I think the key with Mac, as you say, is health. I thought Dylan Andrews played well and competed. He looked good in combination with Tyger and I thought they moved the ball well. This mau well be a late developing team when you factor in 3 freshman plus a recovering Etienne into the equation. Patience may be the order of the day.
UCLA failing to develop 5 star talent… or they’re all just over rated? Bailey seemed visibly upset at the end of the game. Looked like he didn’t really care if they lost because he wasn’t played anyways. Strange that you have a 5 star player that you just stand in the corner to watch tyger and jaquez? That after benching him for 10 minutes? Bona on the other hand just stands under the basket. Oh, and gets pulled within 30 seconds of the tip off for a foul? What kind of players want to play for that kind of coach…
Obviously not that many. Next years recruiting class sucks. Ucla struck out on 4 of the 5 star recruits they had a shot with. And that’s given the fact that ucla will be losing jaquez, singleton, nwuba, bona, Bailey, and maybe even tyger… so why could that be? It’s because cronin is a shitty offensive minded coach…
UCLA has no offensive identity and they never have under cronin. They aren’t a 3 pt team, or an inside out team, or a pick and roll team, or a drive and dish team, or an up tempo team. The only player that ever did anything was a transfer who learned to create his own shot at Kentucky. Cronin doesn’t develop offensive talent.
This years team is going to struggle with jaquez and tyger passing it back and forth while the rest of the team watches. That’s what happened vs Illinois and Baylor. When the shit hits the fan, and your plan is to pass it back and forth between two players, you’re gonna lose…
UCLA hasn’t won the Pac-12 in 10 years. Unfortunately this isn’t their year either. They’re magical final four run from two years ago is still leaving them over rated. Arizona has better athletes and a much better coach. Usc has much better athletes. Oregon has a great coach. Without an offensive identity they’ll lose more games then expected.
Because this team has no identity on offense, they should be a defense minded team. This means clark, Andrews, and Bailey should get the most minutes every game. That won’t happen because cronin will just pull the new guys at any sign of a mental mistake instead of letting them learn like duke, Kentucky, unc, Baylor, Gonzaga, Virginia, Illinois, and many others. UCLA won’t win a championship with cronin as I said all along. He’s done a much better job than the last loser, but he isn’t the savior of ucla. Let’s hope for something better by the time ucla gets to the new conference.
On Watson… my point exactly. Any nba bound athlete with half a brain realizes that the nba is about offense. Nobody plays defense in the nba. The only way to get better at offense is to play lots of minutes under a coach with a very large appetite for mistakes. Watson wasn’t allowed to play let alone make mistakes. Of course he’s going to leave for something better.
Bailey looked pissed at the end of the game, and rightfully so. He’s being completely misused thus far. He isn’t allowed to create and have fun. He’s put in a box to minimize mistakes and being stifled on his opportunity to get better. The best way to get better is to make mistakes
Bailey has been allowed to create plenty. UCLA runs plays specifically to give him that opportunity. He just hasn't succeeded on that front yet. It happens, but he's getting time to work through it. If he wasn't being given that time, Bailey would be sitting the majority of the game and Andrews would be getting way more of the minutes.
I don't think it's a coincidence that the offense looked the best when Jaquez was out. He's way too iso-heavy compared to everyone else, which bogs things down. You basically have to get him to buy in to moving the ball like everyone else; there's a time and place for his offense but right now it's consistent whenever he's on the floor.
The seniors are not delivering, and a I'd argue that their poor play has contributed more to our losses than anything the freshmen did. I love Tyger, but 5 for 15 against Baylor is ATROCIOUS. We win that game if he does not do that. 8 for 22 fro Jaquez against Illinois is not much better.
Evan, I don't care about your dumb opinions. The guy was terrible on offense and a turnover machine. When people say bullshit like Cronin is terrible at developing 5 star talent and use Watson as an example saying that he should have played over the guys that were there longer, I am going to point out how awful he was. Sometimes it takes time to develop, more than 1 year. So, it is a cheap shot to blame Cronin for Watson sucking! Remember Chris Smith? He was terrible until his junior year.
When you're trying to win games, you're not going to play guys who are prone to make silly mistakes, especially on that team, which was full of experienced players.
Not worried at all, two highly ranked very good teams early in the season. UCLA was very competitive in both, just came up short. It's not the games early in the season anyone should be worried about.
I hear ya, gibby, and we can address that, but let's do it in a more constructive manner. We all need to remember that the one thing we all have in common here is that we want to see our basketball program succeed. We're on the same side. We can discuss all these things from that framework.
I never said I could coach anybody… I’m just a couch coach as you know. I can still be frustrated that ucla doesn’t have an offensive game plan AT ALL! You watched the games I assume… the plan was for Jaime and tyger to play 2 on 5
Since you air out your complaints, here's my complaints. I don't like how Amari is given a super long leash. Singleton should be starting at the 2! Also Tyger needs to stop thinking he's Kobe. His shooting has been putrid so far. Can someone made a Free Throw? There you go. I am gonna bitch, bitch, bitch.
13th ranked is good for what? Another sweet 16 run? UCLA should have had a much better class recruiting for next year. Especially considering they plan on losing 4 starters! So yeah, 13th sucks for ucla. I’m tired of UCLA’s ceiling being the sweet 16
If Altman is so great Baskets, how did his team get their asses handed to them by UCI? Where's your analysis complaining about what he did wrong or didn't do right? You only come here to whine after a loss. An 80-75 UCLA loss to #5 Baylor. But you're here overreacting. Geezus.
