Buddy's game | Page 4 | Syracusefan.com

Buddy's game

Buddy is the same defender at the top of the zone that he was last year, but last year he was paired with a 6'6" guy (Howard or Battle) who was well versed in the zone. This year its a 6'1" guy who is new to the zone.

Today G-town was screening the top of the zone in particular Buddy. Girard didn't play it correctly and allowed the straight line drive. He needed to force the pass to the wing.

Gtown did a very good job attacking the zone. Ewing and Orr know how to attack it.
 
The JG3/Buddy combo is going to be a major issue. They are so bad defensively, lack athleticism and size/strength and are mostly one dimensionsal offensively (Joe can at least handle and pass). If we have them up top together for 30+ a night for 2+ more years, I find it hard to believe we’ll ever be any kind of threat. They can shoot and put up points at times, but man, the defense is just so horrible. Without any semblance of an inside game or high level forwards in the pipeline, this could be messy until we have a new system.
 
Buddy is averaging over 15 ppg, 2.7 assists/game and shooting over 39% from the 3 point circle.

On an offensively challenged team, he is one of our only players who can score.

He isn’t very good defensively. This is true. I don’t think we have any above average players on defense this year. Elijah is average. Marek is average, might be a little above average if it wasn’t for his constant foul trouble.

If you think Buddy is our biggest problem, you have serious problems evaluating what you see. Who do you think should be playing over Buddy? Playing another player the defense doesn’t have to cover is not going to help matters.

Buddy is a very good shooter. He could probably be called a great catch and shoot shooter. He just does nothing else to help his team on both ends, and that outweighs his shooting most of the time.

The problem isn’t Buddy. The problems run deeper. It’s not on him that there’s nobody else and we have no speed/athleticism at G. Not his fault that he’s so unable to hang at the top of the zone and gets exposed more with another bad defender next to him. This is all on the system and his old man. Buddy could be a star at a lower level school or a quality microwave off the bench for P5 teams. His flaws are just too much to overcome with great shooting performances from time to time.
 
Agree with the poster who said this is JB’s construct.

Buddy would struggle being the 11th man on the 2011-12 team.

Eight year later, it has come down to him being one of the top two guys on offense out of necessity.

It’s been time for awhile and this isn’t Buddy’s fault. He’s doing the best he can and isn’t a bad player. He’s just not an top-tier, ACC-level guy and has very limited upside.
 
Agree with the poster who said this is JB’s construct.

Buddy would struggle being the 11th man on the 2011-12 team.

Eight year later, it has come down to him being one of the top two guys on offense out of necessity.

It’s been time for awhile and this isn’t Buddy’s fault. He’s doing the best he can and isn’t a bad player. He’s just not an top-tier, ACC-level guy and has very limited upside.

Yeah, I think a lot of the criticism flows through Buddy, because, well, he's the shooting guard. I think you can survive with specialist at maybe a couple of positions......ideally that's not your SG, or SF. If they are, they better be good on defense...and that used to be a necessity, pre-Buddy. So, not his fault, at all, not sure anyone blames him for being him, and slow, just sort of the state of things when we end up with a player with that skillset getting huge minutes at SG. Everyone else sort of had a fall back defense which amounted to, "well, they play great defense when the shots aren't falling."

The whole roster is an issue though, that's a fact. However, when people keep saying, "if he had the right four guys around him, just imagine how great he'd be...." that's an issue. Especially if we have 3 other guys in the starting lineup you could say that about. Soooooooooooooooooooooooo.....
 
The JG3/Buddy combo is going to be a major issue. They are so bad defensively, lack athleticism and size/strength and are mostly one dimensionsal offensively (Joe can at least handle and pass). If we have them up top together for 30+ a night for 2+ more years, I find it hard to believe we’ll ever be any kind of threat. They can shoot and put up points at times, but man, the defense is just so horrible. Without any semblance of an inside game or high level forwards in the pipeline, this could be messy until we have a new system.


I think you can play one of them if the other guard is an athletic, "plus" defender. Howard or Carey with Buddy last year didn't leave Buddy looking quite so exposed. Back when we had really good shooters who weren't that great defensively, it worked best when an athletic PG (Scoop, Triche, Flynn, Hart, Autry) was paired with the dead-eye shooter (Andy, Janulis, Cipolla, Roe). That way, you can cheat toward the more athletic defender to try to keep him out of the lane better.
 
Wow - we all know Buddy's weaknesses - but he just had one of the greatest 2nd half offensive performances in SU history and so much of this thread is harping on the weaknesses instead of his strengths. I'm sure if we had won lots of people would be praising how he led us back in the 2nd half...
 
Wow - we all know Buddy's weaknesses - but he just had one of the greatest 2nd half offensive performances in SU history and so much of this thread is harping on the weaknesses instead of his strengths. I'm sure if we had won lots of people would be praising how he led us back in the 2nd half...
Except we didn’t... because the top of the zone doesn’t stop anyone. although better athletes and size would help I’m convinced the zone as we play it would be better off as a spark plug change-of-pace option instead of an every down defense in 2019 and beyond. Times change but the zone hasn’t since 2009. We must be 5-63 or something in games where we go trunk monkey or do that halfcourt trap that works the first play it’s used and then everyone knows it’s coming and adjusts?
 
represents a lot of what I hate about basketball - he threw in a ton of points in the second half when the game was never in doubt. He was a major negative on both ends in the first half and on D the entire game. What irks me the most is he literally does nothing else on the court, but shoot. He doesn't rebound or seem to scrap. Not a good passer or handler. I thought he had a chance to be fringe honorable mention ACC, but now I just see him as a chucker who gets too many minutes.

so he does nothing well but shoot...so at least he does that...what about half the rest of the team that does nothing well.
 
