Derrick Walton v. Trey Burke
I've had this conversation with a die hard UNC friend of mine. He loved Trey Burke's game. He always goes back to THE shot. But I contend that Derrick has been more valuable. I know that Trey won the B1G, Naismith, and Wooden POY. He did it with a team with five other NBA players. It reminds me of a quarterback winning the Heisman with a stacked team (tebow comes to mind here) or the best player on the best team situation.
I "member" Trey being a liability at times. Beilein had to sit him during the final regular season game against Indiana where he missed a crucial free throw and shot at the end to cost us the B1G title. He struggled mightily at times during the NCAA tourney run. Im going off of memory, but I think he struggled in the first game and definitely during the first half of Kansas game.
This isn't to take away from what Trey did during his time here. I think that Derrick has at worse been invisible during stretches during his career, but has been the steel in this teams spine. He is possibly our best rebounder, great distributor, and knows how and when to score when we need it most. He's done all of this with maaaybe two potential NBA players on this roster. I can't this of a MIchigan point guard that has been so critical in a teams success. Maybe Jalen and Trey. Gary Grant was before my time so I can't speak on him.
I'd be interested in hearing what you all think and hopefully seeing some advanced statistics to add something beyond the eye and smell tests.
...what he's doing now is kind of what Trey did for a full year. Walton's BPM is insane, it was 9.9 before the game and will probably be around 10 now. But Trey's was 12.2...Burke also averaged more points and more assists.
That being said, Walton has been a superstar this past month. I think he is playing at Burke's level right now.
Agreed.
Walton is a great follow up to a Naismith National Player of the Year PG in Trey Burke.
Hopefully X follows up Walton well too. (he can start by hitting crunch time free throws lol)
fire beilein right???
When you compare, somebody or something gets diminished. They're both great
-James Joseph Harbaugh
My thought as well extreme recency bias. Walton is great, but Burke was an all-time Michigan great. There is still a little time for Walton though.
but the year before the POY season Burke led a team starting novak at power forward to a conference title.
We're talking about POY Trey Burke, who led Michigan to within a bullshit foul call of a national championship against a team illegally recruited by hookers, right?
Spike kept us in that game in the first half. Similar to my feelings about the Fab Five and NCAA sanctions, the hookers didn't give them an unfair advantage on the court. It could be argued that hookers are the opposite of performance enhancing. Deion Sanders used to talk about NFL players getting hookers for opposing players the night before a game.
Interesting. I'd never heard that.
I always thought that the UL hookers were more about showing the recruit that they play loose with the rules, and they won't have to worry about discipline at the school. Most star athletes have the pick of the litter when it comes to getting laid.
Spike kept us in that game in the first half.
Technically, Spike got us out to a huge lead, which we couldn't hold on to because Burke got called for a terrible second foul in the first half. Burke kept us in the game in the second half and nearly won it for us single-handedly.
Which isn't to say that Walton isn't playing amazing basketball right now. He certainly is, and hopefully he can keep it up for seven more games. If he does, this becomes a much more appropriate discussion.
what if Hancock had decided to never come to Louisville except the hookers conviced him!?!? ON THE COURT ADVANTAGE right there! What if!?!?!?
He''s obviously talking about the other one. The one you're talking about was exponentially better than Walton. And I like Walton.
Walton is great, and peaking at the perfect time. Trey was that his whole last season, and pretty close before that. Burke was fantastic, consistently. Walton is fantastic, recently.
BOTH played for Michigan!! Awesome to watch them compete. Gives us a ton to cheer about.
GO BLUE!!
I can understand the OP's argument. Correct me if I'm wrong, but he's not saying Walton is better, just more valuable. I would agree. This team without Walton playing like he is is bottom of the B1G. 2013 without Burke is still a Sweet 16 team probably.
Walton is Jake Rudock of basketball
I don't know about 2013 (our alternative was a true freshman Albrecht at the point) but the 2012 team wouldn't have been too good without Burke.
The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil (e.g. Izzo) is for good Michigan Men to do nothing.
Would be interesting to see how good Burke would be if he was playing for this team. Then again, he played before the Fresh Five showed up and he produced, so I think he'd still play well.
Freshman Spike averaged 8 mpg. 2.2 points and 38% shooter arent stats to be relied on
And the freshman LeVert averaged 10.7 mpg and 2.3 ppg while shooting 31.5%.
Years from now, people will talk about how this year's team featured future NBA players in Wagner, Wilson, and Ibi Watson...
I wish Ibi had gotten more playing time this year. When he gets in the game, he seems more athletic than anyone else on the team. I hope he has a break out year next year.
McGary didn't do shit until the tourney because he was in Beileins doghouse, and Stauskas was basically #JustAShooter his freshman year. Not to say the team was chopped liver, but it's not like Burke was taking nights off because the team was so good.
I think Walton is playing at a Burke level right now, but Burke had more iconic moments. There was the steal, the steal after the steal, the shot, raining down 3's in OT after the shot ect. He was also consistently very good, never going through any kind of slump if I recall correctly.
I will say that Walton may be the better rebounder, though. He has got to be one of the best rebounders I've seen for his size. I feel this aspect of his game is underrated and underappreciated at times.
Xavier Simpson
Edit: Wow tough crowd with the negs. Pretty honest mistake to think of Xavier University during march madness
Someone's a big basketball fan.
but honestly, i think this is better:
I love love love Walton but I think there may be some recency bias here. Burke is probably the best Michigan player since Chris Webber.