Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - Best/Worst Lineups for Kansas: More Diggy Coit! Plus Emmanuel Henderson as WR1 & 10-1 KU Baseball!

Starting point is 00:00:00 On today's Locked On Jayhawks, what are the best and worst lineups for KU Basketball? Have they mismanaged things to this point? Does it give you hope for the postseason? And Emmanuel Henderson, the transfer from Alabama, is he about to be the first KU receiver with over 1,000 yards in a season in a very long time? Plus, how about the KU baseball team? You are Locked On Jayhawks, your daily podcast on the Kansas Jayhawks, part of the locked on podcast network, your team every day. What's going on Derek Johnson here.

Starting point is 00:00:35 This is locked on Jayhawks. Thanks for making it your first listen every day. Thank you to every dayers catching each and every episode, no matter where you get it, whether it's on YouTube, whether it's anywhere you get your podcasts and thank you to you for listening if you are making this first time listen thank you as well on today's edition of the show we're gonna go over the best and worst lineups to this point of the season for KU basketball maybe some intriguing stuff what it could tell us about the team and then we're also going to get into a little KU football talk because

Starting point is 00:01:01 there's been some press conferences and some interesting words were said about Emmanuel Henderson and Cam Pickett to a lesser extent about some possible breakouts for KU at the receiver position. Plus KU baseball is off to an unbelievable start so far this season and awesome crowd support. First, this episode of the show though is brought to you by the 2025 all new Nissan Armada.

Starting point is 00:01:22 Stay with us for the Armada team of the week. Later on in the episode. So we're going to start with the best and worst lineups for Kansas basketball and. It's very interesting because KU has played a ton of lineups this season, and that is something where it's like you can tell Bill Self is still tankering and.

Starting point is 00:01:43 Has been tinkering all season long and that has continued even to this point in time to where, you know, normally by this point in the season, he is narrowing down the rotation. I think that's part of the problem too for Kansas that he hasn't been able to narrow the rotation. And I think there are reasons for that. One, some of the guys he hoped would get to that point where they would deserve to have it narrowed down haven't emerged. then you've had other guys who have you know kind of ebbed and flowed at different points of the season and it's just been very difficult so i wanted to search by this for the qualified lineups. I'm can use played thirty games at this point in the season so i wanted to limit it to thirty minutes played for the lineup which. wanted to limit it to 30 minutes played for the lineup, which that's not even like that many minutes. That's a minute per game on average, right? But that at least gives us a decent

Starting point is 00:02:28 sample size for some lineups. There are only 10 lineups this season that Kansas played 30 or more minutes per game. I should have gone back and looked at past years and seen is that unusual, you know, because you would think to a certain standpoint, like, there would be these like five or six lineups that you just play like way more than the others. And so far this season, Kansas has basically, I don't know, it's been so much mismatching and oh, put a guy in here, tinker with that here. They do have one lineup that's played 199 minutes, another that's played 99,

Starting point is 00:03:01 but the rest of them are kind of in between that 30 to 60 range where they haven't really settled in on it. And again, it's kind of that chicken-a situation where it's like, well, they've done enough on the court to earn playing with that lineup more, but also is Bill self-trusted enough, right? It's kind of a difficult back and forth thing. So I wanted to go with the 30 minutes play that gives us 10 possible lineups so we can look at the best and the worst. And if we sort that by net rating, I guess we'll start with the best. We'll start with some positive here. The best lineup that KU has played this season is a lineup they've played for 60 minutes. It is the Shaquille Moore, DeJuan Harris, Zeke Mayo, KJ Adams, Hunter Dickinson lineup. And that lineup has a plus 43.8 net rating, which is in the 94th percentile for

Starting point is 00:03:42 five-man lineups so far this season. The D rating is in the 99th percentile for five man lineups so far this season. The D rating is in the 99th percentile. So that's where they've really excelled. The O rating is only in the 34th percentile. So basically the Shaquille Moore, DeWan Harris, Zeke Mayow, KJ Adams, Hunter Dickinson lineup has been a really good lineup for KU just because it's been elite defensively. Now where you run into a bit of an issue with that being the top lineup is that is including the game that you blew out UCF on the road.

Starting point is 00:04:07 And it does matter, but at this point in time, like that has kind of been more of the aberration of how the season is going to go. And so the plus minus for that lineup for KU is plus 43 this season. How much of that was in the UCF game? Which that was your starting lineup in that game, right? I don't know, was that responsible for like plus 20 of that was responsible for plus 30. So realistically, I don't know that that actually is KU's best lineup. So let's go look at the second best lineup this season.

