The only people to mention Dixon in this thread were you, HTP and Fireballz. It is possible to really not care about Dixon anymore, or even dislike him and still be displeased with Stallings' work thus far.
Samson George commits
- Thread starter King Of All Message Boards
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I think the situations are totally different . KS was taking over a senior laden team that made the NCAAs the previous yr losing only one key player . According to all accounts the three incoming players were a step above the recent recruiting classes . You had a four star freshman who struggled his freshman yr and both Nix ( who South Carolina wanted ) and Milligan who was coming of injuries ready to play . Last season all those players showed their true value and with theses players as a core Pitt would easily supplant BC as the bottom dweller of the ACC . Pitt NEEDS players and taking chances on the guys who are out there are KS only option , I'm sure he'd have loved to sign a bunch of the four stars he was recruiting . He doing what he must do not what he wanted to do .
Right but i assume he's referring more to the decision not to fill the open spot last year with either a grad transfer or another recruit. Completely agree that KS has no other choice at this point and needs to fill out the roster and hope for the best. If more than a few of these project kids workout then it could be a solid foundation but percentages are probably against it. There's only so many diamond in the rough guys out there.
One thing you don't do is cut Samsons hair.When I googled Samson this is all that I could find?
We'll have to get him some shoes, a shirt, maybe a trim haircut and some new shorts but he looks good?
Nice add!
A grad point guard would've been nice . I'm sure he'd have liked to sign a couple grad transfers this yr too , but for some reason they don't want to come here .
The larger question is: How did he last at Vandy for 17 years with his track record? He's a hanger in there/survivor kind of guy so buckle you Pete seat belts he may be here for a while!
As if the only reason to be disappointed in a 4-14 season, with a worse one pending, is because we're longing for the previous HC...
Who is bitching about missing JD in this thread? I see tons of comments complaining about people talking about Dixon. As far as I can tell, those comments complaining are talking about JD are the only comments talking about JD.
Yea, it is possible to be displeased with Stallings work to date as long as one doesn't discount the magnitude of the mess his lackluster predecessor left....which is precisely what you and others have unfairly done.
I'm advocating that he should have done exactly what I advocated that he should have done last spring. It was pretty obvious to anyone who knew what we had coming back that we needed a point guard who could at least give you 15-20 minutes a game and that we also could have used another big. And yet we left a scholarship open and decided to ride with what we had. Hell, even you recognized that we needed help at those positions, but still we decided to stand pat.
With a decent point guard last year's team is one that should have made the tournament. Instead we decided to rely on a guy who was changing positions who had given no prior indication that he could be a decent point guard and a true freshman. Doing something like that is a great idea when it works, but let's not pretend it was ever likely to work.
But a lot of people felt this:
Don't act like everyone recognized an obvious need at point guard. Most did not.
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Ok I get the PG issue but it seemed you were suggesting that he should have brought in several players. If not, then we're not necessarily in disagreement. The failure to aggressively pursue a PG was a major mistake, although I'm not sure there were viable options available
Ok....
He made a mistake. Does that end it now? He made several mistakes not addressing those needs you so eloquently pointed out was one of them.
Does this end this now if someone admits he a made a mistake. Or will you continue to bring this up in almost every thread mentioning a new commit with some sort of optimism? Up to you, I'm just asking a question.
There is only 2 scenarios.
1. You are being dumb. Sorry that's the option. You don't have he social intellgence to see what these guys are doing in almost every post that can be construed positive.
**note: I don't believe this option to be the case**
2. You were so close to the situation and so fond of the former coach you've comprised your ability to think rationally on these matters.
They/you don't have to mention Dixon.
It's written all over the words you type. How you say Manigault was as good of a recruit as Golden (FALSE), how you attempted to downplay Parker Stewart (Clark was not as a good of a recruit as Stewart). How you defend the behavior of some of these horrid posters. Whether you see it or not others on this board have.
What amuses me is that everyone seems to think he didn't try to add a true pg or big . Does anyone really know ? Wanting something and getting it are two different thinks ! Hell he should have added two players both one and done guys at center and point guard I'm sure he wanted too !
