A huge waste of time on this post. Again not sure why your attacking me when I mentioned in another post I agree he should of been getting 5-7 mins a game for experience and to see what he could contribute. I disagreed with ppl mentioning he should be getting starter minutes (not you so weird to choose my post for your tangent) but where I disagree is I think he had been playing weak all year up until the last few games. The notion that he couldn’t rebound wasn’t a notion. He was soft under the boards, got pushed around, wasn’t aggressive and would constantly get the ball poked out of his hands/ was weak with it. I call BS on your BS. You don’t agree with my opinion above I’d imagine which is fine. But I watched pretty much every second of every game outside of the GT game and this is really the first time I’ve come away being impressed with Edwards.
And I call BS to you doubling down on an opinion that is based upon erroneous information / assumptions! Ha!
All kidding aside, here's the deal -- everyone is entitled to their opinion. But you seem to be digging your heels in for forming that opinion, when others on a message board are pointing out the flaws in the logic. It mirrors a board undercurrent that sold Jesse short last year, that continued denigrating his capabilities over the summer, and has extended into this year using the fact that JB hasn't played him to indicate that he's not capable.
There's something else that needs to be pointed out [not to you specifically - but in general]. There's bench play that doesn't hurt the team, and bench play that HELPS the team. Examples of the former are Bayer having to play the final 6:30 of an NCAA game against a highly seeded Michigan State team, and not making mistakes, not trying to do too much, etc. and helping the team eek one out. Not hurting the team was those two times in 2014, when we'd ride or die with Rak the entire game, and he got in bad foul trouble necessitating us bringing in Obokoh to play extended minutes in both second halves -- who didn't do a ton, but also didn't hurt us as we won both of those games.
Not hurting us should be the benchmark for which backup center play is acceptable. Come in, do a reasonable job, use your fouls, don't try to do too much, avoid dumb mistakes.
But it is entirely different when a guy comes in and actually exceeds that minimum threshold. Especially for a team that -- as thousands have pointed out throughout this thread -- has struggled immensely to rebound and defend the interior. We've been hurting inside from game 1, when Sidibe got injured a mere four minutes into the season. What we're seeing isn't just a guy for whom the light bulb has suddenly gone on for -- he's been capable of this all along.
Sure, he's skinny / weak right now. No, he isn't a finished product. And yes, we have to expect some inconsistency -- because he's inexperienced.
But does he have mobility? Does he have length? Does he do a better job of challenging / altering shots than the majority of the fanbase gives him credit for? Does he offer more of a rebounding threat than Marek against legitimate bigs? Does he offer a "longer" defensive presence than Marek? Does he give us an additional 5 fouls to burn defending the paint? Does he finish with authority better than any other C on the roster?
Check, check, check, check, check, check, and check.
Don't buy into the excuse from the head coach that Jesse "isn't ready" or can't produce. We've seen what he can do when given the opportunity to play extended minutes, and through mistakes. UNC has torn us up inside the past 10+ times we've played them. This wasn't some miniscule team that Jesse got the job done against -- this was a beefy UNC with wave after wave of bigs. And we don't win without Boeheim playing Edwards and letting him use every minute available.
