You have no clue if Wagner will take a step forward or not. He could top out and be what he was at UK.
Honest opinion about Arkansas roster
- Thread starter Dontworryboutit23
- Start date
In the end, it’s all about the coach.
If Cal has rekindled his flame, and actually coaches and works his butt off, they could be dangerous.
If it’s the same old lazy, Little House on the Prairie watching, I’d rather be walking my dog Cal that we saw at UK the last several seasons, then they’ll be lucky to win a tourney game.
As always, Cal has the talent, now let’s see what he can do with it.
If Cal has rekindled his flame, and actually coaches and works his butt off, they could be dangerous.
If it’s the same old lazy, Little House on the Prairie watching, I’d rather be walking my dog Cal that we saw at UK the last several seasons, then they’ll be lucky to win a tourney game.
As always, Cal has the talent, now let’s see what he can do with it.
Go cry in a corner . If you really knew the long list of questionable " injuries" in the past with Cal you would have understood the post .
I feel like people are entirely overweighing the importance of head coaches on these message boards lol.
Every school in the SEC knows UK is better off without Calipari coaching. Folks in Gainesville are worried the real UK will come alive once more and if it does, watch out. Nobody thinks Arkansas will win anything but Kentucky is a whole different ball game. Kentucky will be Kentucky again, at the top of the SEC.
The way Calipari was phased out was a masterpiece and I only wish we could have been so lucky getting rid of some of our football coaches.
The way Calipari was phased out was a masterpiece and I only wish we could have been so lucky getting rid of some of our football coaches.
Napier has gotta go if you wanna do anything. Guy is a G5 coach. Better suited for gimmicky offenses and a godaddy.com bowl win every few years.
You know he is going to do whatever it takes to prove to people he hasn't lost it.
So did Bruce Pearl. Had a team with more talent last year than this year so it’s safe to assume Auburn will go winless this year in the tournament.
I'm honestly not sure he is capable of that. The RRRRUUUUNNNN GGGOOOO offense can only get you so far and I'm not sure that he knows anything else.
Lets keep our emotions in check. Piggie's roster is plenty stout, barring no injuries. It's almost as if Cal is waiting for a last second high, high transfer for insurance. But the seven rotation that Cal so loves is plenty competitive.
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Yeah, the most glaring issue I see is a lack of perimeter shooting. If they don't get some 3pt shooting from their freshmen, I don't see where it will come from. Last season's UK team's shooters are all gone. No Sheppard, no Reeves, no Dilly, and not even a Mitchell. Wagner's biggest issue was his shooting. We all know it. Ivisic might be the best shooter on the team. After that, they're hoping Boogie Fland becomes a knock-down shooter. In today's game, that's a serious issue. A zone would potentially kill them.
... not to mention a delusional self-aggrandizing coach and a questionable staff. My deepest sincere appreciation to the Arkansas Athletic Department for their benevolence toward the health and well-being of the UK Men's Basketball Program. Who could have ever imagined they cared that much?
Cal will actually be 66 years OLD in February.
Absolutely no way he has enough left in the tank to make a whole lot of coaching improvement over his last 5 years at UK.
Arkansas thinks they hired 2010 Cal. They actually hired a semi-retired washed up coach who is only hanging on for the money, his ego, and Brad's future in coaching.
I am sure it will end well. Just like it did for us, Memphis, UMass and anywhere else Cal burned down on his way out of town.
Off the top of my head he made Richards into a good player by helping him to be effective making moves inside.
Josh Harrelson too I believe.
I think Payne always had a reputation with the bigs. You never know how much of an effect he actually had but when he did leave, we kind of sucked developing big men after that. So it does make you wonder a bit.
Why do you care? I was not impressed with anyone who was at UK EXCEPT for Adio that has transferred to the SWC school. He should have played more. Their loyalty was to the coach not UK, not the UK basketball program. My loyalty has been since 1964 to UK and the UK basketball program. I could give a damn what they do now that they have shown me no loyalty to my school and program.
If Cal was capable of rekindling anything he would have done it here before experiencing his greatest embarrassment.
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Huh? I was replying to a guy saying Wagner will take a step forward. What a out of left field post.
I am sorry I thought I was replying to the post regarding all his teammates including Wagner I should have caught it. My apologies
Davis shot 41% from three last year. Brazile was 35-37% over the last few years.
Agreed overall though. The thing is three-point shooting seems to be so volatile from year to year. Some players suddenly move 10% in either direction for no apparent reason. Devo Davis shot 40% one season and was a bad three point shooter every other year.
Agree. They are going to be athletic and play fast. As has been mentioned on this post, shooting especially from 3 will hurt them.
Even with Z, Theiro and Aidou or Brazile rebounding I ( if they do) I don't see a dangerous team.
Davis will be their go to guy and he's streaky.
I see them as middle of the pack in the SEC and on the bubble for the Dance.
We shall see.
I hope Pope just throws a zone at them and changes up defense a few times then Cal will get the deer in headlights look. Ball game. I seriously doubt they have a full rotation because of mystery injuries when we play them and I can hear it now well we played them in Rupp with 7 senior's and we're just young but hey were build for march and I'm gonna make a tweak...lmao.
Good point about injuries. With 9 guys on scholarship, he’ll be down to 6-7 guys by midseason, if not before, if things play out like they did his last several years at UK.
When was the last time Cal navigated an entire season without having multiple guys missing multiple games due to nagging injuries?
With just 9 guys, odds are that injuries will be a factor keeping this team from reaching its potential.
Yeah, it looks like Johnell Davis is your best shooter. He wasn't too good before last season, but 41% is good. But it looks to me like you've got an inside-out kind of team. They're gonna drive and slash, and post up quite a bit, I'd say. It can work, obviously, but that team is not likely to follow the trends of today's game. Calipari coached guys in that old school style many times before, though, so he may be looking to keep games in the 70s next season.
