JB calling into Axe about recruiting now

[Funk Doc]

I think much of what you have written has merit.

Perhaps JB and Hop shouldn't have been coaching team USA. But one can't argue that the sanctions prevented us from scouting/recruiting when the coaches had time to coach another team. That doesn't hold up.

As for coach K at Duke... I think the succession plan there will be much better and private. One day he'll just decide to announce his retirement, meanwhile the University probably already knows who his replacement is, but are smart enough to keep it secret. Duke is also a blue blood program, and I suspect it will go on long after Cosch K retires.

I respect your opinion, but I'm holding firm that JB's age is the single biggest factor. It's also a factor which cannot improve or be changed. Go Orange!

Duke is so much more superior in terms of recruiting compared to everyone, except UK of course, but there is most certainly going to be a dip in their recruiting when K leaves. The problem is that they are so much better than everyone to start with that the dip will not really hurt them as much as it's most definitely hurting us!

You don't move on from a coach like K without skipping a beat.

 

[Funk Doc]

Can you back that up statistically? What is your definition of "good?" Is it an eye test thing only? Again, we scored more points per game than Xavier... do the results actually matter to you? Andrew White made a ridiculous amount of tough shots is your criticism? Andrew White is a good player who made shots, how is that a criticism? Our offense is dependant on how many 3's we made? So is about every offense in America... the Cavs and the Warriors offense's are reliant on how many 3's they make as well. You are taking your personal preference on offense and trying to turn it into a criticism of JB, but our offense was FINE last year. For someone who claims to be objective in your observations, this one certainly is not.

This all comes down to PG play. That it why our offense is so bad. You are both right. Our numbers look comparable to other teams around the country. White and Lydon bailed out us by being such great shooters. But if we had someone out there who could lead and create, we wouldn't have to play so much ISO and jump shooting! Not having a legit PG is killing us! We all have to jump on the Frank can improve bandwagon as it sounds like JAB is the only one on board so far, and we all know he doesn't deviate too much from his plans!

 

[Alsacs]

Can you back that up statistically? What is your definition of "good?" Is it an eye test thing only? Again, we scored more points per game than Xavier... do the results actually matter to you? Andrew White made a ridiculous amount of tough shots is your criticism? Andrew White is a good player who made shots, how is that a criticism? Our offense is dependant on how many 3's we made? So is about every offense in America... the Cavs and the Warriors offense's are reliant on how many 3's they make as well. You are taking your personal preference on offense and trying to turn it into a criticism of JB, but our offense was FINE last year. For someone who claims to be objective in your observations, this one certainly is not.

Our offense has been fine okay.

PPG rankings
NCAA Basketball Stats - NCAA BB Team Points per Game on TeamRankings.com

Last year we were 83rd in the nation.
2015-16 we were 236th in the nation.
2014-2015 we were 155th in the nation.
2013-2014 we were 244th in the nation.


Your right though the offense has been great. I mean look at the freaking numbers. Just because we had a team last year that was our best in 5 years doesn't mean it was good. Also last year was our worst defensive team in 5 years. That 83rd ranked offense is just great for Syracuse.

 

[JazzNC]

Duke is so much more superior in terms of recruiting compared to everyone, except UK of course, but there is most certainly going to be a dip in their recruiting when K leaves. The problem is that they are so much better than everyone to start with that the dip will not really hurt them as much as it's most definitely hurting us!

You don't move on from a coach like K without skipping a beat.

I don't think Duke will come away completely unscathed by Coach K when he retires. But it will be an easier transition than ours, in my opinion for the reasons you stated.

 

[JDubbin]

Our offense has been fine okay.

PPG rankings
NCAA Basketball Stats - NCAA BB Team Points per Game on TeamRankings.com

Last year we were 83rd in the nation.
2015-16 we were 236th in the nation.
2014-2015 we were 155th in the nation.
2013-2014 we were 244th in the nation.


Your right though the offense has been great. I mean look at the freaking numbers. Just because we had a team last year that was our best in 5 years doesn't mean it was good. Also last year was our worst defensive team in 5 years. That 83rd ranked offense is just great for Syracuse.

Dude, did you see my disagreeing with you about our defense? No. You're the one who criticized our offense as being a clogged toilet and I showed you statistically that it wasn't true. I said our offense was fine, right there with teams like Xavier and Arizona who receive a lot of praise on this board. Again, what do you consider "good?" You keep throwing it out there. Is good top 50? top 25? If so, then Syracuse offense was not "good," but neither were those other teams. There are things to be critical of for Syracuse basketball, but the offense from last season was not one of them. Do you agree?

