re: Tide Hoops | Please Anchor

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Chad, you are the most level headed, non emotional guy on this board and you love Tide basketball. What do you think about things right now and moving forward?

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Moving forward (meaning starting next season and into the future of the program in the Oats era) I feel very positive still. I do believe in the system and how it works and why it works. As a fan, I have to buy in to it, because it's what and who we are. The system or strategy within the system is not going to vary much, if at all - and nor should it when it is generating open looks on a consistent basis. I can see what Oats wants to do and how he wants to do it and why he wants to do it. We are recruiting extremely well and are targeting certain archetypes that mesh well with that system in theory. Recruiting can be weird though. JD shouldn't have been rated as highly as he was, so now everyone is disappointed in his play even though he was playing very low level high school basketball last year and is now thrust into a starting lineup in arguably the deepest conference in the country. Hindsight being what it is, maybe we should've looked for something else in Holt's spot just so we didn't have another freshman from a small high school classification to acclimate to more of a grown man's game. The staff definitely needs to do a better job with the portal - Bruner was an amazing fit before he lost both of his knees, but Gurley and Beetle are/were disappointing at best (hopefully Nimari is who we think he is). So all in all, I believe we are still firmly on a positive trajectory as a program even without considering what we are coming off of with the last 15 or so years.

How do I feel about things right now though? Frustrated as hell tbh. I feel like the guys (not every singe one of them individually, but as a collective) just don't get it and/or don't even want to get it. I think I want Keon to be the alpha/leader/voice/heartbeat of the team, but the role is actually taken by a combination of JQ and Shack in a 1/1A scenario. I don't want to belittle either of them, but I don't think either one of them are capable of being that guy. They don't or can't do the things that are required to hold that spot like Herb did. JQ seems to get a little too concerned at times with flashiness or swag or jelly or whatever it is instead of just making quick, smart decisive plays to get him or his teammates a good look. His play this year compared to last year is some of the most disappointing I can remember. I actually thought that guy could be a dark horse candidate for SEC POTY . Shack is just Shack. He has improved over the course of his career to be fair, but he definitely strikes me as a guy who works on his 3P shooting like 90% of the time and everything else the other 10%. Both are undersized and neither are great defenders (Shack is much better the JQ), but neither strike me as always being team first guys either. I have no way of actually quantifying that, but it is something that I feel at certain times.

Maybe it is just naivete, but I really feel like the biggest problem with this team is personnel/leadership. I don't know about leadership yet, but personnel should be a pretty big upgrade on next year's team from a size and athleticism standpoint - hopefully IQ and discipline as well. Oats has to continue growing as a coach too, but I expect that to happen as he continues to gain experience as a HC at this level. This team is frustrating as hell, but it's even more frustrating because of how good we were last year. It looks like we will just have to ride this roller coaster out this year, hope we get hot enough to advance in March and then recalibrate over the Summer.

Well said CHAD!!

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but neither strike me as always being team first guys either. I have no way of actually quantifying that, but it is something that I feel at certain times.

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I think Shacks off-season shenanigans are probably enough to show he's not a team first guy. I'm not wishing he hadn't come back because he's our only consistent scorer but he also strikes me as the type who doesn't really care if we lose as long as he puts up his stats.

Well said Chad. I think this years problems aren’t a program problem but just problems with this team. Just find a way into the tournament this year and Oats will 100% fix our problems going into next

Only way this team is making The Dance is to turn it on for the SEC tournament and play like the team that beat Gonzaga for 3-4 games straight and win it.

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Maybe Bama Basketball is Final 4 bound and we just don’t know it

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They aren’t. It’s difficult to go that far if you can’t defend, and we are historically bad at defending, giving up 80+ in 4/8 conference games with two of those being league bottom dwellers. It’s impossible to go that far if you can’t defend or shoot.

We have 0 two way viable players. Last year we put two of those guys on the court in the starting lineup- this allowed the role players (quick off the dribble JQ, good catch and shoot sharpshooter Shack) to play their role within the system. Their defensive inadequacy was masked and they were allowed to play an offensive game that suited their skillset. Keon has the skillset but he is just not an aggressive person.

We basically have 3 or 4 guys that are pretty good at one thing only and no guys that are good at multiple things- we had that last year. There’s not a clear best player on the team that can command everyone else raise their level of play. It’s just a bunch of guys that frick up a lot so they aren’t comfortable calling out their teammates. It would be like Demarco Hellams bitching at someone every game for missing a tackle.

At the end of the day, it’s just not a very well put together roster. I think having a secondary ball handler (Burnett) probably has us at 15-5 right now, but the group that is available is riddled with fundamental flaws. All of them are really bad at certain elements of the game of basketball.

JQ gets a lot of flack, often deservedly, but we are so proper fricked if he were to get hurt and miss substantial time. Not sure if y’all haven’t noticed but he’s the only guy on the team that can get past a man while bouncing a basketball. When the offense is 3 of y’all setup at the 3 point line and stand still, and let the big guy go set a screen at the top of the key for the dribbler, you better have a good fricking dribbler.

There’s just a lot wrong with this team, but it’s because there’s glaring weaknesses in the individual players on this team. When I’m watching it’s maddening that we don’t move more off the ball on offense when the iso/screen isn’t working. Then I realize that the way we pass the ball we probably aren’t capable of running a motion offense. JD has looked pretty awful in most of his games, but I think he would’ve killed it with a guy like Herb that understood when and how to cut to the basket. His skill aside from leaping ability was always anticipatory passing. That’s rendered useless in the stand around offense. He’s being asked to beat a guy off the dribble and either finish a contested shot at the rim or dish it to a guy behind the 3 point line. It‘s just not his game. I’m rambling now, but this fricking team drives me nuts.

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I really thought Ellis would be the bulldog and leader of this team. 

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He still is. I feel sorry for him, because he works his arse off and is the only guy that doesn't lose his mind come crunch time. The perfect symbol for this team is the constant WTF face Ellis gives to his teammates on the regular. Ellis and Gary are the only two guys I look at on this roster and think they want to win the game above everything else.

Also who the Hell would have thought JQ would turn into this self-imploding nightmare at the end of games. I'm not sure he could play worse if he tried down the stretch of these games. With the NIL in place, I wouldn't think players are trying to point-shave and lose games, but he's going to spark an investigation for sure.

...we lost to UGA?

I guess my "don't watch" strategy has failed.

Here's that attention you're seeking.