If I were an Arkansas fan, shooting would be my biggest concern- that and defense. Half of that team showed last season they struggle with defense. Slowing down the pace could help some of that, but I don't think most Arkansas fans wants to see the team post up 25 times per game. They want to see fast pace, lots of threes, and high scoring games. I'm not sure this roster is geared for that kind of approach. I guess we'll see.
Here is the issues. 1. Suspect shooting. 2. Using big Z the right way. 3. Limited depth and not even enough bodies to run a full practice.
We all know how much talent Cal needs to have a great year. Game planning and injures alone will lose them 5 games. I’d also say they have less talent especially at the guards than our team last year. That team won nothing and lost 10 games. We were ranked all year but still, I don’t see them doing much overall based on youth, shooting, and depth. Cal has proven he won’t over achieve the last 7 years. His staff also got worse.
One last thing, when is the last time a Cal team really guarded people? Maybe 2018-2019? Lots of talent and different looking teams since then and last year he trotted out the most pathetic defensive team we ever had under him.
I mean yea we’ve all heard that. Richards ended up a decent player but nothing earth shattering. I’d also submit that there’s no evidence he had anything to do with it. Sometimes players improve from their freshman to junior years. There are many cases of bigs coming in and not being able to hit layups by the time they left.
We’ve seen what type of coach he is and underwhelming doesn’t begin to describe his abilities. As a lead assistant he doesn’t recruit (which was Calipari’s biggest positive), doesn’t work the team during practice, cannot floor coach to even a modicum of acceptability, I mean Payne by all accounts is just not good at coaching basketball.
In the early years he had great players gifted that he had nothing to do with recruiting. And even some of them didn’t develop at all past their initial talent. How many bigs did we have that solely relied on talent alone? Most of them.
IMO I think it’s time to put the “Payne and the bigs” comments to rest. That was just something that was floated because as a lead assistant he did absolutely nothing and we had to come up with something he did. In reality he’s Calipari’s yes guy, someone that is really liked, but not good at coaching. I mean what happened to the bigs at Louisville? They might have been worse than the guards lol. You and I could coach Randle to go 1 on 3 and finish.
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Brad “works with the guards” the same as Payne “works with the bigs”. Calipari “works to recruit” and Chin “shows them around town”.
We don’t have to try and spin it. It’s a solid roster with talent and experience mixed together. Typically the best combination for teams Cal had at Kentucky.
I personally wouldn’t trade it for ours, as we have proven defenders and shooters. Not just highly rated, athletic recruits.
I personally wouldn’t trade it for ours, as we have proven defenders and shooters. Not just highly rated, athletic recruits.
I don’t think anyone is spinning really. It’s a typical Calipari team that has no chance to compete for a title before it starts. It’s completely void of veteran shooters and is going to rely on talent and youth. They’ve got one guy on the roster who can score from anywhere on the floor who’s also got experience. He’s not going to play him correctly and will probably have him coming off the bench.
This team will be good and it will win games which for Arkansas is what they want. I’ve said for years Calipari needs to be at a program that isn’t striving for championships because his methods don’t bring that. His methods bring really good teams and you’ll get some NBA pedigree. You can’t do that at Kentucky we’ve got too many records to uphold. But Arkansas is perfect for that. They’re just trying to establish a brand. He should have been at a program like that from the beginning.
More than anything I think Calipari should have just built his own program and brought his methods to success there. A program like Georgetown, they’d love him. Why he keeps sticking in the SEC to compete against football and piss off blue blood fan bases I don’t get. His goals were just far different in his younger years I suppose. But we’ve seen this show before, it’s the same exact thing he brought here over the last 7 years.
It was a stupid post regardless of the context, which you didn't need to explain to me. It's the type of crap someone who is deeply unfunny and unoriginal would say just to get a reaction.
I don't know how much of a factor Payne has been coaching bigs here if you had to put a percent on how much better some guys have gotten. Just know that Payne has been pointed out of teaching some bigs a move to add to their game and that they practiced it over and over till they got good at it. Our bigs did seem to improve some after they was here a while. Just what I heard and my perception of some improvement from a few of them.
It will be interesting to see if Big Z and Aidoo looks any better with Payne coaching them. It did take take getting them better so a guy like Aidoo I would not suspect we would see a lot of difference because it took Payne at least a year or even two for us to see any difference with a couple of our bigs.
Yes. Kal traded Welch for Brad. What could possibly go wrong?
The question is about the roster not what the coach is doing with it so to hopefully compartmentalize...
I think it is top 15 and probably closer to 10th so I'll split the difference and call it 12.
The bottom can fall out though if Fland and Knox can't help spread the floor, Davis is not quite as expected, and/or Big Z fails to take the step forward and they get bubbleish but if they stay healthy and those tickets hit they have Final Four potential.
Too thin for my personal tastes and the outside shooting is a legitimate question but the potential cannot be discounted from purely a personnel and upside stand point.
I think it is top 15 and probably closer to 10th so I'll split the difference and call it 12.
The bottom can fall out though if Fland and Knox can't help spread the floor, Davis is not quite as expected, and/or Big Z fails to take the step forward and they get bubbleish but if they stay healthy and those tickets hit they have Final Four potential.
Too thin for my personal tastes and the outside shooting is a legitimate question but the potential cannot be discounted from purely a personnel and upside stand point.
All three of their main guards are known as ball dominant, and even if they weren't what system is he putting in place offensively again after Welchs departure??? We all saw how it looked when we went back to Cowball.... And don't get me started on his defensive approach.....
He will have the “luxury” of being the hunter now, versus the hunted. Pope will now experience this in reverse. It will be interesting to see how they both do. GO CATS !!!
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