Josh Langford at PG? Also, let's watch some of his highlights
With the commitment of Tyus Battle, Michigan has one scholarship open for next year if Austin Davis takes a prep year as widely speculated. That remaining scholarship will obviously go to a PG, and the staff is putting on the full-court press with Cassius Winston, who is on campus in Ann Arbor today.
However, I'd be interested to know if the staff is considering selling Josh Langford on the idea of playing PG with Battle at the 2 and waiting until 2017 to take a PG. Langford is not a pure PG, but he's a very good passer and has great size paired with good vision. Given those strengths, I think he would be fantastic in the pick-and-roll . His handles are extremely good for a 2, as well. He'd need to tighten up his dribble due to his height if he was manning the point at the B1G level, but I think that a strong case could be made for going this route.
Check out his highlights below. They're fun to watch.
was going to try point gaurd and was very confused.
I would take Langford in a heart beat. Can't pass on that type of talent especially if Winston plans on dragging out his recruitment for a while. MAAR would be the backup PG in this case for a year then we could get a PG in 2017 and still have some of the best wing players in the nation.
He thinks Michigan doesn't have room for Langford for now - he also said he thought the possibility of Langford picking Michigan may have helped motivate Battle to commit when he did. He believes Michigan thinks of itself as having one scholarship to use and that Winston is their choice all the way for that spot.
I hate to root for someone to leave the roster, but it would be great to somehow fit Langford into the fold.
Langford is a top 20 prospect, so I wouldn't be surprised if he waited until the dust settled on 2016 NBA decisions before making his own decision. Obviously, we'd prefer that to happen since it's more than likely we'll have attrition in this class due to a playing time crunch at a few positions.
Sam thought Langford's top two were Michigan and Florida, and he seemed a little mystified as to why Langford didn't pull the trigger on Michigan when Donovan left the Gators.
see Michigan having enough ball at this point for Langford and Battle. I think Irvin is staying 4 years, Chatman, Dawkins and MAAR will be juniors and Battle will be a feature wing. I would agree that you take star players when and where you can get them, but at this point the only move is to go full court press on a point guard, if not Winston than one of the several other targets. You have to consider team make up at some point, and it does not make sense to have six players who do close to the same thing(albeit at different levels) and completely ignore another position of need.
langford has that elite athleticism. I think you can survive with MAAR as a back up point guard and a guy that could bring along a 2017 freshmen if he needed to (if you miss out on cassius)
Plus never doubt JB's ability to let anyone be the point forward/guard (look at Stauskus)
know, in all of the excitement and talk of recruiting, I think some people have kind of lost sight of the players that we have right now. MAAR did not look like a "back up point guard" that could bring along a 2017 freshman to me last year, he looked like a true freshman who went for 20 against State on the road and that dunked on Maryland's entire team because he felt like it. Yes, the prospect of Langford excites me, but so does the prospect of MOAR MAAR.
I loved what MAAR did as much as the next guy, but you're talking about someone who was old for his class (lower upside) and had more assists than turnovers. There is an ENORMOUS difference between the Langfords and Battles of the world and a guy who wouldn't have cracked 5 mpg last year if LeVert and Walton stayed healthy.
if your team looked like
walton/maar
battle/dawkins
langford/robinson
irvin/wilson/wagner
doyle/teske/donnal
(or however you wanna split it up) you're worried if MAAR plays 10 mins a game as a point guard we're in trouble? or at least not indifferent to winston being there? Give me elite, athletic, large wings all the time please. MAAR will develop and he will be better for the experience he had to get this year.
The problem is the following season, MIchigan would have to recruit 2 PGs, rely on one of them to start, create a roster imbalance issue, and all but guarantee that one of them was a lowly regarded guy.
The alternative is they can take someone who can smooth the transition from Walton and learn the system by the year. It could be argued PG is the most important position for Beilein.
Michigan also could have gone with Stauskas or LeVert as a backup PG for a year. Instead they went out and grabbed a guy nobody else in D1 wanted who seemed more like a preferred walk-on than a scholarship player. Spike worked out alright.
I think MIchigan would rather havve 3 PGs on the roster than 1.
...Battle committed. Because of that, I'm going to respond to your hyphothetical line-up by saying WOOHOO WE GOT TYUS BATTLE!
It's more important to have a good PG for Michigan going forward with Albrecht gone after one more year, and Walton being gone probably the year after that. Winston has to be the main target with several other guys as backup. If Langford is still available and another scholarship opens up beyond the possible one mentioned above (ref. Davis), then sure, I'd take him in a heartbeat.