Altman lost to UCI because my beloved Anteaters are the best team in the Big West and deserve a six seed in the NCAA Tournament AT WORST. ZOT ZOT ZOT Y'ALL
Five games into the season is a entirely too early to smash the panic button. Sure, losses to ranked teams is disappointing, but with 26 games left in the regular season, it's not like the team is running out of time to get it right.
This notion that Cronin historically doesn't develop 5 star players is unfounded especially since Peyton Watson was the only 5-star player he's signed in his coaching career prior to Bailey and Bona. Sure, Watson did not do well in his one season as a Bruin, but that's not a reasonable basis for making a silly statement that Cronin mishandles his 5 star recruits.
There are folks here complaining Watson never developed under Cronin because he didn't play, Let's conveniently set aside the fact that last season was interrupted by Covid, wiping out 3 weeks of games and practices. That had a lot to do with Watson's lack of development and playing time. A few folks here are also forgetting that Peyton Watson didn't do enough to stay on the floor when given the opportunity largely because he didn't have the skills to play in a system which already featured experienced players ahead of him (Juzang, Jules, Jaime, Singleton).
Cronin has two 5 star players this season in Bailey and Bona. How is he handling them? Answer: They're starting. Whatever issues anyone had with Cronin's handling of Watson is not applicable here because Bailey and Bona are going to play significant minutes and how they make use of this opportunity is entirely up to them.
But a 5 star rating mean less and less these days. Many of the blue chip 5 star players end up at elite basketball academies to play alongside other blue chip players. These elite high schools are powerhouses that end up decimating their leagues. The players at these schools spend more time working on their highlight reel plays for IG and YT, rather than working on fundamental team basketball.
You also said this in a comment below: "Any nba bound athlete with half a brain realizes that the nba is about offense. Nobody plays defense in the nba." That is so far from the truth, it's ridiculous.
The NBA Championship teams, year in and year out, are always in the top 1 through 4 of the league defensively. Defense wins championships. A good offensive game can get a player into the league, but it doesn't keep you in the league. The best players who have long careers in the league have to be able to do multiple things. They need to do at 3 of the following 4 things: shoot 3's, pass, rebound, play defense. The G-League has been littered with players who can go to the rack and throw down highlight reel dunks while droppinetcg 50 pts, guys like Ben McLemore, Vander Blue, Jemerrio Jones, but they can't get into the NBA for much more than a drink of water. Meanwhile, we see more and more no-offense guys like Kevin Looney, Herb Jones, Alex Caruso, Austin Reeves, Payton Pritchard, Gary Payton II, and Jose Alvarado carve out significant roles on their teams by playing defense. Jaylen Clark will be one of these guys when it's his turn to enter the NBA.
As for Cronin's offense, it's accurate in saying that historically he has no offense. For the past 3 seasons, we've seen what amounts to ISO basketball in half court sets. It's been Jacquez and Juzang in ISO at the free throw line and at the elbows, it's been Tyger going 1 on 1, probing the paint looking for a dump-off, a catch and shoot for Bernard or Singleton, or a shot, and that's about it. Until now, they never had a big man finisher to establish pick and roll, they didn't have the athletes to run motion, and they didn't have good passers. Instead, their offense was their defense. Cronin wants his defense to create offensive possessions through deflections, steals, and forcing the other team into bad shots. He wants to get points from transition. This is how Cronin teams generated offense during his years at Cincinnati and his 2 seasons at UCLA, so his modus operandi should be no surprise.
The Bruins' two losses this weekend were the result of bad, awful defense. Fixing the defense now is going to have much greater returns than spending time on fixing the offense. A great defense is a different maker in March.
But that's not to say he's not going to expand his playbook this season. With Bona, he has a legit run to the rack center who he can use for pick and roll in a 2 man game with Tyger and baseline rim runs for layups and lobs. I saw a few failed PNRs this weekend where Bona turned the wrong way and rolled into traffic and stopped too far away from the rim. IMO, Tyger, Jaime, and Bailey should all be able to run PNR with Bona.
Yes, Bailey spent a lot of time sitting in the corner 3 spot, but he was stuck to his spot with lead boots. That play exists in nobody's book unless the player is Klay Thompson or Ray Allen. If he wants to impact the game, he's got to move his feet. The ball isn't going to find him if he's not going to make himself available. If his assignment to be available for a catch and shoot 3, he needs between the elbow to the baseline to keep his defender's eyes on him, away from the ball to prevent him from dropping into weakside coverage. Everyone thinks it's Cronin's fault that Bailey was camping in the corner, but IMO Bailey wasn't doing his job.
From what I've seen, Bailey is playing soft. But that's no surprise. Sierra Canyon produces highly rated players who are good, but not great. IMO, Dylan Andrews and Adem Bona could easily end up being better NBA prospects than Bailey.
With 26 games left on the schedule, I'm still firmly on the Cronin bus.
Thanks for the reasonable and well elucidated thoughts, m. We could use a bit more of the approach around here (dad yelling into the back seat here...)
