Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - Hunter Dickinson Turns the Kansas Jayhawks Into a Top Tier National Title Contender
Episode Date: May 5, 2023The Kansas Jayhawks basketball team landed Hunter Dickinson out of the transfer portal from Michigan. How he impacts the starting lineup, the center position, the rest of KU, and the Jayhawks' Nationa...l Championship hopes. Dickinson's scouting report such as his post up ability and more, plus what this commitment overall means for Bill Self and Kansas.Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!Built BarBuilt Bar is a protein bar that tastes like a candy bar. Go to builtbar.com and use promo code “LOCKEDON15,” and you’ll get 15% off your next order.FanDuelMake Every Moment More. Don’t miss the chance to get your No Sweat First Bet up to ONE THOUSAND DOLLARS in Bonus Bets when you go FanDuel.com/LOCKEDON.FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Transcript
Discussion (0)
On today's Locked on Jayhawks, Hunter Dickinson is a Kansas Jayhawk.
Let's go further into that discussion about him picking KU, his scouting report,
how he fits in, how it changes this team into being one of the top tier
national title contenders, all that and more on today's Locked on Jayhawks.
You are Locked on Jayhawks, your daily podcast on the Kansas Jayhawks,
part of the Locked On Podcast Network,
your team every day.
I'm Derek Johnson.
You can hear me as well.
Monday through Friday, 3 to 6 p.m. on KLWN in Lawrence with Rock Chalk Sports Talk.
Thanks for making Locked on Jayhawks your first listen every day.
We are free and available wherever you get any of your podcasts.
And on today's edition of Locked on Jayhawks,
we're going to be going over Hunter Dickinson coming to KU,
scouting report, rehash into that.
Obviously, we had our Hunter Dickinson deep dive i don't know
maybe a few weeks ago two three weeks ago something like that you can always check that out and make
sure you're subscribing to the show wherever you get your podcasts or on youtube and you can find
that there but we'll go further into that kind of rehash some of the scouting report stuff and then
into the fit at kansas obviously you know he's going to come in and be like the guy and be a
starter but how does it affect the other players in the starting lineup
and in the rotation kind of in general,
and how much does this change Kansas from being a good team
to a possible legit Tier 1 national title contender?
We'll get all of that on today's episode.
So first things first, Hunter Dickinson just picks Kansas.
This is a huge get, obviously, for KU.
He was the top available target available at this
point, probably a few combined. I mean, it's hard when you include the freshman with Ron Holland
and Mackenzie Mbako, like maybe those guys have the higher potential or the higher NBA ceiling,
right, or have the potential to help you further in recruiting because you had a good player come
in and get drafted well in the NBA, right? But realistically, Hunter Dickinson was by far the top target available
via Transfer Portal and high school recruiting for next season,
whether you're looking at it from who's just available right now
to even just in general.
If you were to include literally every single high school freshman,
even the ones that had already committed,
but just the entire class of 2023
and the entire transfer portal class,
guys who have and have not committed.
If you were just ranking every single player
who's going to be at a new destination next year
based on their impact to college basketball next season,
Hunter Dickinson would be number one on that list,
most likely, most likely.
Now, I don't know a ton about maybe the top
three to five guys in the class but this is not seen as a super strong class necessarily so i
don't know that this would be one of those years where you feel like there's an alien who's the
number one overall recruit in the country who's going to come to his new school and average you
know be like zion williamson and be a national player of the year where if that were the case
then yes that guy would be number one but i don't know there there is that guy in this year's class
maybe there is maybe there isn't but with hunter dickinson you don't have the unknown and
so from that standpoint you probably be the number one guy there and you went out and you landed him
continue spring bill spring bill self continues to you know if you go out all of the big time
spring gets he has gotten just over the last three years right kevin mcculler was consensusly
one of the top two or three transfers in the portal a season ago.
KU gets him.
Remy Martin was consensusly one of the top two or three, maybe even the number one most prized possession that you could get in the transfer portal a year ago.
He lands him.
Now with Hunter Dickinson, you just get to a point where every year he's just landing that guy.
We've seen him do it with high school recruits all the time, whether it's been guys who are more diamonds in the rough, like he did it with Devante Graham and Sfima Kyluk, or you also saw him do it with Spring Bill in terms of some of the top-notch guys.
Josh Jackson was a spring commit.
Andrew Wiggins was a spring commit.
This is when Bill Self is at his best when he is in the spring.
