Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - ELIGIBILITY NIGHTMARE: Kansas Jayhawks FACE Uncertainty as Paul Mbiya's Future HANGS in Balance

Starting point is 00:00:00 Sounds like the NCAA is adding some scrutiny to some of the international recruits, and that could have an impact on KU basketball. What if KU finds Paul MBA ineligible? 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 up, Derek Johnson here with another episode of Locked on Jayhawks. We're getting to the latest at KU Baseball, getting to host of Regional. we'll get to KU football, adding a new commit in a three-star Nick Vakrumba, a offensive lineman.

Starting point is 00:00:40 We'll start right here. What happens if Paul and Bia just ends up not being eligible? Today's episode of show is brought to you by Fandual Sportsbook. You can get a first-time offer over at Fandual for any first-timers here. Just bet $5, turning into $1.15 bonus bets just for getting started with Fandual, the official sportsbook partner of the Lockdown Podcast Network. So this was sent out by Kevin Sweeney. who covers college basketball, really good work with Sports Illustrated.

Starting point is 00:01:08 New guidance issued by the NCAA to schools earlier this month opens the door for a crackdown on the title wave of international pros, hoping to head to college basketball. Players from top leads could face added scrutiny. That was the tweet coming out from CBB Central for Kevin Sweeney and Sports Illustrated. Now, going into the article, here are some of the important bits of it. It says the guidance distributed on May 8th, obtained recently by Sports Illustrated, lays out updated pre-enrollment eligibility requirements,

Starting point is 00:01:40 largely surrounding compensation and professional team involvement. How aggressively the requirements will be enforced is unclear, but they lay the groundwork for the NCAA to push back significantly on professional players in Europe and other top international leagues enrolling in college. And this isn't surprising to me because it is something where we've seen this flux of players coming in and a lot of times you're getting players who are 22, 23 years old, you're hearing coaches complain about it. So it made sense that this was going to be on the ledger, right?

Starting point is 00:02:09 But then it continues to get interesting here. In part, the guidelines state the prospective student athletes who, quote, entered an agreement with competed or received compensation from a team that participates in a league with minimum compensation that exceeds actual and necessary expenses, end quote, will not have their college eligibility reinstated. The document lists MLB, NBA, NFL, Premier League in WNBA as examples of such leagues, but other top basketball leagues globally could also qualify. So we don't have exact clarification yet, I don't think, but here's the part of that that I think

Starting point is 00:02:46 becomes the big problem. Again, quote, actual and necessary expenses continue to be a factor in a prospect's eligibility, but as part of that broader effort to update pre-enrollment rules, the NCAA also identified several international leagues in which participation by a prospect is likely to result in a violation of NCAA rules and a loss of eligibility, right? And that's what an NCAA spokesperson told to Sports Illustrated. That becomes the issue here, right? And it points out in this article, the Euroleague had a collective bargaining agreement with a minimum number of what, you know, first year players in the league did and yada, yada, yada. that it would almost exceed the NCAA's guideline pretty assuredly, right?

Starting point is 00:03:33 It also mentions this in the article. Even players from a smaller, less lucrative professional league might not be in the clear. For players who earn above actual and necessary expenses based on contracts required to be submitted to the NCAA, the guidance states that reinstatement will be evaluated on a case-to-case basis, considering how long the player was receiving a salary above their expenses. The quality of the league they played in and other factors, dozens, if not. hundreds of prospective men's basketball players alone could require such review. So that becomes interesting on its own right too because you get the standpoint.

Starting point is 00:04:05 When you get into the NCAA doing these case-by-case basis, it becomes a mess because you get somebody who gets eligible and somebody who doesn't get eligible and you end up comparing their cases and you're like, these are pretty much the same. Why is one guy eligible? Why one not? And it becomes a bit of a crapshoot. And that is unfortunate. The part about it being even players from smaller leagues becomes important for Polymia.

