The early season we will see a lot of b2b practice games the first three weeks to see if Self can find anyone that can score that way. Against some cupcakes, it will look like some can. But against good teams it will look like they cannot. Part of working on the b2b game goes beyond turning and dunking on an angle, or hooking a leg around a defender and catching a pass and dunking it, or catching and shooting a turnaround. Part of it will also involve the posts practicing passing cross lane out of doubles and kicking out to wings for open look treys. Hence, a bit more work on the b2b, while hoisting more treys in kick outs to try to win games at .82, while getting Diallo and Bragg experience with speed and violence.
Against MSU and other good teams, we will see more driving and less Diallo and Bragg.
The key to remember is that in pre-con we will see the team continually adding and subtracting pieces, so that it starts conference with as full of a tool chest as feasible.
This will be less of a chore this season, because the perimeter players all pretty much know how to play with a full tool chest, so this season will revolve around teaching Diallo and Bragg as much as possible as soon as possible, under the assumption that Perry, Landen, Traylor and Mikelson know HOW to do things, whether or not they can do them well,.
So: to the undiscerning eye, it will look like Self is changing the offense to "play through" our bigs a whole lot more early in the season, and being longer and more athletic, Diallo and Bragg will look pretty good against the cup cakes, but when ever we have to win games the first half of the season, games will be won just as they were last season. Shoot the trey, defend the lead. Drive it. Defend the lead. Shrink the impact space. Disruption of rhythm. Bad Ball. And all without a great wing man like Kelly became during the middle of the season, and the withered away from due to the ever enlarging gauze ball on his knee down the stretch. But this is now and that was then to invert the cliche.
During the first half and during games with leads, we will play a classic high-low passing game as often as we can to teach Diallo and Bragg how to do it. Bad Ball will be played with the usual cast of Merrill's Marauders from last season minus Oubre--a big loss, unless Brannen and Svi REALLY man up.
Around late December, Self will make some assessments about what Diallo and Bragg can and cannot contribute during conference. What they can do will stay in. What they cannot do will be thrown out of the offense. Because we are dealing with freshman bigs that will have been poster children for child abuse by Ratso and his thugs after the MSU game, unless Self just keeps them out to be merciful, it will take a couple of cupcake games after MSU for Diallo and Bragg to get their balls grown back. So: as is usual for freshman bigs, there will be sharp ups and downs, and once a good coach sees them play a good team or two, then all their weaknesses will be schemed against and Self will have to sharply reduce what they are permitted to do.
In the big pic, Self will try to craft a traditional high low game that will involve rotations of Diallo, Bragg and Perry, and also a Bad Ball game that will involve rotations of Landen, Traylor and Perry. This will keep it simple for Diallo and Bragg only having to learn to play high-low, not Bad Ball, too. Starting mid to late January, depending on what Diallo and Bragg can learn, they will begin to be introduced into Bad Ball rotations, too. And as the competition toughens in B12 action, more drive ball will be the trend, rather than less.
As usual we will see some pretty good trey balling early when everyone's wheels are sound and legs are rested. And as usual, as the season wears on and the gauze balls and the Victor's Secret lingerie starts showing up on the knees of long ballers, and the tendons and ligaments of same, and they lose their elasticities, the trey balling will taper off because the shooting percentages will be falling in practice, where Self measures when to cut the 3ptas from the 15-20 per game range to the 10-15 range.
What should be a huge concern for @HighEliteMajor and me (the resident 3pt apostates) is that Self has signed no more perimeter players. This spells doom for sustaining 20 3ptas the last third of the season. Losing and not replacing Oubre means we actually have fewer legs to draw on to keep our perimeter rotation from losing its legs down the stretch. Oh, it will be deceptive the first month of January, when Self likes to let them shoot a lot of treys early in conference to steal the early road wins and assure the home wins, and get that early conference lead to begin defending end of January with 10-15 trey plus drive ball and cram it inside when we can.
