Inside Syracuse’s rough off-season: How portal misses and a lack of NIL money led to a lost year

[OrangeXtreme]

 

[OrangeXtreme]

The TL: DR summary...

A day late and a dollar short.

 

[cusefan88]

I'm sure Mike Waters is repeating exactly what he was told by insiders. However, I struggle to believe Louisville had a $4.5m budget and gave Noah Waterman $1m. That math doesn't do it for me.

The larger issue is NIL desperately needs transparency.

 

[Cusefan0307]

I have a difficult time believing we would be that much better had we signed some of those players in that article.

 

[hoopsupstate]

What worries me moving forward is that it’s been said that SU has $1 million set aside for a center. That’s not going to get a difference maker this year. Everyone is going have that for a bonafide center. IF everyone comes back that we hope to come back, SU needs to bring in a center, forward and point guard. Those three will cost our entire current NIL budget. You’re also not going to keep Donnie for $150,000 or JJ for $300,000 either. I have little faith that our budget will be able to put a tournament team together for next year. Unless they’re finding a whole new flow of donations, we’re in big trouble. Kline can have a list of probable portal guys, but if you can’t pay them, what’s the point?

 

[kcsu]

This is SU laying the narrative for Red being retained

 

[hoopsupstate]

I have a difficult time believing we would be that much better had we signed some of those players in that article.

I agree. If those were the guys we were interested in, we wouldn’t be a whole lot better this year. Tennessee brought in the two of best three point shooters in the country the past two years. We aren’t even looking at these guys. How do you expect to compete if we don’t even sniff the better portal players? The bigs mentioned are non factors. You need to find skilled players who know how to play the game. I’d like to be a fly on the wall to see the list of players Kline is targeting. This program has sunk to an all time low this season. If SU doesn’t make a huge splash in the portal, we will be fighting for an ACC tournament bid again next year instead of a NCAA bid. Fans are watching and so are season ticket renewals. It’s time SU starts acting like a big time program because they currently are not in the ball park. We’ve been a total non factor in the ACC since we joined. It’s time they stop living in the past and get their act together. If not, they’ve lost everything they built the past forty years, not counting the crappy last ten years.

 

[kingtidge]

I have a difficult time believing we would be that much better had we signed some of those players in that article.

You are not alone. Players don't play hard or stout defense on hope.

PR blitz continues. How come we didn’t hear anyone crying poor in June, but only how great the team was?

The narrative as I recall was "We won at the portal and got budget-buys that would perform whilst other programs were paying over the nines."

Of course, the adage of "you get what you pay for" came home to roost, not surprisingly.

That script has not only flipped but we're sitting at #129 in Ken Pom with programs like UC Irvine and High Point much higher up the list.

Not only did we whiff in the portal, the players we did get are worse than the sum of their parts (i.e. they are poorly coached.)

We're batting .087.

 

[Sbucketball]

This is SU laying the narrative for Red being retained

After reading the article, I still think this is mostly on Red. We weren't prepared. He's captain of the ship.

 

[Sbucketball]

Funny thing about this article is that it sounds like the program knew it wasn't prepared in real time, and some of us fans knew that and called it out last year relating to the portal and generally with NIL, but the word was they were a well-oiled smart moneyball machine. What changed?

 

[pwong]

This is SU laying the narrative for Red being retained

Agree but even the narrative shows how out of touch the staff was on a key part of their job. This also isn’t the first offseason with NIL/transfer portal.

 

[5OutFred]

This article does far more telling-on the coaching staff than it does give valid reasons for poor performance this season. The plan was they weren't prepared?

This type of reasoning is exactly what this fan base doesn't want to hear right now.

 

[hoopsupstate]

This is SU laying the narrative for Red being retained

I agree, but you have to admit Red has been severely strapped with having the necessary tools to compete. He needed to be better prepared and SU needed to provide the resources to compete in the new world of college athletics. I have no doubt that Kadary Richmond would have come back to SU if we could have matched St. John’s $1.2 million offer. If we matched Duke’s offer to Maliq, he may have come back. Relationships mean nothing any more. It’s only the $$$. I’m worried that we think Kline is going to be our savior.

 

[Fly Rodder]

Well now that we got the budget stuff figured out, next stop is safely in the NCAA tournament and 25 wins! Going to be a bright sunshiney day!