Starting point is 00:04:27 Because if you remember, Paul and Bia was kind of mostly playing at the junior level from where he was at playing overseas in France, right? So even if that is under scrutiny, that could be a problem for KU. Now, one thing that it doesn't mention here is if players who already started in college, for instance, Pauline Bia was with Kansas last season, is this going to be something where the current guys are grandfathered in in some way? Or is this going to be something where anybody who entered is going to be retroactively reviewed? in some way, you know, and could this lead to Paul Mbia being ineligible for Kansas? The part about it being case-to-case and the fact that there are so many of these players makes me think this is going to be a long, painstaking process that, you know, it's going to take

Starting point is 00:05:13 forever. And there also always is the risk for the NCAA when they do something like this of being sued. And again, going back to the idea that it's case by case, if somebody gets ineligible and somebody's eligible, I'd imagine they're going to, you know, file a suit and try to sue the NCAA and try to win that court case. And then if they win, it sets precedent that all these other people can use that precedent to try to win their court case as well. So there's a lot that kind of goes into this, but it does at least put, you know, I'm still expecting Paul Mbia to be playing for KU this upcoming season, but it does at least put a small question mark of what if this does lead

Starting point is 00:05:47 to a hurdle here for KU, right? And I'm even skeptical that this both passes and doesn't get sued out of the way from just the standpoint of again, like, I don't know, like it just feels like you're opening yourself up to lawsuits. And it just takes one person winning to be able to set that president, right? But what happens if the lawsuit against them takes some time where, you know, you're not able to play a kid till the lawsuit clears and all of a sudden you're in February and it hasn't happened yet, you know, then it gets complicated from that standpoint too, right? But it obviously puts more pressure on certain guys on the KU roster. Like Davian Adkins, If Paul and Bia were ineligible for KU at any point in the season or for the season because of this, and again, I'm not saying that would be the case. I don't even know if you'd qualify here, but it's at least worth posing the question.

Starting point is 00:06:35 Davian Adkins would skyrocket up in terms of his importance to be ready right away for KU. Because as of right now, you look at it, it's okay. Well, Paul Mbia and Christian Reeves should be able to handle pretty much all the five minutes for KU. Any of the other minutes of the five, probably going to go to like Kianu Daz when KU was playing a small ball five. But if Bia can't go, right, now all of a sudden somebody else has to step up at the center position and you're either playing way more small ball, which maybe that would be the solution, or Davy on Adkins is going to play a lot for KU at that standpoint. And I'd imagine some of that is dependent on how ready he is, right? If he's not ready, then maybe you're playing more small ball. If he is ready, then, you know, he's getting those minutes, right?

Starting point is 00:07:17 It also puts more pressure on Christian Reeves to get back from surgery, you know, because what happens if we get to, to the beginning of the season here. And, you know, KU will play a few cupcakes in the non-con. But we know they load up that non-con schedule. They're going to play some really good opponents along the way. What happens if you get to an early game in November against a ranked opponent? And Christian Reeves is still coming back from the surgery or is still not 100%. Paul M. B is ineligible.

Starting point is 00:07:42 And Davy on Adkins isn't ready. Like, what are you doing at the center position? So it does create some more questions for KU at Center just in case. And I think because of that to me, If I were KU, I'd be looking to add someone. I would be looking to add someone regardless, to be honest, but we know there's a bit of a money hurdle and a money issue for KU to clear, especially now as you're like trying to use money to keep Dan Fitzgerald

Starting point is 00:08:06 and to upgrade KU baseball deservedly so, you know? There's a lot that you need money for right now, the stadium chiefs among them, right? But like, if KU could find a way to add somebody else at the center position, it doesn't have to be a star, like, can you add a Euro big man, similar to how you added Paul and Bia last year? can you add this year's version of a Polymia that's maybe more of a developmental big that you take a risk on that at least gives you another body in there that maybe you're swing and miss or maybe you're swinging hit but at least get you another guy in there in the case of this happening then again are you wanting to go back to the international route with this looming rule or would at least knowing this looming rule allow you to know what channels to go down in the international route or maybe do you do you look for another developmental player just to get another body i don't know right are we going to have to see grant more dini on a basketball court for k u this year right but um um I will say this. I do think in general it would hurt more teams in the top 25 than it would hurt KU because for KU, this is pretty much just the one guy with Paul Mbia, right?

