Game Thread: Baylor Basketball Battles No. 5 Houston in Tough Road Test

bear2be2 said:

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Crawfoso1973 said:

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Part of the reason we are in this situation -total roster turnover every season- is due to the mindset of impatience and instant gratification. For our program to turn around, we need to go back to our developmental roots. A prospect like Nnaji has a tremendous ceiling if given the time to get healthy and develop.

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I'm with you completely on Nnaji. I don't get the hate honestly.

Get him healthy and fully integrated into our offensive and defensive schemes and I don't see any reason why he can't be a solid multi-year rotation player for us.

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You guys are part of the group who sees potential with him. I hope you are right and I am wrong. I'd prefer to spend the money on someone with a more well rounded game.

Crawfoso1973 said:

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Skillings is not that bad. He is our best offensive rebounder and plays with energy and hustle. He ideally would be our 3rd or 4th player off the bench. But our depth is so limited we need him to play more minutes and his deficiencies show.

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I really do like his effort. Along with Powell. Not saying they should be starters, but they give it all.

Guitarbiscuit said:

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bear2be2 said:

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Crawfoso1973 said:

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Part of the reason we are in this situation -total roster turnover every season- is due to the mindset of impatience and instant gratification. For our program to turn around, we need to go back to our developmental roots. A prospect like Nnaji has a tremendous ceiling if given the time to get healthy and develop.

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I'm with you completely on Nnaji. I don't get the hate honestly.

Get him healthy and fully integrated into our offensive and defensive schemes and I don't see any reason why he can't be a solid multi-year rotation player for us.

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You guys are part of the group who sees potential with him. I hope you are right and I am wrong. I'd prefer to spend the money on someone with a more well rounded game.

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That group included a bunch of NBA scouts as recently as a few years ago, so the talent is in there. He's just got to get healthy.

He'll likely never be a significant offensive threat. But with his length and athleticism, there's no reason he can't be really solid 15-20 minute rotation big IMO.

In denial of what, exactly? By any reasonable standard Baylor is neck and neck with TTU and Houston. Their NIL budgets are reportedly larger. Ours is competitive. We have great facilities and a future HOF head coach and a national championship.

Do you think Tech will win a NC this year? Houston? I will go on the record and predict that Kelvin will not win a NC before he retires.

Maybe we are on a permanent decline, but it's far too soon to tell. You don't have to live in the past to understand and appreciate historical context. Our past experience suggests it's at least as likely that Drew pulls us out of this skid as it is we continue sliding.

Having optimism is not being in denial. I can choose not to feel miserable about this program based on totally rational premises. If the downward trend continues two years from now, I will eat crow and be miserable. Why start now?

In what planet is Baylor neck and neck with either Tech or Houston? Those 2 programs are vastly superior to BU the last several years. Sure, Baylor has the natty and not a single fan should minimize the importance of that. It was also 5 years ago. Baylor's program has been steadily trending fine since 2022.
Like I said the results speak for themselves. Not only are Houston and Tech whipping BU H2H both are also experiencing much much more success in March.
it's OK to see Baylor what they are right now. No realistic fan thinks the program is worth a hoot right now.
Maybe Drew revamps things in the off season.

BabyJBear said:

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In denial of what, exactly? By any reasonable standard Baylor is neck and neck with TTU and Houston. Their NIL budgets are reportedly larger. Ours is competitive. We have great facilities and a future HOF head coach and a national championship.


Maybe we are on a permanent decline, but it's far too soon to tell. You don't have to live in the past to understand and appreciate historical context. Our past experience suggests it's at least as likely that Drew pulls us out of this skid as it is we continue sliding.

Having optimism is not being in denial. I can choose not to feel miserable about this program based on totally rational premises. If the downward trend continues two years from now, I will eat crow and be miserable. Why start now?

