Recruiting is an art, not a science

[Jumbo]

This was a thread I wanted to start anyway, but in light of Taylor King’s transfer, I thought it was particularly fitting now. My thoughts are more broad-based, though, so I didn’t think it fit that thread well. And I still owe Gary a response, so I’ll post it here when I get a chance.

At last count, that thread had more than 300 responses and plenty of bickering. But what most of the posts had in common was an implicit desire to view recruiting through some sort of scientific or business model. Sadly, it doesn’t work that way. People have wondered why we’ve lost players. Why we haven’t landed others. Why some haven’t improved. Why our roster size has fluctuated. The answer is really simple: We’re dealing with kids. And they’re not just any kids; they’re all high-achievers.

To recap, we got one combined year out of Livingston, Deng and Humphries, leaving us with an incredibly short-handed roster in 2004-05. So Coach K made a conscious decision to use more of our scholarships. We discussed that at length on the DBR, and we ALL said at the time that a likely byproduct would be periodic transfers.

In the thread about Taylor King, one poster questioned the idea of his being a safety valve behind Kyle Singler. I don’t think K viewed him that way. I’m sure K thought King, just like everyone else, would have a chance to compete for playing time. But the fact that he also served a different purpose couldn’t be considered a bad thing.

The problem is that next year, Duke was scheduled to have 12 scholarship players. And 12 simply does not divide into 200 available minutes nicely, especially when you have three potentially elite players (Singler, Scheyer and Henderson) plus a four-year starter at PG (Paulus). None of the 12 kids want or expect to sit. But someone has to. And sometimes, a kid will decide that’s not good enough, and he’ll leave. Or kids will leave for other reasons – because they are kids. That’s okay. That was part of the plan. Duke wanted to have enough players to be able to deal with attrition of every type.

But that’s where the art comes in. How do you find guys like Nick Horvath, Casey Sanders or Lee Melchionni, who adjust to any role? And when you look for those guys, how do you make sure they are actually good enough to play? How do you find guys with the skills to be elite players, but also a willingness to stick around for at least a couple of years? How do you make sure they can handle Duke’s academic load, get along with each other and react to K’s demanding nature? There are so many variables, and then you have to consider the following: Kids are committing earlier than ever. Coaches are forced to evaluate these guys at 15 and 16. Think about that for second! These kids are still immature when they are in college; now picture any teenager you know. We’re expecting teenagers to make perfect decisions, and our staff to make perfect decisions about them?

Of course not. There will be mistakes in evaluation, mistakes in development, mistakes by the kids themselves. We’ve had hits and misses for decades, just like other programs. That will not change. That’s why this is an art, not a science. And this art form is constantly evolving. K has changed his recruiting strategy many times, and he might be in the process of doing so again. But the one aspect of science you can apply to these strategies is that each will cause anticipated reactions. If you bring in a lot of kids like Favors, you risk a) more one-and-done departures b) a lack of veteran stars and c) sufficient depth. Conversely, if you bring in more multi-year players and try to fill at least 11 scholarships (if not all 13), you are going to have attrition. Very few kids that Duke targets will be willing to sit for four years, or even sit for two years and see how years three and four go, because they are used to being stars and have been told how great they are their whole lives. That’s the nature of the beast.

It’s critical to remember this. No matter what strategy we employ, disappointment is somewhat inevitable in this sport. Someone mentioned that people tend to remember the $10 they lose more than the $15 they win. And that’s even more true in a game defined by a tournament where 64 of 65 teams lose their final game. I struggle with these emotions as much as anyone. It hurt to lose to WVU. It hurt to lose Taylor King. It hurts to let your mind wander and start to question the future.

So, I think the only way to survive as a college hoops fan is to force yourself to place things in the appropriate perspective, which would not include freaking out when last year’s 10th man decides to transfer from a team that should have 11 scholarship players next year. Otherwise, college basketball just stops being fun. As Tony Soprano would tell us, we’ve got to remember the good times. And then we need to have enough faith to know that more will be on the way, even with various speed bumps that jolt us more than they should.

[Clipsfan]

Nicely said. I think that another point which people haven't mentioned as much is that we're just now going to be settling down to the point where we'll have solid-to-great upper classmen on our team. It makes a large difference to have juniors and seniors who have not only been through it all multiple times but have had the chance to continue to develop both physically and mentally. Those tough losses of personnel 3-5 years ago have led to our current situation, but it looks like we're going to have solid players of the 3-4 year variety leading our team going forward. Our down years while adjusting were 22-11 and 28-6. That's really not all that bad, even for the program that many have considered the epitome of college basketball over the past 20+ years. On top of it all, I really like rooting for the guys as individuals. It's great to be able to say that.