Well, maybe I am dumb.
I do think it's possible for people simply not to like Kevin Stallings and that has nothing to do with their opinion on Dixon.
Personally, I don't have a "negative" opinion of Stallings. I'm holding out to see what the next 10 months brings.
And with the recruits. Here are some facts. Going by Rivals (which isn't the only source, I understand), Corey's was ranked #138 and Golden is ranked #124. Pretty close, I'd say.
It's tougher to compare Stewart and Clark (as a JUCO) but Stewart is ranked #200+ and based on both's offer sheets, I'd say they are similar.
My point is the way Dixon recruited as of late got us into the place we are now, and I really have not seen the upgrade needed to get us out of that place. I'm hoping that what Stallings snags for 2018 changes that opinion.
DT: I think you have stated you look at (if not use) Verbal Commits ratings.Well, maybe I am dumb.
I do think it's possible for people simply not to like Kevin Stallings and that has nothing to do with their opinion on Dixon.
Personally, I don't have a "negative" opinion of Stallings. I'm holding out to see what the next 10 months brings.
And with the recruits. Here are some facts. Going by Rivals (which isn't the only source, I understand), Corey's was ranked #138 and Golden is ranked #124. Pretty close, I'd say.
It's tougher to compare Stewart and Clark (as a JUCO) but Stewart is ranked #200+ and based on both's offer sheets, I'd say they are similar.
My point is the way Dixon recruited as of late got us into the place we are now, and I really have not seen the upgrade needed to get us out of that place. I'm hoping that what Stallings snags for 2018 changes that opinion.
Verbal Commits has Stewart as a composite 3.5 ( 4.0 on Espn) - Clark as a composite 2.0 (N/A on Scout, Rivals and ESPN)
Clarks offers: Loyola (Chic), Cal Ful, St.Marys, Nevada and Oreg
Stewarts offers: Ole Miss, NC St, Bayl, LSU, SD St, Gt'wn, Wisc, Utah, Misso, Fla, Neb, Santa Clara, Kans St, Wyo, USC Upstate, Memphis and Tex A&M
Clark also arrived with 2 surgeries
I also do not believe that Clark was included in Stalling's assessment of how many players he felt he could play.
I don't think you are on very solid ground in comparing these 2 players - MHO
As to the other point - Dixon certainly recruited some reaches and it appears this year, that Stallings has as well. In a short time we will discover which coach is the better reacher..
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If it was all about their high school/AAU rankings then Pitts in trouble . Let's hope that KS and staff have an eye for talent . How many yrs has it been since a Pitt team had two 6'10" kids and several guards with quickness or a shot and a kid with muscle who seems to be in the right spot a lot . I have a feeling this might work out a little better than we think . A month ago I was worried last yrs Louisville game was going to be the norm . W's will be hard to come by in conference play ,but hopefully KS is laying a foundation to build upon . Won't be that long before we find out .
Good post - I will just add: Most of our recruits came from top programs that played top competition. They did not play in the WPIAL or its out of state equivalent.
Why are you talking about dixon?
I'm talking about stallings.
With our new additions , how many additional wins in your optimism?
It's binary to someAs if the only reason to be disappointed in a 4-14 season, with a worse one pending, is because we're longing for the previous HC...
Well I absolutely do not bring this up in every thread that mentions a new commit, or even anything close to it, so there is that. When you have to just make stuff up to try to make your point it's a pretty good indication that your point isn't so good to begin with.
However, with regards to the new recruits I have said on numerous occasions that I have never seen them play and have no idea how good they will be. The "problem", as it were, is that there are people who bitched and moaned non-stop that the previous coach brought in too many guys who were ranked in the 90-120 or so range and that there was no way you could be a long term success relying on those kinds of players and that that sort of recruiting just wasn't good enough who are now pissed off that everyone on the board doesn't think that guys who are ranked in the mid-200 range are the answer to all of our prayers. The issue isn't with the recruits or the coach, it's with the posters with the double standards because they can't bring themselves to say hey, this doesn't really seem to be any better than what got us into trouble in the first place.
