BTO’s Ole Miss Postgame Report

[Thunder Good-Oil]

Maybe, but I’m of the mind that there’s some lines you don’t cross. I know I definitely wouldn’t want Beard affiliated with any team I cheer for.

But RB is a better man than me so

Whether it was legit or not, Beard wasn’t convicted of anything. And it’s certainly in the Barnes wheel house to be forgiving, not casting stones, living in glass houses, etc.

Barnes ALWAYS speaks well of opposing coaches. Even when it’s obvious that they aren’t very good.

 

[Thunder Good-Oil]

Yes, all that is true. I do like his driving ability to the basket, but his shooting and ball protection have regressed.

He seems kind of lost. He was the primary ball handler early on when he flashed potential greatness. He was more comfortable as the distributor than now being on the receiving end. Maybe it’s difficult for him to find opportunities when the ball isn’t in his possession.

 

[walkenvol]

Vols won by defending, rebounding and sharing the ball. 100% recipe for success, Ole Miss did not know what hit them in the 2nd half!

IMHO, I believe the only thing different between the halfs was the open shots fell in the 2nd half at a higher rate than they were falling in the first 17 minutes. A well played game throughout.

 

[birdie74]

Sounds redundant to anyone who remembers my posts in the past - but, managing minutes has always been a problem for Coach Barnes. Even with our best teams over the past decade, our guys were out of gas by year end. Some will argue that there have been several teams who have won it all with a limited rotation and heavy minutes. I don’t disagree. However, the style that we play and the effort we exert is not typical. This team will flame out at year end unless the minutes are distributed such that no player averages more than 32 minutes/game. Doing so may cost us s game or two in the regular season but will likely pay dividends at year end.
I also agree that Gainey is struggling - but he is a better defender and has a better offensive game than Freddie. He will just have to play through it - and provide relief for ZZ.

 

[cardvolfan]

Sounds redundant to anyone who remembers my posts in the past - but, managing minutes has always been a problem for Coach Barnes. Even with our best teams over the past decade, our guys were out of gas by year end. Some will argue that there have been several teams who have won it all with a limited rotation and heavy minutes. I don’t disagree. However, the style that we play and the effort we exert is not typical. This team will flame out at year end unless the minutes are distributed such that no player averages more than 32 minutes/game. Doing so may cost us s game or two in the regular season but will likely pay dividends at year end.
I also agree that Gainey is struggling - but he is a better defender and has a better offensive game than Freddie. He will just have to play through it - and provide relief for ZZ.

Totally disagree. Scores of teams in the past have won the biggest prize playing 7 players, sometimes 8. These are young healthy athletes that want to play all the minutes they can play. Continuity can only be maximized by playing a smaller rotation, in my opinion. If you can play more and maintain the continuity, then great. Curious as to how you came to the 32-minute cutoff? As we know, everyone is different, and what is okay for one player may be totally different for another.

 

[cncchris33]

IMO, it’s a better use of minutes at this point of the season to let your key contributors get the work together versus a good opponent rather than throwing a low minute freshman or two into the mix. With ZZ sitting out over the off season and Gainey and Knecht being new and in the core group having the guys that you’re expecting to bring the success in 2023-24 they coukd use the work. Knecht has certainly improved at finding teammates like Santi recently as opposed to a month ago when he was only going one-on-one. Gainey is a more likely candidate to be a key part of the rotation come March than Dilione or the other 2.

Keep them hungry, grounded, and focused on improving enough to be key pieces this year.

I also don’t think that Barnes is as inclined to give up the valuable minutes to freshmen as in years past. This is the best chance at a FF maybe ever. Also, giving lots of minutes to freshmen might not work out so well with the abundance of transfers now being the norm.

How the freshmen react to not playing a lot might be a better indicator of what they are capable of doing for the program a year or two out than playing a handful of additional sloppy minutes.

Now watch Barnes play all 13 in a close game in Starkville and throw even more confusing signals to the casual fans.

I hear what you're saying, but all of that runs contradictory to protecting your greatest asset; availability. In a season with F4 aspirations, why run the risk of an unnecessary injury?

Fans would be storming Pratt Pavilion with torches and pitchforks, and rightfully so, if Aidoo, ZZ, or Vescovi blows a knee out in the closing minutes of a game that you're up by almost 30 points.

And you mention Knecht and Gainey as two specific guys who could benefit from the work, but they only played a combined 31 minutes, themselves, and they weren't the guys playing the majority of time in the final 10 minutes.

Playing the freshmen isn't exclusively about them, keeping them happy, or even getting them legitimate development. It's equally as much, if not more so, about keeping the regulars healthy when there's nothing to gain from them being out there and exposed to potential injury that alters your season.