[freedevil]

So, I think the only way to survive as a college hoops fan is to force yourself to place things in the appropriate perspective, which would not include freaking out when last year’s 10th man decides to transfer from a team that should have 11 scholarship players next year.

If that's not a "nice gratuitous insult," then I don't know what is.

As for the rest, I don't disagree with much. Obviously recruiting is not a science by any means. But perhaps posters should stop flouting how incredibly selective Duke is in the recruiting process in terms of who it will offer a scholarship, given that even that selectivity (if you will) is by no means perfect. So, when random posters suggest, "Hey, why aren't we recruiting 'X'" - maybe people should not electronically slap them with a high and mighty answer about Duke's standards for recruiting.

[Clipsfan]

For the whole season, he did average the 9th most minutes of any player on the team, which would suggest that calling him the 10th player is an insult. However, I have to assume that the fact that his average minutes declined from roughly 12.6/game for the first 20 games to 5.6/game over the last 14 would suggest that he was moving down the depth chart.

In contrast, McClure, the 10th player by overall average minutes, went from 10.7 to 7.6 over the same span. The players towards the bottom of the order all took a hit later in the season, but King suffered the most and was the 10th player in the depth order at the end of the season.

I say this from a purely minutes/numbers basis, not from anything else.

[BCGroup]

It’s critical to remember this. No matter what strategy we employ, disappointment is somewhat inevitable in this sport. Someone mentioned that people tend to remember the $10 they lose more than the $15 they win. And that’s even more true in a game defined by a tournament where 64 of 65 teams lose their final game. I struggle with these emotions as much as anyone. It hurt to lose to WVU. It hurt to lose Taylor King. It hurts to let your mind wander and start to question the future.

Our brains are wired in ways that we remember the negatives more than the positives. I could pull the research on that, but for a quick link, I found this:
Why do we remember negative events?

Whenever emotions are activated, especially strong emotions, the information or experience is entrenched into memory. Often times we tend to dwell on it, thereby rehearsing it and entrenching it even further. It is also easier to recall negative memories when we are in a bad mood. Why? Because we remember things in the state that we learned them so whenever you are feeling angry you will more easily recall other situations in which you were angry.
http://www.world-mysteries.com/sci_memory1.htm

[Wander]

I think the question that people want addressed isn't "Why are players transferring out of Duke" but rather "Why are players transferring out of Duke recently at a higher rate than other elite programs like UNC, UCLA, Kansas, etc?"

I'm not really taking a side here (DO we have a higher transfer rate than those schools recently? I honestly don't know), but I'd say that's the relevant question.

[JasonEvans]

If that's not a "nice gratuitous insult," then I don't know what is.

Ummm, actually, it was a fact. Or it was at least close to a fact. In terms of minutes played (which is a pretty solid measure, I'd say) Taylor King was 9th on Duke, just a fraction of a minute ahead of David McClure (and McClure was playing more than King at the end of the season). I have a hard time seeing how you could call King anything but the 9th or 10th man.

-Jason "Jumbo's post was fabulous perspective, IMO" Evans

[MarkD83]

I looked at the UNC roster for this year and give you my thoughts.

There are 17 players on the UNC roster.

Eight play all or most of the minutes. Frasor is hurt making 9 players.

The players on the rest of the roster are all from North Carolina. I know that some of them are scholarship players (at least Graves and Copeland) and some walk-ons, but none of them are going to be homesick and most of them probably grew up as UNC fans.

So UNC has great players but is not 10-11 deep so playing time is not an issue.

[BD80]

Recruiting is an art, not a science

Amen.

However, there is a science to succeeding, and we have one of the best trained coaches in the world in that respect. Coach K studied at West Point, which has trained some of the best leaders in history. Many will scoff, but West Point is still an elite educational institution, and the training is perfect for coaches. Army officers learn how to recruit and train soldiers and to plan the best use of their resources - logistics. They learn back-up and contingency plans. Any wonder Coach K is associated with our business school?

Coach K is an "artist" in being able to forge personal relationships - his manner of recruiting - but has the "science" of being a master of his resources. I am anxious to celebrate his next success.