 

[hoopsupstate]

Well now that we got the budget stuff figured out, next stop is safely in the NCAA tournament and 25 wins! Going to be a bright sunshiney day!

We are supposed to hit 40 degrees today

 

[Fly Rodder]

Relationships mean nothing any more. It’s only the $$$

I don’t believe this for a minute. The top programs are retaining their guys for multiple seasons and not just ratcheting up their payroll.

 

[kingtidge]

This article does far more telling-on the coaching staff than it does give valid reasons for poor performance this season. The plan was they weren't prepared?

This type of reasoning is exactly what this fan base doesn't want to hear right now.

We just need our "Kyle McCord" for basketball.

I like that new one from Griff.

 

[pwong]

I agree, but you have to admit Red has been severely strapped with having the necessary tools to compete. He needed to be better prepared and SU needed to provide the resources to compete in the new world of college athletics. I have no doubt that Kadary Richmond would have come back to SU if we could have matched St. John’s $1.2 million offer. If we matched Duke’s offer to Maliq, he may have come back. Relationships mean nothing any more. It’s only the $$$. I’m worried that we think Kline is going to be our savior.

I think St Johns was a done deal but they were telling Kooks to talk to other schools (us, Oklahoma, Illinois) so it didn’t look like blatant tampering on their side.

 

[hoopsupstate]

I don’t believe this for a minute. The top programs are retaining their guys for multiple seasons and not just ratcheting up their payroll.

They are competitive with NIL or they are gone. Remember, players leave or graduate and additional money comes back to the till. Most freshman are not getting the big bucks. We will find out this year with JJ and Freeman. SU pays up or they will be gone. If JJ leaves it will say a lot. No one has a better relationship with JJ than Red.

 

[hoopsupstate]

I think St Johns was a done deal but they were telling Kooks to talk to other schools (us, Oklahoma, Illinois) so it didn’t look like blatant tampering on their side.

I think you’re partially right. St. John’s would have paid whatever they needed to get Kadary. They would have just kept raising the price. Pitino had made him a priority and a big splash get.

 

[Grbac]

Trying to look at the positive side of things. I think having open spots for guys to come in and start and get major playing time will be a big selling point. IF we can be competitive in NIL.

You want a milly to go be 15mpg backup at Duke or you want a milly to start and play 30mpg at Syracuse.

We have to get the right guys though. We need toughness and defense in a bad way. We also need shooters and ball handlers. Kline and Red have their work cut out.

 

[CU44SE]

I don’t have access to this article and will not be paying to view it. But the first thing I thought when I read the headline was spin cycle. As mentioned previously in this article, article was put in motion, as well as Jim B the other day complaining and putting it on NIL. Laying the foundation to bring back Red, while trying to keep the fanbase happy and explain the issues.

 

[hoopsupstate]

I don’t have access to this article and will not be paying to view it. But the first thing I thought when I read the headline was spin cycle. As mentioned previously in this article, article was put in motion, as well as Jim B the other day complaining and putting it on NIL. Laying the foundation to bring back Red, while trying to keep the fanbase happy and explain the issues.

I think Mike Waters is trying to inform people what SU is dealing with and the constraints Red had last spring. He also writes how unprepared the coaching staff was in preparing for the portal. If he was just spinning for the university he didn’t need to show how unprepared everyone was. The article is damning in many ways. I don’t think it’s complimentary towards anyone.

 

[kcsu]

They are competitive with NIL or they are gone. Remember, players leave or graduate and additional money comes back to the till. Most freshman are not getting the big bucks. We will find out this year with JJ and Freeman. SU pays up or they will be gone. If JJ leaves it will say a lot. No one has a better relationship with JJ than Red.

I really want JJ back. He is an excellent player and by all accounts a good teammate. I think that he can be our leader next year. If we can add a true scoring 3 an athletic 5 and of course a 1. We can be good. Other than Donnie and JJ keep Petar and let everyone else decide if they want to stay or transfer but don't pay up for them.
3 solid older portal players.
PG SF C
JJ, DONNIE, PETAR
FROSH and any other player that wants to stay but only under our terms. That's the roster

 

[oldpinepoint]

We just need our "Kyle McCord" for basketball.

I like that new one from Griff.

Fran had a plan, hoops clearly didnt have anything close to it