Crawfoso1973 said:
I have absolutely no problem bringing in a 5 star freshman every year, because Sochan Missi and VJ were spectacular in their one year. CSD has a good success rate with them but the issue has been the rest of the team around them. We have lost our way as far as bringing it in developmental players and excellent role players. Outside of the one and done freshman are recruiting has been largely trash. No one complains as much about the one and done fourth and fifth year seniors, but that has been worse because they have been terrible with the exception of Omer and RayJ. Players like Roach, Obi, and Rataj are a double whammy because they suck in their one year. It is opportunity cost, because those scholarship could have been used to develop guys over a two or three year period. We have no coherent strategy on how to navigate the transfer portal era.
Unless the standard is meaningless accolades and/or post-Baylor success, I'm not sure how an argument can possibly be made that Scott Drew's track record with five-star freshmen is a good one.
--Tweety Carter's career is only remembered as it is because he developed over four years and was excellent as a senior. If he had left any time before his final season -- as most blue chip freshmen do -- he'd have been viewed as a good, not great player on a bunch of middling (or worse) teams.
--Perry Jones and Isaiah Austin saw their stock drop so much as freshmen they had to stay a second year. Both helped lead good teams as sophomores, but if either was judged on his freshman season alone, he'd have been viewed as a disappointment.
--Between the two above, Quincy Miller was a solid role player for a really good team. But he didn't do anything that Anthony Jones couldn't have in the minutes that were taken from him.
--Kendall Brown was a role player who wilted down the stretch and was largely a non-factor late in his one season on campus.
--Jeremy Sochan was great. No complaints.
--Keyonte George was a low-efficiency volume scorer who gave everything he got on the offensive end back on the defensive end.
--The same description above applies to Ja'Kobe Walter.
--Yves Missi was great. No complaints.
--VJ Edgecombe was great. No complaints.
--Robert Wright was a good, not great player for us who wilted down the stretch and left on horrible terms.
--Tounde Yessoufou, while very talented, has a super raw skillet and a very low basketball IQ that plays us out of as many games as his elite athleticism and motor play us into.
By my count, we've had three five-star freshmen in 12 who were elite college players as freshmen. And two of those weren't expected to be as good as they were. And as good as those guys were, none of them got us to the second weekend of the tournament during their time in Waco.
The only freshman we've had that played in a Sweet Sixteen or deeper as a freshman was Miller, and that's because he was like the fourth or fifth option on that team.
If our goal is to put guys in the NBA, the five-star freshman route has been a rousing success. If it is to bring success to the Baylor men's basketball program, I don't think anyone can argue it's been anything but a failure as a strategy.
