perry, a player with some gravity, KU’s possessions went as follows:

1. 1-2 FT from Devonte Graham on penetration
2. 2-2 FT from Perry Ellis inside
3. 2-2 FT from Graham on penetration
4. Missed jumper from Mason
5. Layup from Selden
6. Missed jumper from Mason

After that was the turnovers and FTs that ultimately ended the game. After Lattin had to move from the middle of the lane, KU got 7 points in 6 possessions, and the only time they didn’t score was when they didn’t get into the lane.

Lucas, and to a similar extent, Traylor, simply do not have gravity. They may set good screens and get rebounds, etc., but they do not pose enough offensive threat to merit being guarded. I could not believe that OU didn’t guard Lucas even when he was underneath the basket!

Diallo and Bragg and Mickelson can do those same little things, but they can also do big things like make jump shots that force defensive guys to do something other than camp in the lane and block shots.

@BeddieKU23

Oregon is us (or we are Oregon) to a large degree. They run almost everything through Brooks. He and Jackson going back and forth should be some of the best basketball we will see all year. That matchup alone is worth the price of admission.

Their key guy will be Dorsey. He and Graham should matchup, although it will be interesting to see what happens when Vick is in the game. Had Dorsey not gone to Oregon, it’s likely he would be at KU and Vick would be somewhere else. Vick has to know that, and probably would like to demonstrate that KU ended up in the superior position.

I expect a huge game from Lucas, oddly enough. He struggled last night, but he remembers that Villanova game and I don’t think he wants his career to end like that. Lucas double double to the tune of 14 points, 15 boards.

I think the Big 12 suffers from one major issue - the schools in this conference other than KU often suffer from a good coaching not having elite players, or elite players not having a good coach.

Huggins is a good coach. WVU has good players, but not any elite ones. That hurts come tourney time. Last year Lon Kruger had a lottery pick. He rode that team to the Final Four. This year he has nothing. We all see what happened.

Jamie Dixon is a good coach. He’s at TCU. No NBA talent there.

Hoiberg was a good coach at ISU. Can anyone think of any lottery picks that he had?

Part of that is that the Big 12 conference footprint doesn’t have a ton of basketball talent aside from Texas. There’s just not a lot to draw from as far as local NBA caliber talent.

That makes it really difficult come March. The Big 12 has lots of really good college teams, but you have to raise the talent level to match that on the coaching side of things (the Big 12 has, top to bottom, probably the most coaching talent of any league). Who has the most talent in the Big 12 consistently? KU of course. Is there any surprise we dominate the league? We have the most talent and generally speaking, that is a huge difference.

Let’s look at the three major games (McDs, Jordan Brand and Nike Hoops Summit) and check the rosters to see how many are committed to Big 12 schools:

McDs - 2, Billy Preston (Kansas) and Trae Young (Oklahoma).

Jordan - 2, Preston and Matt Coleman (Texas).

Nike - 1, Lindell Wigginton (Iowa State).

Think about that for a second. Out of the players considered elite, the Big 12 has four (4!!!) that are committed to play in the conference.

Flip over to the ESPN 100 recruiting. Let’s look at the top 50 players.

Zero top 10 recruits heading to the Big 12 so far, although 4 top 10 players are still uncommitted.

2 top 20 recruits coming to Kansas (Preston) and Oklahoma (Young).

Coleman (ranked 27) heading to Texas.

Wigginton (ranked 42) going to ISU.

That’s it for the top 50.

Here’s the rest of the hundred - 58 (Terrance Lewis to ISU), 61 (Marcus Garrett to Kansas), 66 (Jericho Sims to Texas), 68 (Zach Dawson to Oklahoma State), 74 (Royce Hamm to Texas), 89 (Derek Culver to West Virginia).

10 players in the top 100 are heading to the Big 12, with two each to KU and Iowa State, three to Texas and one each to Oklahoma, Oklahoma State and West Virginia.

The SEC has 20 top 100 guys going to 9 different conference schools.

Pac-12 has landed 18 going to 9 of their schools.

The ACC has 16 going to 9 schools.

Even the Big 10 has 12 going to 8 schools.

6 schools in the Big 12 split 10 top 100 guys. That means nearly half of the conference is missing any top 100 talent. Three quarters of the Pac 12 has top 100 talent. The SEC, ACC and Big 10 are all bigger, but they have 8 or 9 schools getting top 100 talent, which means the top of their conferences boast more talent (although the Big 10 is pretty thin talentwise, but we saw what happened to that conference in the regular season).

