First there was the great 'Wacie mystery. It's been discussed at length, so I'll leave that one alone. Today, Richard didn't start . . . say what? He's been easily our most efficient scorer. Dude shot 100% today with 4/4 on threes. OTOH Kugel started and struggled against Stetson. He's wildly talented and will be a great player, but is not playing efficiently thus far. Fudge started in place of Felder today and I think that was a great move. Might have even lit a spark for Felder. I'm not totally critical of the lineup decisions, but there have been a few eyebrow-raising instances. Are some of these seemingly dubious decisions a matter of analytics?
Still early in the season, and playing against inferior opponents. It’s a good time to play with lineups just to see what happens. Wouldn’t think it’s too analytics based, but it’s building data to use later.
Richard probably didn’t start because he is coming back from an injury. As for Kugel, if you don’t play him, he won’t improve. He simply needs to become assertive. He is a great passer, but he is somewhat timid when it comes to scoring the ball. By the way, I heard that Richard is changing his name to Lee Humphrey.
Exactly right. Richard was hurt and didn’t practice this week. Probably a game time decision. Kugel is definitely struggling to find his rhythm. The missed shots at the rim are weird, but he is being aggressive and taking good shots. The turnovers are a bigger concern, IMO, because of how much this staff values turnover rate. But we needed him this game to replace Lofton’s minutes with a secondary ball handler. I still think Jones will eventually be the odd man out when we go to nine.
Our starting lineup will be: Lofton Richard Kugel Reeves Fudge Castleton Now that's how you do analytics!
Agree all around, but am not sure about the point on Jones. He's been quietly very efficient in recent games. Earlier in the season was much different. Let's see if Jones keeps up the current play. I look fwd to getting Lofton back in the mix; we need to get our guard rotation stabilized for the SEC grind. I don't think that's a good time to be experimenting to find the best guard rotations. The guards will have to play solid for us to have any chance in the SEC.
The staff is definitely giving Jones opportunities, and he is coming up with good numbers lately (takes care of the ball, sets up teammates, gets defensive rebounds). But whose minutes does he take? If Lofton, Bonham, Reeves, and Richard combine for around 100 a game (and I think that is low, probably more like 105), that leaves 20 minutes max for Kugel and Jones. Would you rather shorten the rotation and let one of them have that 15-20 to get into a rhythm? Or split it and end up with 8-12 apiece, which is only about 2-3 shifts per game?
I don’t think that anyone on the team other than CC should play more than 25 mpg. In the 1999-2000 season, Mike Miller played 28 mpg. No one else on that Gator team played as much as 24 mpg. Bonner and Parker played a little less than 14 mpg each as the 9th and 10th men. Jones is starting to play better. Kudos to Golden for continuing to have faith in Jones. Lane appears to be the odd man out, but, other than the drop off from CC to JJ, it’s hard to say that there is a big difference between the players at the other 4 positions. Put together whatever first and second teams you choose at the 1-4, and, if they play against each other, the winner is likely going to be whichever team has CC at the 5.
Jones has been very effective running the point recently, and has got his shot going in. Bonham excels at times. But Lofton is The Guy. We need him. Anyway, I think we have three guys that are showing they can run the point at this level. That's more than most teams can say.
Too little of good data for the analytics to be accurate and reliable unless you want to fool yourself. Coaches will have to wing it old school with what they have.
Yet even Donovan rarely (if ever) used that minute distribution again. No one has these even, 20 mpg platoons. And so far Golden has shown a clear preference for certain guys getting a preponderance of minutes, especially CC, Lofton, Richard, and (lately) Bonham.
We have a deep roster. CC is the only one on the roster who, I believe, is a top-25 player at his position.
I don’t know how quick Aberdeen is, but you are right. I wished that CTG would have brought him in earlier in the game with the length that UConn had. He seems to be calm in a storm but can get to the basket and probably shoot better than Lofton. Needs more minutes anyway.
He played very well against a bunch of good big men last season. In my opinion, he is trying to do way too much this year. He needs to get his teammates involved on offense and get rid of the ball whenever he’s getting double teamed. he also, in most cases, does not need to be dribbling the ball up court. We need an offense where the ball is moving, there are plenty of screens, and plenty of player movement and involvement in the plays.
