marigold23 said:

---

It is odd to see so many just assume that there must be something wrong with the staff that is leading to the empty roster spots when in reality it's like you said: 1) players out of eligibility/going to the NBA 2) rob wright 3) guys getting effectively dismissed. Lang was unreliable & Celestine, Asemota & Dubravcic weren't trusted to contribute to depth unless desperately needed. Then there's Adegbola, Jackson & Ndjonga. Jackson is fielding offers from William & Mary, Colgate & Harvard - so that maybe clues us into where the staff were at with him. So NIL is causing issues, absolutely. Who knows what this will all look like in 2026, but today Baylor is STILL a competitor. Still landing top recruits and respectfully letting go of guys who don't meet the standard, as they should be.

---

The turnover this offseason didn't happen in a vacuum. It was the result of years of recruiting decisions.

The reason we had a bunch of ill-fitting role players is that we didn't prioritize those guys in our recruiting or development plans at all after the championship. We had a "stars and scrubs" recruiting strategy that left us with nothing but scrubs once our stars inevitably left after their one season in Waco.

So yes, the guys left over weren't good or worth keeping in some cases. But that's still a program/staff failure.

The teams that are having success in our conference and others aren't having the same issues to the same degree that we are. I've said this for years now. That's primarily because the teams that are winning in college basketball today (and for the last quarter century, honestly) aren't recruiting the way we are. That concerned me alone in 2022-23. Now pretty everyone agrees with me.

EvilTroyAndAbed said:

---

cowboycwr said:

---

EvilTroyAndAbed said:

---

cowboycwr said:

---

EvilTroyAndAbed said:

---

cowboycwr said:

---

EvilTroyAndAbed said:

---

cowboycwr said:

---

EvilTroyAndAbed said:

---

cowboycwr said:

---

EvilTroyAndAbed said:

---

cowboycwr said:

---

I thought our NIL was solid? Or is that more talk from the higher ups without backing it up?

---

There's a difference between having a solid NIL and paying one player $3.5 million.

---

And yet our entire team has left??? That to me makes me think there are issues with our NIL. Or some other hidden program issues.

---

You want to use our NIL to pay Asemota and Celestine and a frequently hurt Langston Love? I like the players we got so far to replace them. The issue is Wright, who we agreed to a seven figure deal and BYU backed up the truck and overpaid for him. Our NIL is obviously not on BYU's level, but that's because of BYU, not us.

---

I didn't say that.

I just said that if our entire team left then to me it screams we have issues with our NIL. We could have let the 3 you mentioned go and spent the money to retain others…. But we didn't retain anyone.

So again to me that screams we have an issue with NIL.

---

Retain others? Who are you talking about?

Omier out of eligibility
Roach out of eligibility
Nunn out of eligibility
Edgecombe will be an NBA lottery pick
I guess you're talking about Josh O, and we don't know what is up there except he probably won't be healthy when the season starts no matter where he goes.

So we have gotten four players in the transfer portal and a 5-star freshman. I like the guys transferring in better than those transferring out (except obviously Wright and Love if he were healthy, which is a crapshoot).

You seem to imply that Wright left because other players left. He left because he was offered nearly 3 times as much as we signed him to (which in my opinion was more than fair). It didn't matter who was or was not coming back. He was leaving no matter what. It doesn't make our NIL bad. It's just not at BYU's level where we can throw around money at anyone in the country.

It's not unlike Tennessee football except Wright didn't give us a chance to turn him down, which we most certainly would have (and gotten good PR over the way Tennessee is now). He simply took the money and ran.

---

Wow I had no idea we only had 6 guys on our roster!!!

Oh wait we didn't.

I didn't imply anything about Wright. You are putting words in my mouth.

We had our entire roster leave. Yes some were due to eligibility or the NBA but all the others left the program for other reasons. To me that is a problem. You may disagree but that is my opinion.

---

Name me the other guys on the roster who left this season who were essential for us to contend next year and who left because we supposedly have an NIL issue.

---

Oh I see. You are one of those that as soon as a player leaves it means we don't need them or they aren't good. Which then highlights the issue of our coaching staff can't identify talent or develop talent and can only bring in other guys already developed.


Got it.

So yeah no problem with our program at all in your eyes no matter how many guys leave for any reason.

---

Now who's putting words in whose mouth? We missed on a few guys. Every team does sooner or later. But we're not having this conversation if BYU doesn't wildly overpay for Wright. In fact, we're simply talking about the transfers coming in.

We're not at the top of the heap right now. We're a good program who will have a ton of question marks next year, and I'm willing to give Drew and the staff the benefit of the doubt. But not paying one guy $3.5 million is not an NIL issue to me.

---

You seem to only be focusing on one guy and missing what I am saying.

Our entire team is gone. You can dismiss the 4 that are leaving for eligibility or NBA as normal. What cannot be normal is the entire rest of the roster leaving. And to dismiss it as "they aren't guys we need or want" screams there are other issues.