Interesting about your G league comments because Peyton Watson is tearing up the G right now. I guess we'll see if he's going to be one of those offense only players or if he develops a more well rounded game and gets any shot with the Nuggets.
Peyton might be tearing up the G-League, but I'm not sure that means anything. I think it was last season when a 33 year old Isaiah Thomas on bad hips came and played 1 game in the G-League and dropped 40 pts. It's a league that plays no defense.
Here are the top scorers from the 2021-2022 G-League regular season:
CARSEN EDWARDS
CRAIG RANDALL II
MASON JONES
QUINNDARY WEATHERSPOON
TREVELIN QUEEN
SABEN LEE
CHRIS CLEMONS
NIK STAUSKAS
JUSTIN TILLMAN
CAT BARBER
Where are these guys now? I could be wrong, but I think every one of these players is either back in the G-League or Euro Leagues or delivering for Door Dash.
Don't get me wrong, Peyton could be a good player in the NBA. But until he can do 2 out these 4 things - knock down 3's, pass, rebound, defend - he's not going to get much playing time. As I've said, volume scorers are a dime a dozen in the pros. To stick in the NBA, these guys need to bring something more to the game than highlight reel dunks and occasional 30 foot bombs.
I totally agree with you and that's what I meant about Payton. Tearing up the G isn't a marker for NBA success (though I think Watson might have been up for a couple games when a bunch of guys were out with illness/injury this last week), so it supports your point that we don't have much basis to say whether Cronin improved Watson's game or whether he can develop 5* players or not.
I hope Watson does well. He had a shot every day in practice to earn more playing time. I do think Mick could or should have played him more early in the season to gain experience. I feel that way about Dylan Andrews right now. Tyger needs more rest. But, as we get into conference play, you need to produce. Watson was not a consistent producer and needed to earn playing time. He simply didn’t get it done. We get our expectations of 18 and 19 year old kids from scouting services. Perhaps that’s not fair. Shabazz Muhammad anyone?
Listening to Cronin's presser, it was basically the same as his prior years, early on in the season. I remember after Cronin losing early games to lesser opponents, his main comment was the defense was not good enough against the three and being beaten on the dribble. Not surprised about the two losses this weekend--Cronin's team have traditionally started this way and eventually have gone on to deep runs in the NCAA tournament.
To the people here already screaming to fire Cronin after his prior exceedingly good accomplishments at UCLA, I just do not understand that type of mentality. He is experimenting with using three freshman and returning ACL injury players, give him some time to train these players and adjust to the situation. Of course, I understand that Alford or Howland are in the wings and available to replace Cronin. Or, UCLA could hire the couple complainers here who seem to know how the team should be coached far better than Cronin .
I think the team played much better against Baylor than Illinois. They answered all of Baylor’s runs and didn’t wilt and traded leads with a far more experienced team. If it wasn’t for a couple of individual plays by Baylor players against good defense, ucla could’ve won but they still answered every dagger and every shot against a top5 team.
I think the problem early on this season isn’t the offense, but the defense. These aren’t howland-type grinding games in the 50s and 60s. We scored 70+ in every game this season and a Cronin team should be able to hold our opponents to a lower score. Baylor relied on 1on1 play and one long bomb of a 3 to win.
For those who say that Bailey isn’t given enough playing time, he played 30 minutes against Illinois and 21 against Baylor and scored a grand total of 6 points. He needs more development and confidence but to say that Cronin is misusing him by not giving him playing time or running plays for him is just using preconceived biases to bash him. And fwiw, Baylors star freshman also rode the bench for long stretches of the second half too.
Ok… so of course I’ll get some push back… but why won’t one of the cronin lovers answer this question. What is the offensive identity of mick cronin coached teams. What does ucla do really good at offensively? Seriously, I’m curious about what y’all are watching and going man, this is some well coached offense out there
I’m not talking about just this season gib… you’re not even a little frustrated that 3 seasons and mick still hasn’t come up with an offensive identity for the program? It took Arizonas new coach one year…
well if you are not talking about this season, then you have a huge f'ing problem because whatever our offensive identity has been, or has not been, since Cronin arrived has led to pretty spectacular results.
And by the way, why does our offense need an "identity." What are we, a third grader at a $48,000 a year private elementary school on Mulholland?
UCLA absolutely has an offensive gameplan and has for the past seasons under Mick Cronin. They've been an iso-heavy squad, using screens and motion to hunt for mismatches that they would then repeatedly exploit. It's been brutally effective as an offense - UCLA's offense ranked in the top 15 in KenPom the past two years, and has started off at 10 this year - even though it can go through lulls at times if players aren't hitting shots.
The difference this year is that Clark and Bailey are not the iso players that Juzang and Bernard were. They work better scoring in the flow of a more motion-based offense where they can use their athleticism to take advantage of a scrambling defense. That's why it felt like the offense flowed more smoothly when Jaquez was out, as Campbell can play that motion style just fine but Jaquez tends to bog the offense down because he still plays the iso style. I don't think this is bad - again, the offense is highly efficient - but I imagine it is going to evolve as it always does.
I think Mick already tweaked his system when he came to UCLA - his Cincinnati teams had much more ball movement and motion than UCLA has had. He got to UCLA and found he had a lot of players who excelled in isolation, so the offense adjusted to that. He now has more players who resemble the type he had at Cincinnati, so I imagine the offense will adjust accordingly.
