Confirmed--there's a transfer commit

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Jason94
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Re: Confirmed--there's a transfer commit

Post by Jason94 »

MrMemorial wrote: Fri Apr 21, 2023 8:31 am
Jason94 wrote: Thu Apr 20, 2023 12:58 pm
UltimateVUFan wrote: Thu Apr 20, 2023 11:48 am

1) He couldn’t replace Ty (which is part of your point, I think).

2) I will be legitimately shocked if Ty isn’t back next season. Testing the NBA waters is part of his development plan, much as it was for Pippen after his sophomore season. Ty clearly has a strong relationship with Stack, and next year will be Ty’s team. He has a chance to solidify his NBA aspirations with another year of development in this system, and he’s smart enough to realize it.

EDIT: No disrespect to Evan Taylor, by the way. This is a great pickup! High percentage, high volume shooter who also has some ability to slash and keep defenders honest. He simply isn’t the same type of player as Ty.
Just watched some film on Taylor. Is it just me, or is he reminiscent of Matthew Fisher-Davis? He also stood 6’5, wore #5, was a high-percentage shooter, and seemed to have similar moves and shot release.
There are some physical similarities between the two players, but from a game standpoint, MFD was primarily a player who spotted up behind the arc and let it fly. He didn't venture inside the arc much and wasn't a great finisher either. Taylor last season compares to MFD's junior season, except with fewer threes (at better accuracy) and less twos (but with worse accuracy). Probably similar athleticism, but Taylor seems to have a mid-range jumper off of a couple of bounces and was less reliant upon the three point shot. Rebounding is also a massive difference. Taylor has been really good on the defensive boards the last three seasons and would have led our team in defensive rebounding if he had the same rate and PT in each of those seasons. I'm not sure how this is possible, and it could have to do with the level of competition, but those rebounding numbers are eye opening.

Taylor appears to be an excellent replacement for pretty much any player we lost except for Robbins. Very good start to our portal forays.
After seeing some film, we are again in agreement. MFD is more of a pure shooter while Taylor can handle the rock and slash and drive in a very SEC athlete style. Very crafty when he gets into the lane with the ball to shoot or dish off. That can help break down a defense. Can help open up the three-line for other guys.
The context of all of this as well is that he is a guy who can probably play 25-30 mpg. In terms of offensive production, he is easily going to replace Thomas and Stute, who combined to shoot 371 threes and hit them at a combined 33% clip. Plus they combined to shoot 98 shots inside the arc and only hit 33% of those, and only took 53 FT's combined, hitting 75% of those. Taylor hit 42% of his threes, 42% of his shots inside the arc (on twice the volume of Stute and Thomas combined) and had 87 FTA. He had more rebounds and fewer turnovers (in terms of percentage).

As long as Taylor isn't forced to carry a heavy offensive load (which he shouldn't be if Lawrence and Manjon are both back) and he has a similar shot percentage to Stute and Thomas, it would be shocking if he isn't more efficient than Thomas and Stute were, but a pretty wide margin. We saw what happened to Manjon, who went from someone who took 31% of the shots for UCD to taking 20% of the shots for Vanderbilt, and his efficiency went through the roof. I think something similar can happen with Taylor, and while his scoring might go down, his shooting percentages could go up, especially inside the arc.

This is a reason why the transfers we had (outside of Wright) were not anything to really be upset about by themselves. As long as CJS is active in the portal, there is a very high likelihood that we will replace a lot of the players who transferred with better players. The challenge is finding a replacement for Robbins, but much like last year, when we replaced Pippen, there will probably be a dropoff in production at the center spot that can be made up with increases in production at other positions, especially the 3 and 4 spots where half of the minutes were effectively used up by Thomas and Stute at a very low efficiency and overall production.


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