A pretty good read:
http://www.foxsportshouston.com/01/30/12/Durley-all-grown-up/landing.html?blockID=655732&feedID=3803
January 30, 2012
RICHMOND, Texas – They don't play contact sports in Saudi Arabia. Or at least they didn't until Aaron Durley got the ball in a soccer game.
Durley was always the big kid. You may first have been introduced to him a few years ago as a 6-foot-8, 245-pound 13-year-old first baseman for his Saudi Arabian Little League World Series team, coached by his father, an American working in the Saudi Arabian oil industry. It was a novelty that generated enough fame he was a guest on Jimmy Kimmel's late-night talk show. But he was big minute he was born, when the nurses were snapping photos of this 22-inch-long baby with their hands up next to his feet.
"I'm like, 'Hello, sew me up,'" said his mother, Dana.
And this was a kid born two months premature. Aaron never did stop being enormous, and at some point between the flashbulbs of his birth and his move from Saudi Arabia to the United States at 13, Durley was just another kid trying to score a goal in a soccer game. To hear his father, James, describe it was like playing a game of marbles with a bowling ball.
"He took out like two or three smaller kids along the way, and then he took out the coach that was playing with them," James Durley said. "After he did that, the coach took him out and said, 'Aaron, you're way bigger than the other kids. You shouldn't be doing that.'"
And so it was Aaron realized he could hurt people. Aaron doesn't like hurting people. That brings us to the present day. Aaron Durley has grown up, but he isn't that much bigger than he was when he shared the stage with Kimmel. He's 6-10, 280 pounds and his mom thinks he is still growing. He complains of ankle, knee and back pain, just like he did when he was an 11-year-old kid growing from 6-4 to 6-8.
"He's eating me out of house and home," she says.
Durley is a center for Fort Bush Bend High School just outside Houston, where he is not the biggest attraction. He shares the frontcourt with Cameron Ridley, a 6-10, 245-pound center who is a top-25 player in the class of 2012 while Scout.com doesn't rank Durley among its top 100 prospects. The two rarely even play at the same time, because Fort Bend coach Ronnie Courtney likes to run a full-court press, and that doesn't work as well with a pair of centers.
Truth be told, Courtney still is searching for the best way to utilize the biggest guy on the team.
"Aaron is one of those guys that has not found his niche," Courtney said. "He does so many things. I'm trying to get him something he can put his finger on and be really good at."
Courtney says Durley is among the team's best 3-point shooters, dribbles better than any big man he's ever had and is quick on his feet for a guy his size. In a game last week, Durley caught the ball outside the lane, then drove for a dunk. It was a flicker of dominance, but just a flicker. Durley Courtney said it was the first time he had ever see him do that.
"This dude, if he ever let the light come on, he would be a force to reckon with," Courtney said.
But the issue isn't so much one of illumination as it is one of empathy.
"He knows if he really puts himself into it and goes full force, he would hurt somebody," Courtney said.
Aaron is self-aware enough to know this. He's a "yes sir, no ma'am" kind of kid who is comfortable on camera. Polite and affable. Quick to smile.
"He's a gentle giant," Dana said.
Aaron is working on roughing up the gentle a little.
"I think there's certain times I'm not using (my size) the best way I can," he said. "As long as I keep growing mentally and physically, where I'll end up in three or four years can be something me and my family can be proud of."
The specifics of this untapped potential are the reason there is such considerable optimism about his career as a major-conference basketball player. He needs to face people his own size, for once. Courtney says facing Ridley seems to bring out the beast in Durley, and when Durley played pickup games on recruiting visits to mid-major schools, he stunned the coaches and himself.
"He came back from a mid-major school visit and he was like, 'Mom, I think I hurt them,'" Dana said. "'I was just doing work on them.' I said, 'Aaron, to me, that's not where you need to be. You need to be challenged.'"
He needs to be challenged physically, which is the obvious part. The part some people miss is that he also needs to feel comfortable psychologically, which hasn't come easy. This is an American kid who grew up mostly in Saudi Arabia, where western culture is blocked out entirely and where people tend to live in small, familial communities.
It's a bubble.
"It's like growing up in the 50s," Dana said.
James and Dana liked the bubble, but thought they'd be stupid to have a 6-8, 260-pound kid going to school in a culture where knocking people over on the way to scoring a goal was considered a bad thing.
He needed to be someplace where knocking people over on the way to a goal isn't just considered OK, it's considered awesome. In America, James said, "It would have been perfectly acceptable."
So at 13 Aaron moved to Houston to live with Dana's parents. It was a heartbreaking time for Dana, who had to let her son move away a few years earlier than most moms would want, and it was a socially challenging one for Aaron, who realized he didn't understand the nuances of American culture.