You have to remember, Cronin has experimented with the offense before. That's basically all that the 2019-2020 season was really, and last year saw the Bruins start out by playing at being an up-tempo team before getting blown out by Gonzaga, which convinced Cronin that wasn't the best option for the team and they stopped doing that. I think this weekend will have a similar outcome and we'll see changes (like with Campbell hunting for his shot consistently). Basically I'm not worried about the offense, and I think the defense will come along with time as players get more comfortable with it.
I can agree with this analysis of the style and this is probably why it worked with juzang in the lineup. It’s probably why this season is already so frustrating to watch because Jaime and tyger are the only guys that can play iso and it’s really easy for any opposing team to defend once they’ve figured out that you just have to wear out two guys on the court and then the game is over
Fwiw I absolutely think that Bailey has the ball handling skills, vision, and footwork for the iso-offense. He just needs to improve his jump shot and be more confident handling the ball. His shooting form looks really good even if his shots aren’t going in yet.
What is Cronin's offensive identity? He explained it in almost every interview and press conference he's conducted as the UCLA head coach. The team identity is to create offense by playing great defense by creating tough looks, getting stops, by getting deflections and steals, and creating transition opportunities and additional possessions. They've done that for the 2 seasons he's been the coach.
It's the same methodology used by Jay Wright at Villanova and Tony Bennett at Virginia. They put defense ahead of offense as the foundational piece for winning basketball games. It's not top secret stuff.
And that's what we'all been watching.
Or were you actually asking about X's and O's? If so, maybe you should rephrase your question more appropriately. Identity is your drive and motivation, X's and O's is your execution. They are two distinctly different things and you would know this if you've read any of John Wooden's works.
This whole thread with people acting like the sky is falling because we lost TWO games is totally ridiculous. Yeah Tyger had a shit shooting night. He might finish the season shooting 40% from 3.
I'd actually probably put money on that one. We lost 2 games. I got news for you -- we are going to lose a lot more than 2 games this year. And we are going to be right there at the end trying to make a Final 4 run.
Okay Evan, you just want to troll now. Saying that something you wrote is dumb is not the same as saying you are dumb, personally. If you want to continue to troll, argue, etc, don't bother. I am done. I already deal with enough of that shit from Baskets.
The Illinois loss was a tougher swallow than the Baylor, especially with how it happened down the stretch. The mistakes in that two minutes stretch of just not getting the ball cleanly across half court were gruesome, like passing a kidney stone. Very winnable game against Illinois and were punished by a Baylor team that can clearly get any 3pt shot they want with ease.
It does feel like part of the defensive gameplan to gamble the other team hitting a corner three of the skip pass rather than the bucket and the foul from the roll man. Three point shooting teams will exploit that more often than not, and it's hard with an iso heavy system to come back from a team hitting open shots at will. If Bona can stop leaving his feet so early in shot attempts and not get into foul trouble quickly, they can work on the blitzing and funneling to him, even though he has shown glimpses of holding his own defensively on the perimeter.
Amari will come along, just a bad shooting weekend, but the instincts and moves are there on both sides of the ball, they'll need to get him going on some of these lesser games before conference play opens up.
I don't mind that JJJ gets the offense going through isos, because he is a supreme college mismatch hunter, and teams will work to deny the low block to him with a double which will open up the rest of the offense whenever he's feeling himself. Tyger is better when he has rhythm in his 3pt shot and then using it to get to an open middy jumper where he has been buttery smooth from. But the lack of rhythm in his shooting possessions got a bit ugly that weekend.
Sad weekend overall for the athletic department in revenue sports, as we now enter Jarmond Watch for when the nuns sing the song at the beginning of Sound of Music about the football coach problem on their hands.
Mick can get it done, but this is really the year to win the conference outright both in the season and the tournament, considering the talent they have as a team and the talent around the conference. If not this year, than realistically when?
Y'all, I'm pinning this up top. Learn to play nice or I stop giving you all post-game comments.
I think the key with Mac, as you say, is health. I thought Dylan Andrews played well and competed. He looked good in combination with Tyger and I thought they moved the ball well. This mau well be a late developing team when you factor in 3 freshman plus a recovering Etienne into the equation. Patience may be the order of the day.
Mac looks so much bigger… he’s a big dude. Hope he regains full health and some mobility
It must be the hair. :D
Army, Baskets thinks a 13th ranked recruiting class sucks. LMAO.
It’s his annual rite of passage. He runs hot and cold. I like where the program is at.
UCLA failing to develop 5 star talent… or they’re all just over rated? Bailey seemed visibly upset at the end of the game. Looked like he didn’t really care if they lost because he wasn’t played anyways. Strange that you have a 5 star player that you just stand in the corner to watch tyger and jaquez? That after benching him for 10 minutes? Bona on the other hand just stands under the basket. Oh, and gets pulled within 30 seconds of the tip off for a foul? What kind of players want to play for that kind of coach…
Obviously not that many. Next years recruiting class sucks. Ucla struck out on 4 of the 5 star recruits they had a shot with. And that’s given the fact that ucla will be losing jaquez, singleton, nwuba, bona, Bailey, and maybe even tyger… so why could that be? It’s because cronin is a shitty offensive minded coach…
UCLA has no offensive identity and they never have under cronin. They aren’t a 3 pt team, or an inside out team, or a pick and roll team, or a drive and dish team, or an up tempo team. The only player that ever did anything was a transfer who learned to create his own shot at Kentucky. Cronin doesn’t develop offensive talent.
