Lance is committed to Duke

[rthomas]

http://www.nj.com/columns/ledger/pol...550.xml&coll=1

Nice article on Lance Thomas and speculation on a possible transfer. Lance says no. He is committed to being a Dukie and loves everything about Duke except that he wants to get better and make Duke better.

[RepoMan]

Nice article. Everthing I have heard LT say suggests that he is a determined hard-worker who will stick it out and do everything he can to improve at Duke. I expect a solid career at Duke, with Lance providing valuable leadership to a championship contender in 2 years.

[Dukefan4Life]

I guess time will tell how good lance can be for us. I think with an offseason of weights and developing inside game he could be huge for us! id like to see him come back

[duke03]

If Lance is going to become a factor, he's going to have to stop averaging one foul for every 5.5625 minutes he plays.

[Troublemaker]

Good to hear. Here's how he may be able to get minutes in the coming seasons...

2008:
Paulus, Smith
Scheyer, Pocius
Henderson, Nelson
Singler (30 min), McClure (10 min), King (0 min)
Zoubek (20 min), Thomas (20 min)

2009:
Paulus, Smith
Scheyer, Pocius
Henderson, McClure
Singler (30 min), Thomas(10 min), King (0 min)
Monroe (25 min), Zoubek (15 min)

2010:
Smith, 2009 PG
Scheyer, 2009 SG
Henderson
Thomas (30 min), King (10 min), 2009 PF
Zoubek (30 min), 2009 C

Lance's toughest time getting minutes will be his junior year.

[JasonEvans]

If Lance is going to become a factor, he's going to have to stop averaging one foul for every 5.5625 minutes he plays.

Well, he would still be available 23 minutes a game at that pace

If, as many big men do, Lance shows improvement in his freshman to soph seasons then I expect big things out of him. The kid has amazing defensive instincts. If he can figure out a way to be more dangerous on offense, he is going to play a major role in Duke's future.

The transfer rumors, from what I hear, were never coming from Lance but were the product of some misguided folks back home who expected Lance to play more from day one.

-Jason "if we get some scoring out of our '5th starter' in the next few weeks then the season will last a few weeks longer " Evans

[OZZIE4DUKE]

Good to hear. Here's how he may be able to get minutes in the coming seasons...

2008:
Paulus, Smith
Scheyer, Pocius
Henderson, Nelson
Singler (30 min), McClure (10 min), King (0 min)
Zoubek (20 min), Thomas (20 min)

No McRoberts? No Patterson? You pessimist!

As Lance develops he will get plenty of minutes.

[SoCalDukeFan]

The minutes analysis is very premature.

We could get Patterson and McRoberts could stay.

Singler and King could play one of outside positions as well.

SoCal

[Bob Green]

Lance Thomas has the potential to be very good. Take a look at his Freshman numbers and compared them to Al Thornton's Freshman numbers:

L. Thomas 14.8 minutes/4 points/2.4 rebounds

A. Thornton 7.9 minutes/2.8 points/1.8 rebounds

Sometimes fans (including myself) are guilty of expecting everyone to produce immediately. I believe LT has the potential to develop into a 1st Team All-ACC performer. He is approximately the same size as Thornton and his Freshman numbers are better than Thornton's numbers. As many posters have said over and over - patience is required.

Bob Green
Yokosuka, Japan

[duke03]

If he can figure out a way to be more dangerous on offense, he is going to play a major role in Duke's future.

This is undoubtedly true, but it's also the exact same thing that was said about Shavlik and Casey Sanders, to name two. Both were foul machines, and neither one seemed to be able to find his groove offensively.

Moreover, K doesn't have the best track record (at least recently) of developing guys who don't play much early on. With King and Singler playing roughly the same role as Lance, history would suggest that they will get every opportunity to get minutes before Lance will. For the past several seasons, the only guys who really saw a material increase in minutes that I can think of are Melchionni last season and Casey his senior year, and both were really due to necessity more than anything else -- the same reason why Zoubek will likely get minutes next year if McRoberts leaves.

[DukeBlood]

Lance Thomas has the potential to be very good. Take a look at his Freshman numbers and compared them to Al Thornton's Freshman numbers:

L. Thomas 14.8 minutes/4 points/2.4 rebounds

A. Thornton 7.9 minutes/2.8 points/1.8 rebounds

Sometimes fans (including myself) are guilty of expecting everyone to produce immediately. I believe LT has the potential to develop into a 1st Team All-ACC performer. He is approximately the same size as Thornton and his Freshman numbers are better than Thornton's numbers. As many posters have said over and over - patience is required.

Bob Green
Yokosuka, Japan

Nice find on Thorton minutes.

Not sure if he will ever turn out that good, But we can hope !

[Troublemaker]

No McRoberts? No Patterson? You pessimist!

As Lance develops he will get plenty of minutes.

Everyone's a pessimist compared to you Ozzie. There are some people "in the know" who would predict the same.

[Troublemaker]

The minutes analysis is very premature.

We could get Patterson and McRoberts could stay.

Singler and King could play one of outside positions as well.

SoCal

Well, any minutes analysis could be premature because situations can change. In a thread dealing with Lance's future contribution, I think it's relevant to see how he may be able to attain minutes in the coming seasons. And I don't believe Singler and King will ever play more than spot minutes at the 1, 2, or 3 because of the roster structure. We have a lot of guards that are going to get minutes as well.

