Agree across the board.

Self can be convinced otherwise though. Luckily, we have a really tough non-con this year. KJ won’t be able to just look good against bad teams.

I’m sure guys like Passmore, Griffen, and Bidunga will have every chance to crack the lineup.

I’m also more concerned with minutes over starting. I don’t really care if KJ starts, but I’d like to see him have fewer minutes. 30+ will be hard to stomach. Ideally, he’s around 20 and playing in a variety of lineups. I won’t hold my breath though.

Self plays guys he trusts. He trusts KJ. He'll play.

Unless someone earns his trust who makes the team better than the baseline KJ can provide.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Men&#39;s Bracketology: 2025 NCAA Tournament <a href="https://t.co/146SOUv6MW">https://t.co/146SOUv6MW</a>. 🏀🏀 As Kansas enters the 2024-25 season as the nation&#39;s No. 1 team, it&#39;s worth reviewing just how elite the Jayhawks have been under Bill Self. The five preseason No. 1 rankings, including the past two Octobers,…</p>&mdash; Joe Lunardi (@ESPNLunardi) <a href="https://twitter.com/ESPNLunardi/status/1848862881984737465?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 22, 2024</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

KJ has value, a lot of it but it should be matchup based. I wouldn’t mind 30 minutes if it works but if it doesn’t there needs to be a quick hook.

KJ can be really effective against the right guys, and really ineffective against others.

New Season!
New Players!
New Conf. Teams!

Going to be an interesting year!

You are right. KJ is pretty much boom or bust.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Per a release — Effective immediately, all Kansas men&#39;s basketball radio broadcasts will be moving from 105.9 FM to 92.9 FM &quot;The Bull&quot; in Lawrence beginning with Friday&#39;s charity exhibition game at Arkansas. <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/kubball?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#kubball</a></p>&mdash; JayhawkSlant (@JayhawkSlant) <a href="https://twitter.com/JayhawkSlant/status/1849816336408490213?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 25, 2024</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Is it named after Bullwinkle's?

Should call it "The Tuocan"

Maybe spell your wannabe insults correctly first, it takes the sting out when you look dumb.

Lighten up, turd

I'm light as a feather man you're the one swooping in with swing and a miss trash talk

:shrug:

What are you dick touchers out here talking about? Did they remove the vacated banners yet?

“I’ll touch your dick with mine!” “No I’ll do it first!” “Meet me in the lounge at Phog.net.” “Tee hee, we’re naughty.” ~ Jayhawk fans

Guards have been absolutely destroyed so far.

Wait did Calipari get fired from Kentucky I totally missed that hes at Arkansas now

He left UK

Entire game is an undisciplined hackfest, not gonna take too much from it

More Bidunga

We can take away that Clemence still sucks

How is someone as bad as Clemence still in the program after all these years

Obviously we aren't going to make wild predictions and opinions on this game but the signs have been troubling. I think the most disappointing thing is in a game full of guys with inexperience, KJ and Harris have been so ineffective. Should we expect this? Probably. Is it disappointing? Also yes.

With the transfer portal, I get the feeling that your deeper depth is going to be guys like him.

In the past, we could have a 4th big that was actually competent.

Those guys just transfer away for more minutes now.

I doubt we’ll have many Jamari Traylor type guys who could play somewhere else but are content to be the emergency big.

I said it in my scouting report earlier in this thread, People are sleeping on him.

We’ve really settled down. Harris especially.

Bidunga impacts everything around him.

Our two most experienced players get abused. Exhibition or not that can't happen.

There’s a storm brewing.

Harris and KJ will be fine. Not worried about them whatsoever based on this exho

This is what KU is gonna look like quite often without their best offensive player on the court though. Everything goes through Dickinson and did last year too.

lol. Harris seemed annoyed that the ref allowed the Arkansas player to grab his arm and turn him around for that steal.

There could have been 40 fouls called that half easily

The only takeaway from this is on an individual basis.

