Unverified Voracity Googled Krampelj
Sponsor note. Thinking about signing a contract? Starting a business? Making some tacos? Richard Hoeg can help you with most of that! Probably all of it, I mean, who can't make tacos. I make these fish tacos where I cook the heck out of some tilapia, like make it all brown and crispy, and then re-hydrate it a bit with some broth like they're potstickers. It sounds weird but it's good, because crispy tilapia bits are good. Why not eat a meal that's all crispy bits, that's what I say.
Right: Hoeg. If you've got a taco truck, Hoeg can help you with the various aspects of running a small business. I do not know if he can help you with taco recipes. But if you hire Hoeg to help you I'll chip in some taco takes, although to be honest if you need me to give you taco takes you may want to start a different sort of business.
Bush light. Er… Bush heavy. Josh Ross didn't get the snaps his play warranted last year, per both your author's grading and PFF:
Josh Ross is ready to step-it-up for Michigan this season. pic.twitter.com/MCWpxgmykQ
— PFF College (@PFF_College) July 16, 2019
Bush had an 85 grade; Ross probably won't get there but won't be far off.
Franz… hello. He's with the German U18s as they prep for the European Championship at the end of this month:
Michigan commit Franz Wagner balling with the German U18 national team against Serbia: 29 points (10-12 FG), 6 rebounds, 5 steals, 3 assists and an efficiency rating of 43 in 24 minutes. pic.twitter.com/2PFVVKHLU9
— NBADraftProspects (@draftprosnba) July 15, 2019
He's not going to blow by defenders but if he gets the whisper of a driving lane he's got the length to finish over people. Also that jumper gets off in a flash.
[After THE JUMP: acquiring Franz, Battle For Atlantis takes]
The board. Orion Sang has put together a comprehensive basketball recruiting board; Michigan is going after a wide array of highly-touted 2020 prospects but playing from behind on almost all of them since top-end guys start getting recruited in middle school. Interesting bit on Lance Ware:
Lance Ware, F (Burlington, New Jersey)
Is he a ‘4’ or a ‘5’? That’s the biggest question when it comes to projecting Ware to the next level. Michigan’s staff recently sat down to discuss this exact topic. Their conclusion: They see him as a “junkyard dog 4” who can score down low, grab rebounds and defend the rim. The Wolverines are taking a long, hard look at Ware, who has yet to receive an offer. Martelli saw him Thursday and Howard watched on Friday.
If U-M wants to stay in this one, it may have to jump in soon — Ware was one of the breakout players at the Peach Jam, reportedly picking up offers from Louisville and Oregon on Friday, and he said he’ll narrow his list shortly after the Peach Jam. There’s certainly interest in Michigan from his end.
That would be a shift, and may indicate that Colin Castleton could find some minutes at the four this year, a la Wisconsin's Nate Reuvers. Probably not many since he has to be the backup 5, but some.
Landing Franz. Also from Sang, the story of how Michigan landed Franz despite Beilein leaving literally the same day he came in for a visit:
"At that time, you have to either decide to bail and figure out what’s next for you personally," Washington said, "or hunker down and make sure that we spend time with the family and give Franz the full opportunity to see Michigan."
According to Washington, the original plan was to let the Wagner's spend the first night of the visit alone, giving them a chance to process everything as a family.
Instead, the three assistants decided it was important to "rally the troops," Washington said, and took the Wagner's to dinner at Ruth's Chris Steak House, located in the heart of downtown Ann Arbor. If anything else, they would have a great dinner.
Washington started the evening by addressing Beilein's departure. He told the Wagners they were considered family and said the staff was excited "to just be able to re-connect."
The bracket. Michigan's in the Bahamas tournament with the goofy name played in a ballroom again. Bracket:
Iowa State was 15th in Kenpom last year—you may remember me advocating for Steve Prohm during the coaching search—but suffered a ton of attrition. The three guys with big usage numbers are all gone; Marial Shayok is out of eligibility and both Talen Horton-Tucker and Lindell Wigginton entered the draft. They also lost Nick Weiler-Babb, who was low-usage but omnipresent. Cameron Lard also entered the draft despite playing just 8 MPG.
ISU's recruiting class doesn't have a guy ranked higher than #168 and the two transfers they acquired are both sit-out guys. If Prohm can keep them anywhere near where they were a year ago he's a genius. Torvik projects them 53rd. Michigan is 29th post-Franz.
