Originally Posted by
devil84
Well, maybe it IS time. I've highlighted in red the available numbers for incoming freshmen next year. I didn't highlight 00, as you can only have either 0 or 00, not both on the roster at one time. Given that the rumor is that K doesn't like 0/00 or 1 (Kyrie notwithstanding), and most players don't like 13 or the "big" numbers of 50+ (sometimes even 40+), that leaves the incoming frosh to choose from 5, 30, 34, 41, 42, and 45, unless they can take a number off of a current player's back.
Imagine talking to a recruit. "Hey Coach, can I have my high school number?" "Sorry, son. It's retired. So is the number that's half of it, and double it. And reversed*. You've got these six, maybe eight, numbers to choose from -- more if you like the 50's." And the coach is thinking, "Please, please, please don't figure out that if you play with this number for 3-4 years and become the super stud we think you are, we can't really retire many more jersey numbers." *I understand 22 reversed is still 22, but others have reversed their number for such dilemmas.
Here's a thought experiment: imagine that we had retired Kyle Singler's and Nolan Smith's jerseys. And maybe we can retire, say, Mason Plumlee's jersey. That means there are only 3-5 "good" numbers left. Hmmm...now how are we going to retire some current or future player's jersey?
Believe me, I really want those numbers to remain unworn and in the rafters forever. But we can't keep retiring numbers and having available numbers that are attractive for our future stars to wear. Remember, these recruits are teenagers. Things like available numbers are important to them. If everything else is equal, and the other schools in the mix have that available number, would that play into a teenager's mind?
I wish I had a solution. Changing the semantics to "honored" jerseys hung in Cameron, then figuring out what to rename the Hall of Honor sounds like the best way to do that.