Who will make biggest improvement this year?

[MrTbone]

Sal does some very good things and will continue to improve. but from my view so far, Grace is a better passer from the post and a better spot up perimeter shooter. and he wasn't bad as an interior defender either.

I think Sal's a better 4 than Matt, but Matt's a better 5.

+1 to this.

Last year, Noah was the go to backup at 4 behind Nate, so if he needed to come out it was clear Yates was going to play probably mostly out of maturity and strength. Knowing what we know now that Noah wouldn't get an 8th year or whatever he was shooting for, Sal should have maybe gotten more minutes. It just didn't happen.

 

[SpiderTrap]

Every year we talk about depth and how we think we have it or need it but the truth is most teams and Mooney history tells us 7-8 guys is the rotation.
In Mooney’s back to back NCAA years he played 8 guys nightly with he last man (Garrett and Martel getting about 10-12 minutes a night).
I think we should expect the same which probably means the following 7 for sure
Gilyard
Francis
Sherod
Cayo
Golden
Wojcik
Andre

The final spot will be between Sal/grace/burton it sounds like. But even these guys I would expect get 10 or less minutes.

 

[spiderman]

agreed. I think 8 is as many as you can expect to play. but having quality depth all the way though those 8 is huge. and the quality of the depth beyond those 8 is important too for the few minutes they're on the floor, for when there are injuries, and for the future.

 

[MrTbone]

The key to this is "quality" of depth. We have not had great quality on the bench for quite some time, or at a minimum, the quality was subjugated by lack of experience.

This year should be better, big question is how much. I'm optimistic that I won't regret my season ticket renewal like I did last year.

 

[PhillySpider]

As I always find myself saying on here - - - far too much of this entire discussion focuses on how people fit offensively or what skills they bring offensively. . . . Even short handed last year with injuries we were fine offensively. We figure to be better offensively this year almost no matter what configuration we come up with. We lost 20 games (again) last year because we were horrible (again) defensively. And we will lose or come close to losing 20 again if we are the same team defensively.

So when we look at who will make the biggest improvement (the threads title) or what will the rotation look like (as its turned into), to me its all about the defense. The biggest improvement needs to be someone (preferably several someones) stepping up their defense in a meaningful way. That to me starts with Grant. He will still be out there for 32+ minutes a night regardless, so we can't have him being a black hole defensively. He got in foul trouble a lot early last year because of very poor positioning and footwork etc. and after that, he basically stopped risking fouls and that was a huge problem for our defense. He needs to have worked extremely hard in the off season to be in better shape and also on his quickness and the coaches need to really help him get a much better feel and understanding for how he can be effective defensively. He's never going to be a rim protector, but he can certainly work and learn to be a solid defender and that's what we need! Several others could also use to make major strides as well, but their problems are even more tied to physical limitations (lateral quickness and foot speed in particular) so harder to make the leap forward that Grant can make with improvements that don't simply rely on improved athleticism.

And the really big improvement that would help us the most would be for our coach to have spent the off season working 16 hours a day examining everything he does and how he does it and figuring out how he could be doing it a LOT better. In particular, he should be figuring out why we can't defend a lick and how to fix that!! Under consideration should be that this group is perhaps better equipped to play some other scheme as our primary defense. We have two very small but quick guards and Cayo is fairly athletic and we have some depth this year. Hopefully he's reviewed tons and tons of film on teams that meet that profile and figured out ways those teams have been successful and he's going to come in ready to coach them up on that. Now having said I hope he has done that doesn't mean I expect he will. In fact I give that a near zero chance. What I expect is we will look to play the exact same defense we have played for years and it will be coached in exactly the same way. That means the improvement must come the players having done outside work etc. That's far more likely than Mooney making any changes whatsoever.

 

[spiderman]

you know we're switching to man-to-man this year, right? and that we've spent an unusually large percentage of the off-season working on defensive principles?

 

[SouthJerseySpiderFan]

Philly I hear you and sounded great until stated what you expect Mooney to do. LOL! And Sman Mooney adjusting to the man-to-man sounds great but team has a few players who don't appear will ever be average at best defensively. Would have liked to see more zone played but remember Mooney once said he "wasn't comfortable with a zone."

 

[spiderman]

meaning not comfortable that a straight zone would be effective. not that he doesn't know how a simple 2-3 works.

I think we'll be good in man. I personally would look to isolate one of our small guards with a bigger guard on the block, but nobody seems to look to do that anymore.

if an individual player can't stay in front of his guy, he might find himself on the bench. I think Grant will be a much better defender being behind a man rather than being in space.

 

[kneepadmckinney]

Philly, I rarely agree with you, but on this one I agree.

 

[PhillySpider]

you know we're switching to man-to-man this year, right? and that we've spent an unusually large percentage of the off-season working on defensive principles?

Man to man is a very broad description. we have been a man to man team for years (although many confuse it as a match up zone). I assume the comments mean we'll be trying some other type of man. There are many types of man - - - from Packline (which for example emphasizes gap positioning and doesn't emphasize a lot of pressure on the passing lanes) to VCU like man (that are all about getting up in the passing lanes etc.) and tons more kinds of man defense. Some man to mans switch everything, some switch nothing. We have been a man to man team for awhile now, but I certainly hope nest year its not the same one we've been running! The key for us is figuring out a defense that allows us to take advantage of real quickness from our guards while hiding the fact that we don't have very good on ball defenders among the group that figures to be in the rotation (not including Blake who I haven't seen much of defensively). This is a real coaching task, we don't have great talent defensively - - - I am just not confident that this coach can get it done. We have lived and died defensively with what we have done for years and I think its pretty fair to say adapting hasn't been a real strong suit!

 

[PhillySpider]

Philly I hear you and sounded great until stated what you expect Mooney to do. LOL! And Sman Mooney adjusting to the man-to-man sounds great but team has a few players who don't appear will ever be average at best defensively. Would have liked to see more zone played but remember Mooney once said he "wasn't comfortable with a zone."

Reread my friend - - - I don't expect him to change anything at all!

 

[spider23]

I am voting for Sal for most improved. I have no idea if he has this summer, or will in the winter - but I think we can gain the most as a team if he is improved.

Interesting that Gilly mentioned Woj looking good in summer work outs. If Woj is the most improved, I wonder if Mooney will figure out how to use him considering Francis is the anointed starter and probably gets 34 minutes most nights.

 

[SouthJerseySpiderFan]

Reread my friend - - - I don't expect him to change anything at all!

I know. That's why I LOL. Things for Mooney to do ..... but nothing will get done.

 

[spiderman]

Man to man is a very broad description. we have been a man to man team for years (although many confuse it as a match up zone).

I don't know how you can call our previous base defense under Mooney a man to man. it had man principals, but if your man changed sides of the floor we passed him off. not just switching on a screen.

he's said we're going to play man this year ... as opposed to what we played before. not sure why you think nothing's changing. it's not like he's said we were going to change defense in prior years and then not done it. in previous seasons he stayed with the base defense believing it would come around, and it didn't.

 

[urfan1]

I've always described the match up as a zone using man principles