"He had stuff stolen from him, he had his feelings hurt," Dana said. "Coming from the Little League World Series, he had to deal with jealousy and he didn't know where that was coming from. He's a good kid. He makes As and Bs. He loves school. He just doesn't get the relationships or the jargon. He's cautious, almost to a fault."
So here was this enormous kid who grew up in Saudi Arabia, who had no friends, who was living with his grandparents and trying to understand how to relate to teenagers in a new culture while just trying not to hurt anybody.
"Aaron is a misfit toy," Dana said.
In the recruiting process, Aaron learned there was an Island of Misfit Toys out there, and it was the basketball team at a Jesuit, Roman Catholic university in Milwaukee, Wis.
Marquette had guys who were junior college transfers, guys who were unnoticed as recruits. It has one guy, a forward from Aaron's own high school named Chris Otule, who has an artificial eye.
It seemed like the kind of place a misfit might fit in. According to Dana, there's something about coach Buzz Williams.
"Somehow he completely can see something other people don't," she said.
At Marquette, they're looking at Aaron in the same way they looked at Otule, who was mostly ignored as a recruit and was averaging more than 17 minutes per game for the 17th-ranked Golden Eagles before losing his season to a knee injury.
"Determining the future of big guys is at times, very dicey," Williams said in November. "But our entire staff has seen Aaron multiple times and similar to where Chris was at this time in his development, I believe Aaron is on that same trajectory."
James thinks his son has some maturing to do. He thinks it's going to take good work by Williams and his staff to coax out Aaron's full potential. So many people don't understand Aaron, James says. They just see a big kid.
It has been five years since Aaron last played in the Little League World Series. It's been about nine than that since that formative soccer game in Saudi Arabia.
Which means that in just a few months, Aaron Durley won't have to worry about hurting people anymore.
"When I get up to Marquette," he said, "they'll unleash the beast."
Cue the Roseboro bit....
Good article.
He's the best 3 point shooter on his team! Wow
If you're going to take a flier on a kid, a 6-10 280 lb-er with solid academics and athletic ability is a good flier to take. I have no idea how this will work out, but these are the kinds of things you need to do when trying to upgrade the program to the next level. I look forward to Aaron joining the team.
Awesome. I can't wait to see this kid after Buzz gets ahold of him.
I can't wait to see what Durley can do after two years of playing against Gardner and Otule every day in practice and a couple off seasons with Todd Smith. The fact that his coach praises his ball handling is encouraging. It means he must have good hand-eye coordination. If passivity is what he needs to get over to tap into his full potential, I'm confident this staff can cure him of that. Got a really good feeling about Durley.
Good article. Will be fun watching him progress.
I think the best thing about this article is how both he and his parents seem to think that he needs to come up here and develop into a player...they all know and accept the fact that he's a bit of a project. I can't wait to see how his career plays out!
Marquette: The Island of Misfit Toys
Quote from: mu_hilltopper on January 30, 2012, 10:18:21 AM
Marquette: The Island of Misfit Toys
The Marquette Misfit Toys would be an amazing mascot. A little odd, but totally unforgettable.
Quote from: tommyc6 on January 30, 2012, 10:28:21 AM
The Marquette Misfit Toys would be an amazing mascot. A little odd, but totally unforgettable.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5SH1j1luFOw&feature=related
I vote for the polka-dot elephant.
6'11, 280. Check. Interesting backstory, check. Wants to work, check. Co-ordinated, but needs to learn how to use his physicality to play basketball, yes please. I would like some of the guys who were trashing him to come back and explain why this is a bad signing.
"Nobody wants a Charlie in the Box!?"
Seriously ...
If Durley is a legit high-major project that we want, and this article suggests he is, then we have no room for Philip Nolan.
It seems like Nolan wants to come to MU. So how does MU make room for a top 100 6' 10" guy? Which misfit toy gets voted off the island?
Added later
http://espn.go.com/college-sports/basketball/recruiting/player/_/id/111668/phillip-nolan
This link is Nolan recruiting line from ESPN. He is the #23 pf in the country and the #3 WI recruit behind Sam Dekker and J.P. Tokoto
These things work themselves out.
Quote from: AnotherMU84 on January 30, 2012, 11:44:46 AM
Seriously ...
If Durley is a legit high-major project that we want, and this article suggests he is, then we have no room for Philip Nolan.
It seems like Nolan wants to come to MU. So how does MU make room for a top 100 6' 10" guy? Which misfit toy gets voted off the island?
