2021 Transfer Portal Thread

[George]

Played two years at UNC-Asheville as well. He'll be 24 in two months.

My point is that we're going to have old players on this team, and old is a commodity. Kellan Grady will be 24 at the beginning of the season. Mintz will be 23 in June.

I don't really agree that the players have to be in the program for a long time, simply because Cal has shown that he can win with freshmen. These transfers are not on the level of some of those freshmen clearly but they are significantly older. That matters (usually).

Did Mintz announce his return?

[Joneslab]

Did Mintz announce his return?

No. May not return.

[Joneslab]

Cal has to take elite freshmen when he can get them, and I believe he can still get some of them. But, if that OAD freshman isn’t an immediate-impact guy, gimme then OAD transfer every day of the week.

Can’t know what you’re going to get until they step on the court, of course.

This is sort of the way I feel simply because there have been so many good transfers out there playing on championship teams over the last few years.

It's still not ideal because you would love a team that had guys who kind of started out raw, then grew, grew some more, and became game-changing players by their junior or senior years. That's what college basketball should be about.

But Cal can't do that. I'm just convinced he can't at this point. The genie has been out of the bottle for years. So he has to adjust some other way, and COVID gave us an absolute gift with this free agency market, as Matt calls it.

I really believe in my bones that this way can win a title. But again, it is very risky and it's absolute BS that Cal has to do it this way.

[George]

This is sort of the way I feel simply because there have been so many good transfers out there playing on championship teams over the last few years.

It's still not ideal because you would love a team that had guys who kind of started out raw, then grew, grew some more, and became game-changing players by their junior or senior years. That's what college basketball should be about.

I mean, we’ll kind of wind up with that — except they’ll have done their growing elsewhere. We just get something close to a finished product, which is fine by me if they’re the right pieces.

If we have to lose players after one season, I’d rather lose players who knew how to play from day one.

[Dwight Schrute]

Jared Butler was a consensus 1st team All-American....he was absolutely a superstar in college. NBA ranking/draftability has little to do with being an elite college player in my opinion.

You mentioned elite and NBA back, I thought you were using NBA prospect as the standard there. I agree that you can be an elite college player and not have high NBA potential.

[Joneslab]

I think a case could be made that in that game last night, Butler was the only player on the court who might be considered an "elite" player if you were making that prognostication in October 2020.

Both Gonzaga and Baylor (and programs like Villanova, etc.) have had a history of really growing players. Guys come into those programs and look radically different year to year.

Cal obviously hasn't done a whole lot of that. There's been some but not much. He has shown though a talent of getting players to gel pretty quickly into a team.

[JFCats22]

I think a case could be made that in that game last night, Butler was the only player on the court who might be considered an "elite" player if you were making that prognostication in October 2020.

Both Gonzaga and Baylor (and programs like Villanova, etc.) have had a history of really growing players. Guys come into those programs and look radically different year to year.

Cal obviously hasn't done a whole lot of that. There's been some but not much. He has shown though a talent of getting players to gel pretty quickly into a team.

Kispert and Timme were both pre-season All-Americans

[Joneslab]

Kispert and Timme were both pre-season All-Americans

Drew Timme certainly wasn't a preseason all-American in the AP unless I'm misreading the list. He averaged about 10 and 5 as a freshman.

Very solid player but in no way elite coming into this season. Kispert was an AP all-American but still, very borderline if "elite" is the standard. You could definitely argue it. I would definitely love a player like him at his size and his shooting ability but he wasn't really a takeover-the-game type. He'd scored 20+ twice in his career coming into this season.

My point is that the way we see these guys now looks so different to how we see them coming into the year. Who would've ever thought Immanuel Quickley would've been the player he became? Guy went from non-entity to a star.

