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7 hours ago, KoB2011 said:

A lot of you have Smith at the three; just going to float it out there that he didn't play it at all last year and in the very limited video we saw he wasn't ever on the floor with two guys bigger than him. Anyone that was at the scrimmage remember seeing him play the 3?

Completely agree on this. Unless Smith has greatly increased his handles and athleticism (I don't mean vertical jump, I mean quickness laterally, etc.) I don't see him as a wing, I see him as a hybrid/stretch 4, which is what he pretty much was exclusively last season. I think it's more likely that IU goes small again this year than big. 

I could see:

Green

Romeo

McRoberts

Smith

Morgan

I could see:

Green

Romeo

McRoberts

Morgan

Fitzner

I could even see:

Green

Durham

Romeo

Smith

Morgan

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10 minutes ago, FKIM01 said:

I love McBob, but if he starts this whole season, something has gone very wrong.

Why? It is so easy to point to championship teams that have a guy who is a really good defender and doesnt make mistakes on offense in the starting lineup. 

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1 minute ago, KoB2011 said:

Why? It is so easy to point to championship teams that have a guy who is a really good defender and doesnt make mistakes on offense in the starting lineup. 

It just seems to me that with the talent present on this team, some guys will not develop the way we expect them to if McBob maintains starters minutes the entire season.  I'm not saying he won't play but surely someone in this group will pass him up on the depth chart sometime this season.

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28 minutes ago, KoB2011 said:

Why? It is so easy to point to championship teams that have a guy who is a really good defender and doesnt make mistakes on offense in the starting lineup. 

I can see McBob starting and I can see him coming off the bench. He doesn't provide much offense. He's really good on the glass and overall on D and he helps make the team better when he's on the floor generally, imo, hustle plays, smart play, etc. But his offense is just not at a level where, when we need scoring, he provides much help. 

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40 minutes ago, BGleas said:

Completely agree on this. Unless Smith has greatly increased his handles and athleticism (I don't mean vertical jump, I mean quickness laterally, etc.) I don't see him as a wing, I see him as a hybrid/stretch 4, which is what he pretty much was exclusively last season. I think it's more likely that IU goes small again this year than big. 

I could see:

Green

Romeo

McRoberts

Smith

Morgan

I could see:

Green

Romeo

McRoberts

Morgan

Fitzner

I could even see:

Green

Durham

Romeo

Smith

Morgan

Largely agree except that I think we're continuing to see the move into mostly "positionless" basketball. We'll see how much Smith has improved, and lateral movement/D is important, but man he looked to be progressing and he has the ceiling to be really impactful, and then you add Fitz with his outside shooting to go with his "arsenal" of post moves (that we haven't really seen yet), and Romeo - a "2" or "3" will be on the floor along with Morgan and either Green or Al (who, probably at times, will be on the floor together, but I don't think that much).

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1 hour ago, Hoosierhoopster said:

I can see McBob starting and I can see him coming off the bench. He doesn't provide much offense. He's really good on the glass and overall on D and he helps make the team better when he's on the floor generally, imo, hustle plays, smart play, etc. But his offense is just not at a level where, when we need scoring, he provides much help. 

We have two guys who should push 30% usage in our starting lineup and neither is a PG. Having a guy who either immediately passes or takes open threes while being a great defender and dominant on the glass (for his position) is a perfect compliment to this team. 

Often times the best five man combination is not the five most talented individual players. 

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6 minutes ago, KoB2011 said:

We have two guys who should push 30% usage in our starting lineup and neither is a PG. Having a guy who either immediately passes or takes open threes while being a great defender and dominant on the glass (for his position) is a perfect compliment to this team. 

Often times the best five man combination is not the five most talented individual players. 

To piggy back on this, to a degree, if we need scoring, we are behind.  McRoberts provides some lockdown defense and rebounding, which arguably provides as much value as scoring in that instance.  The counterpoint, ideally, is we have a solid 2-way player develop and start.  With our depth of talent, it appears that could be a number of players.

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11 minutes ago, KoB2011 said:

We have two guys who should push 30% usage in our starting lineup and neither is a PG. Having a guy who either immediately passes or takes open threes while being a great defender and dominant on the glass (for his position) is a perfect compliment to this team. 

