JUCO Expectations (plus bonus top 100 expectations)

[Henry Sugar]

Well worth reading.

http://basketball.realgm.com/article/227237/JUCO-Expectations

There are two important points to be made here

The first is the table that shows the breakdown of Top 100 recruits and their average first year performance. The big takeaway is that unless that player is top 30, they probably won't be any good (>100 ORtg; >20% usage) their first year. Expectations are too high for first year players.

The second point is the expected performance of top JUCO players. I've summarized the prediction of MU's incoming players in the below table.

[Jay Bee]

This is very useful information because of the additional years of data being used. Interesting how well the results follow the RSCI in some areas, especially when looking at 21-30, 31-40 and 41-50. The correlation up top isn't surprising, but interesting to see how far down the chart it goes.

All that said, the next step in projecting a team's performance is taking model-based projections and then making adjustments based on knowledge of the specific teams and players. That's the fun part (to me).

For MU, 2013-14 is going to be trickier to project than most years. Not only because of the newcomers, but the minutes, usage & %Shots of returners should differ quite a bit from what a typical 'progression' would indicate (i.e., PT for Chris & Davante?, how much higher can Jamil go in usage & %shots?, huge diff in usage b/w what Junior gave and what Derrick would.. what about Duane?, Todd Mayo mins?, etc).

[esotericmindguy]

Interesting, thanks for posting. Good example of expecting way to much of incoming freshman, I'm guilty of it as well. The one thing that hurts the RSCI credibility is Burton and Wilson's ranking. Burton, if I'm not mistaken, didn't even make first team all state and is ranked ahead of Wilson....who many believe was the best senior in Wisconsin. These rankings are based off limited views.

In addition, the numbers are tilted because most players ranked 30-100 go into power conferences, where teams are full of other highly ranked recruits...which limits opportunity.

[Henry Sugar]

Interesting, thanks for posting. Good example of expecting way to much of incoming freshman, I'm guilty of it as well. The one thing that hurts the RSCI credibility is Burton and Wilson's ranking. Burton, if I'm not mistaken, didn't even make first team all state and is ranked ahead of Wilson....who many believe was the best senior in Wisconsin. These rankings are based off limited views.

In addition, the numbers are tilted because most players ranked 30-100 go into power conferences, where teams are full of other highly ranked recruits...which limits opportunity.

Note: Final RSCI rankings are not available yet. These are still from September 2012.

[Slim]

Welcome back Henry!

Always great information.

[bilsu]

We all know how good a player Crowder became, but he also was not very good the first half of his junior year. Even at the start of his senior year fans here were not realizing how good he was. We need to be patient with Mckay and our incoming freshmen. Talented players still need time to adjust.

[Canned Goods n Ammo]

We should pin this to the top of the board so when people are mad about (insert frosh.), they can realize that Frosh. typically don't make a very big impact.

What UK does is a rarity. What Dom James did is a rarity.

[ATWizJr]

Note: Final RSCI rankings are not available yet. These are still from September 2012.

Good stuff!  Where you been?

[Henry Sugar]

Welcome back Henry!

Always great information.

Thanks Slim (and ATWizJr)... I've been around but was posting under a different name. Decided to change back

We should pin this to the top of the board so when people are mad about (insert frosh.), they can realize that Frosh. typically don't make a very big impact.

What UK does is a rarity. What Dom James did is a rarity.

Really, the post from Hanner has so much amazing information.

And what UK does is indeed a rarity, mostly that they continually are able to stock their team with multiple RSCI top 10 players.

[Silkk the Shaka]

Cool read and thanks for the summary.  So Steve Taylor (RSCI #82) at 112.4 and 18.9 pretty much blew it out of the water in terms of offensive production/efficiency but got below expected minutes? 

Some other interesting things I noted:

Like you mentioned, these are based off of summer ratings, and players like Jajuan have seen a jump in a couple rankings since then.  However, even when he moves up a notch or two, it really shouldn't increase efficiency expectations at all (98.8 vs. 99.5) but he might see more minutes.

Even if Duane Wilson matches these somewhat low expectations, he will still bring more efficiency to the table than Cadougan did at 98.8 vs. 96.1. (Not knocking Cadougan, I always pulled for him hard, just an observation)

I always had the highest expectations for McKay off the bat, but this just confirms it.


2014-15 Prediction time:

McKay matches or slightly exceeds expectations

Jajuan matches expectations (which would pretty much deliver Mayo's frosh season so people SHOULD be pleased)

Duane exceeds expectations (due to his long range shooting prowess which will enhance his efficiency #s and he will also see more minutes than expected here due to positional need)

Burton below expectations (will likely follow more of a Vander Blue path IMO as he learns to shoot/score at this level but will earn minutes due to toughness/physicality/defense)

Dawson matches expectations


Should be fun to see how these guys fare vs. frosh expectations as well as how their careers progress from there.  Blue's improvement trajectory should cause people to hold off on bashing the frosh, but I'm not holding my breath on that end.

[Henry Sugar]

Cool read and thanks for the summary.  So Steve Taylor (RSCI #82) at 112.4 and 18.9 pretty much blew it out of the water in terms of offensive production/efficiency but got below expected minutes?

Even if Duane Wilson matches these somewhat low expectations, he will still bring more efficiency to the table than Cadougan did at 98.8 vs. 96.1. (Not knocking Cadougan, I always pulled for him hard, just an observation)

For FST, I think his performance is related to the point that players are more efficient with limited minutes. Overall, it's not a bad model... get the efficient players limited minutes and then gradually expand their possessions YoY. Consider how that worked for Gardner or JFB.

As for DuWil, I think this is an excellent point and one I hadn't considered.

[Jay Bee]

I'd be most guarded with projections on Duane. Wide range of possibilities for him.

Once you start breaking down this information more and more, certain things become more clear.

This article from a couple of years ago looks at the stats/progression of several Big Ten PG's... it was written to settle down some of the expectations on Andre Hollins of the Gophers.

Having seen a fair amount of Duane in person, he's awesome. Very capable of a great career at MU. However, the turnover rate... the shooting in year 1? Lots of downside risk. Be patient with him.

Really like Burton on this team. If he can settle into a nice role early on he could help a lot.

[jesmu84]

whoa whoa whoa... Based on what some posters have argued, we shouldn't use RSCI because some recruiting sites have guys at 3 stars, while other have them at 4 stars. And that doesn't help their arguments. I'm confused...

[Lennys Tap]

whoa whoa whoa... Based on what some posters have argued, we shouldn't use RSCI because some recruiting sites have guys at 3 stars, while other have them at 4 stars. And that doesn't help their arguments. I'm confused...

Arguing that the #73 RSCI guy isn't by definition a consensus 4* is just arguing for the sake of arguing.

[Silkk the Shaka]

Arguing that the #73 RSCI guy isn't by definition a consensus 4* is just arguing for the sake of arguing.

It also completely ignores one definition of the word consensus: the judgment arrived at by most of those concerned.  Which is exactly what the RSCI is.  Arguing that consensus requires unanimity because that is one definition is the worst kind of lawyering, and it's also intellectually dishonest.  But anyway, I digress, this thread is not about that.