See, you're getting close to starting that thread that most of us would not want to see.
Quote from: MU Fan in Connecticut on January 30, 2012, 11:24:09 AM
"Nobody wants a Charlie in the Box!?"
Unless he's got ups than that Charlie does.
Quote from: LittleMurs on January 30, 2012, 11:50:12 AM
See, you're getting close to starting that thread that most of us would not want to see.
I know, but either we stop all the the treads about "we need bigs" (another was just started this morning) as we have no spots for a year or we talk about this unpleasant subject.
Quote from: tower912 on January 30, 2012, 11:47:08 AM
These things work themselves out.
Yeah and as I said in another thread, this is why the late signing period is in April...after the season. If Buzz wants Nolan, and has some sort of plan as how this is going to work out, he's going to tell him to keep it to himself until after the season ends. If Nolan announces he is coming here now, all hell is going to break loose - and that most certainly would have an impact on a team that is putting together a pretty nice year.
Quote from: AnotherMU84 on January 30, 2012, 11:53:01 AM
I know, but either we stop all the the treads about "we need bigs" (another was just started this morning) as we have no spots for a year or we talk about this unpleasant subject.
That was about a middle schooler. Unless he's jumping from grade school to the Big East, I'm pretty sure we don't have to worry about any of our current players needing to leave or recruits not showing up to make room for him at this point.
Why is there any need to talk about anything that none of us has any real information about? What is the point of speculation? It can only lead to bad things if in fact the guys read this board. There's enough to talk about between winning games and how Ox is doing and how awesome Jamil is coming along. Little Murs, I vote for the option about stopping the threads about things we know nothing about.
Quote from: The Sultan of South Wayne on January 30, 2012, 11:55:30 AM
Yeah and as I said in another thread, this is why the late signing period is in April...after the season. If Buzz wants Nolan, and has some sort of plan as how this is going to work out, he's going to tell him to keep it to himself until after the season ends. If Nolan announces he is coming here now, all hell is going to break loose - and that most certainly would have an impact on a team that is putting together a pretty nice year.
+1. I say we play along, and not speculate on what none of us will have an answer to anyway.
This is a message board. Uninformed speculation based purely on emotion is what we do, and do well!
Durley absolutely needs to redshirt his first year. With Gardner & Otule back, Durley would get virtually no playing time next season.
Quote from: AnotherMU84 on January 30, 2012, 12:01:55 PM
This is a message board. Uninformed speculation based purely on emotion is what we do, and do well!
Why, I resemble that remark! ;)
Quote from: WarriorHal on January 30, 2012, 12:10:38 PM
Durley absolutely needs to redshirt his first year. With Gardner & Otule back, Durley would get virtually no playing time next season.
If Durley were on the roster now, he'd be playing tomorrow. Hell, he'd probably be playing 8-10 minutes a game since the Otule injury. Ya never know...
Quote from: WarriorHal on January 30, 2012, 12:10:38 PM
Durley absolutely needs to redshirt his first year. With Gardner & Otule back, Durley would get virtually no playing time next season.
I agree. However, Buzz says that he evaluates on a player-by-player basis. What if CO (or, God forbid, DG? is slow to recover. What if DG declares? What if the kid comes in and is so far beyond what anybody thought? Those scenarios aside, yes, red-shirt him. Let him spend a year with Todd and beating on CO and DG in practice. Then unleash him as a red-shirt frosh.
There are many, many, many huge concerns in the world.
Marquette successfully recruiting too many big men would not appear to be one of them.
I agree with the posters who have said within several of these posts that these things take care of themselves. The best player(s) and/or the best fit(s) will be on the team. And I say this even though I am a skeptic by nature.
Good thing we have Gardner. It's not like Durley is gonna be pushing him around in the post or be afraid of hurting him. I look forward to watching him develop. In all seriousness, this is what has to happen...bring in one big project a year and let him develop. And if you happen to recruit a stud instead, all the better.
Actually, Durley's role on the team going forward and whether we will find a way to bring in Nolan is as good a topic as any for this board. I find it far more interesting than reading everyone's predictions for the next game or someone posting a link to ESPN bracketology.
Durley sounds like a good kid who has high major size and the right attitude. Hopefully he will be a steal and we will all be praising this signing in few years. If he needs to redshirt or go JUCO in order to develop then fine, but I disagree with the view that because we have Otule we have no use for another big man. Given Otule's history, you have to assume about a 50/50 chance he misses significant time next year due to injury.
Quote from: MU82 on January 30, 2012, 01:03:17 PM
There are many, many, many huge concerns in the world.
Marquette successfully recruiting too many big men would not appear to be one of them.