Often times the best five man combination is not the five most talented individual players. 

if McBob is going to get as many minutes as last year, he absolutely MUST look to shoot the three more often. Too many times last year the defense was able to lag off of him because they knew he wasn't going to look to shoot. He doesn't even need to take that many...he just needs to force the defense to come out and guard him.

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9 minutes ago, CauseThatsMyDJ said:

if McBob is going to get as many minutes as last year, he absolutely MUST look to shoot the three more often. Too many times last year the defense was able to lag off of him because they knew he wasn't going to look to shoot. He doesn't even need to take that many...he just needs to force the defense to come out and guard him.

Agree with this. I know we all like McBob, but he has to be an offensive threat.

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32 minutes ago, CauseThatsMyDJ said:

if McBob is going to get as many minutes as last year, he absolutely MUST look to shoot the three more often. Too many times last year the defense was able to lag off of him because they knew he wasn't going to look to shoot. He doesn't even need to take that many...he just needs to force the defense to come out and guard him.

Agree, and with the talent around him, one of two things will happen. He will have to look to shoot or his minutes will be reduced as the competition for playing time appears to be fierce.

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38 minutes ago, CauseThatsMyDJ said:

if McBob is going to get as many minutes as last year, he absolutely MUST look to shoot the three more often. Too many times last year the defense was able to lag off of him because they knew he wasn't going to look to shoot. He doesn't even need to take that many...he just needs to force the defense to come out and guard him.

^^^^^^This!!!  

He needs to shoot 25-30%= 1-3 or 4 per game.  He doesnt need to be Hulls or Ziesloft but has to at least be a thought for the defense.

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3 hours ago, BGleas said:

Completely agree on this. Unless Smith has greatly increased his handles and athleticism (I don't mean vertical jump, I mean quickness laterally, etc.) I don't see him as a wing, I see him as a hybrid/stretch 4, which is what he pretty much was exclusively last season. I think it's more likely that IU goes small again this year than big. 

IMO Smith has to develop as a 3 if he has any chance of playing past IU. There are so many options for the 4 and 5 that we would be way more dangerous if he can play the three. I agree with what you said about his quickness and ball handling, hopefully it is better this year. If I recall correctly, we didn’t play as much small ball until after De’Ron got hurt and were forced to. I think CAM wants length at the three and even the 2 if they can stay in front. That would give us a huge advantage on close outs, rebounding, etc. I’m not saying they won’t go small at times during certain situations, but we played Duke pretty well last year when we were bigger. 

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3 hours ago, FKIM01 said:

I love McBob, but if he starts this whole season, something has gone very wrong.

Archie loves defense and Zach led the BIG in steal % last year. It'll be difficult to keep that skill set on the bench when the other 4 on floor can score. The biggest transition for most freshman is defense, they will earn their minutes by competing against Zach.

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41 minutes ago, Sapperin LA said:

Archie loves defense and Zach led the BIG in steal % last year. It'll be difficult to keep that skill set on the bench when the other 4 on floor can score. The biggest transition for most freshman is defense, they will earn their minutes by competing against Zach.

Yes, he makes a lot of steals and gets his hands on the ball and knocks it loose.  With the guys we have on this team that will lead to a lot of real easy scores which is a big deal.

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4 hours ago, CauseThatsMyDJ said:

if McBob is going to get as many minutes as last year, he absolutely MUST look to shoot the three more often. Too many times last year the defense was able to lag off of him because they knew he wasn't going to look to shoot. He doesn't even need to take that many...he just needs to force the defense to come out and guard him.

I think he will look to shoot more, but it doesn't need to be much more. In conference play last year, he had 30 steals, 21 assists and only 10 turnovers. Combine that with the fact that he will possibly be our best perimeter defender next year and you've got a guy who is going to impact winning more than a more talented scorer. 

Who cares if Justin Hunter is better at scoring? Whichever of them starts is going to be the fourth or fifth option of the starters, so why not play the guy who does the other stuff better? Playing a guy like Hunter with the second unit where he is the first or second option is going to play to his strengths better, too, and help him succeed next year and set him up for a big sophomore year when he will possibly be the top scoring option. 