So it is either we have an NIL problem for our ENTIRE roster to go seek money/playing time elsewhere, a miss on multiple guys all at once, a development issue, or a combination of all of the above at once.

---

Fine. You win. Drew's lost it. I guess I'll go get some BYU gear.

---

Still focused on one guy/BYU.

Read the post by bear2. He explains what I've been saying. This issue of EVERYONE leaving is not something to easily dismiss. It shows we have issues.

But people like you want to dismiss it as a new normal and everything is fine.

It doesn't mean Drew has lost it or is done. But it does mean our program has issues that need to be fixed.

You're missing my point. The roster was bad because of how Drew constructed it. The high turnover rate every year ain't it. That's been proven for well forever. I would have liked them to keep Asemota and Celestine personally on top of Wright. I like the guys we've brought in. But we're once again setting up for another gigantic roster turnover next off season because Drew's bringing in a ton of 1 year rentals. It's completely fair at this point to criticize how Drew's building his rosters.

IowaBear said:

---

You're missing my point. The roster was bad because of how Drew constructed it. The high turnover rate every year ain't it. That's been proven for well forever. I would have liked them to keep Asemota and Celestine personally on top of Wright. I like the guys we've brought in. But we're once again setting up for another gigantic roster turnover next off season because Drew's bringing in a ton of 1 year rentals. It's completely fair at this point to criticize how Drew's building his rosters.

---

It's not Drew's fault homie, he can't be touched. He didn't recruit the roster full of dispensable players that are all now gone.

BU got screwed by Rob. No doubt about that. I get that NIL is playing a factor in things. It seems Drew is still navigating the best way to handle the NIL era too. Huge CAD fan, dude deserves to coach at Bu as long as he wishes. I just hope that he finds ways to retain decent chunks of the roster going forward. IMO that's the secret sauce to getting BU back to the 2nd weekend in March.

graysongrundhoefer said:

---

Jorkel said:

---

IowaBear said:

---

You're missing my point. The roster was bad because of how Drew constructed it. The high turnover rate every year ain't it. That's been proven for well forever. I would have liked them to keep Asemota and Celestine personally on top of Wright. I like the guys we've brought in. But we're once again setting up for another gigantic roster turnover next off season because Drew's bringing in a ton of 1 year rentals. It's completely fair at this point to criticize how Drew's building his rosters.

---

It's not Drew's fault homie, he can't be touched. He didn't recruit the roster full of dispensable players that are all now gone.

---

Like I said before the season was where he failed in roster construction but why would you fail then just bring back a bunch of guys who didn't work? That would make zero sense.

---

The concern is we're on at least offseason #3 of this strategy. It gets worse every year. Yes the roster construction was bad yes we had to run guys out, yes we failed to run guys out we should have (like Nunn). The problem is Drew has done little to nothing this offseason to make it look like we're going to not be in the same position next year. We're adding tons of seniors and very few multi year guys thus far. I'll wait and trust the process before final judgement.

But frustration is not that we're running off lesser players it's that we've failed to retain the one guy we wanted to and we've had 3 years now where almost none of the team was worth retaining because we're not hitting on any player development.

Bridges is the only successful multi year transfer of the NIL era for us. That's scary we don't have others.

I don't begrudge doing what needs to be done, but the problem is deeper than roster construction last year.

The staff did what they could to bring Wright back, I think it's been made pretty clear that he screwed them over to get himself an egregiously overpaid deal.

Drew is getting the guys he wants, who are a good fit for Baylor and excellent athletes. You have to have seniors, no choice. But he's also got Carr, Bodo Bodo, Tounde (always a possibility) and is not done yet. It would be scary if he wasn't able to land them, that would signal a major alarm.

Lots of folks thought the world was ending when Novosad screwed CDA over at the last min a few years ago, but now he's a bench warmer and we have Sawyer. Sometimes it works out

graysongrundhoefer said:

---

IowaBear said:

---

Nah, there's zero way Drew decided to literally lose an entire roster. Poor construction on his part lead to this. He's admitted as much.

---

The team wasn't good which was due to roster construction so this offseason Drew 100% knew there was going to be a major roster shake up. Ashley posted pretty early that everyone except Rob Wright and Jalen Celestine were going to be gone. It's a good thing by the way as the guys who could have returned aren't very good aside from Rob and weren't going to contribute to winning at the highest level. Most of the guys gone were the staffs decision so yeah Drew did know because he needed to build a better roster than the one they had this year and most of these guys weren't going to help that.

Is it unfortunate and not ideal for that to happen? Sure. Was it necessary to have massive turnover? Absolutely. It's not deeper than that.

---

But it is deeper than that.

If we had a roster full of guys that have not developed that is an issue. If we had a roster full of guys that were misses in recruiting all at once that is an issue.

