The Lexington Wildcats of the NBA D-League have a front office that is second-to-none in getting in great talent and getting that talent into the Association.
Tyreke Evans has won NBA Rookie of the Year award. Last year, you may recall, Derek Rose won the award. I may be wrong, but I believe this means that Memphis joins UNC as the only school to produce back-to-back NBA Rookies of the Year (Phil Ford and Walter Davis back in the 1970s).
"Whatever," you may say. Well, as a recruiting tool for their former college coach, that can be powerful. And you know what could be even more powerful -- what if he goes 3-for-3? John Wall has to be considered the front-runner for 2011 Rookie of the Year. Cousins will likely also be in the running. Blake Griffin will qualify for the ROY race considering that he skipped this entire season with injury, but there is a very real possibility that Calipari will have 3 ROYs in a row from his programs.
Just a thought.
--Jason "Calipari/Memphis now joins Dean Smith/UNC as the answer to the back-to-back ROY trivia question" Evans
Why are you wasting time here when you could be wasting it by listening to the latest episode of the DBR Podcast?
The Lexington Wildcats of the NBA D-League have a front office that is second-to-none in getting in great talent and getting that talent into the Association.
I for one am concerned but I'm not going to stay awake thinking about it. I think people got a little too high on this year's E8 flameout, using it as vindication of the idea that pumping in freshmen every year can't work. I think it can work, as 'melo proved. The key will be whether he can get the four-year role players a team needs as well.
Either way, if he can keep this recruiting cycle going I would bet even money that sometime in the next 5 years he'lll hit pay dirt and KY wins a 'natty.
Trinity '09
It won't matter when he's in the NBA too.
This doesn't make him a good coach. Why didn't he make it to the final four if he had the two leading candidates for next years league ROY? Talent on the court can make you appear to be a good coach. I give you the 2009 NC coach as a prime example. Duke 2010 had very good players but needed excellent coaching and teachable student athletes to achieve their goal.
First question - odds are probably lower than you think. Cal failed in the NBA once before. He needs to prove he can win before he is seriously considered as a coach again. And if not the NBA, then where else? He's already hit the pinnacle of college bball.
Second question - odds are also really low. Kentucky alumni has a lot of hush hush money that they can throw at the NCAA if anything ever came up
I'd think that the chance of Cal winning a NC Tourney are significantly higher than either of those two scenarios.
Criticism may not be agreeable, but it is necessary. It fulfils the same function as pain in the human body. It calls attention to an unhealthy state of things. - Winston Churchill
President of the "Nolan Smith Should Have His Jersey in The Rafters" Club
And folks thought John Chaney was outta line...
I think we should ask ourselves what we can to to help him continue his work...
Criticism may not be agreeable, but it is necessary. It fulfils the same function as pain in the human body. It calls attention to an unhealthy state of things. - Winston Churchill
President of the "Nolan Smith Should Have His Jersey in The Rafters" Club
In my opinion, Calipari has underachieved with exceptionally good talent. Calipari has "recruited" (whether ethically or not) players with NBA talent. I would not go so far as to say he "produced" that talent. These players most likely would have done well in the NBA with or without Calipari. If a coach helps to develop a marginal player to be successful in the NBA, then maybe you can say the coach "produced" that player. But if a player is talented enough to make the NBA regardless of who his college coach is, I don't think you should give that coach or school credit for "producing" the player. For example, I would not give Dean Smith credit for "producing" Michael Jordan. Smith was a great coach, but I think MJ would have been a great NBA player with or without Coach Smith.
Last edited by JimBD; 04-30-2010 at 01:14 PM.
How exactly does this affect Duke? High School players aren't idiots. Cal has done a great job at producing NBA point guards. When was the last time Coach K and Cal went hard after the same point guard recurit? Right now, the only player with offers from Duke and UK is QMiller, who projects as a NBA small forward. Currently, the following people play SF in the NBA who played for Cal: CDR and Joey Dorsey; for K: Grant Hill, Corey Maggette, Mike Dunleavy, and Luol Deng. If a recruit were to look at a track record for a coach's NBA alum, he will look at his own position. If Miller chooses UK, it won't be because Derrick Rose and Tyreke Evans won ROY. If Duke were to suddenly throw their hat into the ring with one-and-done point guards, I will start worrying about that.
There is a big difference between what Syarcuse did and What UK is trying to do. Both teams had 8 players average over 12 mpg. For UK, 5 of those players had never played a college basketball game before the season (technically only 4 were Freshman, but Dodson had never played before despite technically being a sophomore). Syracuse only had 3 such players (also one who had previously red shirted). Each team had 4 players average at least 10 ppg. UK had 3 freshman in this group, Syracuse only had 2. Guys before the one-and-done rule (and sever guys after) are inaccurately lumped in with certain true one-and-done players. There is a difference between the guys who only stepped on campus because they had to (Wall and Cousins) and the whole world knew that they would be gone after one year during their high school recruitment, and guys who were going to college no matter what and became a one-and-done after the fact because of stellar play ('Melo and Bledsoe). Having a freshman or two play a major role or even lead a championship team is nothing new and very few doubt the potential success of such a team, but there has never been a team made up of nearly all freshman who have gone on to win a title. This is the type of team that most doubt. I certainly think that it is possible that this type of team could win a title one day, but I think that it is very unlikely and I would never pick such a team to win until after I see one do it first.
Touche, but it's not shaping up to happen again anytime soon. That situation rose more out of need than want anyway (not that we didn't want him, but we didn't want him from day 1), hence Duke getting into the game until really late on that one. If Coach K had his choice, he would likely never again go after the same pg's as Cal anyway, that was more of my point.
We were interested in Brandon Knight. They were interested in Kyrie Irving. UK and Duke often go for similar PGs.
And, btw, it should be noted that Brandon Knight is really, really smart. He has a very strong PGA (higher than Barnes, "The Golden Child," from what I've heard). Just saying...
Criticism may not be agreeable, but it is necessary. It fulfils the same function as pain in the human body. It calls attention to an unhealthy state of things. - Winston Churchill
President of the "Nolan Smith Should Have His Jersey in The Rafters" Club