Starting point is 00:04:34 This one has a plus 42.5 net rating also in the 94th percentile. And that would be Dewan Harris, Diggy Coyt, Zeke Mayo, KJ Adams and Hunter Dickinson. Now that one I find very interesting because you're coming off a big game with Diggy Coyote against Houston and to a certain standpoint, I kind of wonder if he would work into the starting lineup and you wonder with Ryland Griffin struggling, does that make sense for KU to go back to that? Now that lineup was something they started earlier in the season though too when they

Starting point is 00:05:00 were blowing out bad opponents. How much of those numbers are kind of enthused by that. But what's interesting about that lineup is it ranks in the 77th percentile for O-rating, 94th on the defensive side. So maybe that is a lineup that KU needs to go to more. It's only played 42 minutes so far this season. Again, a little skeptical about the early season numbers there, but after watching the Houston game, I would like to see that lineup maybe a little bit more for KU, you know,

Starting point is 00:05:24 moving forward at least in some upcoming games. Third best lineup. We'll go a little bit more for KU, you know, moving forward at least in some upcoming games. Third best lineup, we'll go a little quicker with the further ones. Plus 33.1 net rating in 39 minutes. That is Dewan Harris, Zeke Mayo, Ryland Griffin, Flory Bedunga, and Hunter Dickinson. And I think a lot of the two big lineups with Flory and Hunter have done pretty well. They actually have better O ratings than they do D rating. The next best is D quite

Starting point is 00:05:45 Dewan Harris AJ Store KJ Adams Hunter Dickinson. And then if we want to flip sides here and go to the bottom of the list would have been the worst line of 4K you that have played 30 or more minutes. The worst has been. Dewan Harris Zeke Mail, Rylan Griffin, KJ Adams and Flory Budunga, which to me makes sense.

Starting point is 00:06:04 The Florian and Hunter pairing works because you have the Zeke Mayo, Ryland Griffin, KJ Adams, and Flory Budunga, which to me makes sense. The Flory and Hunter pairing works because you have this super skilled offensive guy in Hunter. You have this raw defensive prospect in Flory. Hunter's an elite defensive rebounder. Flory's an elite offensive rebounder, right? So you pair that together and that's why I think it works. KJ isn't a great rebounder, though he has had some games recently where he's rebounded

Starting point is 00:06:22 ball out. Flory is not a good defensive rebounder, even though he's a good offensive rebounder, though he has had some games recently where he's rebounded ball out. Flory is not a good defensive rebounder, even though he's a good offensive rebounder. And so that pairing causes problems. And also you have two bigs who can't shoot, at least Hunter, even though he's not shot three well at all, can shoot mid range right now to where that pairing works a little bit better. So it does make a little sense to me. That one's there. This next one I find also interesting is the second worst. By the way, that first lineup I mentioned

Starting point is 00:06:45 as being the worst, minus 43 net rating in 44 minutes. This one was played 31 minutes, the second worst, minus 12 net rating. It is DeWan Harris, Zeke Mayo, Rylan Griffin, AJ Storr at the four and then Hunter Dickinson at the five. It's just a lineup that, you know, before the season started, you might've thought that would've been a starting lineup possibility, right?

Starting point is 00:07:04 Would they bring KJ off the bench and that lineup has just been bad for KU. You just don't really have a true foreman in there who is able to provide certain things that you kind of need there. The next lowest on the list is Diggy Coyt, DeJuan Harris, Ryland Griffin, KJ Adams and Hunter Dickinson. And so I think what this kind of leads me to seeing is the popular names that I'm kind of seen at the top of the list. I mean, she killed more is randomly on like one of these. But Diggie Coy is in a good amount of the top half ones.