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I agree with the optimism, and would argue that no decline is permanent, though living through a 50-year drought kinda seemed like one. When you mention however that our NIL is competitive, it just seems we are all working with the same script. I keep hearing the same line, but when I notice big gaps in our front line, when we have gone from a deep roster only a few years ago to settling for 8 guys able to play, when we were in the running early for Peat and Dybantsa and were blown away by the money stakes, are we really competitive or is that just something we keep saying to ourselves. Pardon my doubt, but in the decades we sucked at Football and MBB, the line you always heard was "we're competitive money wise."

We're just going to have to disagree I guess. I am firmly in the camp that believes luck matters more in CBB than is often readily apparent, and fortunes change quickly. We whiffed on a handful of evaluations in recent years, and it's cost us. We've had an unusually high number of injuries. Guys have left earlier for the draft than expected. NIL has totally changed the relationship between players and their universities. Very hard to have a culture of JOY in a casino.

Drew could learn a lot from McCasland, Otz, and Sampson, just like those guys no doubt have learned a thing or two from Drew over the years. I guarantee you none of those guys feel like they've "lapped" Baylor, though.

This is my biggest concern as well, and I cop to parroting the company line with no inside knowledge of the actual funding situation.

Quinton said:

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Nnaji can't play physically. Someone whiffed on the guy's availability big time. IF he can get healthy and an offseason, he can be decent.

Right now he can't go over 30 seconds without being completely gassed.

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It's almost like he got pneumonia or something. In the first game he did not look that out of shape as far as cardio. But in the few games he's played recently he just looks worn out almost as soon as he steps on the floor.

boognish_bear said:

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Quinton said:

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Nnaji can't play physically. Someone whiffed on the guy's availability big time. IF he can get healthy and an offseason, he can be decent.

Right now he can't go over 30 seconds without being completely gassed.

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It's almost like he got pneumonia or something. In the first game he did not look that out of shape as far as cardio. But in the few games he's played recently he just looks worn out almost as soon as he steps on the floor.

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From my experience, a couple of weeks eating at Penland can do that to you...

Yep, I agree that's not a great record. I'll reward your determination to make your fellow fans feel miserable about the state of their program and simply say congratulations, you've made me sad.

Speaking only for myself, I think my biggest disappointment with Nnaji is attributable to Scott and others who kept slyly hinting as if we were about to sign a big who was going to come in and help both immediately and significantly. That was quite a relief in late December after seeing the debacle play out in Memphis when it was readily apparent we had some major holes, no depth and Caden was prone to foul trouble for playing more minutes than it was intended for him to play.

I must say, I too was quite surprised at how green Nnaji looked. For someone who had played several seasons of professional ball, albeit European pro, he didn't exhibit any basic fundamentals you'd expect from someone with that much experience. He was rarely in an athletic position on D, he didn't know how to use his body to block out, and he was routinely beaten to rebounds he should have corralled. He also had no idea how to rotate, but that was definitely attributable to lack of time in our defensive system, so I was easily able to overlook like defect. I never expected anything on O because he was never "sold" as having great offensive skills. Luckily, he showed a bit more promise as he played more games.

It made a bit more sense to me when I found out he had been injured and is still not at 100% from those injuries. I just wish it had been presented that way by our own folks rather than acting like we were about to get a second wind with this talent that was suddenly going to show up.

I'm still glad we have him. I'm on the side who believes he is definitely a project and the best I see him at this point is a backup 8-12 minute a game guy (which all teams need), but athletic guys his size don't grow on trees and Drew and his historical staffs have shown an ability to develop those kind of guys over time so hopefully he'll develop into much more. .

BabyJBear said:

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Yep, I agree that's not a great record. I'll reward your determination to make your fellow fans feel miserable about the state of their program and simply say congratulations, you've made me sad.

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If watching this team play the last two years (and especially this season) hasn't already set you on that path, I wouldn't consider us "fellow fans" -- at least in the sense that we both share the same level of passion for the sport and this program.

