Jabari Parker To Duke!!

[TruBlu]

Jabari is a fine young man. I will even like him some, even if he picks the wrong school. Can't say that about a some "misses".

Not saying you're wrong about him (I have no idea about him at all as a person), but I always wonder what brings people to these conclusions about a kid whom they've likely never met and likely know very little about.

Granted, I have never met him, but I hope to know more about him if/when he selects Duke. What I do know about him and my conclusion about him come from reading several glowing articles about his personal life, family, and team spirit. These articles may be totally misleading, but I have not seen any articles that would raise any questions about his character.

I have also never met Grant, Shane, and numerous other present or former Duke representatives (other than some post-game handshakes and chance meetings), but came to the same conclusion about them, even before they committed to Duke.

If you would like to get an idea about him as a person, I would suggest reading some of the articles about him as have been linked in the Jabari Parker Recruiting Thread on DBR.

[English]

Quinn and Sheed are a good start to a team, but it's asking a lot of them to do the heavy lifting for a top 5 squad. Amile, Hood, MP3, and Murphy collectively have decent upside but it's unlikely that they all become good and the stat quo is sufficient to contend.

I agree that it's far too early to tell who plays what role NEXT season, but one thing to consider--there have been numerous reports that Hood is an NBA 1st round talent who is likely to mature after being in the Duke system for two offseasons and the current season. I would tend to include him with the others as a start to the team who will do frequent heavy lifting moving forward.

[hillsborodevil]

Way too early to say with any certainty, but I don't see why we couldn't see lienups that surround Marshall Plumlee with Cook-Sulaimon-Hood-Parker or Cook-Sulaimon-Parker-Jefferson/Murphy.

Let's not forget about Andre Dawkins. With or without Parker Duke will be OK Fine...

[FerryFor50]

Thanks for posting, Debbie Downer.

debbie+downer.jpg

[lotusland]

Let's not forget about Andre Dawkins. With or without Parker Duke will be OK Fine...

and Jones and Ojeleye so even without Parker Duke is bound to be Semi-good

[BD80]

Currently I see Sheed, Quinn and Hood starting next year. Who comes off the bench if Parker comes to Duke or does Hood or Parker play the 4? It's never to early to speculate about starting lineups and MPG I'm sure Parker is a good kid who can help Duke next year but he would be a luxury at this point IMO.

Less than 5 hours until someone brought up minutes. Sigh.

Can we get someone to put together an interactive spread sheet that captures each poster's current bottomline/just numbers whimsy on minutes and updates a selectable file, and then scrubs the remainder of any post mentioning MPG to be jettisoned to another thread entitled "reasoning behind opinions on minutes" (although a few more apt names spring to mind).

Jabari makes our team better. I hope he chooses Duke.

[lotusland]

A kid with the overwhelming talent that Parker has is never a luxury. He would be central to the identity of the team and to everything it did, from Day One.

Like McBob right? I know he will help and I hope we get him but I don't think we know that he is better than Hood or Sheed at this point or that he is a better 4 than Murphy or Amile. he may be Kidd-Gilchrist or he could be HB. Either way he'll contribute but I'd trade him for a top 50 big man next year to start developing for a 4-yr career at Duke. BTW I'm not down on McRoberts but as a Frosh he was good but not great. Our Senior leaders next year are likely to be key reserves not starters so I'm not sure throwing a freshman in to be the man is a great idea. Like I said I hope we get him but I'm not sweating it.

[Turtleboy]

A guy tied in very closely with chicago hoops says on twitter hed put his money on MSU..then Cliff Alexander[whos also beign heavily recruited by msu] repsonded to him saying he agrees with him.

Doesnt mean anything definite but if two guys who know Jabari[at least im guessing] think this then there might be something too it

Well, it has been established that if it's on twitter it must be legit.

[ricks68]

Less than 5 hours until someone brought up minutes. Sigh.

Can we get someone to put together an interactive spread sheet that captures each poster's current bottomline/just numbers whimsy on minutes and updates a selectable file, and then scrubs the remainder of any post mentioning MPG to be jettisoned to another thread entitled "reasoning behind opinions on minutes" (although a few more apt names spring to mind).

Jabari makes our team better. I hope he chooses Duke.

Just give us all at least 5 minutes to think about this, O.K? (Or, maybe only 3.)

ricks68

[AAA1980]

Well, it has been established that if it's on twitter it must be legit.

Of course not but the fact that Cliff Alexander said it whos from Chicago and being recruited by MSU and is friends with Parker isnt something to totally disregard..

Id imagine he has more inside info about Jabari then the national guys making predictions who dont know Jabari at all..

[Kedsy]

I think it's difficult to envision Duke as a powerhouse next season w/o him.

