I don’t get the Shaka hate here. He’s a solid coach. Is it really just because he got his team prepared to beat us on a big stage when Self fell into one of his old habits (i.e., playing certain guys too much). That’s not Shaka Smart’s fault. We complain about that on this board all the time. Shaka Smart had a team that exploited that.

He would have gotten a P5 chance at some point either way, same as Marshall has had P5 offers, same as many other coaches have had P5 offers. He wasn’t dominant at VCU, but he had a good team that was consistent in a mid major, something that Bill Self can tell you is tough to do.

Smart had his guys ready again last night, and KU was fortunate they screwed up that last play, otherwise we are sitting at 2-2 in conference.

BShark said:

Side note: Cunliffe, Anrio etc…were not good HS players. Also Cunliffe was a transfer obviously, and I’d love to get away from transfers for the most part.

Odd fact, Cunliffe and Adams both graduated from the same high school (Rainier Beach in Seattle). CJ Giles and Roderick Stewart also went to that school.

Given those names, its no surprise that Rainier Beach is a perennial state power in Washington, winning or playing for the state title just about every season.

Looking first at Adams, he led the state of Washington in scoring as a sophomore, junior and senior. He led two different schools to state titles while in high school. Averaged 21 points, 6 rebounds and 5 assists per game as a senior. That’s a darn good player.

Cunliffe averaged 21/9/3 as a senior, and 20/5/5 as a junior. He was the state tournament MVP as a senior when he led Rainier Beach to the title. Darn good high school player.

You don’t get recruited to a P5 school (any P5 school, not just Kansas) if you were not a stud in high school. P5 bench guys were all state picks in high school.

Take Garrett Luinstra, a current walkon at KU. He went to Lawrence Free State. All he did in high school was toss in 19 points per game and set a school record for points in a season.

Chris Teahan was an all district player at Rockhurst as a junior and senior.

Those two guys were darn good HS players.

If you were an average or below high school player, you might have a chance to walk on at a D2 or NAIA school, but if you are at a P5 school, you were a stud in high school without a doubt, and likely one of the better players in your state as a senior.

I’m uneasy about this diversion. I hope that he isn’t a scumbag, but I am also worried.

KU football has a lot of momentum right now. New coach. Good recruits coming in. Excitement around the program.

I hope no one bowed to the excitement and pressure and brushed something serious off as a “mistake.” If he did something bad, he should be punished, even if that means he’s off the team.

Now, that isn’t to say that he did do something horrible. I don’t have the facts. But I also know that there’s a pretty long and ugly history of athletes being granted much more leeway than they should have because they were helping the team win. College football has a long history of coverups in the name of team wins (see Baylor, Colorado, Penn State, Florida State, Miami, North Carolina, Tennessee, USC, Michigan State, LSU, Florida, Ohio State, Maryland, Nebraska - could go on, but you get the point). I just hope that this isn’t a sign that Kansas should be added to that list.

How did this TCU team lose to Lipscomb?

It’s easier to play guard than inside. That has always been true. They always talk about how much a PG has on their plate (and it is quite a bit), but the position doesn’t ever really change. The ball is in your hands all the time. If you played PG when you were 9 and had the skills to continue playing PG as you moved up the ranks, your job never really changed.

For big guys, that’s not the case. If you’re bigger or stronger than everyone else, that’s enough for a long time, but you have to add ball handling, the ability to diagnose and pass out of double teams, rim protection, etc. There’s new stuff being thrown at you at every level. You don’t have the ball in your hands all the time, so the talent of the guards you play with can make you look a lot better (or worse) than you actually are.

It’s also less likely to project advanced skills onto guards. If you’re Frank Mason, you’re 5-10, can handle and can score. Tough as nails. But your size means that people aren’t going to be as high on you as they are on a 6-5 guy with less skill, or a 6-10 guy with even less skill. A 5-10 guy has to be very skilled to get a D1 offer. If you’re over 6-8, that’s not the case. Nobody looks at a 6-1 guy and recruits him as a “project.” You get fired for that. That guy has to be able to play. On the other hand, you can recruit a 6-9 project. You can recruit Joel Embiid and hope he develops into Joel Embiid. You can’t recruit a guard that just started playing basketball at 14 and hope he progresses. There’s just not enough time.

Agbaji played really, really well last night. If he plays like that going forward, pulling the redshirt was well worth it.