Starting point is 00:07:40 KJ Adams is in a good amount of the top half ones. Now, maybe some of these lineups are a little skewed because as we talked about, you have some of those non-con games in there that involve beating up, you know, teams that you're paying for buy games and that UCF game. So plus KU is, it just feels like they're a different team

Starting point is 00:07:57 now than they were in November. So I'm going to change this up. Here's the lineups for KU over the last 11 games. You might be wondering why 11? Why not 10? Last 11 games is correlates when KJ Adams returned. January 28th versus UCF. So that's the current version of Kansas more realistically. And Kansas played an astounding 41 lineups

Starting point is 00:08:16 over the last 11 games. They played 23 lineups for five or more minutes. That goes back to the idea, they're still tinkering and unable to kind of narrow down the rotation. But anyway, if we just take the seven lineups over the last 11 games since January 28th for Kansas that have played 12 or more minutes total, here's what you wind up with. The best lineup for KU with a net rating of plus 71 in 12 minutes, a small sample size, that's 99% although, is Diggy Coy, DeJuan Harris, AJ Storr, Floyd Badunga, a small sample size. That's 99% although is Diggie Coy,

Starting point is 00:08:45 Juan Harris, AJ Storr, Floyd Badunga and Hunter Dickinson. And I'm trying to think when that lineup was out there that led to that being the case, was that like the TCU game on the road where that would have been before KJ returned. So I don't know where that's coming from necessarily because clearly I don't think AJ Stor should be in the rotation at this point in time. So let's go to the second best one. This one has 26 minutes, more than double.

Starting point is 00:09:12 So it's a little better of a sample size. Teggy Coy, again, Dewan Harris, Zeke Mayo, KJ Adams, and Hunter Dickinson. So again, going back to the idea that like, should that just be the starting lineup that ranks in the 98th percentile in that rating in 26 minutes over these last 11 games. And the reason why it is in the 95th percentile and O rating in the, let's see on D rating also in the 93rd percentile. So my conclusion here is kind of like Diggy Quaid should be playing more and Diggy Quaid should probably be in the starting lineup right now with Rylan Griffin struggling. Go go with diggy dewan and zeke now i guess if you wanted to

Starting point is 00:09:48 say you want rylan back next year your best avenue to that happening is starting rylan griffin that i can understand that but the primary lineup should still be diggy dewan and zeke mayo the third best lineup dewan harris zeke mayo rylan griffin kj adams hunter dickinson that has in 119 minutes that's their most played lineup a plus 11. point seven net rating, but that's sixty third percentile, right? There's a drop off there because that's basically just above average nationally. It's in the sixty fifth percentile on rating. It is in the fifty ninth percentile on D rating.

Starting point is 00:10:17 You look at the worst lineup for KU over these last eleven games among the ones qualified here. Twenty five minutes played. It is Dwan Harris, Zeke Mayo, Ryland Griffin, KJ Adams, Flory Bedunga. So the big takeaway for me here is this. Stop playing Flory next to KJ Adams. That does not work. Play Flory next to Hunter, right? Play KJ next to Hunter. You can't play KJ next to Flory anymore. It does not work. And play Diggy quite more. Those are

Starting point is 00:10:45 my two takeaways here. Does it fix Kansas? Does it make them this great team? No. It could matter a little bit. And for a Kansas team where, you know, they're not in that zone where they're one of the best teams in the country, where it's like, you know, it's like Bobby wit. If you said, oh, Bobby wits going to have a two week stretch where he's not going to get hit. Oh no. Instead of hitting 300 that year, he hit 290. You know, like he has he has room to give from greatness to what he can do. Can's basketball isn't in that zone. They're in a zone where every fine margin matters. And so if that's the difference between one extra win

Starting point is 00:11:16 in the Big 12 tournament or against Arizona on Saturday or, you know, winning the first round NCAA tournament game, you got to take that risk. So those are my big takeaways from the best and worst lineups for KU. All right, KU football talk. Emmanuel Henderson, stud, wide receiver one, question mark. This episode of Locked on Jayhawks is brought to you by the Nissan 2025 New Armada. And the Armada team of the week

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Starting point is 00:12:37 just like you can in the all new Nissan Armada or any of the Nissan's outstanding vehicles. Take the Nissan Armada, Rogue, or Pathfinder, and go find your next big adventure shop, NissanUSA.com. Continuing on on the show, a little KU football talk during spring ball, a little KU football update. And Matt Gilderslieff, who is the strength and conditioning coach for KU, outstanding at his job. He was meeting with the media, I think it was over the weekend or something like that. And he mentioned a couple guys, Cam Pickett and Emanuel Henderson as basically roundabout

Starting point is 00:13:12 way in the quotes said those guys have hit the ground running, which is good news, Kansas needs some of those new receivers to hit the ground running. And I do believe Bryson Canty, the transfer from Columbia, I don't think he'll be joining until summer. So you know, that could be somebody else. But maybe if you're projecting who the star and receivers are going to be, maybe you view it as that maybe you say can pick it will be the slot guy, right? Unless Doug