And I can't help but think it doesn't have something to do with,
you know, he's probably always a good recruiter,
but he closes really well.
He closes in basketball games really well, right?
He wins close games.
He closes in recruiting really well.
He is just the ultimate closer.
And I think that's what you're seeing here.
And, you know, for other guys, maybe they put more emphasis.
It's not that the KU staff doesn't emphasize recruiting
during the season. They obviously do. They're bringing in in visits and stuff but I just can't help but think
that like with how I don't know with how much more time I guess you get during the off season which
you're you are in the spring then you do during the season where you're still game planning and
prepping and all that stuff that it gives Bill Self even more time to be a knockout recruiter,
and it makes it difficult for other people to catch up to. So, I mean, the guys who commit
in spring, it becomes even better for Bill Self when that is the case. But obviously,
this keeps Kansas in the positive media cycle for recruiting. You're trying to maybe land
another recruit here with an open scholarship of McKenzie Mbako or whoever that keeps you in the positive cycle of bringing on these big players.
Kansas still has one scholarship left after Kyle Cuff departed.
Originally, the Dickinson commitment was going to fill KU up on scholarships.
I'd been adamant in saying the scholarship stuff would work out, though.
So they're clearly going for other guys more than just Hunter Dickinson, whether it was visiting with Jalen Tyson or visiting with Mackenzie Mbako or anybody else there's been kind of reported interest in.
And they were full up, but it was like, well, they have avenues to open up scholarships,
whether it's one of the incoming freshmen ended up not coming here or if it's Kyle Cuff
departing or if it's, you know, getting creative with the way you're using your scholarships
in terms of the self-imposed stuff or, you know, having N with the way you're using your scholarships in terms of the self-imposed
stuff or, you know, having NIL money pay for scholarship, whatever it is, there are, there
are ways to work around that. And Kansas does end up working around to having another open scholarship
here. The only possible negative that I think we talked about the other day in the pro con list is
how this could affect the locker room, I guess.
Like, obviously, from an on-court perspective, this is a perfect fit.
Hunter Dickinson comes in to a program where he can be the guy.
Kansas needs that guy.
They were looking for somebody to be a back-to-the-basket scorer.
He checks that, fits into perfectly with the Bill Self system.
He's a good passer out of the post.
He'll make other players better.
This is just a really good basketball fit.
The only negative you see here is,
does this affect the locker room at all?
And I'm not saying it will.
I'm just saying that's something that you have to monitor.
Last year, it was very noted that, yeah,
you had Grady Dick and Jalen Wilson maybe making, you know,
seven figures off NIL money or at least darn near it.
And the rest of the team were all supportive.
Nobody was jealous.
It wasn't causing any problems
in the locker room it was a good locker room now with this year's team you have a lot of newcomers
a lot of new faces onto the team now i think in general um most players are easy to like
they'll understand especially like once you go to the nba you can't be like man i'm only making
five million dollars why is lebron making 50 million dollars you know what i mean like that because especially like once you go to the NBA, you can't be like, man, I'm only making $5 million.
Why is LeBron making $50 million?
You know what I mean?
Like that doesn't work.
So that is a mindset you do have to kind of get to.
And I guess that is something you do have to deal with as a player.
Like you go to school level, the grassroots level, like you're like, why is that guy getting
offers to there and there?
And I'm only getting offers to here and there.
Maybe for some guys that does affect their locker room chemistry. Maybe maybe for others it's just something that annoys them but they
deal with right um but probably not everyone in the ku locker room is like man there's a the
rumor deal about whatever two years four million dollars to where everybody is like oh i'm all
about that like hey i've been here at kansas why am i not getting paid that and he hasn't been
but i i think at the end of the day, most of the KU players probably understand like,
this is just recruiting. This is how things go. You'll get taken care of. And you know,
Hunter Dickinson comes in, he's probably going to be the big 12 preseason player of the year.
Probably going to be like a, you know, preseason all American national player of the year candidate.
Like, so it does make some sense, but you just have to make sure there are no factions in the locker room
from kind of the pomp and circumstance that surrounded the Hunter Dickinson
recruitment with how big of a recruitment it was and how many other pieces
were there of kind of going around just the player decision.
You have to make sure that doesn't affect the locker room and that it doesn't
cause players to have a rift and be like, man, I don't know about this dude.