There are many other message boards for those concerns and you're welcome to go visit them. In the meantime, in case you forgot, this message board is only about Marquette basketball and successfully recruiting a big man (men) is arguably the most important issues facing the program.
Now please tell you fell and hit your head and was still dazed when you wrote this post.
Quote from: AnotherMU84 on January 30, 2012, 02:06:24 PM
Their are many other message boards for those concerns and you're welcome to go visit them. In the meantime, in case you forgot, this message board is only about Marquette basketball and successfully recruiting a big man (men) is arguably the most important issues facing the program.
Now please tell you fell and hit your head and was still dazed when you wrote this post.
There. I think I've seen this error from you in a number of posts. I hate to be a grammar police, but that is as basic of grammar as it comes. I think I learned that in 2nd grade. If that.
Quote from: wadesworld on January 30, 2012, 02:07:58 PM
There. I think I've seen this error from you in a number of posts. I hate to be a grammar police, but that is as basic of grammar as it comes. I think I learned that in 2nd grade. If that.
Their, I fell and hit my head and was still dazed when I wrote that post.
Quote from: AnotherMU84 on January 30, 2012, 02:10:59 PM
Their, I fell and hit my head and was still dazed when I wrote that post.
Haha
Quote from: AnotherMU84 on January 30, 2012, 02:06:24 PM
There are many other message boards for those concerns and you're welcome to go visit them. In the meantime, in case you forgot, this message board is only about Marquette basketball and successfully recruiting a big man (men) is arguably the most important issues facing the program.
Now please tell you fell and hit your head and was still dazed when you wrote this post.
I'm pretty sure MU82 was saying that having too many big men is not something to complain about, rather it's something we should be embracing. I don't think he was trying to say we shouldn't be talking about this on the board.
As one of the posters who was glad we had signed such a big dude (physically) but was totally baffled as to whether he would be any good due to his lack of playing time on the high school team, it was refreshing to hear the reason directly from his coach and totally puts my mind at ease with the signing. I am really pumped about it now and am excited for Durley to have the chance to develop under Otule and Gardner for a year before unleashing the beast on our opponents.
http://www.ihigh.com/vypewest/gallery_67801.html?articleid=101634
This picture has been on here before, but I think it is appropriate to be shown again in this thread. Aaron is #50. The one making the 6'10, 245 lb guy behind him look like Trend Blackledge. I worry about his footspeed, but DG isn't going to win many sprints and he seems to be surviving.
Quote from: g0lden3agle on January 30, 2012, 02:11:44 PM
I'm pretty sure MU82 was saying that having too many big men is not something to complain about, rather it's something we should be embracing. I don't think he was trying to say we shouldn't be talking about this on the board.
Thank you.
Forget that he is a basketball player...
On this article alone, he sounds like he'd make a great Marquette student: studies hard, has good manners, is used to getting picked on.
Quote from: wadesworld on January 30, 2012, 02:07:58 PM
There. I think I've seen this error from you in a number of posts. I hate to be a grammar police, but that is as basic of grammar as it comes. I think I learned that in 2nd grade. If that.
"Police," I believe, is a plural noun; whereas, "I" is a singular pronoun. One of the basic grammatical rules is that a pronoun should agree with its antecedent in number. Actually, the second clause in the same sentence is rather clumsy ("...basic of grammar...") and probably should be rephrased, as well. I'm here to help. You're welcome.
Great article and Aaron sounds like a great kid with the world ahead of him. I can't wait to see what he's capable of doing on the court and hope he meets with nothing but success while he's at MU.
Sounds like Durley is an ideal red shirt candidate so he can develop. Wish there was a way to sign Nolan too. Would be great to have 4 "bigs" on the team!
Where there's a will, there's a way.
Quote from: wildbill sb on January 30, 2012, 03:04:34 PM
"Police," I believe, is a plural noun; whereas, "I" is a singular pronoun. One of the basic grammatical rules is that a pronoun should agree with its antecedent in number. Actually, the second clause in the same sentence is rather clumsy ("...basic of grammar...") and probably should be rephrased, as well. I'm here to help. You're welcome.
Police is both singular and plural. Just like deer. Nice try, though.
Quote from: wadesworld on January 30, 2012, 05:14:00 PM
Police is both singular and plural. Just like deer. Nice try, though.
Nerd slam!
Quote from: msbjim on January 30, 2012, 03:49:03 PM
Wish there was a way to sign Nolan too. Would be great to have 4 "bigs" on the team!
If we had 4 bigs, we would finally have the size most Big East teams and most other top 25 teams have virtually every season. Probably too much to wish for.
