Who Stays and Who Goes

[bluedevilwildcats]

This is where I am too. I'd be shocked if we bring in any rotation players from the portal. We are loaded with 5* talent at every position.

We've moved past "5* talent" as the measuring stick, just ask Kentucky, or look at NC State's roster and tonight's box score. It's now free agency, and until Congress passes legislation (lol), you either recruit impact players out of the portal when you have gaps, or you fall behind. Our recruiting remains elite but it's not enough anymore, and keeping players multiple years is now iffy. If they can act like free agents every year, we have no other choice but to play that game.

[Dukerulz]

I hope he’s Duke’s Primary next year.

[SkyBrickey]

We've moved past "5* talent" as the measuring stick, just ask Kentucky, or look at NC State's roster and tonight's box score. It's now free agency, and until Congress passes legislation (lol), you either recruit impact players out of the portal when you have gaps, or you fall behind. Our recruiting remains elite but it's not enough anymore, and keeping players multiple years is now iffy. If they can act like free agents, then we need to find our own.

I'm glad Jon is our coach and not you. If you want studs like Foster, Power, Stewart, K2, Ngongba to stick around and star as juniors and seniors then you can't bring portal transfers on top of them. Loyalty cuts both ways.

[dhuff]

Roach, Proctor, Foster, Stewart, Power, Evans, Flagg, Maluach

That's an 8-man bada** rotation.

K2, Harris, Schutt, Ngongba and either Blakes or Reeves fill out the roster.

I would expect maybe one of Roach, Proctor or Foster, with my hope still being Proctor even after tonight. Don't forget about Kon who I expect to play a ton next year. Reports were they had already reached out to a guard in the portal, so they must know something.

[WHOneedsSOX]

I disagree with this. We'll see what Jon does. I think we'll be a clear Final Four favorite next year with the incoming freshmen and returnees. And I think we'll be a clear Final Four favorite the following year with the Boozer boys and returnees. Instead of this-year-or-bust, let's go for every-year.

I thought Duke was a long shot for the Boozer twins?

I was pleasantly shocked Proctor, Mitchell, and Flip came back this season. Hopefully shocked again.

[lotusland]

I don’t think Duke is going change its transfer credit policy just for the benefit of athletes. So it may prove difficult to to get upper-classmen transfers, especially without a redshirt year to catch up.

[bluedevilwildcats]

I'm glad Jon is our coach and not you. If you want studs like Foster, Power, Stewart, K2, Ngongba to stick around and star as juniors and seniors then you can't bring portal transfers on top of them. Loyalty cuts both ways.

Ha, ha, I'm glad about that as well.

If your strategy is to wait 3 years for players to (hopefully) be studs, I don't think that makes sense anymore. We can't afford a bench of unproductive guys (which we always seem to have), and they may very well just transfer anyway, and then what would your strategy be if you refuse to Portal?

[SkyBrickey]

Ha, ha, I'm glad about that as well.

If your strategy is to wait 3 years for players to (hopefully) be studs, I don't think that makes sense anymore. We can't afford a bench of unproductive guys (which we always seem to have), and they may very well just transfer anyway, and then what would your strategy be if you refuse to Portal?

We've got 12 5* players with eligibility next year. We are LOADED. Several will leave. But we are getting older. Jon has a plan and is executing on it. We are in the transition. Keeping all of Foster, Power, Stewart this offseason would be a huge step in the plan. All should come back as All-ACC starters as juniors.

I don't expect him to disrupt the plan and bring rotation players in from the portal. But maybe I'm wrong. We will see.

[freshmanjs]

We've got 12 5* players with eligibility next year. We are LOADED. Several will leave. But we are getting older. Jon has a plan and is executing on it. We are in the transition. Keeping all of Foster, Power, Stewart this offseason would be a huge step in the plan. All should come back as All-ACC starters as juniors.

I don't expect him to disrupt the plan and bring rotation players in from the portal. But maybe I'm wrong. We will see.

Getting older? We may not have any returning players older than sophomores. We will have 6 freshman out of our top 10 players. We are very possibly getting younger, not older next year.

[uh_no]

I'm glad Jon is our coach and not you. If you want studs like Foster, Power, Stewart, K2, Ngongba to stick around and star as juniors and seniors then you can't bring portal transfers on top of them. Loyalty cuts both ways.

I think this is a false dichotomy. You don't need every player to stick around and star as a junior and senior, and some amount of portal activity won't deter players who are looking to star from sticking around (or shouldn't).

You can build a team around your returning players by filling gaps in the portal without "bringing in transfers on top of them."

Does this mean there is less room for hot-shot one and done freshmen? Yep. But we have mounting evidence that one-and-done hole-plugging transfers are the better bet anyway. The past two uconn teams and baylor 2 years before that are examples of doing just this.

IMO duke shouldn't be looking at these moster 6-7 person recruiting classes we've become accostomed to and needs to be more discriminating knowing there are likely bigger, stronger, hungrier, more experienced, college-tested players who they can get in the portal.