I'd say its more probable than not that Irvin goes pro after this year.
Not according to the mocks and you would have to hope Langford would wait til next April to commit somewhere to see if Irvin declared for the draft
If you rely on the mocks for your opinion.....
There is indeed a real good chance Irvin leaves.
Second round, but still. ESPN's Kevin Pelton had him in the top 10 of the 2015 draft prior to the season also. Not anymore I'm sure, but it gives you an idea of the potential value of a 6'7 sharpshooter.
Yeah but in this scenario Langford becomes Winston. We only have room left for a PG but if the staff can sell Langford on playing the 1 and wants to commit sooner than Winston, I am sure they would take him. IF he agreed to learn the point.
A positive in the likelihood of this. We have two more years of Walton, he is not NBA ready and would have to have an All-American year to become a first round draft pick. He would be here in 2016 to help Langford learn the position for a year.
Langford is not going to a program "to learn"
He is going to a program to get minutes and shots
Walton will start
Irvin will start
Battle will start
1 of Wilson or Doyle will start
I have to believe 1 of Chatman, Wagner, Robinson or Dawkins will be a potential pro and start
I do not see how to fit him in unless Walton or Irvin goes pro
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"Wilson and Doyle won't compete for minutes that season"
LOL
I'm fairly certain we will have a center starting that year
And Bacari just said DJ is 6'11'' he is a center
Beilein recently said DJ Wilson is not a long term 5....but could be for this year. I assume he is competing with Donnal for backup 5 minutes this year and then rotates over to 4 in 16-17 when Teske or Davis is the backup. (or Donnal I guess)
He also said he would play McGary at the 4 and Robinson at the 3. I'll believe Beilein goes 'big' when I see it.
One also has to consider what happens if Wilson plays well this year - if he's a shot-blocking presence, adequate rebounder and screener, while also presenting a Bielfeldt/Donnal-level mid-range jump shooting - what then? What if he emerges as the top backup at the 5 by seasons end and Donnal is marginalized? Do the freshman bigs immediately displace him in 2016-17? Remember Wilson will be in his third year by that point and presumably have added some weight and strength along with his experience advantage. Furthermore, what if Chatman, Dawkins, Wagner, Robinson ALL look like quality rotation wings/forwards. Is Wilson going to shove those guys to the end of the bench?
I believe that the staff see Wilson's optimal fit at the 4 in the long-run, just as they saw GR3's optimal fit at the 3 in the long-run. I'm sure this staff would love to have a bunch of 6'9 wins and a 7' center. Assuming Wilson stays 4 or 5 years he'll probably end up as a "power" forward, but his ETA is probably year 4. Freshman bigs are freshman bigs and Beilein gonna Beilein.
Everyone seems very willing to ship Wilson away from the 5 spot but I think we should all wait till it happens before assuming it will.
Ship away Wilson from the 5?
Did he even play a minute there in his shortened FR year? I believe not. He was at the 4 if I recall.
So it is difficult to ship someone away from a place he hasn't played.
Unless his physicality goes up about 5x I dont see him as a long term 5.
GR3 is a useless comparison - aside from defense the 2 thru 4 in Beilein system is interchangeable to a large degree. 5 is different. Morgan, Horford, Doyle are similar players. I dont see Donnal or Wilson as real 5s.
Look at any top-tier program and you can say the same thing. Why would 5* Grayson Allen go to Duke only to sit on the bench for a good portion of his freshman year? Granted, it's Duke and Michigan isn't Duke, but that doesn't mean you don't try to be.
Michigan isn't a blueblood where potential one and dones will sit, especially since Langford can go to UK, Duke and KU and start.
I know. I said almost exactly that. But what in the world makes you think that UK/Duke/KU will have less competition for a starting spot, even if they all have significant attrition every year? Those rosters are always loaded. There is not easy path to playing time at any school with a good team.
KU and UK are fairly good at only taking one elite guy at each position on the perimeter.
Duke runs 7 man rotations.
I think its more likely there than beating 2 seniors at UM for perimeter spots.
If Langford wants to come then great but I don't see it at the moment with out a guy leaving to go pro or the remote possibility that none of our forwards develop into potential pros
I generally agree. However, our track record for forward development has been totally underwhelming with the exceptions of Jordan Morgan and Mitch McGary (to some extent...he was a natural talent).
JB has never had forwards with this kind of talent barring GR3 so I don't think using the past to gauge these guys ceilings is wise
I feel like we've been saying that for the past 7 years.