Bidunga = mostly good
KJ and Harris = who cares
Storr, Mayo, Coit = getting decent looks but clanking everything; Mayo trying to do too much at times
Clemence = trash
Passmore = a few flashes, looks the part
McDowell = looks uncomfortable like he did most of last year

I just got home and am still in the 1st quarter but fock yeah bball is back

There’s also no spacing and no sustainable form of half court offense without Dickinson on this team. Shots for those guys will be much more open with him out there.

Too soft Flory

I hope you are right because this is basically last year's team so far. Yes Hunter will help. But KJ and Harris have been terrible. Flory has been good and everyone else has been...well they showed up. Yes we are missing some guys but I don't see any depth that we should have.

It's the very first time he's be in the floor at this level, in a game that really doesn't matter. You're awful negative. All I see after watching one quieter is a damn athletic team just missing some shots against what's likely to be one of the most talented teams in the ncaa's this year.

Dickinson was their entire offense last year. He will be again, just hopefully supplemented by better shooters around him (Griffin, Zeke, Storr).

How is calling him soft on a play where he let that guy go baseline on him for a dunk being too negative lol

It’s all a learning experience for him at this point; this game doesn’t matter for his purposes whatsoever.

Some strange calls in this one LMAO

I'm behind you as I'm watching it dvr'd. I'm just dating you're taking like this team sucks where I'm coming at it with little expectations and only looking for glimpses of what can be for us, not what our ceiling is.

No clue where you’re coming up with this; have you read my other posts about this game in this thread at all?

KCC’s negative reinforcement famously turned Christian Braun into a star and a solid NBA player.

Let him cook.

He also made Legerald Vick quit. There was no fixing him.

Fland is the best player on the floor today by a decent margin, looks like a lottery pick based on this one

I would just hope we would play better than we did against Cincinnati in the big 12 tournament. Unfortunately that hasn't happened.

Was never gonna happen with Dickinson on the bench. He’s a top 5 player in the country. We may not have even been a tournament team last year without him.

Zach Clemence’s tombstone is going to read: “he made them in practice.”

Also worth pointing out that if this game was at AFH, there’s a decent chance KU is in the lead right now. This is a pretty tough environment to just step into and the calls have been one way for its entire duration.

Somehow I doubt he even does that.

KJ making some of the laziest passes ever, definitely tired

I can't wait until I can watch a team without KJ and Harris.

We've made him look unguardable in a meaningless warmup

All of this....
Never seen a player at KU regress like Harris has....
As a sophomore, he was a stud.....
2 years later, he shouldnt be getting more than 10 min a game.
Sad

That’s certainly one way to spin it.

Harris isn’t an issue for this team in any respect, was also their best player in this one on a team with no sustainable half court offense.

Team has a roster construction issue as long as they keep starting KJ though.

Sounds like the same issue they had last season.

It will be if he’s still starting in March beside Dickinson and teams aren’t guarding him at all (and they won’t).

The hope is we got enough good players/complementary guys around Dickinson that Self will be able to work around KJ’s offensive issues. We will have to see if we do.

I'm encouraged by Harris's offensive output in this one, and hopefully he's made a leap (like Self's seniors tend to do). But it's definitely not ideal to have a PG with limited athleticism and a complete inability to draw fouls.

I didn't watch any of this, but seeing Juan score 26 in this made me LMAO

If he ever scores that much (or has/needs to) in an actual real game they'll be in trouble.

He scored 20+ when they beat Kentucky last year and carried them in the 2nd half.

The most telling stat for Harris is this simple on from last year: games when Harris took 8 or more shots we went 10-7. The other two losses we scored 85 and 75 points, which is solid, and then the blowout Houston loss where nobody even showed up. If you look at the 5 worst offensive games, again excluding the Houston no show loss, all of them had Harris shooting more than 8 shots. There is a very direct correlation between Harris shooting more and Kansas losing.

Bingo.