This years team is going to struggle with jaquez and tyger passing it back and forth while the rest of the team watches. That’s what happened vs Illinois and Baylor. When the shit hits the fan, and your plan is to pass it back and forth between two players, you’re gonna lose…
UCLA hasn’t won the Pac-12 in 10 years. Unfortunately this isn’t their year either. They’re magical final four run from two years ago is still leaving them over rated. Arizona has better athletes and a much better coach. Usc has much better athletes. Oregon has a great coach. Without an offensive identity they’ll lose more games then expected.
Because this team has no identity on offense, they should be a defense minded team. This means clark, Andrews, and Bailey should get the most minutes every game. That won’t happen because cronin will just pull the new guys at any sign of a mental mistake instead of letting them learn like duke, Kentucky, unc, Baylor, Gonzaga, Virginia, Illinois, and many others. UCLA won’t win a championship with cronin as I said all along. He’s done a much better job than the last loser, but he isn’t the savior of ucla. Let’s hope for something better by the time ucla gets to the new conference.
What exactly did Mick do with Watson?
Developed his ass
On Watson… my point exactly. Any nba bound athlete with half a brain realizes that the nba is about offense. Nobody plays defense in the nba. The only way to get better at offense is to play lots of minutes under a coach with a very large appetite for mistakes. Watson wasn’t allowed to play let alone make mistakes. Of course he’s going to leave for something better.
Bailey looked pissed at the end of the game, and rightfully so. He’s being completely misused thus far. He isn’t allowed to create and have fun. He’s put in a box to minimize mistakes and being stifled on his opportunity to get better. The best way to get better is to make mistakes
Bailey has been allowed to create plenty. UCLA runs plays specifically to give him that opportunity. He just hasn't succeeded on that front yet. It happens, but he's getting time to work through it. If he wasn't being given that time, Bailey would be sitting the majority of the game and Andrews would be getting way more of the minutes.
I don't think it's a coincidence that the offense looked the best when Jaquez was out. He's way too iso-heavy compared to everyone else, which bogs things down. You basically have to get him to buy in to moving the ball like everyone else; there's a time and place for his offense but right now it's consistent whenever he's on the floor.
Can't play if you keep fouling like Bona did. The freshmen are getting a chance, they're not delivering.
Bona was pulled 30 seconds into the game though
The seniors are not delivering, and a I'd argue that their poor play has contributed more to our losses than anything the freshmen did. I love Tyger, but 5 for 15 against Baylor is ATROCIOUS. We win that game if he does not do that. 8 for 22 fro Jaquez against Illinois is not much better.
Bailey misses fucking layups for Christ's sake. But yeah, let's let him run the show over a senior point guard.
nobody's suggesting this
Watson shot 32%. Yeah, so much talent. He sucked. Whose minutes would you have taken away to let Watson stink it up on the court every night?
you lose credibility when you say Watson sucked. really just a foolish comment.
Evan, I don't care about your dumb opinions. The guy was terrible on offense and a turnover machine. When people say bullshit like Cronin is terrible at developing 5 star talent and use Watson as an example saying that he should have played over the guys that were there longer, I am going to point out how awful he was. Sometimes it takes time to develop, more than 1 year. So, it is a cheap shot to blame Cronin for Watson sucking! Remember Chris Smith? He was terrible until his junior year.
LMAO someone's mad!!!
Oh so you think this shit is funny? After every loss, I get to read a laundry list of complaints by Baskets.
When you're trying to win games, you're not going to play guys who are prone to make silly mistakes, especially on that team, which was full of experienced players.
Baskets already sounding the alarm and declaring the season a failure on November 20th, incredible.
Not worried at all, two highly ranked very good teams early in the season. UCLA was very competitive in both, just came up short. It's not the games early in the season anyone should be worried about.
So a 13th ranked recruiting class sucks, Baskets? You're overly critical and write a lot bullshit.
Tell me what the offensive identity and game plan is under cronin? There isn’t one… you’re just mad cause I’m right this time
LMAO, Baskets. You're pretty f-ing arrogant. All you do is talk crap.
gibby, enough with the insults. You both have a lot of good points to debate but that kind of interaction isn't cool.
g, I am just tired of his constant complaining after a loss. I could be wrong, but I am almost never see him comment after a win.
I hear ya, gibby, and we can address that, but let's do it in a more constructive manner. We all need to remember that the one thing we all have in common here is that we want to see our basketball program succeed. We're on the same side. We can discuss all these things from that framework.
Since you have all the answers Baskets, you should send Jarmond your critiques and coaching resume. Maybe you'll get hired and bring home #12! LMAO.
I never said I could coach anybody… I’m just a couch coach as you know. I can still be frustrated that ucla doesn’t have an offensive game plan AT ALL! You watched the games I assume… the plan was for Jaime and tyger to play 2 on 5
Since you air out your complaints, here's my complaints. I don't like how Amari is given a super long leash. Singleton should be starting at the 2! Also Tyger needs to stop thinking he's Kobe. His shooting has been putrid so far. Can someone made a Free Throw? There you go. I am gonna bitch, bitch, bitch.