7 years with who? GR3 is the only one and he is in the NBA. It is dishonest to say that JB has had the type of talent at the 4 that he has now. First time he has had 6'8''-6'9'' guys like Kam, Wagner and Robinson at the wing positions, too. Dawkins has already been productive enough for heavy optimism. Its a numbers game and at least 1 of those 4 will be starter worthy in 2016.
Smote played tons of center. Sims was a good player and would start over freshmen as a junior.
Give it a year or two and there's a very legitimate chance that Beilein will be able to put up his NBA production with ANYONE at the guard position, especially when you consider the lack of elite HS talent.
And MIchigan, as far as an institution goes, can put it's prestige right up there with Duke and KU. Tradition matters, but in a world where Oregon football outrecruits UM football, one has to acknowledge that recent success matters more.
In other words, no a top 20 recruit isn't going to come to sit on the bench most likely, but there is a real chance that Beilein will be able to talk top 50 recruits into joining the team without an immediate starting spot open or promised to them.
there's a pretty good chance (greater than 50% IMO) that either Walton or Irvin go pro after next year, and a non-zero chance both do it.
Walton isn't ready yet and is short - but if he has a big year (a distinct possibility) he may see his stock as maximimized and bounce. Unlikely but feasible.
If Irvin gets the kind of looks he got as a freshman and knocks down 43% of 3s while continuing the kind of reasonable evolution/growth you'd expect from a guy going from soph to junior year, he's going to be a 1st round pick.
I have the impression that Walton and Irvin are bit underrated by our fanbase right now. Both have a legitimate shot at the NBA and are good bets for all-conference honors within the next year or two.
I think you're giving many guys on the roster far more credit than they earned last season. Chatman was bad, Wagner and Robinson are totally unprovven, and Dawkins was pretty good but not a shoe-in starter. Josh Langford is a phenomenal basketball player. It wouldn't shock me if he came in and was immediately one of the top 3 players at the 1-3 positions.
I'll bet on Beilein turning one of those 4 guys into a star.
They'd take Langford in a heartbeat. So, the "we don't have room" narrative isn't totally accurate. That said, the fit isn't perfect, so Michigan will back off from the kind of effort it takes to land an elite player like this. Realistically, he isn't coming here...
As the OP said, it COULD work, but you'd be asking Langford and/or Battle to sacrifice their optimal positions to play with each other. Not impossible, but highly unlikely. These kids all know that college is a business decision for them (and no, that's not a euphemism for getting paid, it's just an acknowledgment that as potential NBA lottery picks you have millions at stake.) Beilein's a great coach and would make it work, but Langford would have to really want to come to Michigan. Extreme longshot.
With Walton and MAAR back alongside Battle, a true PG is a much more natural fit. Michigan should have no problem recruiting a very good one between the '16 and '17 classes, and it's vastly preferable to have a 2016 recruit play apprentice for a year than rely on a 2017 freshman to come in and start. One could argue that an elite player like Winston won't come with Walton returning, but given his positional flexibility there should be plenty of playing time for three guards: Walton, Battle, and the '16 recruit. Also, Beilein has often played 3 guards in the past (e.g., Levert,Stauskas freshman years) so no one should be scared off by Walton and Battle.
I think Michigan takes another Albrecht type in 2016 before they land a non-PG like Langford. I would expect PG recruits in both the 2016 and 2017 classes. If form follows from past history, one of those will be an elite NBA caliber player and one will be a quailty 4-year college guy who can provide stability and insurance.
Spot on.
Michigan would take Langford but Langford would probably not choose Michigan given the roster.
sold on this. I like the idea of taller guards running the point in a system like Beilein's considering that we usually have a rebounding issue. Another explosive athlete on the court wouldn't hurt.
I like Langford better than Winston anyway so that'd be perfect.
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sam seems to think it would take wagner not qualifying for room. could irvin make the leap this year to get to the league? might we see attrition elsewhere?
hopefully langford and the top 10 guys continue to follow trend of this years guys in waiting for april to shake out and evaluate from there. you GOT to continue recruiting langford hard, winston or no winston
and agree with above, overall like langford game/size more. interesting to see if msu or um end up with both and instate implications down the road for whoever lands winston
Walton will be here in 2016 and Langford isn't going to a place where he comes off the bench.
I have only seen highlight videos from both of them...but I'd much prefer langford. His game looks much more polished, and is far more athletically gifted. Winston's shot is iffy (low release, doesn't get much elevation), and looks less able to finish at the rim. I also love big/scoring point guards (D'angelo Russell, Russell Westbrook).