 

[cncchris33]

I feel like a big part of it was chemistry building with injuries we haven’t seen many of these guys play long stretches together.

ZZ, Santi & Mashack haven’t played a ton together so I liked seeing those 3 get minutes together.

But I also think Barnes wasn’t thrilled with how the team let the foot off the gas in OOC with some easier matchups so he wanted to see us close this one out.

Maybe so. Just don't like the idea of subjecting any of those guys to injury when they don't need to be out there. The main guys out there were Aidoo, Santi, JJJ, and ZZ. Those guys have played about a million minutes together, so I don't necessarily buy that reasoning. If it were about chemistry, you would see Knecht and/or Gainey worked into that mix, and neither guy played all that much either, by comparison.

 

[TheMookieMonster]

I hear what you're saying, but all of that runs contradictory to protecting your greatest asset; availability. In a season with F4 aspirations, why run the risk of an unnecessary injury?

Fans would be storming Pratt Pavilion with torches and pitchforks, and rightfully so, if Aidoo, ZZ, or Vescovi blows a knee out in the closing minutes of a game that you're up by almost 30 points.

And you mention Knecht and Gainey as two specific guys who could benefit from the work, but they only played a combined 31 minutes, themselves, and they weren't the guys playing the majority of time in the final 10 minutes.

Playing the freshmen isn't exclusively about them, keeping them happy, or even getting them legitimate development. It's equally as much, if not more so, about keeping the regulars healthy when there's nothing to gain from them being out there and exposed to potential injury that alters your season.

Yeah. I’m more puzzled as to why Knecht didn’t get more run if we were only going to play those 8 guys. He seems to need the floor time to work through whatever this wall he has hit is rather than benching him for what I assume is poor defense.

Maybe his ankle isn’t 100% and they’re still resting him. That is the only explanation for why he isn’t seeing more minutes to develop chemistry with these guys.

 

[Kas232323]

Barnes was up to something. Only the 8x non-freshmen played a single minute while all 5x freshmen played zero. That almost has to be on purpose. Maybe he didn’t want to indicate that any one of the 5 is ahead of any other and is attempting to ramp up all of their efforts to earn playing time. Maybe he wanted to emphasize that the competition in the SEC is at a higher level and he’s not content that any of the 5 has worked hard enough to earn PT. Maybe he wanted to show that players that don’t leave will get playing time. It’s possible that somehow the flow of the game dictated the rotation, but it sure seems like messages were being delivered to the young guys. I’d guess that it has something to do with all of them needing to work harder because playing time won’t automatically be handed out.

You may be correct…Especially with the comments he made to the freshman in locker room post game.

 

[cncchris33]

You may be correct…Especially with the comments he made to the freshman in locker room post game.

What were those? That may provide some context.

 

[Kas232323]

Sounds redundant to anyone who remembers my posts in the past - but, managing minutes has always been a problem for Coach Barnes. Even with our best teams over the past decade, our guys were out of gas by year end. Some will argue that there have been several teams who have won it all with a limited rotation and heavy minutes. I don’t disagree. However, the style that we play and the effort we exert is not typical. This team will flame out at year end unless the minutes are distributed such that no player averages more than 32 minutes/game. Doing so may cost us s game or two in the regular season but will likely pay dividends at year end.
I also agree that Gainey is struggling - but he is a better defender and has a better offensive game than Freddie. He will just have to play through it - and provide relief for ZZ.

Our guys have never been out of gas at the end of a season…. Two of our best opportunities were lost because we didn’t overcome a key injury…..Alexander one year and ZZ last year. And we lost a very hard fought and controversial game to Purdue in a third year. Had nothing to do with players being ‘tired’….

 

[walkenvol]

Our guys have never been out of gas at the end of a season…. Two of our best opportunities were lost because we didn’t overcome a key injury…..Alexander one year and ZZ last year. And we lost a very hard fought and controversial game to Purdue in a third year. Had nothing to do with players being ‘tired’….

I have no idea how many minutes a game are optimum for a college player to peak in March, but I’m greatly concerned with JJJ’s large number of minutes played. JJJ is playing far and away the best of his career this season, a career that’s been filled with nagging injuries. I do wish CRB would try to protect JJJ if that’s possible. Really hope JJJ & SV can end their journeys playing their best ball!

 

[Kas232323]

What were those? That may provide some context.

There was a video. Pretty sure he was talking to Carr about never taking plays off and the young guys need to learn what knid of consistent effort is needed to play at this level.