If Michigan can get past ISU, UNC likely follows. They will be the usual collection of five-stars running as fast as possible; this we know. We know almost nothing else since Coby White, Nassir Little, Cam Johnson, Luke Maye, and Kenny Williams are all out the door. Torvik still projects them 5th.
The announcement of said bracket completes basketball's nonconference schedule, which also features:
- Creighton (#55 in Kenpom, lose Martin Krampelj, return almost everyone else, pretty short)
- Elon (the team that took the longest to dunk last season! We cannot let them dunk! It will be humiliating!)
- @ Louisville (#23 in Kenpom, return everyone)
- Oregon (#28 in Kenpom, lose Bol Bol, Louis King, Kenny Wooten)
Louisville will be a bear but attrition looks like it's impacted the rest of the schedule at least as much as Michigan, and those teams don't have the Simpson/Teske anchor.
At least the scouting was good? Michigan processed Rashad Weaver out of their class a couple cycles back after discovering him at a satellite camp. This looks like a Whoops:
By winning 17.5% of his pass-rush snaps last season, Rashad Weaver tops returning ACC edge defenders. pic.twitter.com/cJwclUwTxf
— PFF College (@PFF_College) July 13, 2019
It happens.
You know you are bad at this when… you pay a total of 1.2 million dollars in settlements to both Keith Mumphery and the woman he is accused of assaulting.
Etc.: Never change, MSU beat. Basketball support staff mostly intact. Jay Smith, once rumored to be a potential assistant, arrives in an off-court role. Basketball grad transfers are gone.
I watched a Pitt game on a Friday night last year and thought the same thing, also whenever I see a BC stat line and wonder what Kareem Walker is doing now. Worried too much about recruiting New Jersey for a while.
Ah, the crack Freep reporters/editors and their use of apostrophes. So the coaching staff took the "Wagner's" to dinner, eh? Inquiring minds want to know: the Wagner's *what*?
Just ask Weird Al Yankovic.
#WordCrimes
It didn't really sink in until now, but the Lance Ware bullet made me realize that we will likely see a dramatically different style of play from the hoops team moving forward. For years I've incredulously mocked the evergreen notion that "this will be the year" where Beilein uses a line up with two bigs. "If only he would put (McGary, Donnal, Wagner, etc.) at the four, we could rebound better!" they would say. Maybe we will finally see it after all these years.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019%E2%80%9320_Michigan_Wolverines_men%2…
Whoever put together the Wikipedia page for next season doesn't think much of Brooks (third team.) I'd like to see Johns step up so Teske, Castleton and Johns can split those 80 minutes at the 4/5 positions. Z, Franz, Brooks, and Livers can take the 120 minutes at the 1-3 spots. If DDJ steps up, even better.
Lol 'Big Country' at PF would be a nightmare
I know abandoning the offensive boards is a strategic defensive maneuver but damn Michigan sure was missing a ton of shots at the end of last year. Almost wonder if it would've been worth it to put in Castleton and let him and Teske, the long-armed beasts crash the glass. Would've sacrificed some opportunities for transition but could've worked out to more possessions.
I am interesting to see how Juwan coaches 'em up this year. I feel like he was a cerebral player but was also known for his hard-nosed play. It would be nice to see Michigan play a bit more physical next year (but let's keep avoiding fouls please, thanks).
I think that trade-off was proper for last year's team. We had an elite defensive team. If you limit transition chances, the other team has to face our elite D nearly every time down the floor. That's a solid recipe for success. Making that trade last year might mean giving up more easy opportunities and in turn, putting more pressure on our offense.
That formula might be best again for this year as the defense should again be very good. Unless the structure of the lineup changes to a taller lineup, in which case, you might see that shift.
Regarding Weaver:
IIRC Magnus was pretty disappointed when he got processed and looks like that was solid scouting. That said, I'm not really worried about DE depth and think we're okay there. Glad things worked out for him.
Which player did we get/prefer that caused us to pass on Weaver ? Was it Vilain ?
Vilain was the class after him. I'm not sure if there was a specific guy, Harbaugh just told him there was a 50/50 shot there would be a scholarship for him on NSD so he decommitted.
Uche signed the day before Weaver decommitted, so my guess is he saw the writing on the wall then.
Yeah, Weaver was the less talked-about guy who got processed from that class but it definitely hurt. I'm glad he got a nice landing and is playing well.
Rashad Weaver: the kid whose 2 star status when he committed had many fans up in arms about taking low rated prospects and the same kid whose decommittment had many fans up in arms about processing recruits. Glad to see he's doing well at Pitt.