Really? Even without Jabari we'll have at least two potential early entrants (Rasheed and Rodney) plus a top-flight PG (Quinn), a couple of great shooters (Matt, Andre), a few more athletic 6'6 to 6'8 types (Alex, Amile, Semi), and a seven footer (Marshall), and that's without even mentioning our two seniors (Tyler, Josh). Obviously we'll be better with Jabari than without, but that group seems pretty powerful to me.

[Kedsy]

Of course not but the fact that Cliff Alexander said it whos from Chicago and being recruited by MSU and is friends with Parker isnt something to totally disregard..

Id imagine he has more inside info about Jabari then the national guys making predictions who dont know Jabari at all..

My recollection is Kyrie Irving (who at the time at least called HB his "brother") was fairly certain Harrison Barnes was coming to Duke. If a player is trying to keep things confidential, then a fellow player probably won't know anything more than anybody else. Especially in this case when the guy presumably wants Parker to pick MSU so they can play together and therefore could very easily be indulging in wishful thinking.

We won't know until we know.

[Greg_Newton]

Terrible news (in that we now have 8 days of this).

I think we'll see a lot of people predict Duke because that's the logical choice from the outside. Supposedly they've been pretty tight with the whole recruitment though.

I'm going to try to focus on our team without him, then be pleasantly surprised if we add him in. We know we'll at least have great guard and wing play, with a lot of depth of potential versatile 4's (Jefferson, Hairston, Murphy, Ojeleye), along with a standard issue Plumlee. Plus, we should have great chemistry, as we're only adding two great kids as of now to a core group that loves each other and will have enough year together. We should also have a quickness advantage at every position, as it stands, and be very versatile defensively. Jabari can hop on if he wants!

[sporthenry]

I'm not getting happy or upset about it. As mentioned, this team still has a 1 and done type coming next year at the wing spot. Sheed coming back might be more important and Dre/Jones are drop dead shooters. As much as I'd love Parker, Marshall becoming Mason 2.0 (Miles 3.0) would be more important.

That said, can't remember the last time Duke won a big recruiting battle this late. I know we got Amile but I'm talking about the misses like TP, Barnes, Quincy Miller (although by then, I think we moved on from him), etc. I know Austin signed in November, but this was after de-committing earlier but I just feel K/Duke seem to do best with guys who sign quickly and early and I'd put Austin in that category since he was only on the open market for a little time. IIRC Sheed, Kyrie, Mason, Matt Jones all committed in their junior year and I'm sure a few recruits don't fit this, but it just seems as things get drawn out, Duke's chances go down.

[moonpie23]

he really can't go wrong between izzo and MSU or duke/k, however, i've got to think that Duke, and especially K have a slight edge on the lofty tier of where parker wants to go....

imagining him on our team next year (or as long as he wants to stay) is pretty suhWEEET...

[G man]

I think he would fit in very nicely with Duke's roster next year. Duke will have plenty of other talent to take some of the pressure off him. Kind of reminds me of the situation when Deng got to Duke. He will come in and hopefully be able to contribute like Sulaimon. Man it is great to be a Duke fan we are so spoiled. Just look at this years squad then add the possibility of next years team.

[AAA1980]

I think he would fit in very nicely with Duke's roster next year. Duke will have plenty of other talent to take some of the pressure off him. Kind of reminds me of the situation when Deng got to Duke. He will come in and hopefully be able to contribute like Sulaimon. Man it is great to be a Duke fan we are so spoiled. Just look at this years squad then add the possibility of next years team.

If he comes to Duke and lives up to anything close to expectations i think his impact will be even bigger then Sualiamons so far..

[MCFinARL]

this espn article (http://espn.go.com/chicago/mens-coll...on-december-20) mentions jabari's getting advice from isiah thomas. 2 thoughts on that:
- not first on my list of high profile folks whose advice i'd trust...
- more importantly, isiah loves bobby knight, bobby loves k, so, by the transitive property of love, isiah loves k, right?

Maybe not, but judging from the article, it looks like he was giving him pretty good advice--to consider the whole campus experience and how comfortable you feel with that, not just the gym

[BD80]

he really can't go wrong between izzo and MSU or duke/k, ...

He might not feel that way trudging through the snow during a Michigan winter ...

[licc85]

If he comes to Duke and lives up to anything close to expectations i think his impact will be even bigger then Sualiamons so far..

Jabari/Rasheed/Quinn would easily be the best 1-2-3 offensive and possibly DEFENSIVE trio in the ACC. Pretty exciting stuff.

edit: whoops, I forgot . . we have Rodney Hood next year too. Uh . . . plus Marshall, maybe the best starting 5 in the country? UK might give us a run for it if they get Andrew Wiggins but I'd take our 5 next year over anybody's. Fingers crossed for Jabari!!