Good, love the honesty
13th ranked is good for what? Another sweet 16 run? UCLA should have had a much better class recruiting for next year. Especially considering they plan on losing 4 starters! So yeah, 13th sucks for ucla. I’m tired of UCLA’s ceiling being the sweet 16
You exaggerated when you said that next year's recruiting class "sucks." It doesn't.
If Altman is so great Baskets, how did his team get their asses handed to them by UCI? Where's your analysis complaining about what he did wrong or didn't do right? You only come here to whine after a loss. An 80-75 UCLA loss to #5 Baylor. But you're here overreacting. Geezus.
Altman lost to UCI because my beloved Anteaters are the best team in the Big West and deserve a six seed in the NCAA Tournament AT WORST. ZOT ZOT ZOT Y'ALL
Five games into the season is a entirely too early to smash the panic button. Sure, losses to ranked teams is disappointing, but with 26 games left in the regular season, it's not like the team is running out of time to get it right.
This notion that Cronin historically doesn't develop 5 star players is unfounded especially since Peyton Watson was the only 5-star player he's signed in his coaching career prior to Bailey and Bona. Sure, Watson did not do well in his one season as a Bruin, but that's not a reasonable basis for making a silly statement that Cronin mishandles his 5 star recruits.
There are folks here complaining Watson never developed under Cronin because he didn't play, Let's conveniently set aside the fact that last season was interrupted by Covid, wiping out 3 weeks of games and practices. That had a lot to do with Watson's lack of development and playing time. A few folks here are also forgetting that Peyton Watson didn't do enough to stay on the floor when given the opportunity largely because he didn't have the skills to play in a system which already featured experienced players ahead of him (Juzang, Jules, Jaime, Singleton).
Cronin has two 5 star players this season in Bailey and Bona. How is he handling them? Answer: They're starting. Whatever issues anyone had with Cronin's handling of Watson is not applicable here because Bailey and Bona are going to play significant minutes and how they make use of this opportunity is entirely up to them.
But a 5 star rating mean less and less these days. Many of the blue chip 5 star players end up at elite basketball academies to play alongside other blue chip players. These elite high schools are powerhouses that end up decimating their leagues. The players at these schools spend more time working on their highlight reel plays for IG and YT, rather than working on fundamental team basketball.
You also said this in a comment below: "Any nba bound athlete with half a brain realizes that the nba is about offense. Nobody plays defense in the nba." That is so far from the truth, it's ridiculous.
The NBA Championship teams, year in and year out, are always in the top 1 through 4 of the league defensively. Defense wins championships. A good offensive game can get a player into the league, but it doesn't keep you in the league. The best players who have long careers in the league have to be able to do multiple things. They need to do at 3 of the following 4 things: shoot 3's, pass, rebound, play defense. The G-League has been littered with players who can go to the rack and throw down highlight reel dunks while droppinetcg 50 pts, guys like Ben McLemore, Vander Blue, Jemerrio Jones, but they can't get into the NBA for much more than a drink of water. Meanwhile, we see more and more no-offense guys like Kevin Looney, Herb Jones, Alex Caruso, Austin Reeves, Payton Pritchard, Gary Payton II, and Jose Alvarado carve out significant roles on their teams by playing defense. Jaylen Clark will be one of these guys when it's his turn to enter the NBA.
As for Cronin's offense, it's accurate in saying that historically he has no offense. For the past 3 seasons, we've seen what amounts to ISO basketball in half court sets. It's been Jacquez and Juzang in ISO at the free throw line and at the elbows, it's been Tyger going 1 on 1, probing the paint looking for a dump-off, a catch and shoot for Bernard or Singleton, or a shot, and that's about it. Until now, they never had a big man finisher to establish pick and roll, they didn't have the athletes to run motion, and they didn't have good passers. Instead, their offense was their defense. Cronin wants his defense to create offensive possessions through deflections, steals, and forcing the other team into bad shots. He wants to get points from transition. This is how Cronin teams generated offense during his years at Cincinnati and his 2 seasons at UCLA, so his modus operandi should be no surprise.
The Bruins' two losses this weekend were the result of bad, awful defense. Fixing the defense now is going to have much greater returns than spending time on fixing the offense. A great defense is a different maker in March.
But that's not to say he's not going to expand his playbook this season. With Bona, he has a legit run to the rack center who he can use for pick and roll in a 2 man game with Tyger and baseline rim runs for layups and lobs. I saw a few failed PNRs this weekend where Bona turned the wrong way and rolled into traffic and stopped too far away from the rim. IMO, Tyger, Jaime, and Bailey should all be able to run PNR with Bona.
Yes, Bailey spent a lot of time sitting in the corner 3 spot, but he was stuck to his spot with lead boots. That play exists in nobody's book unless the player is Klay Thompson or Ray Allen. If he wants to impact the game, he's got to move his feet. The ball isn't going to find him if he's not going to make himself available. If his assignment to be available for a catch and shoot 3, he needs between the elbow to the baseline to keep his defender's eyes on him, away from the ball to prevent him from dropping into weakside coverage. Everyone thinks it's Cronin's fault that Bailey was camping in the corner, but IMO Bailey wasn't doing his job.
