Syracuse hiring Alex Kline as GM

[007]

I love the addition of Alex Kline.

He has a great track record, and will be successful no matter where he goes.

But I think the problem is that the expectations about his role and what he's trying to do might not align with what needs to transpire this specific offseason, given where we are in terms of roster construction.

My two concerns is that Alex might be phenomenal using advanced analytics and his own "eye test" to identify quality transfer prospects, but that doesn't mean that we'll be able to LAND them. Recruiting is a two-way street, and guys who we'd love to bring in might have other suitors, might have other teams willing to pay them more, or might not have interest in our program -- all of which we saw happen many times last year with the portal.

And given the wholesale roster turnover we're going to have this offseason, adding supplemental guys might not cut it -- we need to land at least 2 [and probably more] top flight caliber starters to come in and be big time contributors next year. Not just depth pieces [and we'll need some of those, as well].

Given the lousy year we're having, it is going to be tough uphill sledding to land those guys, because portal transfer of that caliber will have lots of other options. And what Alex does "best" -- which appears to be identify diamonds in the rough who are undervalued and would be good system fits -- while a great skill and an asset to the program overall, might not be what the program NEEDS this off-season, at this specific point in time.

Your point about the difference between being able to identify top talent and landing top talent is crucial.

Identifying the talent is the first step. Kline has been working on identifying players who could enter the portal. Unlike last year, you have to have a proactive sense of who might be in the pool to formulate a plan. And you have to hit the ground running. Those contacts have been going on for a while.

The more difficult task is assigning grades to every player who could potentially be in the pool. Kline has made his reputation doing exactly that. They then have to assign a value (NIL cost) to those grades. For example (just making up numbers here to illustrate a point), we want a 5 with a certain skill set and a minimum grade of X, and we are estimating the starting cost for that player to be around 1.5 million (or whatever). What are we willing to spend to land that guy? What is the impact of signing that guy relative to the grades we will have to settle for at other positions? Who is the next highest graded 5 on the list if we need to move on?

As players fall off the list for whatever reasons (the "landing" issue), you have to be able to make informed decisions on who to target next AND what grade that player has to have to make the NIL cost make sense. Hopefully, Kline will make a difference in this entire process.

 

[RF2044]

Alex is extremely good at making good relationships with high profile and quality recruits, going back to his high school days and his work with the Nicks has enhanced that. Having sufficient funds to support Basketball will only enhance that!

And Straughn was supposed to be good at making relationships with high profile TTO players, and steer a bunch of recruits / transfers from that program to Syracuse.

He started out great with Freeman, but the transfers -- not so much.

Just pointing out that the relationships factor -- while important -- doesn't guarantee anything. Especially not in this era of NIA / the Portal.

 

[Ozone!]

And Straughn was supposed to be good at making relationships with high profile TTO players, and steer a bunch of recruits / transfers from that program to Syracuse.

He started out great with Freeman, but the transfers -- not so much.

Just pointing out that the relationships factor -- while important -- doesn't guarantee anything. Especially not in this era of NIA / the Portal.

Yes, NIL and other support money needs to be in place for any ACC level coach to get the type of players needed to be in the top tier programs!

 

[FrancoPizza]

It’s amazing how quickly your schitzo rant changes subject when people continuously tell you you’re clueless. It took you ONE WHOLE post to move your goalpost. ONE.

This is a hoops board. Take the talk about goalposts to the other side.

 

[RF2044]

Yes, NIL and other support money needs to be in place for any ACC level coach to get the type of players needed to be in the top tier programs!

I think people don't understand that before NIL can have the necessary impact, a quality nucleus of guys who can play needs to be in place, that can then be supplemented via the portal using NIL.

We lack that foundation heading into next year. Just having NIL is insufficient.

 

[HyattsCuse]

I think people don't understand that before NIL can have the necessary impact, a quality nucleus of guys who can play needs to be in place, that can then be supplemented via the portal using NIL.

We lack that foundation heading into next year. Just having NIL is insufficient.

How many guys are you thinking make up a nucleus? Turnover is rampant all over college basketball, even the Top 25 schools. I think you’re lucky if you get your best 2-3 guys to return and not go pro or transfer.

 

[RF2044]

How many guys are you thinking make up a nucleus? Turnover is rampant all over college basketball, even the Top 25 schools. I think you’re lucky if you get your best 2-3 guys to return and not go pro or transfer.

According to this article, posted earlier in this very same thread returning players should ideally account for 50% of your team's playing time. Additionally, "...there is a clear positive trend between teams that rely more heavily on returning players and better team success."

Here are the two fundamental tenets provided in the article:

Here is the article:

How To Build A Roster In The Modern Portal Era

A study on the roster construction strategies that lead to success for high majors

blog.evanmiya.com

Now, people can debate this -- but the data-driven point is that the foundation / returning nucleus is IMPORTANT, and that NIL is best used to supplement that core [whether by adding a star to catapult things to the next level, or adding depth pieces] and add balance.

Having to go out and recruit 4 to 5 starters might be the situation that we're in, but it isn't an ideal approach, per the article.

The article also looks at teams on either end of that scale -- the teams that return the highest percentage of player contributions [not surprisingly] tended to do better, and the teams at the low end of returning player contributions were generally worse, performed more poorly, and didn't qualify for the tournament.

There will always be exceptions, but if we take some of these data-driven insights as being accurate, our approach is out of whack. Especially if we lose 7-11 players from this year's squad.

 

[HyattsCuse]

According to this article, posted earlier in this very same thread returning players should ideally account for 50% of your team's playing time.