Also the Offensive Tackle that we processed in 2016 because he would not come to camp and solidify his Hoke commitment looks like he might start for Oklahoma this year. Like the man said... it happens...
I know this site loves PFF, but these returning lists seem pretty pointless to me. By the end of this coming season that top 5 list will be comprised of 1 or 2 guys from Clemson, 1 from FSU, 1 from Syracuse, 1 from Miami and maybe a surprise.
Based on Ace’s post-game write-ups and PFF, makes you wonder even more what the staff sees in Gil when 110,000 others in the stadium can see that Ross is better.
So the coaches actually know what there doing. You dont say.
I don’t know how to analyze and rate players, but just watching the games Ross always seemed to me to be outperforming Gil. I assume the coaches saw something I didn’t, but I could not understand how Gil seemed to get more PT than Ross last year. Eager to see what Ross can do with a full time job. Also eager to see if Gil is better than last year or someone else pushes for PT at the other LB spot.
I think Gil probably did really well in practice maybe because he picked up tendencies or "trends" going against UM's offense that didn't translate when the opposition was different. Sometimes you see guys like that - Ben Gedeon jumps to mind as a guy who always seemed to get a ton of coach/camp press but never seemed as good on the field, and it might have just been he showed better when he knew what to expect.
I think you’re thinking of Joe Bolden. Ben Gedeon is quietly having a very nice NFL career starting for the Vikings.
Agreed. Gedeon was just the opposite. If I recall, he only really played his Senior year after Bolden and Desmond Morgan graduated. And I spent that entire season in awe wondering where the hell he'd been for 4 years.
Is it just me or does Wagner seem to be a better finisher at the rim? It could just be the competition, but Iggy seemed to regress in actually finishing drives by the end of the season. I'm looking forward to seeing this kid next year.
Franz's long arms are really an advantage for him. He maybe doesn't have as much athleticism as some, but his body doesn't actually have to change directions much when just switching hands gives him 7' of change of direction to flick the ball around someone. It's going to be really interesting to see how JH uses him next year.
What I'm looking forward to is seeing how JH will get guys like Wagner, Teske, etc to draw the fouls inside. Watching Wagner's film, when driving to the hole, I see him overly contorting his shots as to avoid all contact as if he's playing pickup with no ref, and I think he might be deadly to opposing teams when he learns how to draw the fouls, and with the threat of fouling the opposing players out later in the game, that our collective inside game will get stronger because of it. The season cannot start soon enough. I want to see our big men impose their will.
It's a highlight tape of one good game. Impossible to draw any conclusions.
Lance Ware, F (Burlyngton, New Jersey)
FIFY.
Ross will be fine.
This 2020 class is very important for Howard and he is so far behind on a lot of these kids. My hope is that a lot of them will stay uncommitted at least until the season starts and they can see what style of play Michigan has post Beilein.
Are preseason Kenpom rankings not available to non-subscribers? Last I checked, 2020 was not shown.
"They see him as a 'junkyard dog 4' who can score down low, grab rebounds and defend the rim."
Ugggghhh. Why? This isn't even a complaint about being "not Beilein". Almost no one, especially not good college and pro teams - play junkyard dogs that clog the lane and can't shoot at the four. Most teams don't even play a five like that anymore.
I thought the same thing. Who's the Minnesota guy who just graduated. Like a 6'7" wide-bodied dude in there just barreling into people. Crap. With the hair and the beard...(ugh, Googling)...Jordan Murphy!
Sounds like Jordan Murphy. Fine player. Kind of an ugly brand of basketball.
Anyone have any idea of how big the 2021 class might be? I'm curious because we have a headline5 5 star qb and we seem to really be stacking this 2020 class.
It more or less seems like we'll always be taking 24-27 kids anymore depending on how things shake out. With the transfer portal and mindset shift for athletes, kids will increasingly look to move on for playing time if they get passed on the depth chart in many cases, and there's always the smaller number of cases of kids who just don't work out (medical, violations of team/school rules, etc..). I could be wrong and we may have some years where guys see the depth chart and don't leave and we have to take a smaller class but especially with the level of talent we've brought in the last couple years and continue to be recruiting, it'll be hard to look at a depth chart and not expect a steady flow of transfers, especially if we can find some more Dax Hill types who become year one starters because they're that good. I assume the coaches are looking for 20-25 kids every year and the final numbers come down to who stay and who goes.
Comments