I don't see Taylor King as a failure, just as a experiment that didn't succeed. Taylor did not immediately "click" and apparently wasn't happy with his role as 10th man or his chances of PT over the next several years. It was worth the scholarship last year to see if Taylor would reach his potential at Duke or be a solid bench contributor. We didn't pass over any "hot" recruit to get Taylor. Taylor wants to leave, let us wish him well and move on. This gives Coach K another "resource" - a scholarship - let's see what he does. Taylor wasn't the answer to our perceived weakness in the low post (although I think Lance and Zoub as upperclassmen will make it one of our strengths) - now we have more options.

[keithg]

Thoughts on the Carolina argument:

It was thought of almost universally this year that Duke was deeper than Carolina...

but when we go to play them in Cameron, we use 5 players for 15 minutes or more...they use 7.

Perhaps they have less players transfer because their style of play and coaching philosophy cultivates the development of a bench even at the expense of losing a particular game.

I think Coach K has always been more comfortable with going to each battle with his best soliders sometimes losing sight of the war.

[MarkD83]

I guess my point about UNC is/was that there are really only 8 players on their team this year that expect to play major minutes. Frasor is hurt and the other 8 players may just be happy to wear a UNC uniform.

[moonpie23]

i'm in the music business, and i've always used the analogy that being a rock band and being successful is very akin to being a successful basketball team. there are a ton of talented musicians out there, but finding them, getting them to work together and having the right combination at the right time against the right competition is incredibly difficult.


you can scout them, speculate about their future ability to handle all the OTHER parts of the music business, but there are no guarantees.

aside from the "talent" part, the dynamic of working as a team, along with the various "assistant coaches", there are always wild cards and sometimes, it just doesn't work out...


additionally, in the music business, when the team (band) succeeds, THEY ARE GREAT!...when the team (band) fails, fire the manager (coach). I mean, how could they (manager or coach) have SO much talent and NOT win...?

[dw0827]

But that’s where the art comes in. How do you find guys like Nick Horvath, Casey Sanders or Lee Melchionni, who adjust to any role? And when you look for those guys, how do you make sure they are actually good enough to play? How do you find guys with the skills to be elite players, but also a willingness to stick around for at least a couple of years? How do you make sure they can handle Duke’s academic load, get along with each other and react to K’s demanding nature? There are so many variables, and then you have to consider the following: Kids are committing earlier than ever. Coaches are forced to evaluate these guys at 15 and 16. Think about that for second! These kids are still immature when they are in college; now picture any teenager you know. We’re expecting teenagers to make perfect decisions, and our staff to make perfect decisions about them?

To me, those are what I call character guys. Others call them glue guys. How do you find them? Well, how do you judge the character of a person whose character is being formed before our very eyes? These are 16, 17 18 year old kids we are trying to recruit. And trying to judge their character . . . well, good luck.

The answer? Look to the family. That is probably the best indicator of what kind of character a kid is going to have. And that is exactly what Coach K does. I've heard innumerable stories about how Coach K looks to the family connections and roles and relationships to gauge a potential recruit.

Yep, measuring bounce, lateral movement, and so on can be very scientific. But judging the heart and soul of a kid? You're right, Jumbo. Pure art. And a bit of magic.

[Jumbo]

If that's not a "nice gratuitous insult," then I don't know what is.

As for the rest, I don't disagree with much. Obviously recruiting is not a science by any means. But perhaps posters should stop flouting how incredibly selective Duke is in the recruiting process in terms of who it will offer a scholarship, given that even that selectivity (if you will) is by no means perfect. So, when random posters suggest, "Hey, why aren't we recruiting 'X'" - maybe people should not electronically slap them with a high and mighty answer about Duke's standards for recruiting.

Huh? How is that an insult? Taylor King finished the year as Duke's 10th man. It's not judgmental -- it's a fact. The five starters played ahead of him down the stretch, add did Scheyer, Smith, Zoubek and McClure.

I also don't know who is talking about "selectivity" in any sense other than the fact that a) there are a number of kids Duke just can't touch academically and b) there are certain kids K won't touch because of their character. So when someone wildly suggets Duke chase a certain recruit based on nothing but some website's rankings, it comes off as naive and doesn't consider dozens of other factors -- many of which I mentioned in my original post.

I always detested it when people said "Coach K doesn't have to recruit, he selects" during Duke's unbelieveable recruiting stretch from, say, 1998-2004. It was an enormous overstatement and unfair. If that's what you mean by "selecting," I agree. But if you mean that Duke doesn't consider of variety of factors and is actually willing to recruit every kid out there, then I would have to say that you're quite wrong.

[Jumbo]

I think the question that people want addressed isn't "Why are players transferring out of Duke" but rather "Why are players transferring out of Duke recently at a higher rate than other elite programs like UNC, UCLA, Kansas, etc?"