Starting point is 00:13:32 Emelian is the incumbent can beat him out. And then you'll have Emmanuel Henderson on the outside. And then maybe it'll be Bryson Canty on the other side. Maybe it is a Keaton Quebec. Maybe one of these other transfers like a Levi Wentz or something does feel more comfortable as the camp goes on. But it really stood out to me. And that is good news about Pickett and Henderson. And I do think Pickett, it's really good news if he ends up hitting the ground running because

Starting point is 00:13:55 he has multiple years left, right? Unlike some of these other receivers who have one year left as a senior. But he really raved about Emanuel Henderson. And this was a direct quote from Matt Gilder's sleeve. Emmanuel is going to be very, very special. And so, it makes sense a little bit, right? I mean, you're not to a point where, especially during this point of training,

Starting point is 00:14:15 like it is more of, I guess, the weights and the stuff without the pads on and all that stuff. And like the dude who was at Alabama, who was a former, like basically five star running back, like of course he's gonna look great in workouts. You know what I mean? So that can maybe cloud the judgment a little bit, but I don't know, Matt Gilder's sleeve is a very sharp dude.

Starting point is 00:14:33 And if he's saying it, I'm listening to it. And so the fact that he's saying that, I think is great news for KU because I look at Henderson and I see somebody who I'm like, Kansas hasn't had a thousand year old receiver since Desmond, Briscoe and Carey Meyer. And maybe it'll be too balanced. Maybe they'll have too much with the running backs

Starting point is 00:14:47 and the tight ends that it would be too difficult to do to a receiver. But I'm kind of like, maybe this is the guy that can do that. Maybe this is the guy that can, you know, surpass Steven Sims as being the closest guy to doing it. And he can kind of get over that hump. And at the very least, you know, maybe the thousand yard thing isn't that important, right?

Starting point is 00:15:05 Because if you have 920 yards and 12 touchdowns and other teams really have the game plan for you as one of the best receivers in the Big 12, does it matter that you didn't have a thousand? No, probably not. But the impact there is going to be so important. And I think he provides a level of ceiling that we haven't seen. KU's had a lot of good receivers and high quality receivers even over the years, even when they were not good.

Starting point is 00:15:25 I mentioned Stephen Sims and Laquiviente Gonzalez and Nick Harwell and Nigel King, right? They've had solid receivers. I don't think you've had somebody with the ceiling of Emanuel Henderson, maybe with the exception of like, Dalen Charlotte, but that was a whole thing to itself with kind of the mismanagement

Starting point is 00:15:39 from David Beatty and everything. So you look at Emanuel Henderson and the fact that that is being backed up is important too because it's a position where there are a lot of questions after you lose all that certainty and capability you had from LJ Arnold and Luke Grimm and Quinn Skinner, you need guys to step up. And so hearing those rave reviews about a kid who has as big of a ceiling as anybody, sky's the limit for Henderson and what that can mean for Jalen Daniels throwing to him in the offense. The other notes that I did want to mention KU football Demarius McGee, him and Tristan Fletcher

Starting point is 00:16:10 sounds like they are no longer working with the team. Sounds like they had some long-term injury stuff. They're still going to graduate from KU so I don't think this is like a you know oh they got booted no it's nothing like that like it's just kind of medical retirement type situation. It does become interesting now Fletcher thought of as being probably on the too deep at linebacker, but I don't know how much he was going to really, you know, play on the defensive end, probably special teams guy with McGee. It definitely is somebody who you were expecting me before last season started. I was expecting Marius McGee to be one of the starting corners come into this season.

Starting point is 00:16:41 Now, based on how the season went, I figured, OK, maybe he's more of the slot corner this year, but that's still getting a big role on this season. Now, based on how the season went, I figured, OK, maybe he's more of the slot corner this year. But that's still getting a big role on this team. The fact that he becomes no longer part of the roster opens things up for more of the young guys, right? And I think you look at DJ Graham as being this experienced corner he brought in from Utah State before that Oklahoma. He probably comes one of the starters.

Starting point is 00:17:01 I like what we saw from Jalen Todd. He probably comes the other starter. But that means there's a lot of snaps available for the third corner, and there's even some snaps available for the fourth corner. So you're looking at like Jamil Croft and Jacoby Davis who came in in the same class and were talented

Starting point is 00:17:16 guys who we heard a bit about when they first came on, but you know, we haven't seen that breakout yet. Like just one of them breakout now. What about Julia Hurley, former highly recruited guys well from Alabama? Just like Henderson, you know, what about the guys? What about Jaleel Hurley, former highly recruited guy as well from Alabama, just like Henderson? You know, what about the guys who read? Jordan Austin Alexander and Andre Gibson, right?