Drew has said that the injuries brought issues within the roster to surface. They didn't have depth, they couldn't practice, they lacked height. They were in scarcity mode for the majority of the season. I don't think it's true that there was no player development - they HAD to develop! But I think in the midst of it - the staff decided to do what they needed to do to NEVER be in that position again. That's a smart decision, if that wasn't the decision that would be super concerning. The players they are grabbing from the portal are because they fit the team they're trying to build, regardless of class. We'll get a few more guys with 2+ years to play, but it's just the nature of where college sports are at that it WILL be a battle every offseason. But the choice they've made is that they're not going to sacrifice skill for time. And if they didn't make that choice, fans would be upset that they're giving roster/scholarship spots to guys who aren't worth it.

marigold23 said:

---

Drew has said that the injuries brought issues within the roster to surface. They didn't have depth, they couldn't practice, they lacked height. They were in scarcity mode for the majority of the season. I don't think it's true that there was no player development - they HAD to develop! But I think in the midst of it - the staff decided to do what they needed to do to NEVER be in that position again. That's a smart decision, if that wasn't the decision that would be super concerning. The players they are grabbing from the portal are because they fit the team they're trying to build, regardless of class. We'll get a few more guys with 2+ years to play, but it's just the nature of where college sports are at that it WILL be a battle every offseason. But the choice they've made is that they're not going to sacrifice skill for time. And if they didn't make that choice, fans would be upset that they're giving roster/scholarship spots to guys who aren't worth it.

---

I don't think it's unfair to question the soundness of this calculation, given that the teams winning big in college basketball right now are virtually all returning significant chunks of their rotations year-to-year.

I don't think anyone is arguing the mechanics of Drew's plan. Everyone knows he's recruiting and building his team the way he wants to. It's the wisdom of that approach people have doubts about.

And the trajectory of our program since the national title would suggest such skepticism is warranted.

marigold23 said:

---

Drew has said that the injuries brought issues within the roster to surface. They didn't have depth, they couldn't practice, they lacked height. They were in scarcity mode for the majority of the season. I don't think it's true that there was no player development - they HAD to develop! But I think in the midst of it - the staff decided to do what they needed to do to NEVER be in that position again. That's a smart decision, if that wasn't the decision that would be super concerning. The players they are grabbing from the portal are because they fit the team they're trying to build, regardless of class. We'll get a few more guys with 2+ years to play, but it's just the nature of where college sports are at that it WILL be a battle every offseason. But the choice they've made is that they're not going to sacrifice skill for time. And if they didn't make that choice, fans would be upset that they're giving roster/scholarship spots to guys who aren't worth it.

---

You contradict yourself. You say there was development and then say the guys aren't worth it….


So which is it? There was development or the players weren't worth it?

It can't be both.

This is NOT a result of where college sports are. There are no other programs doing a complete roster rebuild under the same coach. Only those with new hires. And that is why this is concerning to me and makes me wonder if there are other issues going on.

cowboycwr said:

---

BUBear1994DFW said:

---

cowboycwr said:

---

You seem to only be focusing on one guy and missing what I am saying.

Our entire team is gone. You can dismiss the 4 that are leaving for eligibility or NBA as normal. What cannot be normal is the entire rest of the roster leaving. And to dismiss it as "they aren't guys we need or want" screams there are other issues.

So it is either we have an NIL problem for our ENTIRE roster to go seek money/playing time elsewhere, a miss on multiple guys all at once, a development issue, or a combination of all of the above at once.

---

Or maybe we made the decision to clean house with all because not making it past the 2nd round over the last several years is simply not acceptable.

---

Maybe…. But that still fuels my point about the lack of development, lack of good talent identification/recruiting that we "missed" on that many guys all at once.

---

Messi wasn't expected to be a 1 and done

Sochan wasn't expected to be a 1 and done

I guess if you can miss low, you can also miss high

LIB,MR BEARS said:

---

cowboycwr said:

---

BUBear1994DFW said:

---

cowboycwr said:

---

You seem to only be focusing on one guy and missing what I am saying.

Our entire team is gone. You can dismiss the 4 that are leaving for eligibility or NBA as normal. What cannot be normal is the entire rest of the roster leaving. And to dismiss it as "they aren't guys we need or want" screams there are other issues.

So it is either we have an NIL problem for our ENTIRE roster to go seek money/playing time elsewhere, a miss on multiple guys all at once, a development issue, or a combination of all of the above at once.

---

Or maybe we made the decision to clean house with all because not making it past the 2nd round over the last several years is simply not acceptable.

---

Maybe…. But that still fuels my point about the lack of development, lack of good talent identification/recruiting that we "missed" on that many guys all at once.

---

Messi wasn't expected to be a 1 and done

Sochan wasn't expected to be a 1 and done

I guess if you can miss low, you can also miss high

---

Many on here only see the negative.

As I recall, Coach Call had to start his Arkansas roster completely from scratch this year. They started the conference 0-5. They wound up in the Sweet 16 and a last second shot in OT away from the Elite Eight.

So it can be done.