Like, obviously, there was the story from uh the roy williams era when i think it was chris humphries who was like one of the top recruits in the country um he came and
visited and he ended up having a really good season i think he went to minnesota ended up being
like first round pick and everything and ku staff roy williams all that stuff they really wanted him
and the players who showed him on the visit i forget if it was like Keith Lankford or who um basically um went to Roy
Williams after the visit and was like we don't want this kid he's brash he's cocky he's telling
everybody he can't wait to come in here and lead the team and you know points and scoring and that's
the time when KU has like you know Nick Collison and all these guys, right? To where it's like, okay, who is this guy?
And so they were like, don't recruit him.
Now, I'm not saying that happened with Hunter Dickinson.
I don't think that happened at all, right?
I think there are probably a lot of KU players are like, yes, we got this guy.
We got this big, all that stuff.
I'm just saying that that's an example of you have to make sure that the locker room is good.
But Bill Self is the best
coach in college basketball and that's why he gets paid big money to put stuff together like this but
it certainly is interesting because now you look at it and this roster is more of a mercenary type
roster we have a good bunch of guys coming in from elsewhere newcomers where there's not a ton
of that continuity that we're used to obviously you have it with DeJuan Harris and KJ Adams
but you know how does that kind of affect everything with the team?
If you can get over that, the talent on this roster is pretty pure.
That's just something that you've got to watch out for.
All right, on to the Dickinson Scouting Report Rehash in just a second,
but first, this episode of Locked on Jayhawks is brought to you by Built Bar.
Are you looking for a delicious snack but don't want all the sugar and calories?
Then you need to try the best-t bar out there that is Bilt. You might want to
eat healthier during the day. Maybe apples and fruit and stuff isn't your thing, or maybe you
just want something that is a little bit different than that to change it up during the week, but you
don't want to eat the chips and the candy and stuff like that. Well, the good news is built bars are healthy and they taste amazing. They're covered in 100% real dark chocolate and
they come in unbelievable flavors like churro, peanut butter, brownie, and cookies and cream.
They taste like a candy bar while maintaining amazing macros, only 130 calories, four grams
of sugar with a whopping 17 grams of protein. And now you don't need to wait around to get a box for years.
We've been talking about ordering built bars at built.com,
but now you can get them at your local Walmart or Sam's club pharmacy section
at Walmart. They have four bar boxes of cookies and cream,
double chocolate bar, coconut puffs.
Sam's club has 13 bar boxes with brownie batter puff churro puff.
So plenty of ways to get them. And you can order them online at built.com you can thank me later with built bar out in a rehash with hunter dickinson
obviously the stats speak for themselves they jump off the page that's for sure um 18 and a
half points per game nine rebounds per game an assist and a half per game uh 1.8 blocks per
game he shot 56 from the floor 42 from three on just under two three-point attempts per game
uh 73 at the free throw line year prior on a team that made the sweet 16 he averaged 18.6 points per game 8.6 rebounds per game 2.3 assists per game and one and a half
blocks per game on 56 percent shooting 33 percent from the three-point range and 80 percent on
free throws and then his freshman season when I believe he was a second team all-american
he was on a team that made it to the Elite Eight that finished the year number three on Ken Palm, so an elite team, and he averaged over 14 points, seven and a half rebounds, one and a half blocks per game on 60% from the floor.
He's really good when you get him down low in those close two-point shots.
He's really good on the block in the post.
In terms of points per possession in post-up scoring, he was in the 77th percentile last year.
He was in the 94th percentile the year prior,
and he was in the 86th percentile the year before that.
So pretty consistently, he is one of the top players
in the country in post-up scoring.
He's also solid on pick and rolls, which will be good
because he can do that with DeJuan Harris.
He can even pick and pop because of his ability to now shoot
so really gives you a lot of options with what to do with him and that's nice you don't have to just
be a one-trick pony where defense can be like okay even though he's really good at this and
it's still going to cause us problems we just have to defend post-ups it's like no he can still do
well in pick and roll he can still do the short rolls because of his passing ability he can roll
all the way to the basket he can do pick and pops but i think he is best probably on those post-ups and working maybe uh out of even the high post if you have them like
kind of passing away but again the pick and pops effective too um so a lot you can do with him he's
a good rebounder obviously you know nine rebounds per game this year 8.6 a year before 7.4 the year
before that um in big 10 only games he ranked fifth in the conference in defensive rebounding rate and 12th
in offensive rebounding rate so just kind of good at both ends his 22 and a half percent defensive
rebounding rate last season that would have ranked first on last year's ku team and that would have
been the third best mark in the last four seasons among KU rotation players. The only ones were better were
2020 Yudoka Azubuke and then 2021 Jalen Wilson when he was playing a lot of five man, which Jalen
was at 22.6% that year. So just a hair better than Hunter Dickinson was. So good defensive
rebounder. That'll help you from where you were last year. Good offensive rebounder, 8.4%
offensive rebounding rate would
have ranked second on last year's team. I believe only to KJ Adams. And that's what's fun there too.
