I know a lot of folks talk about the ‘next year’ problem, but I like to look at things very realistic. And realistically, I haven’t been looking at things as ‘next year’ for the last 3 years. Since Delon and Jakob have been gone, it’s been really treading water. But I remember thinking in 2012-13 that we had a good core with Dakari, Brandon, and Loveridge, and was hopeful that we could put a few more pieces in place. It was a tough season, but I was optimistic, and that next year we added Delon, the year after Jakob, and it was off to the races.
That’s where we are right now. We have a nice core, probably quite a bit better than 2012-13 of Rylan, Timmy, Both, Micky, Brenden, Riley, and we have some decent role players that can come deep off the bench like Jaxon and Lahat. Are we good this year, no. But I think we are actually a lot closer to being good than most people think. This LA road trip would have looked very different if we could have just made shots from outside. And we have good shooters, but they are young. Next year they will be making shots, and if we can add a couple more pieces, preferably a high volume scorer, I think we can be damn good.
I’m just going to temper my expectations and enjoy the ride.
Yeah, he was a pretty big part of our early success so having him in witness protection has sucked. It’s a lot more minutes for those that remain and also gives us one less long athletic guard. I’m hoping that the injury has hampered him, so perhaps the rest and recovery will restore some of his scoring punch and confidence.
Agreed, the knee jerk reaction is to watch this team and immediately be disappointed by the score/record. But there are some great young pieces that have a high ceiling. The future looks bright.
Here’s the thing about that team. There were literally 3 NBA stars on it, and Larry still lost 9 games and, in my opinion, underachieved in the post season (given the players at his disposal).
He’s a decent recruiter and quite a weak game coach and a terrible player retention coach. I like him and I want to support him, but he’s mediocre and will continue to be mediocre. Even the good years were pretty weak. 9 years, 2 NCAA tourneys, 3 tourney wins.
Team really ran out of gas in the second half yesterday. Jones played 78 minutes this weekend and Gach normally would run the point when Jones is getting a rest.
Hopefully we can give them a lift by cheering them on when the bay area teams visit this weekend.
I’m not even going to try to argue, because probably I mostly agree. I’m still upset (despite some of the apologists) that Kyle was not a better player while here. I remain worried about Krystko as a coach, I mentioned previously about turnovers and out of bounds plays as sort of the canary in the coal mine.
And last time I was looking through the rosters of the last 6-7 years, I’m not sure I can even give him a ‘decent’ mark as a recruiter because so many come and go each year. Admittedly not many that were actual impact players, but then again you have to ask why do we have so few impact players as recruits each year. And many of those that were thought to be impact players have left because they don’t fit the program or were considered to be disruptive.
I guess my point is, while I may get down on Larry because I want/wish him to be better or at least I suspect that he isn’t as good as he could be, I won’t get down on this team. I look at it this way, Larry is a good enough coach to get us to the dance 2-3 times a decade when he gets the right mix of players. I’m very hopeful that is what we are looking at coming together. And further, I guess I hope that he is continuing to learn and improve such that at some point we can get there regularly and not have to make a coaching change.