Starting point is 00:09:02 And there's no guarantee Paul Mbia is going to be a starter for KU. It could be Christian Reeves in the end anyway. There's some other teams like you look at St. John's, for instance, you look at Illinois that would be just completely devastated by their rosters if they were to lose some of these players like Duke even to a certain standpoint, right? the thing that stinks of this for KU is that like Paul M. Bia comes at the position that I think we have the most questions about for this KU basketball team. It comes at the thinnest position and the one that we have the most questions about your top level talent at, which is the center position for KU. Like theoretically, if you were to lose a guard, you'd be like, oh, we still have Cole Rosario and you still have, you know, Talen Kinney or Lee Roy Blight or, you know, whichever player you're kind of talking about there, right? you don't have that luxury at the five position. And so when we look at that, it becomes a lot more complicated to be like,

Starting point is 00:09:52 if KU were to lose this player, it becomes more valuable just from the standpoint of like, KU doesn't have a luxury of five options here. So we'll be keeping an eye on that. Ideally, nothing comes from it or MBA is just fine anyway, but it definitely will be something to keep on the radar now and is a little bit worrisome in the back of our minds. All right, let's get on to KU football, adding a new commit in a three-star offensive lineman. This episode is brought to you by FanDuel Sportsbook,

Starting point is 00:10:20 and did you know you can get in not just on the NHL and NBA playoffs going on right now, but you can get in on the college baseball action coming up this weekend. You can bet a future on one of the teams to win it all, or you can bet on some of the individual games. We're going to be getting to World Cup season coming up here soon. You can get in on the action of FanDuel there.

Starting point is 00:10:39 Plus new customers bet $5. You get $150 in bonus bets for signing up. So go check out fandual.com. You can register and join today, the official sportswork partner of the Locked-on podcast network. That is fandul.com. KU football has their seventh commit of the class of 2027, and we're going to break it down here in a second.

Starting point is 00:11:05 Did you know you can join the Everydayer Club at Locktonjahawks.com to get the ad-free version of LOJ? All right. So Nick Vakrumba is the latest KU football commit. They continue to really just add on. here. I think it's five now since May 3rd for KU and seven total in the class. Vakrumba is a 6'4, 285 pound offensive lineman from Brownsburg, Indiana out of Brownsburg High School. He is unrated over at 24-7 sports and ESPN. Again, ESPN is just whatever.

Starting point is 00:11:37 They kind of lag behind regardless, but like 24-7, they'll have a rating at some point. They just kind of are consistently adding guys and looking at the film and stuff. And when somebody commits, it gets added to the queue. When you look at On 3, they have them as an 86 rated three star through on three arrivals. I guess it's the same thing, whatever it matters, who is top 100 at his position. But I'll say this, like it, you know, not a ton out there in terms of the rankings, but over 20 FBS offers here, you're talking K-Stay, Louisville, Wake Forest, South Florida, and more. So just based on the offers, you're probably looking at a decent three-star rating here.

Starting point is 00:12:12 Over at Brownsburg High School, he played both left tackle and center position. And that seems to be as I continue to look at, you know, some of the past recruits that KU has bought in at the high school level for offensive line. They're constantly looking for guys who can play multiple positions and be versatile because you don't always know how a player is going to, you know, gain weight or fit in at the next level. Like, and so having versatility can make it so that they can figure out where you're best to play if they know you can play multiple positions. Plus, it's super helpful from a standpoint of building out of depth chart, right? If you have somebody who can play left guard and left tackle, if you have somebody you can play center and right guard, you can fill multiple positions on a two deep with that player, right?

Starting point is 00:12:55 But watching him on film, he is a mobile offensive lineman. I would say he has quick feet. He's somebody who can really block on the move. And that becomes, you know, another common trait of what Kansas, I think,

Starting point is 00:13:05 just in general, looks for from the offensive line position, right, whether you're talking about moving linemen for pulling them, or if you're talking about, you know, you're running a wide zone, play or a speed option to the outside.

Starting point is 00:13:17 Those linemen have to move and get to the outside. If you're running a screenplay, those linemen have to be able to move and get out in open field and find somebody to lay a hat on. And that has been a consistent what KU has looked for at the high school level in recruiting. And I think this one kind of follows that same line. There's sometimes where he can get a bit high at times and was able to just finish guys off because you could tell he was just stronger or maybe bigger than them at the

Starting point is 00:13:42 high school level. So he'll have to, you know, find a way to. get a little bit better leverage when he's playing against stronger guys at the big 12 level. I would say there's more run blocking highlights as well. It doesn't mean there's not stuff there from a past blocking perspective, but that's just always a question of how somebody jumps up from high school to the college game where you're going from a lot of times at the high school level, not always, but a lot of times the college game, you know, the running game becomes even bigger than it does at the collegiate game necessarily,

Starting point is 00:14:09 right? But he has, it seems to have like a really good bit of ferocity, I would say, to kind of win some of his blocks and really like will his way through not just like winning the block but being like I'm going to knock you onto the turf I am going to pancake you it seems like a really good demeanor when he is trying to finish somebody with his block right so he becomes the seventh commit overall as I said earlier in the class of 2027 for KU I don't know how big of a class this is going to be for Kansas it'll be kind of interesting they've had you know back-to-back big senior classes they've lost.