I mean, we'll get into this with the fit, but with KJ and Hunter at your four and five,
that should be a good offensive rebounding team. One of the better ones that you've had in recent
memory. Now he's a solid passer, especially for a big man um there have been
some other good passing big men in the bill south era whether it's been dedrick lawson or marcus
morris or joel mb even you know had some good feel for it obviously he's a better passer now than he
was when he was at college but like you've had some good passing big man i mean kj adams would
apply to that too like a good passing big man which that's fun too that you have two good passing big man i mean kj adams would apply to that too like a good passing big man which that's fun too that you have two good passing big men next to each other going back to that
possible iteration of the four and five and i guess again this is into the team fit stuff but
if they land mckenzie and bako who starts is it in bako or kj at the four i don't know i would
lean toward kj at least early in the season maybe by the end of the year it could be in bako but
nonetheless either way whether kj is starting or not he's playing a lot of minutes next to Hunter Dickinson nonetheless um he's a solid passer for a big and that's so important
uh we're having Isaac Trotter from 24-7 sports on Rock Chalk Sports Talk on Friday and uh he just
wrote an article with 24-7 sports about how Hunter Dickinson is this just like matchup passing
nightmare for other teams and like the example he used was Northwestern,
the basketball team who this year they,
they like changed up their defense and they became this like ultra aggressive
post trapping type team.
And it caused like a bunch of teams problems on post-ups,
like really low points per possession for opposing teams on post-ups yet.
Michigan beat them both times running an offense through the post with Hunter Dickinson because he is such a
good passer and so if you do double him all of a sudden somebody's going to open up for three or
somebody's going to open up somewhere else and he's going to find him because he has really good
passing vision now he can stretch it a bit with his shot 98th percentile and spot up shooting
that's more limited than a lot of other guys who shoot a ton of shots. I think it was like 25 shots, but the point is he's making them.
42% from three.
Yeah, low volume, 1.7 per game.
He said in some post-game quotes or some post-commitment quotes, I guess,
that he wants to shoot it even a little bit more,
and that should be good for KU.
You don't want him shooting eight threes a game
where it's taken away from him being on the post,
but KU needs shooting and you need to stretch the floor. So if he's taken
three threes per game, I think that's a good thing for KU. And clearly he showed that he can make
them. He's a good defender and a solid rim protector or good post defender. I should say
good post defender, good solid rim protector. Again, like 1.8 blocks per game this past year,
1.5 the year before 1.4 the year before that.
So, you know, about in line, if not better than like a David McCormick in terms of your
blocking ability.
66th percentile in post defense last year, 60th the year prior, 79th the year before
that.
So good post defender because he's strong, he's big, he's tough to go through.
And keep in mind too, those numbers that came in a big heavy big 10
right think about all the good big men that come through the big 10 year in and year out it is a
big man driven league over the past couple years that he's gone against whether it's luke garza or
kofi coburn right you up and down the list there's so many really good big men that have come out of
the big 10 that he has to deal with so realistically how many true bigs are there in the big 12 right now
not very many and how many are if their true bigs are like very good right now not very many so in a
way he should be able to feast now obviously the big the worry quote-unquote uh the weakness so
to speak is defending in space and that's something you got to deal with and defending pick and roll he was in just the 19th percentile on synergy and pick and roll
defense out of comparison oscar shibway who got a lot of flack for his pick and roll defense
was in the 41st percentile i do think i test would favor hunter dickinson though if you're going just
beyond the numbers there and i think you see some stuff that um hunter dickinson is a smart team
defender and sure he's seven foot one, like 260 pounds.
He's not going to be great in space.
That's why he's not in the NBA right now.
But even with all that included, he was still in the 63rd percentile in defense on synergy,
which is good.
It's above average.
It's good, right?
And so, yeah, you have a couple flaws here or there.
But Bill Self is such a coaching wizard.
I mean, David McCormick wasn't like a great space defender either.
They figured it out.
They ended up having, you know, his, the 2020 to 21 season.
