Returning players for 2021-22

[orientalnc]

More data. Jose & Moses are now draft-declared.

So, there are 135 "seniors" declared for the draft. Plus underclassmen and G Leaguers and foreign players. Could we get to 200 players vying for 60 draft slots? There are likely more undeclared seniors that will submit their names. This is crazy.

What is really crazy is that a 19 year old is more attractive to NBA execs than a 23 year old. And 135 guys in their 20s expect to be "developed" into NBA players. I hope Jose and Moses have their dreams come true, but I wonder if this is a losing battle. Fortunately for them they have their GT diploma.

 

[tbglover]

So, there are 135 "seniors" declared for the draft. Plus underclassmen and G Leaguers and foreign players. Could we get to 200 players vying for 60 draft slots? There are likely more undeclared seniors that will submit their names. This is crazy.

What is really crazy is that a 19 year old is more attractive to NBA execs than a 23 year old. And 135 guys in their 20s expect to be "developed" into NBA players. I hope Jose and Moses have their dreams come true, but I wonder if this is a losing battle. Fortunately for them they have their GT diploma.

Teams arrogantly feel not only like there's more likely physically development from a 19 year as opposed to a 23 year old but also that the young player has more room to be molded and developed skillwise. Basically a college senior is who he's going to be as a basketball player. I don't agree with it but with Moses I wonder if NBA teams will look at him differently since he started basketball late compared to pretty much everyone else at this level.

 

[tbglover]

He put his name in to be evaluated. That’s not the same thing.

At this moment Devoe is eligible to be drafted in the NBA draft same as Gani Lawal and Josh Okogie. Okogie ultimately stayed in and Lawal came back to Tech but there's no difference between them and Devoe as far as being draft eligible as an underclassmen.

 

[ncjacket79]

At this moment Devoe is eligible to be drafted in the NBA draft same as Gani Lawal and Josh Okogie. Okogie ultimately stayed in and Lawal came back to Tech but there's no difference between them and Devoe as far as being draft eligible as an underclassmen.

My point was he has not declared for the draft.

 

[dtm1997]

 

[RyanS12]

I’m assuming he’s officially hired Sb agent then. Congrats to Mo! He’s definitely earned it! Now we can officially start looking for a big man in the portal.

 

[lv20gt]

Now we can officially start looking for a big man in the portal.

Nope.

 

[RyanS12]

Nope.

Running with the 3 we have then?

 

[lv20gt]

Running with the 3 we have then?

Yup.

I'm sure we put out feelers to guys like Cisse out of Memphis and Brown out of Zona just in case, but I doubt we push that hard.

With the team dynamic being that the 5 spot will likely be our 5th option on offense and realistically 4th highest at most, it's not really that big a deal to have second year program guys filling in that role especially since we have 2, and possibly, 3 options working with a proven big man coach.

 

[slugboy]

I’m assuming he’s officially hired Sb agent then. Congrats to Mo! He’s definitely earned it! Now we can officially start looking for a big man in the portal.

I think we’ve known for about a month that Moses is going pro is some sense, and hopefully getting drafted with a good contract in the NBA.

Not that it’s going to matter for Moses (and the same for Jose, too), but unless he takes an advance payment of some sort from the agent, he still could be eligible to come back. From the photo, I wouldn’t be surprised if he did take an advance, because he’s ready to try his wings.

Re: @lv20gt ’s point, unless there’s a 5 in the portal that wants to come here and is already a team-elevating player, you stick with what you have. We already have lots of potential at the 4 and 5 that we’re coaching up. There aren’t that many elite 5’s in the portal, and we only have one spot—you want to use that for a difference-maker, not a “patch”.

 

[Connell62]

Yup.

I'm sure we put out feelers to guys like Cisse out of Memphis and Brown out of Zona just in case, but I doubt we push that hard.

With the team dynamic being that the 5 spot will likely be our 5th option on offense and realistically 4th highest at most, it's not really that big a deal to have second year program guys filling in that role especially since we have 2, and possibly, 3 options working with a proven big man coach.

They're not looking for a pure 5, they're looking for someone like Moses that plays the 4 and 5. Someone that can stretch or play in the paint and there are many of those floating around.

To your point though, they do feel comfortable with whose already on the roster, and they have the ability to ultra-selective in who we pursue.

 

[lv20gt]

They're not looking for a pure 5, they're looking for someone like Moses that plays the 4 and 5. Someone that can stretch or play in the paint and there are many of those floating around.

To your point though, they do feel comfortable with whose already on the roster, and they have the ability to ultra-selective in who we pursue.

Offense isn't the issue. Moses was the 5 almost exclusively last year. And with playing alongside a smaller 4 in Ush I find it hard to believe there are many of those floating around that can guard the 5 at the ACC level that aren't pure 5s. I'd love to hear names though.

For instance, I would be extremely skeptical about taking Bryson Williams with the plan of him playing alongside Usher the way Moses did. I think we'd be interested in him, but not as a replacement for the role Moses played for us last year.

 

[slugboy]

Here’s an article from Ken on Moses, with a few tidbits on Jose and Devoe:

Georgia Tech’s Moses Wright ‘all in,’ will stay in NBA draft

From the time Georgia Tech forward Moses Wright declared his intent to enter the NBA draft, the possibility of him deciding to withdraw and come back for his second senior season was remote.

www.ajc.com

1. Like the headline says, Moses is “all in”.
2. Jose is also all-in
3. Devoe seems to be examining his shot this year more than I thought.