Here are the current rankings on 247 of our commits for this year. First off, they have Wilson-Frame the 10th ranked juco. Pretty good. The other six guys are currently 141, 290, 294, 305, 348 and 432. It is quite frankly the kind of recruiting class (worse actually) that the prior coaching staff was raked over the coals for bringing in. And rightly so. But some of the guys with the "biggest rakes" then are the ones who are selling that everything is fine now. The double standard is stunning.
http://pitt.247sports.com/Season/2017-Basketball/Commits
People who thought that Jamel Artis was going to make a good point guard were whistling past the graveyard. Nothing more, nothing less.
Maybe I'm crazy, but I see Stewart as a 3 star recruit on ESPN, 67th best SG. This corresponds similarly to his 300th or so ranking on 247. I see that verbal commits has him as a 4 star on ESPN, but I just don't see that ranking anywhere.
I think they are comparable in that it does seem that both Dixon and Stallings won decent head to head recruiting battles at the end. Clark committed to Pitt, even after Oregon (a team who made the FF this year) made the late push. Stewart picked Pitt over Georgetown. He's a good get, maybe the 2nd best recruit in the class.
Look..KS has put together an interesting roster. If KS is going to make it it year 4, which IMO requires an NCAA birth, or pretty damn close in 2018-2019, it is imperative that Carr/JWF/Stewart are ready to be big time players in 2 seasons, that the 2018 adds at least two more high impact players, and that some of these wild cards George/Peace/Davis are diamonds in the rough.
It's not an impossible scenario..and I do give KS credit for at least making this season more interesting by adding George and Stewart. Would love one more big.
You bring it up incessantly. If you don't want to admit it and talk semantics so be it. But people see it.
Secondly.....rankings.....you seem to use rankings to your benefit. Carr is considered a borderline top 100 recruit and You of Course use the lowest one out there. Furthermore Stewart's offers were much better than his ranking.
Talk about double standards?? I don't remember people bitching about 90-120 guys. We weren't getting top 100 guys even. Our classes were ranked the worst of any power 5 team the past 3 seasons. You didn't like bitching then so your answer is to now bitch. Lol. There was no need to be a wet blanket in this thread. But again you had to be the "wait you said this" for at least the 4-5 time. I thought you were more then these other antagonistic assclowns but you're not. Always right, always smarter, always a """""
Here's the thing gary2 ... this whole debate really is kinda pointless. We are splitting hairs as to whether some of the current recruits are slightly better or not than some of the past years.
The main point I will assert is that I don't believe how Stallings has recruited thus far is any better in any meaningful way than the recruiting that got us in this situation in the first place. That's my opinion, and at this point in time we can all make our case, but no one can be right or wrong. But there really is nothing that can be "proven" to anyone.
I even think you would agree with my assertion, at least to some extent, as do I agree that Dixon and Stallings both recruited reaches and we will find out who is the better "reacher."
That's just the thing. The results will soon tell the tale.
But there are some things that I know I HOPE to see in the next 10 months to help tell the tale.
* By December, I'd like to see Stallings receive commitments of two "certain top 100 type" players. By this, I mean two guys who are clearly top 100 types, and not 98 by one ranking and 149 by another. With no disrespect to you, I hope we aren't having conversations wondering if the guy was under recruited for some reason, or if we are focusing on a couple of decent P-5 offers by our recruits as the indicator that maybe a ranking around #200 should be better.
In regards to the some of the incoming recruits ... (I already "believe in" Carr and Wilson-Frame, so I'm excluding them)
* During the ACC season, I'd like to see Stewart establish that he can get his shot off, and hit it at the kind of percentage (at least 36%-37%+) as his high school work would promise. I assume he'll play around 20mpg and if so, I'd like to see him shoot around a minimum of 50 threes in ACC play and hit 18 (one per game). Something markedly less than this would tell me he's likely not the quite recruit some think he might be.