Starting point is 00:14:46 Is it going to make more sense for, because you look at this KU team and there are a ton of juniors on the roster. Obviously, we're still waiting for the five and five, how that's going to kind of affect things. But theoretically, between the five and five, between having a bunch of juniors on your roster, there's a chance KU could have a lot of returning players coming into 2027, ideally, you know, as long as you can have good player retention and everything, which they typically have.

Starting point is 00:15:10 So that would lead me to believe it'll probably. be a smaller class of high school kids in terms of, you know, maybe it's, I don't know, 10, 12, 14 kids as opposed to one of those years where it's like 18 or 20, probably on the smaller end when you're looking at that. But he comes to the second offense alignment in the class. Does that mean you're going to, you know, if you're bringing in a smaller class, two offensive linemen, if you're bringing in, you know, 12, 13 kids is probably where you're looking at there at being done. But the other offensive lineman in the class is Derek Gonzalez, who is an 87 rated three star by 24-7 sports.

Starting point is 00:15:45 Interesting, too, that when you look at the two high school commits now you have on the offensive line, I think Gonzalez probably profiles more toward being a tackle. And even though Vakrumba plays tackle for his team along with center, I think the six-four frame, the fact that he does have some reps at center, maybe you're looking toward him more being like an interior offensive line. In fact, one of the ranking sites has enlisted as an interior offensive line. And Tori Gonzalez would be the tackle. Vakrumbo would be one of the interior.

Starting point is 00:16:12 your offense alignment. Maybe he becomes a future center for you there. We've seen KU do well with, you know, Bryce Foster was a 6-5 center for Kruba at 6-4. Those are taller ends for centers, but KU's had success with it. But I think just in general, you know, this is a position KU has to start hitting on better and developing better. You look at a lot of KU's offensive alignment. And like the thing is KU has developed offensive linemen. It's just they've been guys that they've brought in via the transfer portal. Like Dominic Poonie, you know, I don't know, that's partial development. That's also partial him just being a diamond in the rough, but it's great find to get him. And Dominic Poonie, you know, his awesome time at KU, he's been good in the pros so far too, right?

Starting point is 00:16:53 Logan Brown and Bryce Cable do were both guys that, you know, Brown comes over via the transfer portal. Price Cabledu was somebody that the staff inherited was already on the roster. They did a good job developing both players and they went off and they're on NFL rosters, you know. Bryce Foster, like really good offense alignment. We transferred in. Mike Novitzky, like transferred. So you go. Mike Ford transferred in. So like you go down the list and and I guess they get credit because they did bring those guys in at Buffalo too and developed them from the start. But no Hank Fuchs anymore or Scott Fuchs anymore, the offense aligned coach for KU.

Starting point is 00:17:26 But like point being they've had a lot of offense alignment they brought in via the high school ranks that we thought were going to eventually impact the too deep. And it just never happened and they transferred away. And it feels like the attrition they've had at disposition specifically via the high school ranks to eventually the portal has been more than any other position just anecdotally. I don't know if that's true or not. It just kind of feels that way. Doesn't mean that you can't start hitting on some guys. I just hope that this is the class that changes things around. It does look like on paper you got two good ones with Gonzalez and Vercrumba,

Starting point is 00:17:56 but that is the challenge moving forward for KU football. Can you start developing more of the guys you're bringing in from the high school level on the offensive line? And this would be a good place to start. All right. That'll do it for a little talk on Vercrumba there. Let's continue on with KU Baseball, who's going to be hosting a.

