Illinois Hoops Recruiting Thread

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#626      
He is a third year freshman at 6'10.5 and likely 250lbs thats cheap and i pray wants to be here. Why do you want him to leave as a 12th man? Given our roster and depth at the 1-2 Why not Blake? Sometimes i dont get people. Jason has played fine and has sometimg we may need. Jason doesnt need to play this year unless Mirk.gets hurt or Tomi or Z go down or a team with a true power 4. Sometimes i wonder if anyone tried to guard a 6'10.5" 250lb big guy. Jason was ranked 127th by 247 2 years ago and has done just fine when he has played but you guys want him to leave with 3 years in the system. But want Zaens, Femdemi or Jake trying to cover Pherrell Payne if Mirk gets 3 or 4 fouls? I just dont get the hate Ben or the one guy over 6'8" besides Z we have that you want to go! I certainly dont want Jason to need to.play this year but nor do i want him to leave. Hell no, he has shot 80% and rebounded , not turned the ball over and a 3rd year freshman! He is a value and given our current roster if any 4/5 gets hurt we need his !!! way more than Blake or even Lee!
you are misunderstanding me

i have no issues with him wanting to stay . but he isn’t going to play much , jf at all

for his sake , he should transfer down , if he wants to play in games .

see Leib , Brandon
 
#628      
Ideally we retain Dre (plus get Blackwell) and Dre just finds someone he can trust that knows a thing or two about shooting mechanics to improve his 3 pt% :)
So you are suggesting Dre needs a father figure to help him? Were you thinking of George Michael from Wham?
 
#630      
Foul trouble and/or injury is the concern.

That’s Morillo. You aren’t going to get better to come here for 5 minutes a game. They would be the 10th or 11th best player on the team.
 
#632      
I have no inside knowledge, but my guess is that Andrej and Blackwell's decision is related and connected to their NIL requests and how they relate to each. We've heard time and time again that the money is there if need to spend it, and while Blackwell is trying to get a large pay day by teams bidding against each other, Andrej's return seems to be about making sure he's compensated as the top guy. Andrej took a bench roll this year for the greater good of the team, so I imagine he wants to make sure he's compensated for that. Next to Wagler's Purdue game, you could argue that Andrej's hot games were better than anyone else's individual performance this year.

Blackwell coming in making a significant amount of more money than everyone else, specifically Andrej, doesn't help with team chemistry. Especially assuming Mirkovic is our currently highest paid returning player right now.

As much as we love the Ivisics and Jake Davis' group announcement and team first mentality, this is a business and when you start comparing one guy vs another, that's tough to just swallow as a 20-22 year old who has been told their entire lives that they are the best player wherever they've been.
 
#633      
This may be a hot take, but I think Stojakovic being retained is more important than Blackwell.

When I look at the list of players, and I want to give Isaac Trotter full credit for this because he discussed it at length, the names available to replace Stojakovic are really underwhelming. There just aren’t great options.

As far as Blackwell’s position, there are many more solid options, whether it is McNeil, or Hiill, or rolling with Coleman, etc. You get the idea.
Blackwell would be great but not totally sold on him as a team player. He seems somewhat about himself and will want the ball to the detriment of the team. Maybe he would be fine but would not be surprised if he went someplace like Louisville. Louisville seems to collect those kind of people -now and in the past.
 
#636      
I love that on this board you can see portents of doom over not recruiting an all-conference level veteran transfer to play 12 mpg off the bench, right along side recriminations and blame when the freshman we played 25 mpg in the back half of the season transfers because we didn't play him enough. In LoyaltyLand, minutes are irrelevant to recruitment, the sole factor effecting retention, and an inexhaustible resource!
 
#637      
Maybe a hot take … Maybe not …

If you’re a development piece and you’re playing games like dragging out the commitment and all that … Red flag …
are we still in the lead for blackwell
 
#638      
The source is reading the messaging from the insiders that we will be fine if Blackwell doesn't come. That, to me, is them trying to let us down easy; the Blackwell-to-Illinois situation does not seem to be going as well as thought.
Insiders might also be tired from providing continuous Blackwell updates.
 
#640      
What changed in the strategy to not pivot?
Probably something along the lines of Coleman only being willing to come off the bench for a player of Blackwell’s caliber or Andrej not wanting another guard to take the ball out of his hands. Perhaps a combination of both but calls were definitely made
 
#642      
I love that on this board you can see portents of doom over not recruiting an all-conference level veteran transfer to play 12 mpg off the bench, right along side recriminations and blame when the freshman we played 25 mpg in the back half of the season transfers because we didn't play him enough. In LoyaltyLand, minutes are irrelevant to recruitment, the sole factor effecting retention, and an inexhaustible resource!
Animated GIF
 
#643      
Just to try and clear things up …

I think it’s Andrej …

Or Andrej and Blackwell …

And that’s it …

Staff really doesn’t seem to be showing any interest in anyone else right now …

Brad is not interested in pivoting or settling …
Illinois is still actively looking at backup types in the portal - a guard and a developmental big.
Watching Ping Pong GIF by Pudgy Penguins
 
#645      
you are misunderstanding me

i have no issues with him wanting to stay . but he isn’t going to play much , jf at all

for his sake , he should transfer down , if he wants to play in games .

see Leib , Brandon
Im fine and prefer him not to play. But Lieb was the 11th rates player in Illinois and 81st Center
Jason was 127 overall and still 12th or so on our roster and in his 3td season where we dont habe a 4 over 6'8". If anything happens to Z, Mirk or T then he will have to fill a role no one we have now can. He is way better than Lieb. Like i said. When has he played poorly given a chance?
 
#647      
Can we finish Andre already so we can have a bunch of booms for the night and stop arguing about whether JJ is gonna play minutes or why we aren’t trying to convince a good athletic big that he should come here for 5 minutes a game when our bigs foul out twice next year

…then we can pickup the Blackwell stuff in the AM
 
#649      
Can we finish Andre already so we can have a bunch of booms for the night and stop arguing about whether JJ is gonna play minutes or why we aren’t trying to convince a good athletic big that he should come here for 5 minutes a game when our bigs foul out twice next year

…then we can pickup the Blackwell stuff in the AM
skin game archer GIF
 
#650      
Maybe a hot take … Maybe not …

If you’re a development piece and you’re playing games like dragging out the commitment and all that … Red flag …
I took it as someone else may announce tonight and he wanted to give it space.
 
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