* Over the course of the season, I'd like to see Samson George be the team's leading rebounder. I just don't see our other freshman bigs being ready to play enough minutes to get this crown, and Ryan has never really been able to put up big rebound numbers. If George is a keeper, he should be getting enough minutes to get this done.
* As for Stephenson and Brown, I just want to see two players who basically are playing regular roles. I'm not looking for any specific numbers, but something similar or a little better to how Damon Wilson performed as a freshman. In most games during that year, Damon contributed a little, didn't screw up much, and generally, one didn't dread seeing him come in the game. If Stephenson and Brown appear overmatched in the majority of the times they enter ACC games (like Corey did this past season), this will be discouraging.
** I have no expectations for Carr and Peace. If we get anything of importance out of either in ACC games, I'll actually be pleased enough. And if Boykins is playing 20+ minutes a game, I'll be quite displeased actually (same goes for Milligan).
* As for the team, my greatest hope is that we can match last year's win total in the ACC. Beyond that, I want the team to be competitive in most games, avoid 18+ point blowouts. Since I don't have a full handle on the OOC schedule yet, it's hard to put a number on that.
So far, I don't agree with those who are convinced he CAN'T do the job as our head coach. Last year seemed like such a strange situation, I can't be sure what it means, if anything. I've made it clear that I don't think he's done a good enough job recruiting thus far, and I'll wait to look at who he signs in December (along with performances of the incoming freshman as indicated).
So even though I'm not of the opinion that Stallings CAN'T do the job, it's also time for him to start providing fans with some demonstrable evidence that he can.
I'm sure players will improve. I'm sure this team will play hard. What I am least sure about is whether we have an upper echelon ACC player at any position on this roster now, or in the future. For as bad as Jamie's recruiting was, and it sucked, I do think in his final year that Robinson, Young, and Artis were all upper level ACC players. And it probably took having 3 guys like that, and some quality role players like Cam and Luther, to make the NCAA tournament.
Are there 3 guys like that on this team? Of course not. I think its fair to say if you were doing an ACC Draft, and Pitt's 5 were PG: Carr SG: Boykins SF: Frame PF: George C: Luther ....something like that, Pitt probably has the lowest pick in the league at maybe 4, certainly 3 of the 5 positions. That's tough. But the group is young, and kids develop. But what I want to see is more than improvment, its an on the court product which says that we have some pieces who are more than just "ACC players", but players who can win.
I confess that I thought it was a pretty intriguing idea.
And the truth be told Joe, I don't even think it was quite the failure you are suggesting. The biggest failure of last year was that we were ranked #159 in Pomeroy defensive efficiency, compared to #54 the previous year. As you know, our offense was #48, compared to #28 the previous year.
In retrospect, I do believe it would have been better if Stallings would have recruited a point guard at least ready to play some minutes with his last scholarship. But what we learned in retrospect maybe wasn't so much that Artis couldn't handle the point, but that Stallings had absolutely no confidence in Milligan, Kithcart or Wilson to do so either.
There's no doubt that these recruits won't make Coach K lose sleep , but here's the difference your missing in comparing the recruiting between JD and KS . JD had Pitt on the verge of being an elite program . A program that should've been able to recruit 4 & 5 star guys on a regular basis . Where Pitt is right now is a direct result of his poor recruiting . First off he'd still be coaching Pitt had he recruited better and even had he chosen to leave he'd left KS a roster that could compete in the ACC . Unfortunately KS took over a program that had suffered through 3 very lousy recruiting classes . Kids want to play for winners and until KS can show there's light at the end of tunnel it will be tough to recruit the kind of players Pitt really needs to compete in the ACC . Hopefully he's a magician and can produce some results with these recruits and he's off to a good start for 18 . Things aren't good , but the last few signings and commitment give some hope for the future .
He didn't use the lowest rankings. He used their composite rankings, which considers all ranking data points. Isn't that the fairest thing to use?
DT_PITT - That was long and interesting post.
Getting back to the main point of my post - While it can not be PROVEN that Parker Stewart is a (much) better recruit than Crishawn Clark, I would venture to say that the points I raised in my post certainly support that opinion.
