The Official “Regular Posters of the Basketball Forum” Thread

[cncchris33]

I know his name has been mentioned here in the past due to his connection, but I wonder if Jordan Gainey (asst. coach Justin Gainey's son) considers a transfer to Tennessee next season?

He's a freshman starter at USC-Upstate, who coincidentally, we played earlier this season. He started the year a little slow, averaging a shade under 10 ppg and then laying an egg at Tennessee in a game where I'm certain he felt a lot of pressure playing against his dad's team.

Since that game, he's averaging 17.3 ppg and is shooting 51.2% from 3 (43/84) for the entire season. Also an 83% FT shooter. He has good size at 6-4, but is a little thin at 175 lbs.

Seems like a great option as the kind of player we could use, and I'm assuming he would likely be eligible to walk on and not count towards scholarship limits because of his dad's position.

 

[MoCo_Vol]

Some folks claim that the NBA draft favors younger players. Vescovi is only 10 months older than KC. I would think all of these high level basketball players are getting training outside of college programs as some international players are drafted without ever going the college route. Guess it’s hard to rationalize why 2 players that are so close in age would be viewed so differently by the NBA in regards to age because one of the guys entered college at 17 and the other at 19

My memory of JJJ when he arrived was he had an ugly flat shot that wasn’t overly successful. He’s greatly improved as a shooter while at UT IMO

Santi was born Sept. 14 2001
Chandler was born Sept. 16 2002

Still surprised they are that close in age. I don't disagree, I think part of the reason a guy like KC can get drafted over a guy like Santi is that one was a top 15 5 star coming into college and has produced at a high level since coming here. Santi wasn't as highly rated and didn't have quite the same numbers early in his career, I think both are NBA players I just think KC has the shorter path to getting there.


Jame's numbers:

 

[walkenvol]

Santi was born Sept. 14 2001
Chandler was born Sept. 16 2002

Still surprised they are that close in age. I don't disagree, I think part of the reason a guy like KC can get drafted over a guy like Santi is that one was a top 15 5 star coming into college and has produced at a high level since coming here. Santi wasn't as highly rated and didn't have quite the same numbers early in his career, I think both are NBA players I just think KC has the shorter path to getting there.


Jame's numbers:
View attachment 431097

Thanks for the correction on the birthdates. I looked up several players on the UT site and must have gotten a date mixed up although I don’t think 2 months changes the narrative of the discussion.

I don’t have a clue if either player will have NBA careers although KC appears to have more NBA type of athleticism vs SV? If the NBA prefers to draft freshmen, does it hurt a player who enters college at a younger age and develops there as opposed to training in other ways then entering college at 19?

 

[MoCo_Vol]

Thanks for the correction on the birthdates. I looked up several players on the UT site and must have gotten a date mixed up although I don’t think 2 months changes the narrative of the discussion.

I don’t have a clue if either player will have NBA careers although KC appears to have more NBA type of athleticism vs SV? If the NBA prefers to draft freshmen, does it hurt a player who enters college at a younger age and develops there as opposed to training in other ways then entering college at 19?

On that last point I don't know, Santi I don't think is a "NBA or bust" type of player. I believe part of his desire to play college ball was to spend time in the US & pursue a degree. He has been in two different NBA academies before coming to UT, if his goal was simply to get in the NBA he may have just stayed that route.

He's a Business Management major and was on the 2021 SEC Winter Academic Honor Roll

 

[ShowSomePride]

Santi was born Sept. 14 2001
Chandler was born Sept. 16 2002

Still surprised they are that close in age. I don't disagree, I think part of the reason a guy like KC can get drafted over a guy like Santi is that one was a top 15 5 star coming into college and has produced at a high level since coming here. Santi wasn't as highly rated and didn't have quite the same numbers early in his career, I think both are NBA players I just think KC has the shorter path to getting there.


Jame's numbers:
View attachment 431097

I think it's obvious that KC is much more athletic and has considerably better handles. His potential is much higher than Santi, and I love Santi. But to his credit Santi has improved considerably every year so he could surprise a bunch of people.

 

[walkenvol]

On that last point I don't know, Santi I don't think is a "NBA or bust" type of player. I believe part of his desire to play college ball was to spend time in the US & pursue a degree. He has been in two different NBA academies before coming to UT, if his goal was simply to get in the NBA he may have just stayed that route.

He's a Business Management major and was on the 2021 SEC Winter Academic Honor Roll

I truly don’t understand why some of these guys 6’-3” and under get to play in the nba and others don’t. Lofton might of been the best distance shooter I ever saw in college but never appeared to get any NBA interest yet Jeremy Lin did? Can SV play good enough defense against NBA guys such that a team would let him shoot 3’s in a drive& dish type offense?

 

[bleedingTNorange]

I know his name has been mentioned here in the past due to his connection, but I wonder if Jordan Gainey (asst. coach Justin Gainey's son) considers a transfer to Tennessee next season?

He's a freshman starter at USC-Upstate, who coincidentally, we played earlier this season. He started the year a little slow, averaging a shade under 10 ppg and then laying an egg at Tennessee in a game where I'm certain he felt a lot of pressure playing against his dad's team.