I love Juan, and love how his game has gotten better, but if he's scoring 26 points, and shooting as much as he did last night (I don't put too much stock into it) this team is doomed.

I was wondering if Coit would be Charlie Moore or Remy Martin.

Looks more like Remy so far.

Safe to say we aren't going to get outscored by 20 from 3 every game this season.

Outside shooting should be so much better this year.

Dickinson’s life is about to get much easier with that spacing.

We can shoot?

Eric Chenowith says hello.

Dude looked like he was gonna be a solid to possibly even great big man his freshman and sophomore years. And just turned into a softer than baby poop shell of himself. Constantly getting pushed around and couldn't be counted on for jackshit.

Looks like we can shoot this year thank God

We looked kind of awkward in the first half but this second half has been a joy to watch. So nice watching 3 guards roll around screens looking to score and making the right pass for open shots which we are not passing up like last year. And hitting one or two isn't bad either.

Shooters and a bench. Hope springs eternal.

Normally our scrubs would start at these schools.

Clemence though? I’m not sure.

I like KU

Coit’s +/- was +44.

As of right now, my starting ideal 5 is:

Harris
Mayo
Griffen
Storr
Dickinson

Love Coit so far and I think he’ll be a spark plug off the bench. Adams had a nice night but still prefer him as an energy guy off the bench (even though I know that won’t happen). Bidunga looks raw but the ability is off the charts. Passmore has been clanking everything, but he’s my 9th guy to round out the bench.

Everyone else needs to redshirt if possible.

I am not as high as most on AJ Storr. He takes alot of bad shots. He seems awkward and lacking of BBall IQ. It is definitely possible it's just the new system but he is bailed out alot just due to his athletic ability and size. He needs to learn how to be a better basketball player not just a talented one.

I love what I see with Mayo offensively but defensively he has a little ways to go. He has decent size though as a 2 guard so he can probably get away with some deficiency there.

Coit is a bucket getter. Sparkplug. He's too small to play alongside DaJuan though very often. Anytime Harris isn't in I hope Coit is in.

Love what I see with Griffen. He lets the game come to him. Seems to be a 3 and D guy and will know his role. I would start:

Harris
Mayo
Griffen
KJ
Dickinson

That gives you a bunch of shooting even with KJ and Harris on the court. I honestly view AJ Storr as a 6th man type of guy as the best role unless he's some amazing defensive stopper which I'm just not seeing. 2M is a ton of money for that guy.

Storr is clearly struggling with confidence and his role within the offense on a team with this much talent. This isn’t who he is and it’s too early to be worried about it.

What does he even do that is great? Bad reounder for his size. Awful passer. Doesn't get blocks. Doesn't get steals. I have seen no indication he is real good defensively. He needs to show he can be the guy at the end of the shot clock to be in there. Show he can make tough shots....but not take them with 20 on the shot clock.

Yeah, that’s where I’m at. I think you just need to ride with him until it clicks.

He’s too good to not figure it out.

He’s an ISO scorer, the kind of player you give the ball to at the end of the clock to create a shot. There’s no reason to think that skill set has gone anywhere.

He’ll just need to learn how to be a more complementary piece on this team.

We haven’t even seen what this team actually looks like offensively yet. Dickinson is one of the best offensive players in the country and draws all kinds of attention to him on that end of the floor. Lets see how Storr and the others look around him next week.

Aj Storr isn't even a shooter so he should be a guy that can do damage from midrange, also near the basket and draw alot of fouls. He projects into a guy that could figure it out because yeah he has all tbe tools. The hope is he will accept coaching and become a much more efficient player but here are last years numbers...which totally makes sense based on the small sample we have seen. It's not like he can't turn a corner but the light needs to turn on.

Storr 48% 2FG
Griffen 57% 2FG
Coit 50% 2FG
Mayo 54% 2FG

Coit even was more effective inside the arc and he's 5'9". I don't even think it is Storrs fault I just am not sure he is the player most have him billed as.