I mean think about this perimeter situation. IF Devonte doesn't have to spell Wayne so much, and can spell Frank more; AND IF Wayne learn to be consistent; AND IF Brannen gets his pop back; AND IF Svi learns to guard and shoot and drive as well as Kelly; THEN this perimeter still will be one injury away from the same lack of depth that forced Self to wear legs out of Frank. And we all know one perimeter injury ALMOST ALWAYS happens. And we know one UNREPORTED OPERABLE perimeter injury always happens. SO: SELF HAS TO SIGN ANOHER PERIMETER PLAYER THAT CAN ACTUALLY PLAY A LITTLE TO KEEP FROM BEING WEAKER ON THE PERIMETER NEXT SEASON THAN LAST SEASON.
And if Self does not sign another 3, then we will see a lot of trey balling early in conference to get as much juice out of trey balling as he can before the injuries and wear and tear accumulate and he has to come up with another mumbo jumbo explanation for fans about why the three point shooting has to be reigned back in again down the stretch.
I mean, last season Self told everyone that three point shooting was "fools gold" and the team had to learn to play a new version of inside out called driving it from outside fro all positions to get the equivalent of an inside shot aka BAD BALL with Mobile Big Man Attack Platforms in lieu of b2b bigs.
Um, why did he call it fool's gold, after he had just used 20-25 3pta trey balling to steal an early conference lead? Because...his trey ballers by then were starting to look like the flipping MUMMY from the waist down and Brannen wa playing on an operable hip injury; that's why!!!!
Self could not very well hold an presser and tell the fans and opposing coaches: "Well, Frank's legs are toast,, Brannen's hip is operable, Oubre's knee is injured AGAIN, and Devonte gets sped up and roughed up, and so we really don't have anyone that can hit the broad side of a barn from 19-9 away, so we are going to cut our 3ptas to 10-15 per game and start driving it all the time." That would have been giving away the plan a bit too much, wouldn't it? Self HAD to come up "fool's gold" for the KU fans especially, because he knew they would begin excreting rectilinear masonry forms during the coming games, if they didn't have some psy-ops jibberish to focus on in the short term, while KU began playing BAD BALL.
All signs point to more BAD BALL the last third of the season unless:
1.) two skinny freshmen 4s learn to dominate from the five;
2.) Self signs another perimeter player that can play 15-20 mpg at 2-3; and
3.) the refs start penalizing drive ball instead of rewarding it.
The chances of the above three things converging by next February 1st seem similar to the probability of Jeb Bush turning on the Saudis; offering all the oil under Yemen (note: there's reputedly enough oil under Yemen alone to supply the entire world for 50 years) to the Chinese; and telling the North Koreans that they and they alone are entitled to all the oil off North Korea.
Of course, there is one other possibility that could reduce the likelihood of defaulting decisively into drive ball down the stretch. Self could sign a footer that can step in and score b2b.
But this likelihood seems almost as improbable as Hilary Clinton admitting that she has always been, a reputed neocon plant in the Democratic Party; that she was a member of the Young Republicans during undergraduate school and law school, and that she worked as a volunteer for the Republican legal team trying to save the Republican's and Richard Nixon's bacon during Watergate, while she runs as Democratic candidate for President against Jeb Bush. And this IMHO is VERY improbable.
So: in terms of probabilities--batetradamus foresees a very experimental first half of the season coming in which everyone's hopes and dreams will be fulfilled briefly from game to game, and then down the stretch of the season batetradamus foresees another ascent of Bad Ball.
The biggest question for KU: did the B12 schools add many true 5s that can score b2b? If the answer were yes, then KU could be in for a rough ride. KU lucked out last season. Last season the Big 12 was a conference with almost no 5s and very few long 4s. Self could smoke and mirror and BAD BALL through his lack of a b2b 5. I haven't kept track of what the recruiting cat dragged into the B12. Does anyone else know?