From what I've seen, Bailey is playing soft. But that's no surprise. Sierra Canyon produces highly rated players who are good, but not great. IMO, Dylan Andrews and Adem Bona could easily end up being better NBA prospects than Bailey.
With 26 games left on the schedule, I'm still firmly on the Cronin bus.
Thanks for the reasonable and well elucidated thoughts, m. We could use a bit more of the approach around here (dad yelling into the back seat here...)
Interesting about your G league comments because Peyton Watson is tearing up the G right now. I guess we'll see if he's going to be one of those offense only players or if he develops a more well rounded game and gets any shot with the Nuggets.
Peyton might be tearing up the G-League, but I'm not sure that means anything. I think it was last season when a 33 year old Isaiah Thomas on bad hips came and played 1 game in the G-League and dropped 40 pts. It's a league that plays no defense.
Here are the top scorers from the 2021-2022 G-League regular season:
CARSEN EDWARDS
CRAIG RANDALL II
MASON JONES
QUINNDARY WEATHERSPOON
TREVELIN QUEEN
SABEN LEE
CHRIS CLEMONS
NIK STAUSKAS
JUSTIN TILLMAN
CAT BARBER
Where are these guys now? I could be wrong, but I think every one of these players is either back in the G-League or Euro Leagues or delivering for Door Dash.
Don't get me wrong, Peyton could be a good player in the NBA. But until he can do 2 out these 4 things - knock down 3's, pass, rebound, defend - he's not going to get much playing time. As I've said, volume scorers are a dime a dozen in the pros. To stick in the NBA, these guys need to bring something more to the game than highlight reel dunks and occasional 30 foot bombs.
bingo. g league stats mean nothing. it's purely a developmental league
I totally agree with you and that's what I meant about Payton. Tearing up the G isn't a marker for NBA success (though I think Watson might have been up for a couple games when a bunch of guys were out with illness/injury this last week), so it supports your point that we don't have much basis to say whether Cronin improved Watson's game or whether he can develop 5* players or not.
I hope Watson does well. He had a shot every day in practice to earn more playing time. I do think Mick could or should have played him more early in the season to gain experience. I feel that way about Dylan Andrews right now. Tyger needs more rest. But, as we get into conference play, you need to produce. Watson was not a consistent producer and needed to earn playing time. He simply didn’t get it done. We get our expectations of 18 and 19 year old kids from scouting services. Perhaps that’s not fair. Shabazz Muhammad anyone?
Thanks. Agree it's way too early to freak out.
This is a great response… somebody actually taking the time to rebuff my points and engage is some real discussion. Thank you for your thoughts
The Bruin men’s fútbol team beat Clemson today. On to the Sweet 16.
Fire Cronin
Dumb remark.
Actually pure mockery at the fire chip crowd. You didn’t get the sarcasm.
It's stupidity. Cronin has done a better job in 3 years than Chip Kelly has done in 5 years.
that one went way over your head
Don't care. It was fucking stupid.
what was stupid about it?
Listening to Cronin's presser, it was basically the same as his prior years, early on in the season. I remember after Cronin losing early games to lesser opponents, his main comment was the defense was not good enough against the three and being beaten on the dribble. Not surprised about the two losses this weekend--Cronin's team have traditionally started this way and eventually have gone on to deep runs in the NCAA tournament.
To the people here already screaming to fire Cronin after his prior exceedingly good accomplishments at UCLA, I just do not understand that type of mentality. He is experimenting with using three freshman and returning ACL injury players, give him some time to train these players and adjust to the situation. Of course, I understand that Alford or Howland are in the wings and available to replace Cronin. Or, UCLA could hire the couple complainers here who seem to know how the team should be coached far better than Cronin .
They're chronic complainers. Baskets was bitching after Cronin's first game as UCLA HC.
I think the team played much better against Baylor than Illinois. They answered all of Baylor’s runs and didn’t wilt and traded leads with a far more experienced team. If it wasn’t for a couple of individual plays by Baylor players against good defense, ucla could’ve won but they still answered every dagger and every shot against a top5 team.
I think the problem early on this season isn’t the offense, but the defense. These aren’t howland-type grinding games in the 50s and 60s. We scored 70+ in every game this season and a Cronin team should be able to hold our opponents to a lower score. Baylor relied on 1on1 play and one long bomb of a 3 to win.
For those who say that Bailey isn’t given enough playing time, he played 30 minutes against Illinois and 21 against Baylor and scored a grand total of 6 points. He needs more development and confidence but to say that Cronin is misusing him by not giving him playing time or running plays for him is just using preconceived biases to bash him. And fwiw, Baylors star freshman also rode the bench for long stretches of the second half too.
Ok… so of course I’ll get some push back… but why won’t one of the cronin lovers answer this question. What is the offensive identity of mick cronin coached teams. What does ucla do really good at offensively? Seriously, I’m curious about what y’all are watching and going man, this is some well coached offense out there
They're working to build one. FFS, quit bitching when it's only been 5 games.
I’m not talking about just this season gib… you’re not even a little frustrated that 3 seasons and mick still hasn’t come up with an offensive identity for the program? It took Arizonas new coach one year…
Right, you want to complain, complain, complain.
well if you are not talking about this season, then you have a huge f'ing problem because whatever our offensive identity has been, or has not been, since Cronin arrived has led to pretty spectacular results.