 

[Alsacs]

Dude, did you see my disagreeing with you about our defense? No. You're the one who criticized our offense as being a clogged toilet and I showed you statistically that it wasn't true. I said our offense was fine, right there with teams like Xavier and Arizona who receive a lot of praise on this board. Again, what do you consider "good?" You keep throwing it out there. Is good top 50? top 25? If so, then Syracuse offense was not "good," but neither were those other teams. There are things to be critical of for Syracuse basketball, but the offense from last season was not one of them. Do you agree?

We have been in the top 100 in PPG one time in the last 6 years. It's been a garbage offense. If you can't be top 100 it's a clogged toilet.
Last year we were 82nd I don't consider that good. It's acceptable but we aren't 82nd every year.

I wasn't talking a one year off when I said the offense is a clogged toilet. I am talking about the last 5 years.

 

[SoBeCuse]

Can you back that up statistically? What is your definition of "good?" Is it an eye test thing only? Again, we scored more points per game than Xavier... do the results actually matter to you? Andrew White made a ridiculous amount of tough shots is your criticism? Andrew White is a good player who made shots, how is that a criticism? Our offense is dependant on how many 3's we made? So is about every offense in America... the Cavs and the Warriors offense's are reliant on how many 3's they make as well. You are taking your personal preference on offense and trying to turn it into a criticism of JB, but our offense was FINE last year. For someone who claims to be objective in your observations, this one certainly is not.

I think we can all agree that the defense was the main problem. But, to say the offense was "fine" would equally be putting blinders on in terms of only looking at statistics (PPG mostly).

Take a look at some posts by 007 in this thread. He's a better X's and O's guy than I am. Syracuse had some capable long distance shooters but it's fair to say they settled and took lots of bad shots. Some they made like White's. They didn't move the defense much and would just pass around the perimeter and launch off of one pass or hot potato game. Nobody needs stats for that and countless times even late in the season Bilas/Lappas/Fraschilla would over and over mention how the team was standing around too much. If the offense was fine then they could've mustered up more than 50 pts against Miami in the ACCT to get themselves a possible tourney bid. Xavier still was ranked 29 in KenPom in AdjO. Xavier had the capability to (even without their starting PG) score enough (75) to defeat a very good defensive team in Arizona in the Tourney. I'm not confident SU could get to 60 points on Arizona with our "fine" offense. We'll never know. Also, we must realize that SU was getting blown out in so many games that defenses became more soft late 2H's and our offensive numbers picked up due to teams taking the foot off the gas, IMO. Not to mention that there were heroics with Gillon and Battle in games which easily could've been three more losses. I was not going to trust that team if the games went into OT. Again, we'll never know.

No question the defense was the big problem but I can't fathom any fan who with eyes/ears/stats/whatever believes the offense was fine, especially from a conceptual standpoint.

 

[JazzNC]

I find it amusing that it's the same old thing...

People are either posting that recruiting is going downhill, and all the reasons why, OR they are defending the downhill trend. Admittedly, I have contributed.

Both are really futile. If you want to argue that we can't guarantee that a new coach could do better, than do some research. What good basketball schools have lost a coach to retirement or transfer, and how did the new coaches fare after 5 years?

Instead of complaining or defending, let's put our efforts into solutions. Or at the very least, make educated arguments.

I tried to do start something constructive with the 2012-2017 Recruiting Statistics thread, and asked for others to join in. Disappointing to see the lack of interest, but continued conflict and random rants.

 

[Cusefan0307]

Our offense has been fine okay.

PPG rankings
NCAA Basketball Stats - NCAA BB Team Points per Game on TeamRankings.com

Last year we were 83rd in the nation.
2015-16 we were 236th in the nation.
2014-2015 we were 155th in the nation.
2013-2014 we were 244th in the nation.


Your right though the offense has been great. I mean look at the freaking numbers. Just because we had a team last year that was our best in 5 years doesn't mean it was good. Also last year was our worst defensive team in 5 years. That 83rd ranked offense is just great for Syracuse.

Our ppg isn't going to go up unless we run, which we don't do anymore. Much better to look at points per possession.

 

[Jake]

There is no doubt that recruiting has dipped in the past couple years. I don't see it drastically improving in the near future, but I think we can still be successful.

Recently JBs player comments have tended to follow (not always) a cycle where they are great players when the come to him, underachievers while playing for him and misguided when contemplating an early departure for the NBA. That's started to shift a bit with Lydon.

However the damage and perception still exist. We tend to focus on how those comments affect the player-rightfully so- but the greater impact of those words falls on the AAU coaches. It's logical to assume some of those coaches don't like to see their players publicly undressed.

 

[iommi]

Our ppg isn't going to go up unless we run, which we don't do anymore. Much better to look at points per possession.

We haven't run much at all since Dion and MCW were here. And yeah, our offense is woefully ineffecient.