Simply put, the Big 12 isn’t getting enough talent into the conference, particularly at Oklahoma, Iowa State and Baylor, 3 schools that have done well enough recently enough to compete for recruits. You can’t expect to compete at an elite level if you lack elite talent. Just ask the Big 10, the conference most comparable to the Big 12 in terms of incoming talent, about how that’s working out.

I think Davis was trying to make a very simple point. Here’s a coach that knew going into the game that his team was going to be overmatched by KU. He was asked a classic coachspeak question about picking your poison, and he replied in a simple way that conveyed both his respect for KU’s talent, and his frustration at not having an answer - “they all poison”.

Could he have used proper grammar and said “All of the players at the University of Kansas are talented enough offensively to be considered poisonous to the opponent.”

Sure, but that seems silly.

Remember Jim Mora’s “Playoffs? Don’t talk about—playoffs?! You kidding me? Playoffs?!” rant. That’s not perfect English, but it conveys the point perfectly.

Let’s remember, language is about conveying ideas. Sometimes, those ideas are best conveyed through the use of the grammatical rules because the discussion is in a formal setting. At other times, the formality can be discarded to convey an idea through colloquialism, knowing that the audience will understand the point. This is often done to be humorous or sarcastic. That’s all Davis was doing here.

Postgame picture of Lagerald Vick

The big difference between this KU team and so many others is Josh Jackson. Stay with me here because this may get crazy.

Josh Jackson is the most complete player to come to KU under Self. He can affect the game in a million different ways. Already this year I can think of him making big plays with perimeter shooting, rebounding, drives, passing, defense, shot blocking, steals, big time dunks, etc. He can literally do it all.

That should be the difference come March. Jackson can just decide that KU isn’t going home that night when things aren’t going well and whether its defense, offense, transition or whatever, Josh Jackson will make plays because he can make a million different plays to help us win.

Frank and Devonte are carrying us now, but don’t be shocked when its Josh dropping a 20 point, 11 rebound, 6 assist, 4 steal, 2 block gem of a performance at the most critical time you could imagine. He has that talent and that will.

That will matter come March.

@drgnslayr

This team can really put a college team into a meat grinder on both ends.

On defense, because Josh Jackson is so versatile, he can anchor the defense the way a traditional shot blocking center usually would, but still also destroy ball handlers off switches in the PnR. He can trap, and with his size he is disruptive on traps (forced the travel in the corner and created the Vick 360 off double teams).

The rest of the guards can turn up the pressure on the perimeter. Graham, Mason, and Vick can really get after guys, and because Mason is such a good rebounder even at his size, KU gives up nothing on the glass even playing four guards.

On offense the weapons are overwhelming. A million ways for a season to die - choose one:

1. Mason iso
2. Graham iso
3. Jackson iso
4. Mason drive and kick
5. Graham drive and kick
6. Jackson drive and kick
7. Svi for three
8. Vick lob
9. Lucas lob
10. Jackson lob
11. Jackson post up
12. Lucas post up
13. Svi drive
14. Graham corner three
15. Vick transition
16. Jackson transition
17. Mason transition
18. Graham transition
19. Mason PnR
20. Graham PnR
21. Jackson PnR
22. Weave
23. I think you get the point

That’s a lot of ways for a season to die. Purdue experienced them all. Their season is now dead. That is not a coincidence.

This whole Charlottesville thing has been really tough on me personally. As an African American, it has been difficult to put into words what I have felt over the last several days.

The sight of hundreds of white nationalists walking down the street, proudly in broad daylight is jarring. It’s jarring because it used to be that most of these individuals wanted to hide their hateful ideals from the rest of the world. That’s no longer the case. They broadcast their hate for the world to see, arguing that they are just proud to be who they are.

Let me stop here and say that everyone should be proud of who they are, regardless of race, creed, color, orientation, ethnicity, religion, hometown or anything else. Diversity isn’t a declaration that any one group is better than another. It is a declaration that the differences within each of us make all of us better. Diversity includes everyone, including white people. The reason that diversity offers opportunities for non whites is that generally, white people already have a seat at the table for every discussion. Diversity and inclusion are trying to add a variety to the opinions available.