I'm not trying to make anyone miserable, and if you're happy watching mediocre to bad basketball, more power to you. Who am I to yuck your yum? But the current state and trajectory of our program is objectively pretty ****ty right now. And as someone who cares deeply about Baylor men's basketball, I see no value in pretending the picture is rosier than it is.

Big12Fan2024 said:

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Speaking only for myself, I think my biggest disappointment with Nnaji is attributable to Scott and others who kept slyly hinting as if we were about to sign a big who was going to come in and help both immediately and significantly. That was quite a relief in late December after seeing the debacle play out in Memphis when it was readily apparent we had some major holes, no depth and Caden was prone to foul trouble for playing more minutes than it was intended for him to play.

I must say, I too was quite surprised at how green Nnaji looked. For someone who had played several seasons of professional ball, albeit European pro, he didn't exhibit any basic fundamentals you'd expect from someone with that much experience. He was rarely in an athletic position on D, he didn't know how to use his body to block out, and he was routinely beaten to rebounds he should have corralled. He also had no idea how to rotate, but that was definitely attributable to lack of time in our defensive system, so I was easily able to overlook like defect. I never expected anything on O because he was never "sold" as having great offensive skills. Luckily, he showed a bit more promise as he played more games.

It made a bit more sense to me when I found out he had been injured and is still not at 100% from those injuries. I just wish it had been presented that way by our own folks rather than acting like we were about to get a second wind with this talent that was suddenly going to show up.

I'm still glad we have him. I'm on the side who believes he is definitely a project and the best I see him at this point is a backup 8-12 minute a game guy (which all teams need), but athletic guys his size don't grow on trees and Drew and his historical staffs have shown an ability to develop those kind of guys over time so hopefully he'll develop into much more. .

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If Flo Thamba could grow into a 20-plus minute player and Freddie Gillespie could develop into a good Big 12 starter, Nnaji can certainly become more than an 8-12 minute player with the requisite coaching and work.

Capping a guy's potential based on the miniscule data sample we have here seems crazy to me -- particularly when talking about a guy who was believed to have an NBA pedigree before injuries detailed his career.

What will Nnaji develop into (assuming he even stays)? Who knows? But this staff has turned much lesser post talents into better-than-serviceable Big 12 players. I'm not about to place limits on what can happen in this situation if everyone commits to the same development track.

Someone mentioned that Baylor has been slacking on many sports but this is special!

NEVER COUNT OUT THE BEARS!#SicEm 🐻 | @McDonalds pic.twitter.com/gUooaNelmx

— Baylor Men’s Tennis (@BaylorMTennis) March 6, 2026

Crawfoso1973 said:

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Part of the reason we are in this situation -total roster turnover every season- is due to the mindset of impatience and instant gratification. For our program to turn around, we need to go back to our developmental roots. A prospect like Nnaji has a tremendous ceiling if given the time to get healthy and develop.

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I'm one of the biggest proponents of development. But that's not why we recruited this guy. That says to me we have a serious talent scouting problem. I'm judging him by what our coaching staff said publicly about him coming on. I wouldn't be shocked if he didn't come back next year, based on Drew's comments about him being a pro and learning to fit in.

It seems like the coaching staff was a little too eager to bite without fully understanding the extent of his health issues. The relationship might have soured as a result. Both parties knew they were gambling a little.

I hope he can come back. The other big guys we have on our roster are true mysteries.

BabyJBear said:

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It seems like the coaching staff was a little too eager to bite without fully understanding the extent of his health issues. The relationship might have soured as a result. Both parties knew they were gambling a little.

I hope he can come back. The other big guys we have on our roster are true mysteries.

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If he were brought in during a normal recruiting period, I would understand the angst some have over "missing" on Nnaji. But he was probably the only option we had at mid term to at add player at his position who might be able to contribute to this year's team.

Whether he's brought back or not (I really hope he is), he was a flyer. Those acting like there was major risk to his acquisition are being overly dramatic. And there still remains the upside that he'll be a useful piece in time.