Kind of odd that Tom Brady practices with his receivers in the offseason. You'd figure by 45 years old he would've figured out he doesn't get better in practice. What an idiot. I can't imagine what Giselle sees in such a dope.
Kadary Richmond to Seton Hall!
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Nelson was, by and large, one of the more difficult players to watch for SHU in recent memory. Selective memory is a beautiful thing, I suppose for some.
I can tell you watching Nelson’s body language when he got his pocket picked and just let the opposing teams dunk on the other end without at least making an effort to run down the player that just stole your wallet is embarrassing for a fan to watch—much less a head coach.
And that happened many more times than once. I’ll leave it at that.
Imo, Isaiah never played like Isaiah. The Isaiah we knew was good enough to be a serious contributor. But he never played. Was that cause the level of d didn't allow it. Cause he deferred, cause he didn't have a good relationship with the coach or the team. Don't know.
Cant argue with how the nets rebuilt the team. And I had no issue with how the Isaiah who played for the nets became a non factor. I just wonder why our Isaiah never played like we know he can.
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Correct...TEAM and prepared are the operative words and I would add effort also.
This is the recurring image I usually have of Nelson. Having the ball stripped between the circles and still being 60 feet from the opposing basket as his man dunks. Even if it happened just once, it was a bad look.
Agree with you and Seton75. Also remember, as IW said himself, he was supposed to be in the G-leage his rookie season. Then the Nets guard situstion blew up, Jeremy Lin got injured in the first game (I think), and suddenly IW, unexpectedly, was the starting point guard on a not very good team. He was able to get to the basket but just not consistent enough from 3.
The off-season is very important too. Shavar & Rhoden improved dramatically heading into 19-20. Nelson not at all.
And that seemed all Atkinson cared about. People raved about him when the bets hired him. Never sw it.
We had a few years , starting with Nelson's class up until last years, where they were not highly recruited. Willard has found diamonds in the rough before so I trust him with his scouting, but I'm happy we are back to recruiting athletes that can handle playing in the BE.
A quote from John Wooden who might have known a thing or two about teaching the game of basketball.
“Essentially, I was always more of a practice coach than a game coach. This is because of my conviction that a player who practices well, plays well.”
“Essentially, I was always more of a practice coach than a game coach. This is because of my conviction that a player who practices well, plays well.”
Old saying “you play like you practice” is so so true.
Remember my high school coach using this quote from Pat Riley's book, that I think came from Thomas Jefferson:
"I am a great believer in luck. The harder I work the more I have of it."
"I am a great believer in luck. The harder I work the more I have of it."
Well what I'll say is if our game plan against Creighton is to help down low and leave shooters open we have a bigger problem...a supposed defensive coach that is incompetent. I tend to believe those were player mistakes and not coaching incompetence. Especially after watching Willard's reactions and subsequent time outs.
Nice, cherry picking one game in early January. Willard let his guy play and next time we played Creighton we played much better.
I'm not saying there is no point in practicing. What I'm saying is there is no substitute for EXPERIENCE. Are you going to say practicing jumpers in practice necessarily mean you're going to be a great shooter in the game? How many players have we had that we hear don't miss on practice but can't make a shot in a game? Patrick Auda was an player that comes to mind. Karlis was supposed to be the next Andrew Gaze. For whatever reason he just never shot well in games.
My point is that there were mistakes played through that a player like Nelson would have been benched for.
You’re really comparing a 3rd string backup playing through mistakes vs a starter? I’d expect Gill and Ike to play through more than Brodie. Not shocking
You flat out said you don’t get better in practice. Biggest crock I’ve ever heard.
Experience? We’ve lived in a one and done era where most teams filled with one and dones have done better than experienced teams. Karlis was here for 4 years. How much did his experience help?
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If you want to mince words go ahead. You can only judge so much on practice performance. Coaching baseball over the years we came across Batting practice hall of famers. Hit the crap out of the ball in practice, couldn't hit a lick against live pitching. Same goes for any sport. In Basketball, the "scout" defensive is run by 2nd and 3rd stringers. They know the plays and look like all stars. Put them in a game against a team they haven't played and they are lost.... until.... they play through mistakes.
So essentially what you’re saying as a baseball coach you made 0 kids better. They just got better by playing the games. Good job buddy. But other coaches can make players better at practice.
yes there are people who look like studs at practice, but there are a lot of reasons why such as a coach having to throw 200 pitches in 30 minutes at practice as opposed to a pitcher throwing 85 in 2 hours in a game. It’s not shocking the kid with a slow bat hits batting practice shots but can’t hit in the game. A good coach in basketball will be more concerned about quick releases in practice than just the ball going in the hoop.
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What I don’t understand is why there can’t be a middle ground in this debate.
Some players clearly get better with practice and that translates to the game.
Some players do well in practice and then are effected by the bright lights of the real thing.
Some guys go through the motions in practice (which in don’t condone) and have a knack for rising to the occasion on the big stage.