Let’s put this out there right now - the very ideology of white supremacy is that they want to spark a race riot or race war in which all minorities, immigrants, Jews and other “undesirables” (i.e. gays, non-English speakers, non-white supremacists) are either killed or driven from the country. That’s the endgame for white supremacists. To have the president act as an apologist to them is not just disappointing as a minority - it’s life threatening. That’s why you saw the white supremacists show up with guns and body armor. They weren’t looking for a peaceful march - they came for a fight.

These groups no longer fear public shame or identification. They are emboldened. As a black man, that puts my very life in jeopardy. That is not hyperbole. That is real life. We saw last week that one man drove his car into a crowd in an act of domestic terrorism. We have seen in the past where white supremacists have tortured and killed minorities who stopped to get gas or groceries at night. If the president is going to decry the MS-13 gang (rightly, because they are a criminal gang), he should speak just as strongly against what happened last weekend, rather than blaming both sides (white supremacy groups are often funded through criminal activity as well - drug sales, robbery, human trafficking, etc.).

This is no longer about politics. This is about human decency. One side wants equality. The other wants suppression. We fought a war 150 years ago and equality won out. Are we really interested in rolling things back, because only one side wants a do-over on that.

It will be tough to open schools a month from now if we don’t cut the spread dramatically in the next few weeks. That means masks, social distancing, the whole gamut.

Trying to open schools without taking precautions right now is a secondary disaster waiting to happen. Schools will act as a hot zone, with one case quickly turning into a few dozen. We do not have enough willing, qualified and capable teachers to deal with an outbreak ON ANY SCALE. I doubt you will find many substitutes willing to come in if there is a large COVID-19 outbreak in a school system.

And if teachers have to double up with students, that will make things worse rather than better.

The answer is not to just forge ahead, damn the consequences. We need a plan that will cut the spread now, and protect students and teachers later.

@nuleafjhawk

Having Mahomes means there’s never a “there’s no way we can win this game” moment.

I doubt any of the departing teams regrets much, other than Nebraska, honestly.

Colorado would not have wanted to stay in the Big 12 with the addition of West Virginia stretching the conference that far east. The time difference of being the only conference school in the Mountain time zone always made it frustrating for them anyway. I always thought they were the most likely departure to the Pac-10(12) for that reason.

I doubt Mizzou and A&M regret the move. Mizzou may have made more sense in the Big 10 at first glance, but the SEC offered more money, so it doesn’t surprise me they went there. They basically got more money to be in a very similar position conferencewise. That’s a pretty good trade, honestly. And if they do ever win the SEC title game, they will almost certainly play in the national semifinals. Same for A&M.

I think Nebraska may regret it because they didn’t sign on for Maryland and Rutgers. They wanted Michigan, Ohio State, Penn State, etc. They wanted the possibility of Notre Dame joining at some point. That’s not what they got. So they may actually wish they had stayed put. Add to it that the Big Ten hasn’t really helped open new recruiting territory, and Nebraska looks like they got almost nothing from the deal.

The problem with systemic problems is that they are embedded deep in the system, so even things that are not intended to be disproportionate end up being so, because that is a function of society.

Take the Paycheck Protection loans that went out to small businesses earlier this year. Very few minority owned businesses were able to get those types of loans, even though the loans were extended to most everyone. Why?

Well, in order to receive the loan, you had to go through your bank. And the banks that had the processes to handle the loans on the first day the money was available were primarily the large, national banks. Most minority owned businesses, because they often start off small and local, do not bank with the larger, national banks. They bank with the regional, or often even the local banks. Those banks were more or less cut out of the PPP loans, so minority owned businesses were also cut out of that (otherwise) equally distributed program.

So why do minority owned businesses often bank with smaller banks? Well, when evaluating for credit, national banks, for many years, did not bank minority owned businesses. As a result, there are several generations of minority owned businesses that have found larger banks uncooperative, but found certain local banks to be more open. Because of that, those minority owned businesses were able then to act as references for other minority entrepreneurs, who were then able to form that banking relationship, so that they have a strong community relationship with that bank.

But this structure means that when a program is focused primarily on the larger banks (Citi, Bank of America, etc.) that will almost certainly cut minority businesses out of the deal because that is not generally where those businesses bank. That’s how structural or systemic racism works. The racism of large banks from 50-75 years ago still manifests itself today even though the people in those positions today may not themselves be practicing racism. But the structure is there, and that structure cuts against minority owned businesses in this case. As a result, many minority owned businesses did not get those loans and instead had to take higher interest loans, or forego additional funding entirely.