 

[iopjacket]

Even if Moses, Jose, and Michael don't return, we will have 8 talented players returning and 4 new recruits. We will have three experienced seniors in Jordan, Bubba, and Khalid. We are loaded with talent at point guard and the wing positions. We are certainly not a lock to make the NCAAs, but this team can develop and make the post season.

 

[Root4GT]

Even if Moses, Jose, and Michael don't return, we will have 8 talented players returning and 4 new recruits. We will have three experienced seniors in Jordan, Bubba, and Khalid. We are loaded with talent at point guard and the wing positions. We are certainly not a lock to make the NCAAs, but this team can develop and make the post season.

Love the optimism. If we make the NCAAs without Moses, Jose or Devoe next year than CJP should be ACC Coach of the year.
All our returning players were role players last year. Usher developed greatly as the year went on but he played off the other 3 as they were our 3 primary scorers last year.
CJP’s track record for getting freshmen to produce at a high level isn’t very good, only Okogie and Devoe had good freshmen years.

We have some good pieces, however, Devoe’s return is very important for our team. Critical in my opinion.

 

[ncjacket79]

Love the optimism. If we make the NCAAs without Moses, Jose or Devoe next year than CJP should be ACC Coach of the year.
All our returning players were role players last year. Usher developed greatly as the year went on but he played off the other 3 as they were our 3 primary scorers last year.
CJP’s track record for getting freshmen to produce at a high level isn’t very good, only Okogie and Devoe had good freshmen years.

We have some good pieces, however, Devoe’s return is very important for our team. Critical in my opinion.

Only Okogie and Devoe were expected to produce. The freshmen we have this year are better than we’ve had in a while.

 

[iopjacket]

Love the optimism. If we make the NCAAs without Moses, Jose or Devoe next year than CJP should be ACC Coach of the year.
All our returning players were role players last year. Usher developed greatly as the year went on but he played off the other 3 as they were our 3 primary scorers last year.
CJP’s track record for getting freshmen to produce at a high level isn’t very good, only Okogie and Devoe had good freshmen years.

We have some good pieces, however, Devoe’s return is very important for our team. Critical in my opinion.

If you can't be optimistic preseason, when are you going to be. I think Coleman can be a very good freshman, maybe great. I agree that Devoe's return is very important, but we some other potential good outside shooters and Pastner has been ACC coach of the year before.

 

[lv20gt]

If Mike left alongside the other two it would completely change our approach to the year.

With Mike we have a very good returning duo between him and Ush. With an offense built around them instead of being them being supplementary players to Jose and Moses and I think we are in great shape. We'd basically need one player to step up and give us a big 3, most like Coleman imo, and then we can look at the other two spots as more role players where I think Kyle/Bubab/Deivon at the PG and Howard/Gigi at the 5 are really good options. I view that as a normal good position. Still some questions marks, but lots of good potential answers, and in college basketball it is hard to be in a better position, and you certainly won't be consistently. And although there are questions, it would more be a matter of who best fit a certain slot rather than big team dynamics questions.

Without Mike I think we're much more likely in an exploratory position as far as how we want the team structured. For instance, at the 5, in my opinion, Howard is more solid and developed, but Gigi has higher potential. With Mike I think we likely look at Howard more. Without Mike we might look at Gigi and start to go ahead and try to scheme and build around his skill set. Another situation is possibly going with Coleman at the 2 and Ush at the 4 and running a more true two big with Meka and Howard/Gigi based on how the coaches were talking about Meka. We could obviously also just play Parham/Maxwell/Kelly as a more one to one type of replacement for Mike and hope for the best. In general I think Mike overall really lets us use this year to get guys like Kelly and Smith acclimated as well as guys like Meka and Maxwell a year of development, hopefully, injury free before being forced into the core roles.

I still think we'd have a lot of good options and if the breaks went our way could still be very good, but we would be trying to figure out the best team dynamic as well as getting guys experience in more demanding roles.

That being said, the article basically just said what we should have already known, that Mike hasn't informed Pastner of his decision, which should have been obvious since there was no news of a decision.

 

[Root4GT]

If you can't be optimistic preseason, when are you going to be. I think Coleman can be a very good freshman, maybe great. I agree that Devoe's return is very important, but we some other potential good outside shooters and Pastner has been ACC coach of the year

Losing the ACC Player of the Year and the ACC Defensive Player of the Year are huge losses. If Devoe doesn’t return you lose your 3rd best player. Any team losing that much talent will regress.
Now if the freshmen come in as high level ACC Players and Devoe returns then I will be optimistic.

 

[MtnWasp]

Whether a team wins or loses is not a function of who is not on the team but the players who are on the team.

Even if Devoe happens not to return, Gt still will have five 4* players to man spots 1-4. That is more talent than Gt has had in a long time. Just because they are not yet proven does not mean that they can't play. Sturdivant and Smith are particularly studly as a back court duo. To those two add two of the best perimeter shooting recruits in the incoming class, and that ain't bad. Usher averaged 15ppg in the last 8 games of last season and was making good decisions and is a really fine leader.

It will be a new team and that uncertainty will create some hand-wringing by some fans, and there is no way of knowing with certainty if any new team can come together and win. But I'll gladly take my chances with this exciting group.