Bear Down Wildcats

This is a spinoff of a lot of the posts I see.

There seem to be a ton of suggestions about the lineup, tweaks, sitting Dusan more, Trier at PG, etc. Is the solution to building right now more about personnel tweaks or the development of the guys we have.

My personal opinion, developing players and competution matters more at this point than worrying about personnel. It seems like we get more posts about who should play more or less though.

I understand the simplest answer is figuring out both. If there's a priority A, which one is it?

I think team development comes before player development. Some of these players have it in therm and its the coaching staffs job to find out who and get them to execute.

You can look at Randolph and say he has more upside than say IRA Lee, but to me Lee looks like a kid you can coach up.

Hope this makes sense

Priority A. Trier needs to play hard on both ends.

How do you fix that?

That’s the question.

Development is more important. But personnel makes for better message board discussion because we’ve got a community of fans here who can’t see why more Ristic = better results, for example. It’s like watching in slow motion, and knowing he’s about to lose his defensive assignment completely because there’s no way he can recover, and he’s about to get the ball stripped and nothing can be done about it. We can’t develop Ristic or Trier or PJC from the stands or from our sofas, so we want to see a different lineup and watch how that goes.

Olsondogg wrote:Priority A. Trier needs to play hard on both ends.

How do you fix that?

That’s the question.

Trier also needs to be the vocal leader but it's not in his DNA. And I don't think it's something that can be fixed. This is a problem

Alieberman wrote:

Olsondogg wrote:Priority A. Trier needs to play hard on both ends.

How do you fix that?

That’s the question.

Trier also needs to be the vocal leader but it's not in his DNA. And I don't think it's something that can be fixed. This is a problem

It could be Alkins. You can see it on the sidelines. One can hope.

If PJC or Trier disagree, then they can find it in their DNA.

Olsondogg wrote:Priority A. Trier needs to play hard on both ends.

How do you fix that?

That’s the question.

The interesting thing about Trier is that everyone says he is incredibly committed to working on his game and puts in a ton of gym time in the lffseason. Then comes the season and a lot of the criticism is about not working hard.

It's an odd dynamic.

Spaceman Spiff wrote:

Olsondogg wrote:Priority A. Trier needs to play hard on both ends.

How do you fix that?

That’s the question.

The interesting thing about Trier is that everyone says he is incredibly committed to working on his game and puts in a ton of gym time in the lffseason. Then comes the season and a lot of the criticism is about not working hard.

It's an odd dynamic.

Well, I don't know what to say about watching him get burned on defense on the reg.

Spaceman Spiff wrote:This is a spinoff of a lot of the posts I see.

There seem to be a ton of suggestions about the lineup, tweaks, sitting Dusan more, Trier at PG, etc. Is the solution to building right now more about personnel tweaks or the development of the guys we have.

My personal opinion, developing players and competution matters more at this point than worrying about personnel. It seems like we get more posts about who should play more or less though.

I understand the simplest answer is figuring out both. If there's a priority A, which one is it?

To me, Priority A is team development. Specifically, team defense. I'd rather have 5 guys on the floor who are average on-ball defenders but play excellent team defense, than one or two lockdown guys and the rest average who all play poor team defense.

I think the lineup tweaks go hand in hand, they do for me at least. Ristic historically is a guy who has really hurt us in the "team defense" aspect. Not rotating, getting caught in no man's land, poor decisions on ball screens, recovering slowly after hedging, a lack of awareness, allowing teams to get second chance shots, etc., puts the rest of the team in a bad position and either leads to easy buckets, or a teammate having to leave their position to help out. So when I say I wish his minutes would get reduced, it's knowing he has been at his ceiling in that regard and there are young guys who may have the capability to give us more and they just need more time on the floor and in practice to get there. You also see Trier putting his teammates in those spots as well way more than you should. Add the large number of freshmen we play to the mix, it is easy to see why this team is a disaster on that end of the floor. Goes without saying, but you're a much better defender when your team plays good team D. Kadeem deserves a ton of credit for what he did last year defensively, especially early in the season with the load he had to carry. He was essentially defending our opponents' best wing on an island until everyone else started to figure it out.

Spaceman Spiff wrote:

Olsondogg wrote:Priority A. Trier needs to play hard on both ends.

How do you fix that?

That’s the question.

The interesting thing about Trier is that everyone says he is incredibly committed to working on his game and puts in a ton of gym time in the lffseason. Then comes the season and a lot of the criticism is about not working hard.

It's an odd dynamic.

I think he works hard on his offensive game - I think he needs to work harder on being a team player on defense. I always worried about Trier being his own guy and sort of a hired gun based on his unique background. Moving around the country, his mom and basketball as his only constant.

I don't know that "rely on your fellow man, be the man your brother can rely on" is in the fiber of his fabric. He's more sixth-man-of-the-year than MVP (that's mostly a metaphor applied to the next level).

Longhorned wrote:

Alieberman wrote:

Olsondogg wrote:Priority A. Trier needs to play hard on both ends.

How do you fix that?

That’s the question.

Trier also needs to be the vocal leader but it's not in his DNA. And I don't think it's something that can be fixed. This is a problem

It could be Alkins. You can see it on the sidelines. One can hope.

If PJC or Trier disagree, then they can find it in their DNA.

Love this.

you can very easily do both

We need a floor leader...an extension of the coach on the floor...a vocal leader...a leader who quietly shows by example...a bruiser down low...a 3 point marksman...a tough as nails rebounder....a highlight reel dunker....a lockdown defender...a "ice in his veins" FT shooter...an unrattled freshman...a PTPer...a diaper dandy...a grab your popcorn guy....


Anything else?

Olsondogg wrote:We need a floor leader...an extension of the coach on the floor...a vocal leader...a leader who quietly shows by example...a bruiser down low...a 3 point marksman...a tough as nails rebounder....a highlight reel dunker....a lockdown defender...a "ice in his veins" FT shooter...an unrattled freshman...a PTPer...a diaper dandy...a grab your popcorn guy....

Anything else?

We're going to want a towel waving garbage time guy the fans can root for due to his inspiring personal story. Possibly also a rattled freshman just for contrast.