[phaedrus]

With King and Singler playing roughly the same role as Lance, history would suggest that they will get every opportunity to get minutes before Lance will.

not to say that their presence won't limit lance's minutes, but i don't think either king or singler's role will be at all similar to lance's. they are both perimeter-oriented players, no (at least for bigger guys)?

[Clipsfan]

not to say that their presence won't limit lance's minutes, but i don't think either king or singler's role will be at all similar to lance's. they are both perimeter-oriented players, no (at least for bigger guys)?

King is definitely a perimeter oriented guy, and while Singler can take it outside I'm hoping that he'll hang out aroung the basket as well. I think that their ability to play outside will actually be a reason that they may limit Lance's minutes even more, as they'll probably be guarding the same sorts of players, but they'll be able to provide more versatility on the offensive end. We won't be able to really guess defensive assignments until we see what Patterson and McRoberts choose to do, not to mention until we see whether Zoubek puts on some weight and grows into his body more. However, at this time, it appears that the 1-3 will be occupied by people not named Lance, so he'll be competing for time at the 4 (mainly) and 5 (hopefully not) against guys like Singler and King.

[Bob Green]

Good to hear. Here's how he may be able to get minutes in the coming seasons...

2008:
Paulus, Smith
Scheyer, Pocius
Henderson, Nelson
Singler (30 min), McClure (10 min), King (0 min)
Zoubek (20 min), Thomas (20 min)

2009:
Paulus, Smith
Scheyer, Pocius
Henderson, McClure
Singler (30 min), Thomas(10 min), King (0 min)
Monroe (25 min), Zoubek (15 min)

2010:
Smith, 2009 PG
Scheyer, 2009 SG
Henderson
Thomas (30 min), King (10 min), 2009 PF
Zoubek (30 min), 2009 C

Lance's toughest time getting minutes will be his junior year.

Troublemaker,

Your numbers show zero minutes for Taylor King in his Freshman and Sophomore years. I would love to hear your reasoning behind that theory. King is 6'8" and has a deadly outside shot with a quick release. He also has the ability to go inside and mix it up on the boards. I'm no expert but I enjoy following the progress of Duke recruits. In an AAU game last summer, Kevin Love got into foul trouble so T. King moved inside to the 5 spot and led the team to victory. The only knock on his game (that I've heard) is he is not the quickest player on the court. I just cannot fathom him earning no playing time his first two years at Duke. He may play a limited role as a freshman but by his Sophomore year he should be a solid member of the rotation. He can rebound and he can score!

If anyone out there knows something I don't know, please enlighten me. Thanks!

Bob Green
Yokosuka, Japan

[Troublemaker]

Troublemaker,

Your numbers show zero minutes for Taylor King in his Freshman and Sophomore years. I would love to hear your reasoning behind that theory. King is 6'8" and has a deadly outside shot with a quick release. He also has the ability to go inside and mix it up on the boards. I'm no expert but I enjoy following the progress of Duke recruits. In an AAU game last summer, Kevin Love got into foul trouble so T. King moved inside to the 5 spot and led the team to victory. The only knock on his game (that I've heard) is he is not the quickest player on the court. I just cannot fathom him earning no playing time his first two years at Duke. He may play a limited role as a freshman but by his Sophomore year he should be a solid member of the rotation. He can rebound and he can score!

If anyone out there knows something I don't know, please enlighten me. Thanks!

Bob Green
Yokosuka, Japan

King may not get literally 0 minutes, but I don't see how he gets more than 5 to 10 minutes his first two seasons. (And remember, these projections are without McRoberts or Patterson). I may be completely off -- maybe King is as good as Singler, maybe he can play center better than either Zoubek or Thomas or the "3" better than Henderson or McClure... but more than likely, I don't see him getting any more than spot minutes his first couple of seasons. There will be too many players ahead of him that are either better, more experienced, better suited to play a position, or some combination of all three. King may be a fine player but ultimately you have to divide 200 minutes somehow and Duke has a lot of fine players.

[VaDukie]

I really like Lance's potential as a player.

Here's a question I have for everyone out there: Remember how effective Lance was in the Air Force game? We got him the ball on the baseline and he would either drive to the hoop or knock down a nice midrange jumper. I think he had about 14 that game. Why don't we run similar plays for him now? He's clearly not much of a back to the basket player, but why not give him other opportunities offensively?

[watzone]

Everyone's a pessimist compared to you Ozzie. There are some people "in the know" who would predict the same.

Who would that be? Do all the insiders think the same ... that Josh is gone and we have no chance for PP? I would like to know who is in the know. A name ... a site. When you make those kind of statements it is good to include the source, unless it is double top secret

[Troublemaker]

Who would that be? Do all the insiders think the same ... that Josh is gone and we have no chance for PP? I would like to know who is in the know. A name ... a site. When you make those kind of statements it is good to include the source, unless it is double top secret

Nobody said we have "no chance" at PPat, watzone. For the purposes of projecting future rosters, I'm leaving him out since there are 4 schools involved with him. As for Josh, this same question has already been asked a couple of times in the past week (by me even), but you obviously haven't been reading the boards. There are people whose opinion/sources I trust who tell me not to be optimistic on that front. BTW, you are the last person in the universe who should lecture anyone about being cryptic, which I wasn't even trying to be.