Since that game, he's averaging 17.3 ppg and is shooting 51.2% from 3 (43/84) for the entire season. Also an 83% FT shooter. He has good size at 6-4, but is a little thin at 175 lbs.

Seems like a great option as the kind of player we could use, and I'm assuming he would likely be eligible to walk on and not count towards scholarship limits because of his dad's position.

Funny you mentioned it, was gonna bring that up…definitely needs to get a bit stronger but hard to ignore the numbers he’s putting up even if it’s at a lower level.

 

[walkenvol]

Funny you mentioned it, was gonna bring that up…definitely needs to get a bit stronger but hard to ignore the numbers he’s putting up even if it’s at a lower level.

EJ Anosike says hold my beer. He made me suspicious of how lower level success translates to the P5 level

 

[MoCo_Vol]

I truly don’t understand why some of these guys 6’-3” and under get to play in the nba and others don’t. Lofton might of been the best distance shooter I ever saw in college but never appeared to get any NBA interest yet Jeremy Lin did? Can SV play good enough defense against NBA guys such that a team would let him shoot 3’s in a drive& dish type offense?

You actually touch on it. The NBA regardless of what the fans may think from the outside looking in is a league about well rounded players. Huge Lofton fan, but he was really just a shooter. Ran a lot of point here and finished his career with sub 2 assist per game. He played with CJ Watson for two seasons, a guy that was the same size (on paper at least) who spent a decade in the league and just showed up everywhere.

CJ finished his UT career with more rebounds, assist, steals than Lofton. At least with the smaller guys in the league if you look at most of them they almost all are well rounded, very few "specialist" like the 80/90s era of ball where guys like Steve Kerr or John Paxson are just on the court to make deep shots to help soften the paint up.

 

[MoCo_Vol]

I know his name has been mentioned here in the past due to his connection, but I wonder if Jordan Gainey (asst. coach Justin Gainey's son) considers a transfer to Tennessee next season?

He's a freshman starter at USC-Upstate, who coincidentally, we played earlier this season. He started the year a little slow, averaging a shade under 10 ppg and then laying an egg at Tennessee in a game where I'm certain he felt a lot of pressure playing against his dad's team.

Since that game, he's averaging 17.3 ppg and is shooting 51.2% from 3 (43/84) for the entire season. Also an 83% FT shooter. He has good size at 6-4, but is a little thin at 175 lbs.

Seems like a great option as the kind of player we could use, and I'm assuming he would likely be eligible to walk on and not count towards scholarship limits because of his dad's position.

If ya can get him as a walk on that would be a great pickup.

 

[TheMookieMonster]

I know his name has been mentioned here in the past due to his connection, but I wonder if Jordan Gainey (asst. coach Justin Gainey's son) considers a transfer to Tennessee next season?

He's a freshman starter at USC-Upstate, who coincidentally, we played earlier this season. He started the year a little slow, averaging a shade under 10 ppg and then laying an egg at Tennessee in a game where I'm certain he felt a lot of pressure playing against his dad's team.

Since that game, he's averaging 17.3 ppg and is shooting 51.2% from 3 (43/84) for the entire season. Also an 83% FT shooter. He has good size at 6-4, but is a little thin at 175 lbs.

Seems like a great option as the kind of player we could use, and I'm assuming he would likely be eligible to walk on and not count towards scholarship limits because of his dad's position.

I guess it depends on how numbers work out at the end of the season, because we need post players and not guards, BUT to your point about the walk-on option I would gladly take him as a walk-on and see if he can earn his way onto the court. Would be a nice piece to have in practice and then hope he can put on some weight.

I guess it depends on whether Jordan would rather have guaranteed playing time at a small school, or if he’d be okay attending a P5 program with his dad and earn minutes where he can. It’s an interesting point you raise for sure.

 

[bleedingTNorange]

EJ Anosike says hold my beer. He made me suspicious of how lower level success translates to the P5 level

I don’t disagree, but I would have more confidence in a guard with good height/length shooting percentages translating than an undersized post.

 

[MoCo_Vol]

I don’t disagree, but I would have more confidence in a guard with good height/length shooting percentages translating than an undersized post.

Kellan Grady is doing just fine, his points are only down cause he's on a stacked squad and taking 4 less shots a game.

 

[JelloPuddinPup]

I didn't want to believe it at first, but it does appear that Rick Barnes runs a pretty dirty program. #NotWorth5M #FireHim

Tennessee basketball also self-reported a minor violation:
And UT basketball committed another violation because a recruit dribbled a ball on the Thompson-Boling Arena court during a photo shoot.

Source: Tennessee self-reports recruiting violation from 2021 season

 

[TheMookieMonster]

I didn't want to believe it at first, but it does appear that Rick Barnes runs a pretty dirty program. #NotWorth5M #FireHim



Source: Tennessee self-reports recruiting violation from 2021 season

Oh. My. God. The horror! What type of dirty cheap trick is Rick pulling letting a commit DRIBBLE a basketball? Have to fire him. This is worse than Will Wade.