 

[GooseMutt]

Battle is a special talent. To take it to the next level, he is going to have to be way more assertive this year. I don't know if that is him, but he will have to more selfish, so to speak. I think teams are going to try to play him physically and "beat" him up a little. A lot of that stuff happens off the ball. If Battle can weather that storm physically (stay healthy) and still produce, that will help open the floor.

Look at Thorpe's offensive efficiency numbers last year on a terrible team, keeping in mind he was rotated to PG from SG after an injury to the "true" PG. Let's hope he can play like that here.

Moyer will bring it. He needs to be great on the boards.

And Opponents must have been playing Thorpe closely and aggressively being the only real threat to score and he still performed. Imagine if he wasn't pressured as much if his teammates were better

 

[GooseMutt]

To be fair, Thompson is going to score in the front court. We also know that with pretty good certainty.
Frank should be competent to run the offense and certainly has experience, but he's also a head case and could mess up team chemistry if the 5th year guy takes his starting job again.

All the other guys are "lottery tickets"; there's a chance that some of them could be good; they look like a bunch of solid 4 star recruits, for the most part, but at the bottom end of that range (like guys ranked 50-75 rather than 25-50). Brissett and Sidibe are probably going to be the most likely to succeed from our group of other front court players, IMO.

I just hope Boeheim and Thompson get along and we have no bench drama this year

 

[Alsacs]

Our ppg isn't going to go up unless we run, which we don't do anymore. Much better to look at points per possession.

Our points per possession outside of the Ennis 2014 have been outside the top 100 as well the last 5 years.

 

[SoBeCuse]

Our points per possession outside of the Ennis 2014 have been outside the top 100 as well the last 5 years.

Probably possessions down as well since sometimes initial D was ok but they couldn't rebound. Shot clock resets, no steals, more time away from offense, etc.

 

[Alsacs]

Probably possessions down as well since sometimes initial D was ok but they couldn't rebound.

JB's gameplan has to been win on defensive low possession games these last few years.

Our depth hasn't been there and he wants low possession games to keep games close and then try to steal them at the end.
It's such a frustrating product. I only watch because it's my team. JB's style is why the NBA game is such a better watch.


Our offense is so easy to defend and gameplan to slow down.

 

[Cusefan0307]

Our points per possession outside of the Ennis 2014 have been outside the top 100 as well the last 5 years.

It was 30th according to KenPom this year. I would gather if you look at most ACC teams points per possession they all are going to be down compared to most teams because of the competition. I get the complaints about the offense, but that's mostly because we always play one guy who can't score and haven't had a real PG in 4 years.

 

[007]

Our points per possession outside of the Ennis 2014 have been outside the top 100 as well the last 5 years.

Probably a better metric to look at Al is KenPom's adjusted offensive efficiency index. This looks at points scored per possession adjusted for opponent (this is important because the ACC has some of the best Ds in Div 1).

Over the past 5 seasons, starting with 2017, SU has ranked: 30, 50, 118, 29, and 25 using this metric. The 118 is the anomaly in that span (interestingly, that was Christmas sr season).

To my eye, SU's offensive efficiency has been driven by the play of PG for the past several years. We were ranked 29 with Ennis as PG, and 25th with MCW. Last year's efficiency was despite poor PG play, which points to how prolific White and other the shooters performed.

2017 Pomeroy College Basketball Ratings

 

[JDubbin]

Probably a better metric to look at Al is KenPom's adjusted offensive efficiency index. This looks at points scored per possession adjusted for opponent (this is important because the ACC has some of the best Ds in Div 1).

Over the past 5 seasons, starting with 2017, SU has ranked: 30, 50, 118, 29, and 25 using this metric. The 118 is the anomaly in that span (interestingly, that was Christmas sr season).

To my eye, SU's offensive efficiency has been driven by the play of PG for the past several years. We were ranked 29 with Ennis as PG, and 25th with MCW. Last year's efficiency was despite poor PG play, which points to how prolific White and other the shooters performed.

2017 Pomeroy College Basketball Ratings

Again, all the claims that our offense is a toilet bowl, or as iommi just said "woefully inefficient" is just not statistically true! I get frustrated when people post stuff like that over and over again... it's crazy to me that I need to defend the team we're all actually fans of in areas that we are decent in. I honestly don't get it.

 

[jordoo]

I'm probably just echoing what has been said but here goes. IMO JB defended recruiting because he knows we are struggling with it and the fans are getting testy. He then talked up the guys we have coming back and coming in to build excitement and as a form of miss direction. It worked as this thread has just as much talk about this year's team as it does the recruiting issues if not more.

Personally I'm holding my breath to see how the 18 and 19 recruiting classes wind up.

