Another difference between Wisconsin and Kentucky is,..If Calipari had coached Kaminski, Kaminski would have been making multi millions of dollars in the NBA this year instead of fiddlin' around playing college ball for nothing but free socks.
Doubtful Kaminsky would be near the quality ball player if he'd had Calipari as coach instead of Ryan. Frank was at least a 3-year project. Bo has been developing ball players like that his entire career. By necessity mostly. LOL
He finally got a group whose talent matches their desire and coachability.
Cal kicks 'em out of the nest when they're ready to play professionally,...won't allow them to stay.
Fairy tale. Makes good copy, but it's far from the truth. By his own admission he was shocked the Harrison's and about 3 others stayed for this year.
And let's not forget that those players aren't as jaded as some like to project. They got close last year, and wanted to come back and try again for the championship.......regardless of the money they turned down to do it. Can't fault them for that.
Cal kicks 'em out of the nest when they're ready to play professionally,...won't allow them to stay.
Fairy tale. Makes good copy, but it's far from the truth. By his own admission he was shocked the Harrison's and about 3 others stayed for this year.
No fairy tale.
The Harrisons weren't ready to go pro and maybe they're still not. Willy Cauly Stein could have gone pro but he broke his ankle during the tournament last year.
But Cal isn't unique in that.
These days if a coach wants to maintain any credibility, he's got to be honest with his players concerning their capability.
You won't be seeing many 7 footers with Kaminski's abilities playing their senior season any longer.
The Harrisons weren't ready to go pro and maybe they're still not.
"They wanted to stay in school," their father, Aaron Harrison, told ESPN by phone. "They wanted to explore their options and see what's out there. They probably made up their minds last week. All the information they got from the draft was that they were middle to late first round."
Middle to late first round is about where Kaminsky and Dekker are right now. Neither is going to be a lottery pick. And both have improved their draft positions greatly this year.
"I'm coming back for a second season in large part because last year's title run was special, but we still have unfinished business," Aaron Harrison said in a statement.
The greatest difference between the above four players draft fortunes is...........the Harrison's had better prospects last year than did Kaminsky........and likely better than Dekker this year. The Harrison's wanted to stay for a championship run.
And that had precious little to do with Coach Cal's input.
"I didn't want to leave this place," Cousins said Thursday. "I could stay here forever ... it was a hard decision." _____________________________________________
While Calipari didn't answer questions on Thursday, Cousins said Calipari practically ordered him to enter the draft.
"He told me it's my time to go," Cousins said, then nodded his head vigorously later when a reporter asked if Calipari "pushed" him out.
The thing with Kentucky is,...these kids who play basketball here have rock star status,...seriously. They have to run the girls off and everywhere they go they're adored.
23,000 fans will turn out to watch them play a game of Tiddly Winks.
They love their time here.
It would be very easy for a coach to use that to manipulate them to stay longer than they should,...but Cal doesn't do that.
The thing with Kentucky is,...these kids who play basketball here have rock star status,...seriously.
As did the Fab Five at Michigan. Another commonality is they had their victories vacated.........as did Coach Cal for seasons at both UMass and Memphis.
Here's a little primer about Cal and his "Players First" policy. The coach comes by his controversy honestly.
The thing with Kentucky is,...these kids who play basketball here have rock star status,...seriously.
As did the Fab Five at Michigan. Another commonality is they had their victories vacated.........as did Coach Cal for seasons at both UMass and Memphis.
Here's a little primer about Cal and his "Players First" policy. The coach comes by his controversy honestly.
If somebody wanted to pick a player's situation to clobber Cal with, they should have found a better example than Poythress.
Poythress has always been kind of "on again, off again". Also, he came to college to go to college.
Some games made him look like an all American. Other times, he barely showed up. He was a long way from being a sure bet in the league,..so he stayed to both work on his degree and play basketball.
He got hurt.
He'll be back next year.
I'm not positive, but I think he'll have to play as a graduate student next year.
Anderson got pissed because a recruit was stupid and wouldn't be accepted into Wisconsin.
Nah.....ya gotta back off that a little, Bill. It's probably not so cool denigrating the intellect of teenagers without some perspective.
By all accounts Anderson's beef with admissions was UW's requirements for JC transfers as far as credits attained in core courses. The requirements escalate every year, and JC transfers have higher standards than HS graduates......they will have used up some college time and advanced up the requirement ladder.
Also.....as in virtually every University offering athletic scholarships.....there is some leeway or programs available to phase in typically academically borderline or deficient recruits. These programs are difficult to attain at Wisconsin. Been a subject of consternation in some circles for years.
Might not be a stupid recruit. Lesson that might be learned is your time in HS can be pretty damn important.