Since minority businesses employ minorities at a higher rate, that means those businesses were more likely to have to lay off workers - that’s more minorities getting laid off. That means that when this pandemic is over, many minorities will be in a worse financial position than a similarly positioned white person whose small business (or the small business they worked for) was able to get PPP assistance.

Another good example was the early rounds of testing, which required a doctor recommending the testing. There are credible studies out there that describe how doctors often dismiss the claims of their minority patients, leading to less testing and worse outcomes. So again, when you are depending on a physician referral to get critical testing for COVID-19, even though the rates were higher in minority populations, that can be accounted for by unchecked spread, which meant that many minority clusters were not identified until numerous individuals were hospitalized (i.e., people already extremely sick) as opposed to early on, when the spread could be checked.

Those are just two areas where systemic or structural issues have caused problems with COVID-19 response for minorities.

@kjayhawks said in Differentiating fact from opinion on COVID-19:

I would agree about not being able to shut back down. CNN ran a story about how the riots and protests didn’t lead to a rise in cases but ran an article about how a few thousand at a Trump rally caused a huge spike. The media thinks everyone is a potato at this point. Also if we are shutdown this winter millions will die because of the shut down not virus. The morality rate is less than 1% in this country still considerably less than the flu, pneumonia and other illnesses. Be smart and wash your hands. I’ll see if I can find the article about the hundreds of millions of dollars big businesses like amazon, Walmart, Menards etc made during shut down. Will never understand how standing apart in Walmart is different than any other store or local business. I’m just being as safe as I can, I have left my county once since early February and limited unneeded trips anywhere.

One big difference between the protests and the rally is that the protests were all outside, where sunlight and air/humidity/wind all drive the spread of the virus down. Inside the arena, you don’t have those factors, so there’s a greater chance for spread in a large crowd.

Another factor is mask use, as many protesters wore masks even outside, which further cuts down on spread, while the rally had lots of attendees not wearing masks, which, again, increases the chance of transmission.

Those two factors (outside vs. inside and masks vs. no masks) are things that could have easily been predicted based on the science we have, which told us months ago that sunlight/humidity and air temperature could help slow the spread, and that wearing masks can cut person to person transmission.

So the result is really no surprise.

@Kcmatt7 said in Stock picks:

American Airlines has to take a 12% loan yesterday.

Not a great sign for the industry…

Yeah, I am still hanging on the sidelines tracking the market. Just about everything is down this week, probably more of the same for the next couple of weeks.

But at some point, things will start to rebound. The key is figuring out which companies in which industries will rebound best. And that is the challenge.

I like some industries that are down right now (mostly entertainment and hotel/vacation type stuff). They are not making any money right now, so are falling, but will probably rebound once things can fully open back up, similar to air travel.

I made a bit earlier this year, but have mostly backed out of the market over the last several weeks while I wait to see where things end up. I probably won’t get back in for a few more weeks unless I want to buy and hold. Market is just too volatile right now to do much trading without risking losing your shirt.

If we were in such a rush to open (and many were) there should have been mandatory mask requirements in public. That would have allowed lots of businesses to reopen, while cutting down on infection spread. But somehow, people wanted to reopen quickly and not wear masks.

So we ended up here. Infection rates approaching the high of April, no vaccine and many businesses struggling to stay afloat because consumer confidence is low, so even though businesses are open, they are not getting enough customers to make things work. It was a bad strategy to begin with. You cannot reopen if people do not have basic confidence that they won’t get sick (or get someone close to them sick) just by going out into the world.

Masks could have helped prevent that. But apparently wearing a mask (which I do whenever I go out) is a sign of weakness and fear.

So prepare for many more waves until we get a vaccine because it won’t get any better until we take some serious proactive steps.

The mystique of AFH would remain. The history that is part of the atmosphere would still be there.

But without the crowd noise, some of the situations would change. There would be no deafening roar that could disrupt the timing and communication on the court. There would be no crowd energy to feed off of during a run.

It would make for an interesting test in how valuable home court is, for sure.

@Crimsonorblue22 said in Mike Gundy and OSU:

@kjayhawks https://heartland-sports.com/2020/06/16/osu-football-players-deny-list-of-demands-produced-by-doug-gottlieb/ All on Gottlieb not on team! Trying to stir it up

No surprise. It seemed like the kind of thing a guy that can’t figure out how to put on his pants would do.