 

[Dcuse]

Our points per possession outside of the Ennis 2014 have been outside the top 100 as well the last 5 years.

So after others did the research...you totally made this statement up. Your schtick is growing so tired.

 

[007]

Again, all the claims that our offense is a toilet bowl, or as iommi just said "woefully inefficient" is just not statistically true! I get frustrated when people post stuff like that over and over again... it's crazy to me that I need to defend the team we're all actually fans of in areas that we are decent in. I honestly don't get it.

FWIW, I see both points on both sides of this debate. The offense per possession is not as inefficient as it appears, as per the KenPom metric.

However, it is overly dependent on PG play and individual player talent making plays when the offensive sets break down, IMO. This seems to happen too often. There is not a lot of action and off ball player movement that leads to easy baskets or frequent open looks (not that this is easy to do for any team).

Something more subtle is the lack of execution of basic fundamentals on those plays that are well conceived. Pull up any tape and watch, for example, how we run the double high screen set. Don't watch the ball, watch the players "setting" the screens. They seldom wait for contact, roll to early, not at all, or the wrong way (based on the how the D reacts); and/or the PG does not always set the screen up well or come off the second screen hard enough to force the D to adjust.

 

[iommi]

Again, all the claims that our offense is a toilet bowl, or as iommi just said "woefully inefficient" is just not statistically true! I get frustrated when people post stuff like that over and over again... it's crazy to me that I need to defend the team we're all actually fans of in areas that we are decent in. I honestly don't get it.

Oops. I guess I made a mistake of being ranked #30 is a good thing.(No sarcasm intended) Let me put it another way (with sarcasm intended): our offensive was woefully boring to watch.

I genuinely believe our numbers would've looked a lot worse without AW3 jacking up contested shots with the shot clock expiring (as someone else mentioned). I mean this totally complimentary towards White. Our offense is tough to watch and easy to defend.

If the team was fun to watch and tough to defend by opposing teams, you wouldn't have to defend the product we've been putting out there. Our problem last year was our defense, but our offense wasn't good either. We are so easy to defend. Teams don't have to game plan for us. They know exactly what we are going to do (on both ends). Any chance we change our out of bounds plays????? Nah, what am I thinking? Crazy talk.

 

[Funk Doc]

JB lets his best players do what they do best! This year it was White and Lydon shooting the ball. Unfortunately we didn't have anyone that really broke the defense down, so they had to take quite a few shots that weren't so good. (Or in Lydon's case he pump faked no one!) Luckily for us, we have had some really good individual players(I mean players who have one or two very good offensive skills, but are not complete offense players) that have bailed us out. So yes our numbers are pretty good, but if you actually pay attention and watch our offensive sets and to what we are running, our offense has not been very good. Once again this comes back around to poor PG play. We need a solid PG for our offense to work! Most important safety valve on the floor!

 

[SWC75]

There were a ton of guys who said no to us. It's not like there is a list that is made public of exactly what our preferences are position by position. You could make educated guesses based on how much time we put in, when the offers were extended and other factors. On top of that, you can't really say if guys like Sidibe were recruited at certain positions. All players are different with varying skill sets. Sidibe will likely play a lot center this season but in high school he played the 5/4. He played the bottom wing of the zone and the middle of the zone.

Sidibe is regarded as a 5/4, so would you like me to list the 4's or the 5's that we probably would've taken ahead of him? Same with Brissett. He's a 3/4. I think the staff loves both of those guys so I'd prefer not to say we wouldn't taken certain players over them.

You are all about being classy to recruits (rightfully so) but you want me to list whom the staff targeted over Sidibe and Brissett? I'm not going to play that classless game but we lost out on plenty of forward and center targets. Every school does. Duke didn't get Kevin Knox when everyone thought they were sure to get him. Then they took Tucker, hurting us in the process. It happens. Needless to say, there were a good bunch of forward and center types who chose to go elsewhere. Were those guys higher in our pecking order? Some almost certainly were. That said, we have a nice class but we missed out on two top PG targets, several wing targets, and a few bigs as well. Again, I won't say we would've preferred this guy over Brissett and that guy over Sidibe.

And we are not off to a good start in 2018, since Swider just said, "yes" to Villanova.

If you want to find out who turned us down, the answers are on the recruiting board. But I'm not going to take any comments you make about our choices seriously when you don't follow it and then parachute in with an uninformed opinion.

If they love these guys than I guess they didn't 'settle' for them. Both committed in the fall before their seniors seasons so I thought that they were probably #1 or tied for #1 on the coaches priority lists, as opposed to Washington who clearly was #2 behind Greene. Even #2 choices can turn out to be good players. The coaches are not 'uniformed'.