Starting point is 00:18:12 regional this weekend. They're the 15 seed, a little screwed over by the NCAA tournament committee. We'll get to all that and more. What's going and welcome back into the show here on Locked on Jayhawks and KU Baseball is going to be hosting an NCAA tournament regional. They'll be the 15 seed and a little lower than I would have expected. You look at some of the quad one victories, quad two victories, quad one plus quad two, win percentage in quad one plus quad two. KU winds up basically top eight in all of those among the 16 teams that are hosting. So you would think that would have put them in a position to be higher than the 15, you know, even if it's not hosting a super regional, at least being that 11, 12, 13 range,

Starting point is 00:18:53 they beat Nebraska twice in both of the regular season meetings. Nebraska gets the number 13. Obviously, you win the Big 12 regular season over West Virginia. Then you beat them to win the Big 12 championship. You would have thought that, you know, getting a win and having that edge over another team who's hosting would help KU's resume as well. but yeah apparently not the big 12 was just kind of tossed to the side in this and you also end up with a very difficult regional here so if you want more on the ku baseball stuff we did a specific bonus episode for it check it out right here with locked on jhawks but as part of it they're going to be expanding the stadium so they have the basically it's it's i don't know i i always think of there's a bunch of college stadiums that they kind of do this um i forget if it's uh i don't know like Louisville does it. I think Georgia Tech maybe, but there's certain schools that have like in the outfield.

Starting point is 00:19:46 You just have like the fence in the outfield, but it's kind of like a standing room only. It sounds like it's going to be like you bring your own chair or sitting room only, I guess for KU, where you can see through the left field fence, which will add capacity and be kind of a cool way to get more people there for Kansas. Then they're going to be adding some standing room only seating to the bullpen area of the opponent, which is going to be their bullpen's going to be moving. So KU's going to put those tickets up for sale on Wednesday. It's going to be important for KU fans to go after it because Arkansas fans are going to be looking to travel and make their imprint. Missouri State's not super far away either. So like there's going to be some competition there. And obviously as well, there was the post from, I don't know if you want to say the post or whatever.

Starting point is 00:20:29 Like basically the Anderson family who continues to just give so much to KU athletics in general, gave 100K to match. I guess it'd be up to 100K to match other donations. So if they can get other donations to 100K, it would be 200K with the donation from the Andersons, which would help go a long way for KU Baseball. And they're trying to build an indoor practice facility. Like all these things are very important to keep Dan Fitzgerald at Kansas. And if you're enjoying this KU baseball season, like I certainly am,

Starting point is 00:21:01 then that needs to continue on and making sure you keep Dan Fitzgerald, who I said this earlier for my money, Fitzgerald right now is the best coach at the University of Kansas. Now, if you're talking historic or most accomplished coach, no, that's Bill Self, right? But if you're just talking at right now, like, you know, it's like the difference of if you were saying, well, okay, when Michael Jordan was in the league when he was 40 years old, playing for the Wizards, he was the most accomplished player in the league at that point, but that version of Michael Jordan was not the best player in the league at that point. Does that kind of make sense? So that's what I'm saying with Dan Fitzschild.

Starting point is 00:21:35 If you're talking like historically what you've done, not the case, but if you're just talking about like if I'm having a draft right now to coach a team for 2026 or 2027 or start a program right now, Dan Fitzgerald would be my number one pick at the University of Kansas. So I hope he gets the supporting needs in six round of Kansas for a long, long time. All right, a trivia question of the day. Yesterday's question was in KU's 2002 Sweet 16 victory over Illinois, what All-American for Kansas tied for the team lead with 15 points

Starting point is 00:22:05 and had a team best 13 rebounds to boot. The answer is Drew Gooden. Of course, that was the KU win over Bill Self's Illinois team. So Drew Gooden, the answer there. All right, here is today's question that we'll give you the answer to tomorrow. In the 2007 NCAA tournament, Mario Chalmers had what wound up being his career high for assists in a KU uniform. He had eight of them against what team. So again, in the 2007 NCAA tournament, Mario Chalmers had what wound up being his career high for assists of eight against

Starting point is 00:22:35 what team. And don't forget you enjoying our trivia event with half the proceeds going to the Rock Truck Roundball Classic. Other proceeds go into the prize pot. We're also going to be given away some stuff from the Rock Truck Roundball Classic and we'll be given away some stuff from Johnny's. You can sign up for that with a team of up to six people. Just go to Jayhawk trivia at gmail.com.

Starting point is 00:22:53 That's jhawk trivia at gmail.com. I've got it for this episode of Locked on Jayhawks. Don't forget check out our KU baseball episode recapping everything that happened there with the selection show. And you can catch us next. time. We're going to have some guest interviews later this week to get us caught up a little more with KU baseball and some more KU basketball all here on Lockdown Jayhawks.

Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - ELIGIBILITY NIGHTMARE: Kansas Jayhawks FACE Uncertainty as Paul Mbiya's Future HANGS in Balance

There aren't comments yet for this episode. Click on any sentence in the transcript to leave a comment.