 

[JelloPuddinPup]

Oh. My. God. The horror! What type of dirty cheap trick is Rick pulling letting a commit DRIBBLE a basketball? Have to fire him. This is worse than Will Wade.

It was a strong @$$ dribble.

 

[bleedingTNorange]

If ya can get him as a walk on that would be a great pickup.

He ain’t walking on, if he opts to transfer he will have a long list of suitors.

 

[TheMookieMonster]

He ain’t walking on, if he opts to transfer he will have a long list of suitors.

I mean he could walk-on and still not pay a dime in NIL deals. Pretty easy to do that. Plus, his dad is a university employee. I’m not privy to the wealth of different academic scholarships out there, but I have to imagine you could string together a package of NIL and merit based scholarships together to keep him from counting on the 13 limit if we really wanted him.

Just my opinion.

 

[jmva1]

Something that went through my head today was the silver lining behind last year’s covid season was it may allow us to get a 5th year from Vescovi (obviously only if he wants it). He was originally in that class in the first place anyway. With how good he’s been and seems to be getting better, could be a special year if he stays

 

[JelloPuddinPup]

I mean he could walk-on and still not pay a dime in NIL deals. Pretty easy to do that. Plus, his dad is a university employee. I’m not privy to the wealth of different academic scholarships out there, but I have to imagine you could string together a package of NIL and merit based scholarships together to keep him from counting on the 13 limit if we really wanted him.

Just my opinion.

Not sure a kid that could get school for free in most places would want to sign NIL deals just to pay it immediately back to the school. The point of NIL is it's $ for the athlete, not for tuition right? I think a lot of people make the assumptions that kids would do this in a heartbeat like a "scholarship replacement". I just don't see it unless that's a kid that isn't truly worth a scholarship.

 

[golfballs]

I was looking at KenPom's 'home court advantage' estimates where he estimates the advantage in points by each team (ie instead of a general 3 point advantage, Colorado has near 5 point advantage at home). In his analysis for most teams it's foul differential home vs away which is the strongest influence on home court advantage (in the case of Colorado it's elevation). Moreso even than home scoring advantage. He hypothesizes that the crowd may make a difference, but I can't understand why that's the case. Would seem to me to be simply a case of home cooking. The SEC ranks 2nd in the country in foul margin differential. Is this evidence of how bad SEC refs are? Of course we share refs with other conferences too. And the power conferences are all in the top half in this metric. Is officiating the opposite of a meritocracy? Where being "bad" is actually rewarded? Refs who influence games with their calls are the ones who rise to the top and call major conference games? Anyway, here's the list of SEC teams who benefit the most. Doesn't surprise me to see LSU up there.

 

[Volprofch05]

I mean he could walk-on and still not pay a dime in NIL deals. Pretty easy to do that. Plus, his dad is a university employee. I’m not privy to the wealth of different academic scholarships out there, but I have to imagine you could string together a package of NIL and merit based scholarships together to keep him from counting on the 13 limit if we really wanted him.

Just my opinion.

There’s also a pretty big discount in tuition for children of faculty/staff

 

[TheMookieMonster]

Not sure a kid that could get school for free in most places would want to sign NIL deals just to pay it immediately back to the school. The point of NIL is it's $ for the athlete, not for tuition right? I think a lot of people make the assumptions that kids would do this in a heartbeat like a "scholarship replacement". I just don't see it unless that's a kid that isn't truly worth a scholarship.

I’m not saying it always can be used as a scholarship replacement, that’s not really my point. I doubt a kid like Jordan Gainey, even if he gets a scholarship elsewhere, is going to merit a lot of big NIL deals that nets him some cash in his pocket.

I’m just throwing this out as like an example school, but let’s say he gets a full-ride to a place like Marquette. Is there really a big enough NIL program or market for a kid like that to earn much?

Jordan is a unique case, IMO. His dad is an assistant coach. We probably don’t want to use a scholarship on him with our limited spots. So, IF he does decide to transfer, NIL at least gives us an option to pay for his schooling (and maybe more) with the big market we have. His NIL is probably worth more in a market where people know his dad than somewhere else.

Look at Navy Schuler. He just transferred as a PWO QB for our football program. He probably could have gotten a full-ride at another P5 program somewhere, but he came here and announced that he has an NIL deal already lol.

 

[bleedingTNorange]

Kellan Grady is doing just fine, his points are only down cause he's on a stacked squad and taking 4 less shots a game.

Very true…A10 is decent competition in comparison, but yea, I bet the “miss” rate is higher on bigs than guard as far as transferring up a level.

 

[bleedingTNorange]

I mean he could walk-on and still not pay a dime in NIL deals. Pretty easy to do that. Plus, his dad is a university employee. I’m not privy to the wealth of different academic scholarships out there, but I have to imagine you could string together a package of NIL and merit based scholarships together to keep him from counting on the 13 limit if we really wanted him.

Just my opinion.

We didn’t do it for Lanier or Oliver’s kids, we didn’t do it to keep Pember, it just doesn’t really happen and it’s a bad look to ask someone to do it. Not happening.