Gtown did a very good job attacking the zone. Ewing and Orr know how to attack it.

How in the hell did we let Orr be an assistant on Gtown? He should be coaching our big guys. Instead we have a bench of all PG coaching forwards and centers.
 
Buddy is averaging over 15 ppg, 2.7 assists/game and shooting over 39% from the 3 point circle.

On an offensively challenged team, he is one of our only players who can score.

He isn’t very good defensively. This is true. I don’t think we have any above average players on defense this year. Elijah is average. Marek is average, might be a little above average if it wasn’t for his constant foul trouble.

If you think Buddy is our biggest problem, you have serious problems evaluating what you see. Who do you think should be playing over Buddy? Playing another player the defense doesn’t have to cover is not going to help matters.

True, but instructional time on the bench is a valuable thing. I'm all for giving Goodine some spot minutes and letting Buddy watch/learn/rest after he's taken yet another fallaway 18-footer or quick three when his feet aren't set.

Though I'm a little critical, I do think he's got more to offer and refining some of these weak spots during the game (rather than in film study) could help that get realized.
 
Buddy is an extremely high volume 3-point shooter who will likely come in around 40% from deep for a team with limited offensive options. That seems like a valuable piece to me.
 
How in the hell did we let Orr be an assistant on Gtown? He should be coaching our big guys. Instead we have a bench of all PG coaching forwards and centers.
Agreed! I wish Hak would come back and coach our bigs and forwards
 
How in the hell did we let Orr be an assistant on Gtown? He should be coaching our big guys. Instead we have a bench of all PG coaching forwards and centers.

Back in the day, the knock on him was that he couldn’t recruit. When we went from Fine/Orr to Hopkins/Weaver we went from a James Thues/Greg Davis class to suddenly bringing in Edelin, Warrick, Pace, GMac, Carmelo.
 
True, but instructional time on the bench is a valuable thing. I'm all for giving Goodine some spot minutes and letting Buddy watch/learn/rest after he's taken yet another fallaway 18-footer or quick three when his feet aren't set.

Though I'm a little critical, I do think he's got more to offer and refining some of these weak spots during the game (rather than in film study) could help that get realized.
I am not saying Buddy should play 40 minutes. I wish JB would substitute more. I think we had our starters in with no subbing at all until inside the 5 minute mark in the second half. That isn’t good with a young team. When JB does sub, it seems he usually brings in 2 or 3 subs at the same time, they play poorly and he is reluctant to sub again.

I wish we would only use one sub at a time. More than one brings a dramatic dropoff in production.

Guerrier is supposed to be our most reliable sub; someone we bank on to get rebounds, baskets inside and defense. He came in when Marek got his 3rd foul around the 5 minute mark in the first half and the disasterous next five minutes completely changed the game. He was -14 in 5 minutes of play! In a game SU only lost by 10. That is spectacular, but not in a good way. He made so many mental mistakes in such a short period of time, it was stunning. I like Quincy and think he is eventually going to be a good player but wow, that was not the way you want to play on your first big rivalry game.
 
I’ve never seen a guy score 25 points and get slammed like him. If that was Battle half of the board would be saying he was great, but had no help. We are still playing 3 on 5 as we have most of the past 3 years. Nobody respects our 4/5’s.
 
Let's be honest right now all buddy can do is shoot.

Michigan Coach Fielding Yost: "All Red Grange can do is run."

Illinois Coach Bob Zuppke: "All Galli-Curci can do is sing."


Buddy is a 'shooting guard' whose job it is to provide an outside threat to draw the defense out. He scored 25 points IN A HALF. As Bees points out, he kept us withing range of a comeback in a game we would otherwise have lost by 20-25 points. He did his job.
 
I’ve never seen a guy score 25 points and get slammed like him. If that was Battle half of the board would be saying he was great, but had no help. We are still playing 3 on 5 as we have most of the past 3 years. Nobody respects our 4/5’s.

Take his last name out of it. He put up a bunch of points when the game was basically a few baskets too long. His first half was bad, he was just really slow to the ball and his footwork showed. The Georgetown guards were waiting for him at his spots. Just is what it is when he's a guy that is put in that position to be a leading scorer.

But again the team has guys that are role players being asked to play too many minutes.
 
There are people that loved Paul Harris, and we’re throwing shade at a kid that shot 50%, and over 50% from three?
 
There are people that loved Paul Harris, and we’re throwing shade at a kid that shot 50%, and over 50% from three?

I...don’t understand the comparison? Buddy is a great 3 point shooter.

Harris was a poor 3 point shooter, but decent-very good at everything else.

Complete opposites as players. Paul Harris was 2nd team All Big East as a sophomore.
 
Take his last name out of it. He put up a bunch of points when the game was basically a few baskets too long. His first half was bad, he was just really slow to the ball and his footwork showed. The Georgetown guards were waiting for him at his spots. Just is what it is when he's a guy that is put in that position to be a leading scorer.

But again the team has guys that are role players being asked to play too many minutes.

I don’t disagree with any of this. I do think he gets more criticism because he’s JB’s son, but we shouldn’t expect him to have to score 20 for us to be successful.
 
Gerard is bad on D, Buddy is the worst starter I've ever seen at the top of the zone.

McNamara/Devendorf and Devendorf/Flynn may disagree with you.
 
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