Here are the two fundamental tenets provided in the article:
View attachment 250151

Here is the article:

How To Build A Roster In The Modern Portal Era

A study on the roster construction strategies that lead to success for high majors

blog.evanmiya.com

Now, people can debate this -- but the point is that the foundation / returning nucleus is IMPORTANT, and that NIL is best used to supplement that core [whether by adding a star to catapult things to the next level, or adding depth pieces] and add balance.

Having to go out and recruit 4 to 5 starters might be the situation that we're in, but it isn't an ideal approach, per the article.

Thanks, I’ll check it out.

I was curious and am currently skimming the rosters of Top 25 ranked schools sorting by minutes played. From what I’m seeing, my guess of 2-3 returning guys is pretty accurate. The rest of the roster is transfers or freshman. I can’t imagine many, if any, schools are hitting this 50% returning playing time metric.

 

[RF2044]

Thanks, I’ll check it out.

I was curious and am currently skimming the rosters of Top 25 ranked schools sorting by minutes played. From what I’m seeing, my guess of 2-3 returning guys is pretty accurate. The rest of the roster is transfers or freshman. I can’t imagine many, if any, schools are hitting this 50% returning playing time metric.

Here's another thing to keep in mind, from that same article:

We experienced that bottom negative trend first hand this season.

 

[bnoro]

Here's another thing to keep in mind, from that same article:

View attachment 250152

We experienced that bottom negative trend first hand this season.

Not a lot of strong correlation to anything looking at these graphs...

 

[wiCuse]

Those are all fair questions to ask / concerns to have. But there are also factors that make me a lot more comfortable about this addition.

First, Womack plays on one of the top programs in Wisconsin, and has faced a high level of competition and excelled.

Second, he is a good shooter and a good athlete with smooth skills. He's just a bit physically undeveloped right now [not saying this is a perfect comparison, but think: BJ Johnson] who's best basketball is probably ahead of him, once his physique catches up to his level of athleticism / skill.

Third, I know for a fact that once we identified and pursued this kid, the staff was very, very worried that a couple of midwest programs were going to swoop in at the last minute and pluck him away. They were relieved when that didn't happen.

So, again -- everything you express is fair to question. I think he's perhaps a better prospect than you give him credit for, though.

This is fact, not opinion. Neither Marquette or Wisconsin had any interest in Womack. He does play for a good AAU program, no longer the best in WI. Womack is a hard worker. I'll be surprised if he's ever a core rotational player at SU. I hope to be wrong. BJ Johnson was 3x the player Womack is in my opinion. If Womack is a Kline addition, this doesn't excite me as someone who gets to see him a lot... Again, I'd love to be wrong.

 

[RF2044]

Fa

Not a lot of strong correlation to anything looking at these graphs...

Law.

Regression lines don't lie.

 

[orangefog]

Here's another thing to keep in mind, from that same article:

View attachment 250152

We experienced that bottom negative trend first hand this season.

I see two butterflies

 

[atlanticuse]

I see two butterflies

We’d need the raw data - it is dispersed as is real life vs sample college class data

So if R2 is .4 it’s still meaningful

 

[orangefog]

We’d need the raw data - it is dispersed as is real life vs sample college class data

So if R2 is .4 it’s still meaningful

Doesn’t matter, I always see butterflies.

 

[longtimefan]

According to this article, posted earlier in this very same thread returning players should ideally account for 50% of your team's playing time. Additionally, "...there is a clear positive trend between teams that rely more heavily on returning players and better team success."

Here are the two fundamental tenets provided in the article:
View attachment 250151

Here is the article:

How To Build A Roster In The Modern Portal Era

A study on the roster construction strategies that lead to success for high majors

blog.evanmiya.com

Now, people can debate this -- but the data-driven point is that the foundation / returning nucleus is IMPORTANT, and that NIL is best used to supplement that core [whether by adding a star to catapult things to the next level, or adding depth pieces] and add balance.

Having to go out and recruit 4 to 5 starters might be the situation that we're in, but it isn't an ideal approach, per the article.

The article also looks at teams on either end of that scale -- the teams that return the highest percentage of player contributions [not surprisingly] tended to do better, and the teams at the low end of returning player contributions were generally worse, performed more poorly, and didn't qualify for the tournament.

There will always be exceptions, but if we take some of these data-driven insights as being accurate, our approach is out of whack. Especially if we lose 7-11 players from this year's squad.

Exceptions:

The ACC this season has some prime examples. ND returned more scoring (83%?) than any team in the country. LVille returned not a single player from the previous year's squad.

 

[pearl31]

Exceptions:

The ACC this season has some prime examples. ND returned more scoring (83%?) than any team in the country. LVille returned not a single player from the previous year's squad.

ND is so weird to me, I mean yeah Burton was out for a bit but even with him they've been so bad, I thought for sure they'd be in upper 1/3 of ACC after seeing them last year and with that much coming back

 

[atlanticuse]

Doesn’t matter, I always see butterflies.

don't worry, you'll be replaced by AI soon enough.

 

[atlanticuse]

Exceptions:

The ACC this season has some prime examples. ND returned more scoring (83%?) than any team in the country. LVille returned not a single player from the previous year's squad.

Another exception is Kentucky, no?
Did anyone other than Walker Horn (!?) remain on the team.

 

[orangefog]

don't worry, you'll be replaced by AI soon enough.

Good luck with artificial intelligence replicating my thought process.

 

[orange79]

Good luck with artificial intelligence replicating my thought process.

Maybe one of the beta versions that was discarded.