[Los Gatos]

This definitely an interesting thread. While I'm a fan I don't claim to really understand the game and what it takes to win a title. However, I don't see how UK/Cal can expect to win a title using a transfer model unless he goes to a more conventional offense instead of the dribble drive. Doesn't the DD depend on the presence of the high level athletes that Cal has recruited? Don't think he will find many of those in the transfer window as they will have already declared for the draft. Seems like he will have to recruit shooters and team players.

[Joneslab]

This definitely an interesting thread. While I'm a fan I don't claim to really understand the game and what it takes to win a title. However, I don't see how UK/Cal can expect to win a title using a transfer model unless he goes to a more conventional offense instead of the dribble drive. Doesn't the DD depend on the presence of the high level athletes that Cal has recruited? Don't think he will find many of those in the transfer window as they will have already declared for the draft. Seems like he will have to recruit shooters and team players.

They don't really run a lot of dribble drive. He's gone to mostly a motion offense with some other sets thrown in.

This year the offense was basically "Go down and throw it to Jackson or Sarr off the block and then have them try to drive in and score in the paint." Unsurprisingly, it didn't work. But it wasn't drible-drive per se.

Seems to me there needs to be more screening and traditional stuff to free up shooters, but Cal generally doesn't do a lot of that. He'll run guys off the baseline and through rub-screens etc. (see Herro and others), but he won't run a lot of picks and stuff like that. He'd much rather his guys go out and make a play. Some succeed in that system, this last team clearly did not.

As for shooters, we just got a really good one from Davidson. That's a start. Definitely need more.

As much as shooters we need toughness. Last year's team was emotionally and physically weak. We had no gamers. I don't believe that comes back to what sets we were running.

[George]

No. May not return.

10-4. Wasn’t sure if I’d missed it.

[KCKUKFan]

The whole "dribble drive motion offense" that came to UK with Cal was mostly fluff. The Wall team ran some of it, and then we would see flashes of it here and there, but most of his offense philosophy seems to be rooted in the classic motion sets or pick and pops.

To effectively run the DDO, you need to have lightning quick speed.

[KCKUKFan]

They don't really run a lot of dribble drive. He's gone to mostly a motion offense with some other sets thrown in.

This year the offense was basically "Go down and throw it to Jackson or Sarr off the block and then have them try to drive in and score in the paint." Unsurprisingly, it didn't work. But it wasn't drible-drive per se.

Seems to me there needs to be more screening and traditional stuff to free up shooters, but Cal generally doesn't do a lot of that. He'll run guys off the baseline and through rub-screens etc. (see Herro and others), but he won't run a lot of picks and stuff like that. He'd much rather his guys go out and make a play. Some succeed in that system, this last team clearly did not.

As for shooters, we just got a really good one from Davidson. That's a start. Definitely need more.

As much as shooters we need toughness. Last year's team was emotionally and physically weak. We had no gamers. I don't believe that comes back to what sets we were running.

Ifwe get Mintz back and land Carr as expected, we will have Carr, Grady, Mintz, Hickman and Allen. That's a pretty darn solid (and experienced) collection of guards. Between Mintz, Allen and Grady, I'm actually not concerned with shooting.

[Joneslab]

The most clever offense Calipari ever ran was the pick and roll Brandon Knight and Jorts Harrellson started running late in 2011.

Most everything else is either basic stuff a lot of other teams run or very simplified sets that are meant to isolate guys.

One thing people say is that Cal doesn't do anything to get shooters touches. I don't really agree. If you go back and watch what he was doing with Herro, Murray, Lamb, Knight etc. there were a lot of designed plays to get those guys shots.

Most of the time though it's just isolate, throw it in, work one on one. When a set like that stalls it can look very ugly.

[George]

Ifwe get Mintz back and land Carr as expected, we will have Carr, Grady, Mintz, Hickman and Allen. That's a pretty darn solid (and experienced) collection of guards. Between Mintz, Allen and Grady, I'm actually not concerned with shooting.

Hopkins is supposedly a good shooter for his position, too.