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2 hours ago, Hoosier98 said:

IMO Smith has to develop as a 3 if he has any chance of playing past IU. There are so many options for the 4 and 5 that we would be way more dangerous if he can play the three. I agree with what you said about his quickness and ball handling, hopefully it is better this year. If I recall correctly, we didn’t play as much small ball until after De’Ron got hurt and were forced to. I think CAM wants length at the three and even the 2 if they can stay in front. That would give us a huge advantage on close outs, rebounding, etc. I’m not saying they won’t go small at times during certain situations, but we played Duke pretty well last year when we were bigger. 

Duke is a really weird, not normal example but we all use it as an example because they're Duke. Duke played two bigs last year that didn't have any perimeter game; they could get away with it because those guys at least had the quickness to guard outside but offensively they weren't taking guys, like Davis, outside. We saw teams a lot worse than Duke abuse us because of Davis (Ft. Wayne and ISU). Our best game of the year, ND, started with Davis getting abused and ended with a healthy Davis on the bench for a big comeback. 

Davis will have his spots once he is healthy, but he needs to be used only in situations where he won't have to guard on the perimeter. 

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This is a very deep squad. The frosh class is loaded. 

-Forrester is going to be a beast on the block. 

-Phinisee will end up the true point guard we need.

-Anderson is a lights out shooter & can cause problems defensively. Keep your eye on this one.

-Langford’s chip so blue it’s almost purple

-Hunter is very versatile. Has a nice outside shot.

I’m still not willing to bet the farm on Green. So, I’m not including him in the predicted starting five.

P1 Durham

P2 Langford

P3 Morgan

P4 Smith

P5 Forrester

It’s going to be an exciting season!

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6 hours ago, Hoosierhoopster said:

Largely agree except that I think we're continuing to see the move into mostly "positionless" basketball. We'll see how much Smith has improved, and lateral movement/D is important, but man he looked to be progressing and he has the ceiling to be really impactful, and then you add Fitz with his outside shooting to go with his "arsenal" of post moves (that we haven't really seen yet), and Romeo - a "2" or "3" will be on the floor along with Morgan and either Green or Al (who, probably at times, will be on the floor together, but I don't think that much).

Agree with you on positionless basketball. I actually don’t think labeling positions as 1,2,3,4,5 really even works anymore, but in terms of discussion here it sometimes just makes it easier. 

I think I’m reality in today’s basketball you have guards, wings and bigs. ‘Guards’ are your point and combo guards, ‘wings’ are your traditional shooting guards and small forwards and then ‘bigs’ are stretch 4’s and centers (which often times don’t even exist anymore). 

If I had to break this roster down, without having seen the freshmen yet, I would divide them up like this.

Guards: Green, Phinisee and Durham

Wings: Romeo, McRoberts, Damezi, Hunter

Bigs: Morgan, Smith, Fitzner, Moore, Forrester, Davis 

I list Smith as a big because based on what we’ve seen from him so far he’s a stretch 4. It’s the only position he played last year. 

But also to your point about positionless, there’s gray area in many of these positions. While stretch 4 is technically a big, they spend most of their time on the perimeter, either spotting up or setting ball screens and fading to the perimeter, but their generally not initiating offense and generally defender by bigger players, not guards. 

The game has changed no doubt. 

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3 minutes ago, BGleas said:

Agree with you on positionless basketball. I actually don’t think labeling positions as 1,2,3,4,5 really even works anymore, but in terms of discussion here it sometimes just makes it easier. 

I think I’m reality in today’s basketball you have guards, wings and bigs. ‘Guards’ are your point and combo guards, ‘wings’ are your traditional shooting guards and small forwards and then ‘bigs’ are stretch 4’s and centers (which often times don’t even exist anymore). 

If I had to break this roster down, without having seen the freshmen yet, I would divide them up like this.

Guards: Green, Phinisee and Durham

Wings: Romeo, McRoberts, Damezi, Hunter

Bigs: Morgan, Smith, Fitzner, Moore, Forrester, Davis 

I list Smith as a big because based on what we’ve seen from him so far he’s a stretch 4. It’s the only position he played last year. 