Starting point is 00:17:29 It's going to be very interesting to see where that pecking order comes out because a lot of snaps to be had without Demarius McGee. All right, we're going to finish up here on this episode of the show. Little KU baseball update. They're 10 and 1. How good have the Jayhawks been on the diamond? First, this episode of Locked on Jayhawks is brought to you by Supply House. Get the supplies you need from the site made for the skilled traders Supply House.

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Starting point is 00:19:08 they're getting absolutely phenomenal crowd support. And it's not just the crowd support where people are showing up like it's the students and they are making noise. They're turning it into a party. It's awesome. There's no reason why this this you know wasn't doable from the past, right? I mean baseball is a great time, especially for college students. You get out in the warm weather. I know it hasn't, especially for college students. You get out in the warm weather.

Starting point is 00:19:26 I know it hasn't been warm right now, but you get out in the warm weather, you have some hot dogs, and now that you're selling booze on campus, like the students who are 21 and stuff, I'm sure those are the only ones drinking, of course, and they can just have a good time with it. And like, you see some of these SEC schools who like,

Starting point is 00:19:43 the fans really show out for the baseball games. I think that's so cool. And I really like what we see. And I hope that it leads to a combined with the success and everything Dan Fitzgerald has done, who's been a great job and another great hire by Travis Goff. I hope this leads to the support and the donations they need to upgrade those facilities and upgrade the KU baseball stadium and stuff because you know you look at the rest of the big 12. It is a arms race from facilities and stuff and KU you know it's a nice field for what it is, but it can certainly use that big upgrade and that would only

Starting point is 00:20:16 help even more keep this momentum going. But anyway, that's kind of a big picture thing right now. Kansas is 10 and 1 and even though it's not you know big 12 play even though it's not coming against a bunch of top 10 teams or top 25 teams country, it does dearly matter. So you look at last season, Kansas last season with 31 and 23, they were 15 and 15 and big 12 play both solid marks. They made a good run in the big 12 tournament, right? They put pressure on making the NCAA tournament but fell a little bit short in the end because their RPI was a little bit lower.

Starting point is 00:20:47 And part of the reason their RPI was lower, one, maybe they didn't schedule as, this year maybe they factored it in a little bit more, I don't know, but it also had to do with the slower start to the schedule last season. Kansas was three and four through seven games last season. And you know, had they have gone in those five and two, right, to those two wins, if they're 33 and 21 at the end of the year with maybe a little bit better RPI, does that get them in? What if they go

Starting point is 00:21:14 six and one in the first seven games? Now they're 34 and 20 at the end of the year, right? Does that swing them being a tournament team? It very well might, right? And so now you're in that position where you have done that. You've gone 10 and one. And they're mashing right now 22 home runs so far as a team. I mean, 527 slugging percentage as a team. Bobby Witt Jr., who I guess is just getting all sorts of mentions on today's episode, has a career slugging percentage of 505. So Kansas as a team has a better team slugging percentage than Bobby Witt does for his entire career. And the crazy part is Dominic vaguely, who's like this really good pitcher was like one of the best freshmen in the country last year as a pitcher. He is an ERA over seven and like that's not going to last. He is one of the best pitchers in the country. So you're

Starting point is 00:21:55 sitting in a position where you've had this great start and you're like go to like ace pitcher. You're sitting there going, oh yeah, he's going to get better too as the season goes on. So cool to see. And like I said, hopefully the support leads to extra success both on the field and I guess building a new field and yeah, love what Dan Fitzgerald has done and again, another good hire by Travis Goff, which if we are relating this back to basketball, like I continue to look at the hires he's made and it only gives me more confidence that when Bill, Bill South, whenever he does call today, whenever he does retire, like I think you trust Travis goth to make that higher

Starting point is 00:22:26 at a very real level. All right. That'll do it for this episode of Lockdown. I'll talk to you on another edition of L.O.J. coming at you on Thursday. Talk a little more KU basketball, KU Arizona preview coming at you on Friday's episode of the show. See you next time with Lockdown Jayhawks.

Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - Best/Worst Lineups for Kansas: More Diggy Coit! Plus Emmanuel Henderson as WR1 & 10-1 KU Baseball!

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