my take is that most if not all of our international recruits are not ready, or not as ready as we thought. Going to be hard to win relying on them. Mara, Vide, BB are not going to be really factors this year but that's not to say one or all of them won't eventually be stars. This team will go as far as Andrews, Mack, Stefanovic, and Bon…
my take is that most if not all of our international recruits are not ready, or not as ready as we thought. Going to be hard to win relying on them. Mara, Vide, BB are not going to be really factors this year but that's not to say one or all of them won't eventually be stars. This team will go as far as Andrews, Mack, Stefanovic, and Bona take us.....which is to say our ceiling is probably the Sweet 16 if we are lucky.
The thing that strikes me is that the hype by everyone I read on Mara and BB was that they were first round/lottery picks one and done, and would be ready to play and make an impact. Unless Cronin works some improbable magical teaching, that is not the case, particularly with Mara who is limited athletically and was suppose to be the prize of our in coming players.
I do think that UCLA teams tend to make marked gains .during the season because they need to be taught and buy in to Cronin's system, particularly on defense. All of his teams at UCLA have started slow and ended up strong. But if the European player are not contributing this year (just taking up rest time for the other players or if somebody is in foul problems), we will have a short rotation and a lack of outside shooting besides Stefanovic. I do agree with BB88 that assessing the European players to date, we will need to lower our expectations on this team an d hope that can get into the Big Dance.
agreed. I think there was a post (maybe here) comparing Mara to Jokic. He might very well turn into an NBA all star, but I'm not expecting much from him this year...or next year. He'll probably be in the G league next year. The stars were worthless.
my take is that most if not all of our international recruits are not ready, or not as ready as we thought. Going to be hard to win relying on them. Mara, Vide, BB are not going to be really factors this year but that's not to say one or all of them won't eventually be stars. This team will go as far as Andrews, Mack, Stefanovic, and Bona take us.....which is to say our ceiling is probably the Sweet 16 if we are lucky.
The thing that strikes me is that the hype by everyone I read on Mara and BB was that they were first round/lottery picks one and done, and would be ready to play and make an impact. Unless Cronin works some improbable magical teaching, that is not the case, particularly with Mara who is limited athletically and was suppose to be the prize of our in coming players.
I do think that UCLA teams tend to make marked gains .during the season because they need to be taught and buy in to Cronin's system, particularly on defense. All of his teams at UCLA have started slow and ended up strong. But if the European player are not contributing this year (just taking up rest time for the other players or if somebody is in foul problems), we will have a short rotation and a lack of outside shooting besides Stefanovic. I do agree with BB88 that assessing the European players to date, we will need to lower our expectations on this team an d hope that can get into the Big Dance.
agreed. I think there was a post (maybe here) comparing Mara to Jokic. He might very well turn into an NBA all star, but I'm not expecting much from him this year...or next year. He'll probably be in the G league next year. The stars were worthless.