He made an impact on both ends, and his hustle was contagious. In some ways, he’s Marcus Garrett, but a much better shooter. He gives this KU team another weapon.

Credit to Bill Self and staff for seeing that. I was very skeptical, as my posts from yesterday made clear, but Agbaji has a chance to be a big piece on this team, and he does raise the ceiling in a significant way, but also raises the floor because he’s such a well rounded player.

I guess the question to me is if Ochai Agbaji, by his addition to this team, as currently built (i.e., no Silvio, no Doke) make this team a Final Four team?

If yes, burn the redshirt and get him in the rotation.

If no, keep the redshirt and let him be a workhorse for a Final Four team down the road.

I think Agbaji is good, and can get better. I think he makes this years team marginally better. But better is relative.

Let’s say you believe without Agbaji, this year’s team is an 83 on a scale of 1-100. With Agbaji they move up to 84 or 85. He has, by definition, made the team “better”. However, let’s say that the typical team that you expect to get to the Final Four is an 88. Yes, Agbaji made this team better, but he didn’t raise the level all the way to Final Four/National Champion caliber.

Now, you can say that this team, as currently built is an 85 already, and that Agbaji adds 4 points to the total, getting them to 89. In that scenario, I agree completely that its worth it. If, on the other hand, you think this team is just an 80, unless Agbaji adds 8 points to that total, it’s not worth it.

Part of my argument for that is that he’s already missed a significant portion of the season. KU has played 14 of their 31 expected regular season games. He’s missed almost half the season. If he’s not ready to play rotation minutes immediately (literally immediately, like ready to play anywhere from 12-25 minutes TONIGHT), then he will have missed basically half the season. Is half a season of Agbaji now worth sacrificing a full season later?

That’s what I keep coming back to. The benefit of now versus the benefit of the long run. I think Agbaji is good and can help along the margins. I think he can handle the physical play. I think he could provide a boost offensively. I think he can be a physical defender that guards 3 positions. All of those things move the needle to make a team better. Had Agbaji been available from day one, I would have had no problem with that because I think he’s ready to play D1 (presuming 100% health, which has to be assumed, otherwise this entire discussion is insane).

But if you pull Agbaji’s redshirt, this had better be a Final Four team because you are making an All-In type move and that’s the only way you can make it pay off. Pulling his redshirt for half a season that ends with a S16 or even E8 exit would be a waste. You’re not pulling (or shouldn’t be pulling) his redshirt to win the Big 12. That’s a waste. Pulling his redshirt is about national championship aspirations. Approaching it any other way isn’t considering the cost.

I’ve slept on it, and I still don’t know how this really helps KU in the immediate sense.

As others have noted, Agbaji was not a top 30 recruit. He was a good player that improved drastically over the last 16 months. But with the injury, it’s hard to say where he is at developmentwise. I suppose he could have improved even more from when we last got an extended look at him, but even then, it’s doubtful that he turned into a top 50 talent overnight, particularly given he missed time with injury that likely slowed his development a bit.

Travis Releford seems to be a good comp for Agbaji. Obviously, we all remember veteran Releford being a big contributor as a junior and senior. However, Releford barely played as a true freshman, redshirted his second year, then barely played as a redshirt sophomore (just 10 mpg). I think we could expect that type of production from Agbaji, so maybe 4 points, 2 rebounds, 1 assist, 1 steal in 10-12 minutes.

Is that going to change the outcome of games?

Is that worth losing a year of development for him to play roughly half a season?

Is that worth sacrificing the likely production Agbaji will provide in 2022-23 as a redshirt senior?

Now, if Agbaji provides more production than that, say, more along the lines of 6-7 points, 3 rebounds, in 15-18 minutes per game, then the calculation obviously changes because that might change the outcome of some games and raise the ceiling come March. If that’s what Self sees and expects, then his decision to yank the shirt makes sense and could pay huge dividends. But if its not, then this is puzzling.

My only concern is Agbaji’s long term health. Shifting one or two games this season isn’t worth potentially compromising his career.

Stress fractures are weird. I would rather be cautious. I hope he is 100%

The best thing KU can do for McCormack is to not post him up. He’s decent in the post, but not so good that KU should be force feeding him the ball in there.

Better to make him a PnR man. That’s his role at the next level anyway, so it benefits both KU now (by avoiding having him trying to navigate the post in trying to force feed him the ball to score) and McCormack later (by helping him refine a skillset coveted at the next level). That’s a win win scenario.