 

[Kas232323]

I have no idea how many minutes a game are optimum for a college player to peak in March, but I’m greatly concerned with JJJ’s large number of minutes played. JJJ is playing far and away the best of his career this season, a career that’s been filled with nagging injuries. I do wish CRB would try to protect JJJ if that’s possible. Really hope JJJ & SV can end their journeys playing their best ball!

I have to assume Chad and Rick are in the same page regarding the health of each player. I agree with you - 3J is playing his best ball by far. I love to see it.

 

[Thunder Good-Oil]

I don’t think that they’re out of gas at season’s end by playing 30+ minutes in January and February. I do think that playing on Sunday 3x in recent years has hindered them from being in the optimum position going into opening week of the NCAAT. They have to travel back to Knoxville, prepare for the first (and second) round game, travel to the venue and settle in there, maybe meet with the media, and keep up with school work as well. That’s a pretty packed schedule in a small window. I really wish that the SECT would at the very least end on Saturday.

 

[orangemadam]

I'm not sure about the myth that the players will get tired by March.

There are plenty of pros, NBA and Euro, that are younger than Santi and JJJ and playing
many more minutes per week. (no, I have not googled it but both could have gone pro last yr.)

 

[cardvolfan]

I have no idea how many minutes a game are optimum for a college player to peak in March, but I’m greatly concerned with JJJ’s large number of minutes played. JJJ is playing far and away the best of his career this season, a career that’s been filled with nagging injuries. I do wish CRB would try to protect JJJ if that’s possible. Really hope JJJ & SV can end their journeys playing their best ball!

I believe that if JJJ believes he is healthy himself, he’s telling Barnes that, and telling him that he wants to play a lot. In turn, if that is the case, I think Rick is playing him per JJJ’s request. If Barnes had any concerns of injury or overplaying, I truly don’t think JJJ would be putting in that many minutes. Just my viewpoint and it’s probably worth 2 cents.

 

[PEPPERJAX]

Bee
Tea
Owe !!

 

[birdie74]

Totally disagree. Scores of teams in the past have won the biggest prize playing 7 players, sometimes 8. These are young healthy athletes that want to play all the minutes they can play. Continuity can only be maximized by playing a smaller rotation, in my opinion. If you can play more and maintain the continuity, then great. Curious as to how you came to the 32-minute cutoff? As we know, everyone is different, and what is okay for one player may be totally different for another.

 

[birdie74]

Totally disagree. Scores of teams in the past have won the biggest prize playing 7 players, sometimes 8. These are young healthy athletes that want to play all the minutes they can play. Continuity can only be maximized by playing a smaller rotation, in my opinion. If you can play more and maintain the continuity, then great. Curious as to how you came to the 32-minute cutoff? As we know, everyone is different, and what is okay for one player may be totally different for another.

We can agree to disagree. I know from personal experience that legs are gone without enough rest. It is glaringly obvious to me. When we play a late Wed game followed by an early Sat game followed by a Tuesday game we almost always struggle. When you extrapolate that over a 35 game schedule and average 35 minutes a game you run out of gas. I actually asked Admiral about this a few years ago and he agreed….

 

[birdie74]

I don’t think that they’re out of gas at season’s end by playing 30+ minutes in January and February. I do think that playing on Sunday 3x in recent years has hindered them from being in the optimum position going into opening week of the NCAAT. They have to travel back to Knoxville, prepare for the first (and second) round game, travel to the venue and settle in there, maybe meet with the media, and keep up with school work as well. That’s a pretty packed schedule in a small window. I really wish that the SECT would at the very least end on Saturday.

Agreed. Some conferences play their tourneys the week before and several have the title game on Saturday. Disadvantage here for SEC teams that make the finals.

 

[bleedingTNorange]

We can agree to disagree. I know from personal experience that legs are gone without enough rest. It is glaringly obvious to me. When we play a late Wed game followed by an early Sat game followed by a Tuesday game we almost always struggle. When you extrapolate that over a 35 game schedule and average 35 minutes a game you run out of gas. I actually asked Admiral about this a few years ago and he agreed….

How many of those do we have this year?

 

[TheMookieMonster]

How many of those do we have this year?

Just checked. Only once. And it’s this upcoming stretch. And then we don’t play a series that would fit that criteria the rest of the year.

 

[Orangeburst]

Bee
Tea
Owe !!

You can see the morning, but I can see the light..try try try Let it Ride..

 

[chuckiepoo]

Whether it was legit or not, Beard wasn’t convicted of anything. And it’s certainly in the Barnes wheel house to be forgiving, not casting stones, living in glass houses, etc.

Barnes ALWAYS speaks well of opposing coaches. Even when it’s obvious that they aren’t very good.

Well, there is Penny…