I'm not really taking a side here (DO we have a higher transfer rate than those schools recently? I honestly don't know), but I'd say that's the relevant question.

I still have to do the research that Gary wants, but I know off the top of my head that Kansas has had a bigger transfer problem in recent years. David Padgett, C.J. Giles, J.R. Giddens and Micah Downs come to mind immediately. Those are as many transfers as Duke has lost, and they are better players.

[Wander]

Ah that's right. I thought Kansas might be one of them, but I forgot about Padgett who's way way way better than any recent Duke transfer.

[xblade]

Ah that's right. I thought Kansas might be one of them, but I forgot about Padgett who's way way way better than any recent Duke transfer.

And, though certainly not an elite program, but I think Colorado had 4 players transfer in one year a couple of years ago. Wake Forest also had 4, and Wichita State had 3 during the same time frame. Drew Lavender transferred out of Oklahoma. Here is a list of transfers during the 2006-2007 season:

http://collegebasketball.rivals.com/...asp?CID=667122

Take a look at our transfers and you'll see that almost all of them transferred to lesser programs where they were almost guaranteed to get more playing time without having to work for it, and without the pressure of big time college basketball like you have at schools like Duke, UNC, etc.

As long as it's the bench players who contribute little that are transferring, I'm okay with it. I'll let the Duke haters get all worked up about it if they want, but they don't get to define my reality. When the starters and other main players start transferring is when I'll start worrying.

[Regenman]

Again, the flippancy of stating that those that left didn't succeed anywhere is somewhat two-faced. If they weren't good enough to succeed at their next "lesser" institution, that brings up the question of why they even registered on our radar to begin with. It's not merely the fact that recruiting is an art, it's why we're finger-painting with some of these kids. You can't have it both ways.

As for Coach Self, maybe he's had more successful kids leave his program, but considering the depth he had this season, that's no problem. The point is that even the kids that left are good.

Same with Barnes' two transfers (Williams to Cincy (got hurt) and Dowell to Houston (good year).

As for the negative aspects of this season. It's not losing in the round of 32 that disturbed people, it was going 6-5 after going 22-1. Perhaps folks actually scouted us and figured it out? We'll see next season.

This is like the liberal patriotism question. Just because we question what's going doesn't mean we hate America. Really...

[xblade]

I think the question that people want addressed isn't "Why are players transferring out of Duke" but rather "Why are players transferring out of Duke recently at a higher rate than other elite programs like UNC, UCLA, Kansas, etc?"

I'm not really taking a side here (DO we have a higher transfer rate than those schools recently? I honestly don't know), but I'd say that's the relevant question.

It's not really that complicated. As we were reminded during every ball game, Duke has 8 McDonald's All Americans on their team, more than any team in the country I think, and guess what? They all want 30 minutes a game, and a couple of them think the minutes are owed to them versus them earning them.

And another thing to keep in mind too: When our underclassmen turn pro early, for some reason it's an indictment of the program, but when kids at other schools go pro early, it's seen as just the way things are these days. For example, when Deng left after a year, some folks were saying he left early because K was ruining his game, he hated Duke, etc. When Marvin Williams left UNC after a year, he was making a wise decision because he was too talented for the college game, he was a lottery pick, etc.

Bottom line, a lot of the rhetoric out there about Duke basketball is put out by people who hate Duke basketball. Don't buy into their version of how things should be just because Duke and Coach K don't march to the beat of their drummer. I'm certainly not going to let Duke haters tell me how many transfers is too many.

[xblade]

Again, the flippancy of stating that those that left didn't succeed anywhere is somewhat two-faced. If they weren't good enough to succeed at their next "lesser" institution, that brings up the question of why they even registered on our radar to begin with. It's not merely the fact that recruiting is an art, it's why we're finger-painting with some of these kids. You can't have it both ways.

As for Coach Self, maybe he's had more successful kids leave his program, but considering the depth he had this season, that's no problem. The point is that even the kids that left are good.

Same with Barnes' two transfers (Williams to Cincy (got hurt) and Dowell to Houston (good year).

As for the negative aspects of this season. It's not losing in the round of 32 that disturbed people, it was going 6-5 after going 22-1. Perhaps folks actually scouted us and figured it out? We'll see next season.

This is like the liberal patriotism question. Just because we question what's going doesn't mean we hate America. Really...

As for your original question, that's simple: in the real world, there are no guarantees. If there were, no school would ever get players that don't live up to expectations.