Of little notice, assuming everybody stays and everybody who says they are coming is coming, we will also have a selection of forwards > 6'6. I have been racking my brain trying to figure out the last time we had 4 athletic forwards in the 6'6 - 6'8 range. That is the kind of length that other teams take for granted.
Quote from: Sir Lawrence on January 30, 2012, 09:38:41 AM
The two rarely even play at the same time, because Fort Bend coach Ronnie Courtney likes to run a full-court press, and that doesn't work as well with a pair of centers.
I'm not sure this really explains the lack of playing time.... Does Ridley really play EVERY minute for a team that likes to run a full-court press? It's certainly possible, but I'm beginning to think that Fort Bend is plugging someone else in at the 5 for stretches. ?-(
Quote from: wadesworld on January 30, 2012, 05:14:00 PM
Police is both singular and plural. Just like deer. Nice try, though.
So...this has me curious. In what case is "police" singular? I'm not coming up with anything and my Googling is saying it's a collective noun (and thus plural).
* * *
I'm excited to see this kid play. Will he be able to play at the ProAm?
Assuming he gets through the clearinghouse and enrolls he should be at the pro-am...presuming there is one.
I just checked it out and Durley is currently close to Shaq's size the year he left LSU to go pro. Obviously, it is a 50 pound difference so that is quite a bit to add. However, his mother said that he is still growing. He could conceivably add a little more height and will definitely add muscle (is 20 pounds fair?) when he begins working with Todd in the weight room. Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying he is going to be the next Shaq but this fella is going to be an absolute monster.
http://www.lsusports.net/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=5200&ATCLID=174841
I would think about red shirting him his second year. Assuming Otule gets a 6th year, we will have enough at center. Red shirt him his second year, if he shows he is a hard worker. No need to red shirt a player, who is not going to work hard.
Quote from: The Sultan of South Wayne on January 30, 2012, 12:16:37 PM
If Durley were on the roster now, he'd be playing tomorrow. Hell, he'd probably be playing 8-10 minutes a game since the Otule injury. Ya never know...
"He knows if he really puts himself into it and goes full force, he would hurt somebody," Courtney said.
After Gardner went down it would have been nice to be able to put in someone who could maybe "hurt" the other guys.....
Quote from: Utile et Dulce on January 30, 2012, 08:45:28 PM
So...this has me curious. In what case is "police" singular? I'm not coming up with anything and my Googling is saying it's a collective noun (and thus plural).
It's singular, for the most part, only in colloquial speech. Example: In
The Wire, Jimmy McNulty calls Lester "a natural police."
LOVED The Wire, and highly recommend it for anybody who hasn't seen it. However ...
Using what the characters would say as a guide to grammar is not quite as recommended.
Especially Snoop!!!
Quote from: bilsu on January 30, 2012, 09:16:18 PM
I would think about red shirting him his second year. Assuming Otule gets a 6th year, we will have enough at center. Red shirt him his second year, if he shows he is a hard worker. No need to red shirt a player, who is not going to work hard.
What? Why? We complain constantly about a lack of big men depth, and then we would get some depth only to redshirt it? Especially considering the injury potential for bigger players. If he can play a solid 4-8 minutes he should be used regardless
Quote from: MU82 on January 31, 2012, 10:05:40 AM
LOVED The Wire, and highly recommend it for anybody who hasn't seen it. However ...
Using what the characters would say as a guide to grammar is not quite as recommended.
Especially Snoop!!!
(http://26.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lqjvhbJ4KB1qiguseo1_500.jpg)
If memory serves, Roy Hibbert and Aaron Gray were 5-8 minute a game guys as underclassmen, and were pretty good as upperclassmen. Hoping for that type of progression from Durley,
Quote from: Aughnanure on January 31, 2012, 10:35:50 AM
What? Why? We complain constantly about a lack of big men depth, and then we would get some depth only to redshirt it? Especially considering the injury potential for bigger players. If he can play a solid 4-8 minutes he should be used regardless
I believe a redshirt year can be lifted/nullified at any point. I.E. - if someone were to get hurt, the player can start playing immediately (since they can practice and travel with the team) - and just ends up using that year of eligibility.
Quote from: rocky_warrior on January 31, 2012, 04:51:48 PM
I believe a redshirt year can be lifted/nullified at any point. I.E. - if someone were to get hurt, the player can start playing immediately (since they can practice and travel with the team) - and just ends up using that year of eligibility.
That works out well in theory, but you'd want a raw freshman to have played some minutes against the easy part of the schedule if you're going to have to rely on him due to a major injury (which obviously losing Otule or Gardner qualifies).