Shavar is an example of bullet point one.
Nelson was an example of bullet point three when he was given major playing time to excel. Nova BET title game, 1st half Wofford, Maryland game with Powell out.
Kevin Willard clearly has a preference to bullet point number one, but some fans fell in love with the 3 performances I mentioned above for Nelson and were hoping Willard would stick with him longer, because his D in those games was solid also.
Some players clearly get better with practice and that translates to the game.
Some players do well in practice and then are effected by the bright lights of the real thing.
Some guys go through the motions in practice (which in don’t condone) and have a knack for rising to the occasion on the big stage.
Shavar is an example of bullet point one.
Nelson was an example of bullet point three when he was given major playing time to excel. Nova BET title game, 1st half Wofford, Maryland game with Powell out.
Kevin Willard clearly has a preference to bullet point number one, but some fans fell in love with the 3 performances I mentioned above for Nelson and were hoping Willard would stick with him longer, because his D in those games was solid also.
Middle ground to the phrase anyone who ever played sports knows you don’t get better at practice? Lol ok.
Not to that specific quote.
but maybe acknowledge that even though Nelson was getting outperformed in practice, he still had some high ceiling type performances for the Pirates on some big stages when he was given the latitude to perform and not be on a short leash.
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The leash gets shorter when the guy behind you passes you. When he was second string PG, he had the latitude. When he got beat out (at practice) the latitude got taken away.
no one is saying he didn’t have good games, add in the Marquette home game. Let’s also acknowledge shavar shot somewhere above 45% from 3 as a junior. We have a guy killing it from 3 who plays D, along with Q and Powell and we’re going to give another guy who played a few good games a longer leash? Not exactly
Ummmmm....I appreciate your attempt to highlight Nelson’s career games, but that’s cherry picking at its finest. So he had a very nice 25 minutes to end the 2019 season as a freshman. The significance of making improvements from freshman to sophomore year is usually quite indicative of how a player’s career with a program will go.
So let’s dissect the 4 games he had the most playing time after Maryland (not including Prairie View). It was against those juggernauts of Georgetown, DePaul, Marquette and St. John’s in 2020 (the bottom 4 teams of the Big East) where he logged the most time:
52 minutes,
4/9 shooting for 9 points
11 turnovers
8 assists
1 rebohnd
And the brutal defense. Not sure where you see him rise to the occasion. Am I missing something? That’s pretty quality time to judge. I wonder what his defensive and offensive efficiency actually each were for those 4 games.
I am just saying it’s not a clear cut case. When Willard was desperate for a win against Maryland with Powell hurt Nelson got the start and played 36 minutes vs Shavar who only played 10 minutes.
At that point in time Shavar was already ahead of Nelson in the rotation as he got the crunch time minutes down the stretch vs Oregon in the Bahamas.
So for some fans (including myself) it’s confusing that in that scenario Nelson was trusted to be the man at PG in essentially a must win to salvage the noncoference vs a top 10 opponent and Shavar wasn’t.
but when it came time to decide who would be the situational backup. Shavar fit that mold better.
at the end of the day, Nelson seeing his potential come to fruition in big moments ultimately transferred to a spot where the coach was going to let him play through some of his issues.
so it may have benefited the Hall two years ago, but others will debate that Nelson’s development in 2019-20 might have led to him being starting point guard this past year and more stability for what we needed offensively in the position instead of rolling the dice on Aiken.
Go take BP for a month and then face live pitching. You can only accomplish so much through practice.
If I'm wrong, why does KY struggle early ever year then end up in sweet 16 and beyond. You think they're practicing more later in the season?
No one was happy with his D, I think at that point Nelson mailed it in. So once again I am not defending him for that behavior or lack of intensity. But the writing was already on the wall and I think he had 1 1/2 feet out the door.
but he was constantly getting yo-yo’d in and out for 2-3 minute stretches. the same kind of thing Willard was doing to Aiken this year.
you have to let a point guard play and get into the flow of the game. I don’t think he was ever given the opportunity to really do that except for the games I cherry picked, because those coincidentally were the only times he got to play extended minutes regardless of mistakes.
My original point was that playing in games and playing through mistakes is the only way to really get better. For some unknown reason, Willard allows some to do that and others are banished. No one can honestly say they haven't seen this trend with Willard.
I think it was kind of clear that Nelson’s downfall wasn’t game related, but behind the scenes related. And none of us know what that was all about.
Shavar wasn't ahead of Nelson for the Oregon game. Nelson played 19 minutes and Reynolds played 11 minutes that night. Playing Reynolds down the stretch in that game was a default to the defensive end of the floor with McKnight unavailable.
Reynolds didn't really move past Nelson until sometime during conference play that year.
Something went down in the Bahamas, Nelson played a combined 5 minutes in the two games after the Oregon loss.
I remember some type of poor lazy sequence that got him yanked.
