Sjolund to (not) transfer

GT_EE78

GT_EE78

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bos said:
He's really not bad though. Judging him off a small sample size his freshman season is a terrible argument. I believe coaching staff is trying to bulk him up so he can play the 4, since he has no business guarding perimeter players. Also he needs to learn post moves like Moses did. He only took 11 FGs inside the 3 in 21 games.
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most are probably also considering his prior season stats at the juco
 
gte447f

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Techster said:
One of our last minute recruits had this stat line at one time:

16.6 minutes/game
30.7% FG
1.2 Turnovers/game
3.6 pts/game
3.4 rebs/game

He was also talked down on a lot within our fanbase. He came in more raw than Sjolund, who was actually recruited by a numbr of other P5 schools. Good thing we didn't push him to transfer out. That guy is Moses Wright who's probably been our most overall consistent player this year and probably hasn't figured out his full potential yet.
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Moses has developed more than I ever thought he could. He is a legit scoring and rebounding asset when he plays within 10-15 feet of the basket. However he is still plagued by bad decisions, turnovers, bad fouls and being out of position and getting beat on defense routinely. In his defense, I am not at all convinced that he is being coached to his strengths. If he was, he might really be a force to be reckoned with.
 
gte447f

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gte447f said:
Moses has developed more than I ever thought he could. He is a legit scoring and rebounding asset when he plays within 10-15 feet of the basket. However he is still plagued by bad decisions, turnovers, bad fouls and being out of position and getting beat on defense routinely. In his defense, I am not at all convinced that he is being coached to his strengths. If he was, he might really be a force to be reckoned with.
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I didn’t mean to get off topic. I should add that I would like to think that Sjo can develop similarly to if not better than Moses as a scorer, but maybe not as a rebounder. Sjo obviously has a much better shooting stroke and ball handling skills, but doesn’t have the same physicality.
 
TooTall

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sidewalkGTfan

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I don't think he's the type of player (currently or in the future) that is really gonna move the needle for this program. For people pointing out Moses Wright, he's the extreme exception and not the rule. For every Moses Wright, there's 10 "under recruited" guys at P5 schools, who never become real contributors.

Maybe it's just complete apathy setting in for me...
 
gte447f

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sidewalkGTfan said:
I don't think he's the type of player (currently or in the future) that is really gonna move the needle for this program. For people pointing out Moses Wright, he's the extreme exception and not the rule. For every Moses Wright, there's 10 "under recruited" guys at P5 schools, who never become real contributors.

Maybe it's just complete apathy setting in for me...
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Moses is an exception because he was an unrecruited, zero star player that has developed into a serviceable starter, albeit on a mid-pack to bottom tier team in a P5 conference. Moses is not exactly moving the needle in my opinion, at least not yet. On paper and by the eye test in my opinion Sjo should be able to match Moses as a reliable scorer, especially in Pastner's perimeter oriented "offense", but probably will not match Moses as a rebounder. Sjo is currently a weak on ball defender, but so is Moses on the perimeter. Moses is and probably will remain a better rim defender. Neither may move the needle for the program. I think it is more likely that it will take future incoming recruits to do that.
 

lv20gt

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It's amazing how many no content posts that do nothing but crap on the program or troll are allowed to stay. It's not even a matter of being negative, it's just adding nothing to the discussion.

Anyways, it's way too early to be making anything near a final judgement on Sjolund. For those pointing out his shooting stats, go look at Adam Smith's freshman year shooting stats, and he's the guy multiple posters have lamented us not having the past couple of years. His numbers were almost identical in terms of % as a freshman. Look at Vasiljevic at Miami. As a freshman his numbers were nearly identical overall with the difference being he play more minutes. He's second in the ACC in 3% this year and was a solid contributor last year for miami. Look at Ryan McMahon at UL, Diakite at UVA, Childress at Wake, Mooney At ND, Boeheim at Cuse, etc etc. No, there isn't a guarantee he will develop, but to write him off because of his freshman stats is flat out ridiculous.

Also, looking at any per game metric from his freshman year is misleading because of the high number of sub 5 minute appearances where he had little to no chance to show pretty much anything.

In the 5 game stretch where he got significant minutes (all games where he got 10+ minutes except 1) he averaged 24 mpg, 8 ppg, shot 33% from the three on over 5 attempts per game. No, those aren't "move the needle" freshman numbers, but the certainly show enough to believe he'll be a contributor down the line especially as a shooter because the area he needed to improve the most was defense, which will be helped with physical development.
 
slugboy

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Updated the thread title, since he's not transferring. I'll change it back if things change.
 
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