Additional note: I did not start a Stewart/Clark comparison. I never would, as I feel there is no comparison.
I would disagree with the notion that James and Mike and Jamel were upper-echelon ACC players. Mike and Jamel were very inconsistent and mostly one dimensional players. Most importantly, neither one played any defense. James, on the other hand, despite his scoring problems, was a more complete player who worked just as hard on the defensive end. He did many little things for the team that Mike and Jamel wouldn't or couldn't do.
What many overlook from last season to this one, is that we will have a roster that is more complete. They will be inexperienced for sure, but, we will not be playing guys out of position like we did last season. We have a point, some shooters, and a few bigs. Hopefully, if these kids can play their natural positions, they can actually develop over time. Even more importantly, maybe they will buy into a team concept and give max effort on the defensive end. A roster that is made up of solely 3'sand 4's as last years was, was flawed from the start. Fielding a team that has players 1-5 that gives a damn about the defensive end, is already an improvement over last year. Unless these kids are as bad or worse than what JD was bringing in, we should have reason for optimism and look for improvement as the year goes on.
Where I was most disappointed in Stallings' recruiting in right when he got here.
I believe to some extent, kids DO want to play for a winning program, and last summer, we were coming off on NCAA tournament with a well seasoned recruiter in Kevin Stallings.
But kids also want to go where they can play a lot early and get ready for a future making money to play basketball. Stallings had TONS of playing time to sell in the ACC and didn't take advantage of any that when he first got here. At this point, I believe its a cop out to say that Dixon's previous recruiting classes had any bearing whatsoever on the choices recruits made last summer.
I'm glad that what you are seeing gives you some hope, but I'm not there yet.
(On a related, when Dixon got to TCU, he didn't have trouble getting top level guys to play for a program that was a perennial Big 12 bottom feeder.)
Fair point. Of course our coach decided to not pursue fielding a more complete team/roster last year.
Without going through them all, there are 18 threads right now on the front page of the board (at least in the format I'm using) that are about recruiting or specific recruits. I have only posted in five of them. And I didn't make any comments about recruiting rankings in all of the five. The notion that I am talking incessantly about this is batshit crazy, especially in comparison to what some of the people here who are like Kevin Bacon standing on the sidewalk trying to convince the rioting crowd that "all is well" have done. There may be people who "see it", but that would just be another example of people "seeing things" that aren't there.
I didn't use the lowest one. I used the composite rankings that take into account where several different sites have guys ranked. Which, of course, means by definition that I didn't use the lowest rankings out there. So you either don't know what you are talking about, or you are back to just making stuff up.
Well then maybe that's the problem. Maybe it's not that you simply make stuff up, maybe it's that you have such a bad memory that you really don't remember what people have posted. I mean seriously, you don't remember people bitching about Dixon's recruiting the last few years? Really?
Well on the first two, compared to you, sure. But no one here will ever have the market on the third one cornered as long as you are around.
Actually, going back to bobfree's first reply to me, I'm not sure I ever made a Clark / Stewart comparison as he suggested. I'm not sure, but I think it was a Damon Wilson / Stewart comparison.
Hopefully, if these kids can play their natural positions, they can actually develop over time.
Develop over time sounds good. That used to be Pitt's formula for success (before we were only able to recruit 5 freshmen over 3 years). We used to have players that stayed 4 or 5 years and developed. We won a lot of games because we were the more experienced and physically mature team. In recent years that was not the case. We relied on JC and grad transfer patches to win big in our weak OC schedule, finish around .500 in the league and squeeze into the tournament.
It looks like the patchwork approach has ended. We certainly have destroyed class balance, but we have finally recruited some freshmen. (the bulk of whom I expect to return for their second season at Pitt). Maybe we can start to build something instead of merely patch. Maybe we can return to our old formula under our new coach and return to being the more experienced and physically mature team. I think that is our best approach to succeed in the ACC. The ACC has a lot of teams were are just not going to out recruit.
I don't worry about recruiting rating. Top 100 isn't that important t me. I just want players who can play.. I hope to see some next season and the seasons beyond.