They ended up having like the number one defense
over the last month of the year with David McCormick.
And then the 21-22 season, you won the title
and you were like a top 15 defense that over the last month of the season was probably like top five.
So I think they're going to be just fine with Hunter Dickinson,
who probably is a better rim protector than Dave was
and is a solid enough post defender.
So they'll figure it out.
I'm not overly concerned with that.
All right, let's finish up with this episode of Locked on Jayhawks
in terms of how he fits at KU, in terms of the lineup,
where it has some effects, and how it changes up
where they're being looked at nationally
with Locked on Jayhawks.
All right, finishing things up here.
How much does Hunter Dickinson affect KU's lineup
and their national title hopes?
Well, I think that if we start with the second part of this,
they went from number nine to number one on Bart Torvik.
They now have the number one offense, the number four defense.
For what it's worth, if they had McKenzie and Bacovik they now have the number one offense the number four defense for what it's worth if they had McKenzie and Baco they would stay the number
one offense but the distance between them and second would move up a little bit more and they
would move up to the number three defense um but this both raised the floor like you now have a go
to option that you feel like at least raise your floor of being like the Deidre Glosson team like
I feel like that's the floor here and
it's possible you hit the floor it's possibly hit the ceiling right but it raised your floor
whereas before that it's like well what if they don't have the shooting what if they don't have
a go-to score what if this and that right um it also raises your ceiling it raises your ceiling
from before to where you know if you're the ninth best team in the country before having him you
still have a shot at winning the title if you're Kansas so it doesn't raise the ceiling in terms of what your potential outcome is, but the chances of
winning the title if you're the number nine team versus if you're the number one, two, or three
team are vastly different. So it does raise your ceiling in terms of what you could be over the
course of the season and your best chances of winning the national title. So it is a very clear
difference for KU, and it would have been a difference, too. It's not just about how it affected KU and made them go from number nine to number one.
It would have given more competition for you to compete with if you would have been in another school.
If you would have been in Kentucky, they would have been number one or number two on Torvik, I think, from number 10.
Maryland would have gone from 26 to number eight, so they would have hopped you.
You would have dropped to 10.
Villanova would have gotten to number two.
So it would have given you another team in front of you that you would have had to compete
with in addition to not having him so it's a very clear uh college basketball tilting altering move
that was made now as far as his role on the team how this affects the ku lineup and everything
um he'll obviously come in be a starter he'll be your starting center so obviously that for
earnest due day and to be edge for means that they're fighting it out for the backup center be a starter he'll be your starting center so obviously that for Ernest Uday and Zuby Edgeford
means that they're fighting it out for the backup center minutes and you know Dickinson is not a
center who is only playing like this isn't Yudoka Azubuki where it's like you're just hoping for 22
to 25 good minutes of him between conditioning and avoiding foul trouble and stuff like that
like Dickinson avoids fouls uh because he is like he's a center who, for Michigan, has been on the floor for 32 minutes a game.
Let's say, though, it's at 30 for Kansas.
I think, ideally, you look at the UConn path last year.
Adama Sunogo plays in the 26- to 28-minute range,
and they had Donovan Klingin, who looked like a first-round pick.
He decided to come back.
Normally, Sunogo probably plays 30, 32 minutes per game on a team,
but because Klingin was that good, they had to get him on the court.
So he had to play 12 to 14 minutes a game.
I think ideally, if Hunter Dickinson's playing 28 minutes a game,
because Ernest Uday or Zuby Ejifer has taken that next step,
and is that good, that's a good thing for Kansas, obviously.