[bluedevilwildcats]

I think this is a false dichotomy. You don't need every player to stick around and star as a junior and senior, and some amount of portal activity won't deter players who are looking to star from sticking around (or shouldn't).

You can build a team around your returning players by filling gaps in the portal with "bringing in transfers on top of them."

Does this mean there is less room for hot-shot one and done freshmen? Yep. But we have mounting evidence that one-and-done hole-plugging transfers are the better bet anyway. The past two uconn teams and baylor 2 years before that are examples of doing just this.

IMO duke shouldn't be looking at these monster 6-7 person recruiting classes we've become accustomed to and needs to be more discriminating knowing there are likely bigger, stronger, hungrier, more experienced, college-tested players who they can get in the portal.

Well apparently I spork you too often, so I just corrected a couple of your misspellings. :-)

But I think this is really smart and points to the direction we should aim for.

[gumbomoop]

It’s not as if the topic of this thread began tonight. We’ve been speculating for weeks, because we’re fanatics for Duke bball. In part, this new thread itself, while an irritant to some, is grief therapy for others. Logically, perhaps morally, we should not grieve losing even an important game. But we do. It’s pathetic. We’re pathetic. Bball fanaticism is pathetic. I’m guilty.

Just for now, this post, I’ll focus only on next season’s PG possibilities. As the incoming class includes no PG, who stays/goes among Roach, Proctor, and Foster is a major issue. (I ignore Blakes here, as he’s no PG.)

Although a week or so back, most of us assumed Foster would surely return, that doesn’t seem certain now. My guess — guess — is that Foster is unlikely to return if Proctor returns. Although I’ve little doubt that they could log major minutes on the court together, I’d guess both see themselves as future NBA PGs. Foster surely wants to start (somewhere) at PG, and cannot be assured of doing so if Proctor returns. Otoh, if Proctor declares, I’d be really surprised to see Foster transfer. I doubt Foster’s decision depends at all on whether Roach returns. I’ll guess Proctor’s decision does not depend on what either Foster or Roach does.

Roach’s return would threaten neither Proctor nor Foster, as he seems comfortable as a combo-mostly-2-guard. But in the (unlikely?) event that both Proctor and Foster leave, a possibly returning Jeremy would be the PG.

Returning any 2 of those 3 would pretty much fill Duke’s PG slot. Returning only 1 would be a sticky prospect, as by default Knueppel becomes the backup PG.

All 3 leave? Until recently, unthinkable, mainly because the #1 class, Flagg/Maluach, etc., doesn’t include a PG. It would be unsettling, perplexing in the extreme, if none of Proctor, Foster, or Roach wanted to lead next year’s team.

[FosterCoachK82]

And before that was Kyrie

Who didn’t play much.

[chi]

I mean, can we wait a day or two... please?

I agree Jason, or even a couple more days .

[dlmzzz]

Surely K2 and Harris don’t “expect to play” in year 1.

K2? You're saying that a 5 star recruit who led his high school team to an undefeated season expects to not play?

[tommy]

I can tell you for a fact that the Foster family has not made any decisions about next year yet.

[burnspbesq]

Reminder:

Nobody.

Knows.

Anything.

It will play put how it plays out, and everyone who has confidently predicted What Will Absolutely Happen will be absolutely wrong.

[Mtn.Devil.91.92.01.10.15]

Duke will be active in the portal too.

But I've been assured that getting experienced players through the portal is completely unfair to other teams.

Why would we follow this amoral path?

/s

[Mtn.Devil.91.92.01.10.15]

Reminder:

Nobody.

Knows.

Anything.

It will play put how it plays out, and everyone who has confidently predicted What Will Absolutely Happen will be absolutely wrong.

Yeah. This is a hilarious thread at this point. We have some folx who are saying that we absolutely need or should expect players to transfer our because we don't have enough seats on the bus for everyone.

Then we have people who say we need to scour the transfer portal for some halfway decent and experienced talent.

How can both of these things be true?

Are we going to lose EVERYONE off this team (because there's not room), replace them with six new guys, then go find portal pieces that fit alongside?

Because that sounds insane.

I'll wait at least a week or two and see how this all starts to sort itself out. There's an awful lot of very salty posters in the board today. Which I understand.

[JasonEvans]

Surely K2 and Harris don’t “expect to play” in year 1.

K2 is a consensus top 20 recruit who was being recruited to be a starter and featured star at places like Wisconsin and UVA. And you think he isn't coming to Duke expecting to play?!?! Let's be clear -- Kon is a higher rated recruit than Caleb Foster was a year ago (I know recruiting rankings are not perfect).

Harris, who won the MVP award at the Peach Jam this past spring, may be a bit more of a developmental guy -- he's only ranked in the top 50 and isn't going to be an explosive athlete nor a guy who beats you off the dribble from day one -- but I would expect him to fight to carve out minutes as a designated shooter. Then again, I thought Power would do the same and he barely scratched the rotation (and is now at least somewhat likely to leave to find playing time elsewhere).