But also to your point about positionless, there’s gray area in many of these positions. While stretch 4 is technically a big, they spend most of their time on the perimeter, either spotting up or setting ball screens and fading to the perimeter, but their generally not initiating offense and generally defender by bigger players, not guards. 

The game has changed no doubt. 

Think you nailed the player groupings. I think we start a guard, two wings and two bigs but I could see us starting two gaurds, one wing and one big. It's hard to see us playing three bigs together, though. 

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42 minutes ago, KoB2011 said:

Duke is a really weird, not normal example but we all use it as an example because they're Duke. Duke played two bigs last year that didn't have any perimeter game; they could get away with it because those guys at least had the quickness to guard outside but offensively they weren't taking guys, like Davis, outside. We saw teams a lot worse than Duke abuse us because of Davis (Ft. Wayne and ISU). Our best game of the year, ND, started with Davis getting abused and ended with a healthy Davis on the bench for a big comeback. 

Davis will have his spots once he is healthy, but he needs to be used only in situations where he won't have to guard on the perimeter. 

Agree, the Duke game was such an anomaly. I can’t think of a single other team of any significance last season that played two bigs that were both interior players. Also, Duke’s bigs were so bad defensively that K was forced to switch to zone exclusively midway through the year. 

Davis seems like a great kid and amazing ambassador for IU, but again the reality in this day and age is that it’s very difficult to play big minutes if you can’t defense and switch on the perimeter. He’s going to have to prove he can switch onto guards effectively to be more than a situational guy. 

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1 hour ago, BGleas said:

Agree with you on positionless basketball. I actually don’t think labeling positions as 1,2,3,4,5 really even works anymore, but in terms of discussion here it sometimes just makes it easier. 

I think I’m reality in today’s basketball you have guards, wings and bigs. ‘Guards’ are your point and combo guards, ‘wings’ are your traditional shooting guards and small forwards and then ‘bigs’ are stretch 4’s and centers (which often times don’t even exist anymore). 

If I had to break this roster down, without having seen the freshmen yet, I would divide them up like this.

Guards: Green, Phinisee and Durham

Wings: Romeo, McRoberts, Damezi, Hunter

Bigs: Morgan, Smith, Fitzner, Moore, Forrester, Davis 

I list Smith as a big because based on what we’ve seen from him so far he’s a stretch 4. It’s the only position he played last year. 

But also to your point about positionless, there’s gray area in many of these positions. While stretch 4 is technically a big, they spend most of their time on the perimeter, either spotting up or setting ball screens and fading to the perimeter, but their generally not initiating offense and generally defender by bigger players, not guards. 

The game has changed no doubt. 

I agree Gleas, we see the positions pretty much the same. I’m not sure about either Smith or McBob though. McBob doesn’t shoot or even threaten to shoot enough to play offensively as either a 2/guard or 3/wing though of course you have 2 guards like a Roberson who doesn’t shoot but majorly impacts the game. We’ve only seen Smith as a frosh and he played a role on last season’s team. I see him more in that gray area. You could say he’s a tweener but he could develop into either a stretch 4 or a wing imo, plenty of time and he started showing such promise last season. 

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2 hours ago, BGleas said:

Agree with you on positionless basketball. I actually don’t think labeling positions as 1,2,3,4,5 really even works anymore, but in terms of discussion here it sometimes just makes it easier. 

I think I’m reality in today’s basketball you have guards, wings and bigs. ‘Guards’ are your point and combo guards, ‘wings’ are your traditional shooting guards and small forwards and then ‘bigs’ are stretch 4’s and centers (which often times don’t even exist anymore). 

If I had to break this roster down, without having seen the freshmen yet, I would divide them up like this.

Guards: Green, Phinisee and Durham

Wings: Romeo, McRoberts, Damezi, Hunter

Bigs: Morgan, Smith, Fitzner, Moore, Forrester, Davis 

I list Smith as a big because based on what we’ve seen from him so far he’s a stretch 4. It’s the only position he played last year. 

But also to your point about positionless, there’s gray area in many of these positions. While stretch 4 is technically a big, they spend most of their time on the perimeter, either spotting up or setting ball screens and fading to the perimeter, but their generally not initiating offense and generally defender by bigger players, not guards. 

The game has changed no doubt. 

Nodding in agreement.  Don’t forget about big Race.

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