And by the way, why does our offense need an "identity." What are we, a third grader at a $48,000 a year private elementary school on Mulholland?
UCLA absolutely has an offensive gameplan and has for the past seasons under Mick Cronin. They've been an iso-heavy squad, using screens and motion to hunt for mismatches that they would then repeatedly exploit. It's been brutally effective as an offense - UCLA's offense ranked in the top 15 in KenPom the past two years, and has started off at 10 this year - even though it can go through lulls at times if players aren't hitting shots.
The difference this year is that Clark and Bailey are not the iso players that Juzang and Bernard were. They work better scoring in the flow of a more motion-based offense where they can use their athleticism to take advantage of a scrambling defense. That's why it felt like the offense flowed more smoothly when Jaquez was out, as Campbell can play that motion style just fine but Jaquez tends to bog the offense down because he still plays the iso style. I don't think this is bad - again, the offense is highly efficient - but I imagine it is going to evolve as it always does.
I think Mick already tweaked his system when he came to UCLA - his Cincinnati teams had much more ball movement and motion than UCLA has had. He got to UCLA and found he had a lot of players who excelled in isolation, so the offense adjusted to that. He now has more players who resemble the type he had at Cincinnati, so I imagine the offense will adjust accordingly.
You have to remember, Cronin has experimented with the offense before. That's basically all that the 2019-2020 season was really, and last year saw the Bruins start out by playing at being an up-tempo team before getting blown out by Gonzaga, which convinced Cronin that wasn't the best option for the team and they stopped doing that. I think this weekend will have a similar outcome and we'll see changes (like with Campbell hunting for his shot consistently). Basically I'm not worried about the offense, and I think the defense will come along with time as players get more comfortable with it.
I can agree with this analysis of the style and this is probably why it worked with juzang in the lineup. It’s probably why this season is already so frustrating to watch because Jaime and tyger are the only guys that can play iso and it’s really easy for any opposing team to defend once they’ve figured out that you just have to wear out two guys on the court and then the game is over
Fwiw I absolutely think that Bailey has the ball handling skills, vision, and footwork for the iso-offense. He just needs to improve his jump shot and be more confident handling the ball. His shooting form looks really good even if his shots aren’t going in yet.
What is Cronin's offensive identity? He explained it in almost every interview and press conference he's conducted as the UCLA head coach. The team identity is to create offense by playing great defense by creating tough looks, getting stops, by getting deflections and steals, and creating transition opportunities and additional possessions. They've done that for the 2 seasons he's been the coach.
It's the same methodology used by Jay Wright at Villanova and Tony Bennett at Virginia. They put defense ahead of offense as the foundational piece for winning basketball games. It's not top secret stuff.
And that's what we'all been watching.
Or were you actually asking about X's and O's? If so, maybe you should rephrase your question more appropriately. Identity is your drive and motivation, X's and O's is your execution. They are two distinctly different things and you would know this if you've read any of John Wooden's works.
This whole thread with people acting like the sky is falling because we lost TWO games is totally ridiculous. Yeah Tyger had a shit shooting night. He might finish the season shooting 40% from 3.
I'd actually probably put money on that one. We lost 2 games. I got news for you -- we are going to lose a lot more than 2 games this year. And we are going to be right there at the end trying to make a Final 4 run.
No. It's Baskets acting like the sky is falling.
and you calling everyone "dumb" if you disagree with them.
I said your opinion was dumb, not that you were dumb. There's a difference.
same thing
Okay Evan, you just want to troll now. Saying that something you wrote is dumb is not the same as saying you are dumb, personally. If you want to continue to troll, argue, etc, don't bother. I am done. I already deal with enough of that shit from Baskets.
i won the debate
The Illinois loss was a tougher swallow than the Baylor, especially with how it happened down the stretch. The mistakes in that two minutes stretch of just not getting the ball cleanly across half court were gruesome, like passing a kidney stone. Very winnable game against Illinois and were punished by a Baylor team that can clearly get any 3pt shot they want with ease.
It does feel like part of the defensive gameplan to gamble the other team hitting a corner three of the skip pass rather than the bucket and the foul from the roll man. Three point shooting teams will exploit that more often than not, and it's hard with an iso heavy system to come back from a team hitting open shots at will. If Bona can stop leaving his feet so early in shot attempts and not get into foul trouble quickly, they can work on the blitzing and funneling to him, even though he has shown glimpses of holding his own defensively on the perimeter.
Amari will come along, just a bad shooting weekend, but the instincts and moves are there on both sides of the ball, they'll need to get him going on some of these lesser games before conference play opens up.
I don't mind that JJJ gets the offense going through isos, because he is a supreme college mismatch hunter, and teams will work to deny the low block to him with a double which will open up the rest of the offense whenever he's feeling himself. Tyger is better when he has rhythm in his 3pt shot and then using it to get to an open middy jumper where he has been buttery smooth from. But the lack of rhythm in his shooting possessions got a bit ugly that weekend.
Sad weekend overall for the athletic department in revenue sports, as we now enter Jarmond Watch for when the nuns sing the song at the beginning of Sound of Music about the football coach problem on their hands.
Mick can get it done, but this is really the year to win the conference outright both in the season and the tournament, considering the talent they have as a team and the talent around the conference. If not this year, than realistically when?
Such is life, go fightin' bald boys
I agree, not ready for prime time