I think realistically, I'll just set it at, like,
let's say Dickinson plays 30 minutes a game so you have 10 minutes for your backup center Bill Self's probably not going to
be like I will play this guy six and the other guy four he's probably going to want the one guy to
play 10 and then if there is foul trouble or injuries or he's not playing well maybe he will
go to the other guy Zuby was in front of Ernest headed into the Kentucky game before rolling his
ankle so maybe he can beat out Ernest in summer but earnest really started to play better after from that moment on
um that gives you hopes he can be the guy now who knows maybe this move coming in is going to make
either of those or both of those unhappy and we'll see if they end up sticking on the roster
transferring out that'll be something to monitor but that's kind of how that affects the center
position as far as KJ Adams I think this makes it so that you know before if hunter dickinson did not end up choosing kansas
i was still under the assumption kj was going to move to the four but that maybe kj would still
give you five to eight to ten minutes per game at the center and then maybe give you like i don't
know whatever 15 20 at the four position i think now that you have dickinson and then you're going
to eat up the rest of those minutes with ernest or Zuby, I think there's no minutes for KJ at the five. I think all
of his minutes are going to come at the four. And so your question with that is, is how are we going
to, are we going to have enough shooting around it? Well, I think because you added these combo
guards where you're going to be playing a lot of DeJuan Harris on Marco Jackson, Artario Morris,
that gives you a really good defensive guards. Back to the conversation about Hunter Dickinson. Can he
defend in space, the pick and roll? Well, guess what? You have three really athletic guards. And
in the case of Morris and Harris, two proven good big 12 defenders. In case of Harris, big 12
defensive player of the year to help limit that stuff. That's going to limit penetration inside
and going to really help you out there. Then addition to that that'll give you quick guards to deal with any possibly spacing
issues right if they're sagging off people those guards should be able to drive in then you have
nick timberlake to get open threes and because you have hunter dickinson it'll raise everybody's game
if he's getting double teamed we know dewan harris can hit open shots set shots so if he if his guy
is the double boom he he hits it. Nick
Timberlake, same thing. They'll do a bunch of same side actions. Vartario Morris keeps improving as
a shooter, right? You have ways to overcome it now. And I think with KJ Adams too, what it'll
provide is a good offensive rebounding team. So last season, KU was 179th in offensive rebounding
rate the year before, when they won the title, they were 40th in the country in offensive rebounding rate the year before when they won the title they were 40th in the country in offensive rebounding rate the wings were really good at it i think you get back closer to that now
if we go back to i don't know maybe some teams uh earlier on like in the self era like the 2011 team
with the morris twins was 16th in the country the 2010 team was 22nd 2012 team was uh 79th in
offensive rebound rate i think this will be a really good offensive rebounding team when you
have kj and hunter dickinson and it'll be a good defensive rebounding team
too. And to be clear, the championship team wasn't a great
defensive rebounding team. They were, let's see,
I think in the hundreds, yeah, they were 196th
on a defensive rebounding rate the year they won the title. So it's not a prerequisite, but it's
better if you're good at stuff
than you're not good at stuff, right?
And so it was one thing for KJ to be your five,
where he would box out the other center but not be a great defensive rebounder
and hope for other guys to get him.
Now Dickinson can box out the five.
KJ can attack the ball.
Dickinson can still get rebounds.
This should be, I would imagine, a top 100 defensive rebounding team.
So it should be good rebounding there. like i said just having dickinson it might raise the notch of um the
three-point shooting for every player by a percentage or two right just getting a few more
open looks because this guy is attracting so much for the defense inside and drawing doubles and
then i think kj2 i i think the way i view it, I remember Marcus Garrett at one point, it was his sophomore junior season before he started really shooting threes at a more acceptable clip. He got to a
point where he would just, if you sagged off him, even if he wasn't comfortable taking the three,
he would just take the sag off and say, okay, well, I'm just going to use it to get ahead of
steam and I'm going to drive in and attack the basket. And I think KJ we know is a good driver. And I think that's what he'll do. He'll use it to get ahead of steam and I'm going to drive in and attack the basket and I think KJ we know is a good driver
and I think that's what he'll do he'll use it to get ahead of steam and drive to the basket
but I still think there is a very real role for KJ Adams that he's going to still be a very
effective player on this team if Mackenzie Mbako chooses KU that muddles things up at the four
position how many minutes are you going to play is Mbako better fit because of the shooting I
don't know but KJ is still going to have a big role on this team no matter where it is whether it's the start or not
I do still expect him to start regardless but like we just know KJ is a guy that Bill Self loves
and I love watching him play and he'll figure it out he has adapted every year he's been at KU
he'll continue to adapt here because he's probably the biggest one who's maybe affected by this
outside of the other centers at KU. So in the end,
a bit of a long podcast here, but
figured that was okay with Hunter Dickinson picking
KU. That'll do it for this episode of
Locked on Jayhawks. You can find us wherever
you get any of your podcasts. Please subscribe to
the show, iTunes, Spotify, you know,
all the jazz there. Or you can find us on
YouTube. Subscribe to the show there. Give us a like
if you could. We'll be back on Monday, maybe
to recap a weekend that was.
I've been saying for a couple shows I want to get to a KU football one.
Who knows what we'll get to on Monday.
But keep it locked in right here with Locked on Jayhawks today.
Have a good rest of your weekend.