Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - Kansas Jayhawks Basketball Transfer Portal Target Deep Dive: New Mexico Lobos Forward JT Toppin

Starting point is 00:00:00 On today's Locked on Jayhawks, deep dive into one of the top players still available in the transfer portal, JT Toppin. 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. Your team every day or is tuning in to each and every episode. On today's edition of Locked on Jayhawks, we're deep diving into another possible transfer portal target. One of the top players still available in the portal, who is JT Toppin, a transfer from New Mexico, who is also testing the NBA draft water.

Starting point is 00:00:56 So we'll get into his scouting report, possible fit with Kansas, where things are at there, if there is any contact, whatever. And then the latest offseason and a little uh update on what's going on with the KU baseball team on this episode of the show which is brought to you by FanDuel Sportsbook make every moment more right now new customers get $150 in bonus bets with any winning $5 bet that is $150 with any winning $5 bet visit FanDuel.com to get started. We're going to start with some info on JT Toppin's scouting report, everything that's going on right now. So who is JT Toppin?

Starting point is 00:01:32 He is a forward from New Mexico who is both in the portal for the transfer portal and undergoing the NBA draft process. And it sounds like he actually did pretty well at the Combine a week ago. So who knows? He could end up staying in the NBA draft process. And it sounds like he actually did pretty well at the combine a week ago. So who knows? He could end up staying in the NBA draft. He could end up coming back to college. I don't know. This is another player that similar to, you know, we had some conversations about like Cam Christie, who there hasn't been any public contact or any linking of this player's herd

Starting point is 00:02:02 from Kansas, or there's been a visit scheduled or this or that. To this point, there hasn't been any of that so far. I did see a recent article talking about like Texas being in hard on them so far. Again, he might just stay in the NBA and Kansas might just not be interested because of the position he plays and what they already have on the roster. But I do think this is an interesting exercise to go in because, I don't know. I think he arguably might be the best player available in the transfer portal at this point in time. Anyway, he is listed at six foot nine, 210 pounds. But at the combine, he measured at six foot seven without shoes. So probably more like six foot eight with shoes

Starting point is 00:02:40 up to 221 pounds though. He had a seven foot and a half inch wingspan, though. So really, really long arms. And then an eight foot 10 standing reach, which Johnny Furphy out of comparison was like eight foot eight and a half. So standing reach, not that much taller than Furphy, but, you know, both kind of playing the four in a different way. He came into New Mexico last year with the Lobos as a four-star recruit. He was top 130 in the country on 24-7 sports, but certainly wasn't a top 50 recruiter or anything like that. And he killed it as a true freshman.

Starting point is 00:03:14 He went for 12.4 points per game, 9.1 rebounds per game, 0.6 assists, and then really good defensive numbers, 1.9 blocks and 1.1 steals per game. That was in 26.6 minutes per game for a team that won the Mountain West Conference Tournament, got an 11 seed in the NCAA Tournament, or actually favored over Clemson in the first round of the NCAA Tournament, ended up losing that game. Clemson goes on to the Elite Eight. His shooting numbers too, really good, 62% from the field with a 65% mark on two-point shots, and he was 11 of 32 or 34% on three-point shots. The free throw is not so good, though, 56.5% at the foul line while playing some four and a little

Starting point is 00:03:55 bit of five for the Lobos last season. Now, he wound up leading all freshmen in double-doubles and field goal percentage last season across the country. He was second-team All-Mountain West, and he was the Mountain West Freshman of the Year. He didn't have the best game in that NCAA tournament game against Clemson. He went just 2-of-7 with six points. Did find a way to still add value, though. Ten rebounds, two blocks, and a steal. And obviously nothing was really working for New Mexico

Starting point is 00:04:23 in that NCAA tournament game. And he had plenty of opportunities against other good opponents too, though, where it wasn't just, hey, this is the one good opponent you played against. Let's see what you did. Mountain West was really good this year. And I know the Mountain West has had their struggles in the NCAA tournament, which continued to a certain degree this year. And San Diego State made it to the Sweet 16. Utah State won a game and some other things happened.

Starting point is 00:04:45 But like San Diego State, who did make a national title game a year ago, made the Sweet 16 this year. They played them in the Mountain West Championship game. He had 13 points and 11 rebounds in that game. And overall, he still shot 63% on two-point shots in the 11 games that he played against Ken Palm top 50 opponents.

Starting point is 00:05:04 So yes, he was actually still really good against those better teams. And he also wound up in the top 20 among 85 qualified players in the Mountain West who logged 500 plus possessions for offensive BPR on Evan Miyakawa's website, evanmiya.com. So by that metric was top 20 overall on offense he was also top five on defense good for overall a top 10 score in the league so by one metric he was a top 10 player in the league which makes sense he was second team all mountain west that would put you in the top 10 but was top five defender and a top 20 offensive player some of the synergy numbers of note these are fun to dig into here for JT Toppin who by the, you might be wondering at this point in time,

Starting point is 00:05:46 is J.T. Toppin related to Obi Toppin? Because Obi Toppin did have his younger brother, Jacob Toppin, who was at Kentucky. Now he's – I don't know where he's at at this point in time. But no, J.T. Toppin is not related to Obi Toppin, at least from my quick understanding of it. But still, you could use the same phrase that people not related to Obi Toppin, at least from my quick understanding of it. But still, you could use the same phrase that people were saying with Obi Toppin, which is, I don't know, it's just a fun, silly little thing to say. Ain't no stopping JT Toppin, right?

Starting point is 00:06:13 It's always fun to say. Anyway, synergy numbers of note on JT Toppin. He was in the 70th percentile defensively last season. So, you know, that's a number where as a freshman, especially being 70th percentile, that's good. And you're really only going to get better as you grow, as your body gets more muscular, as you get more awareness of everything going on in the college game, good stuff there. 97th percentile overall offensively, just a very efficient offensive player. Didn't put up, you know, 16, 17, 18 points per game. Wasn't super high volume, but still, you know, 12 and a half

Starting point is 00:06:47 points per game as a freshman and doing it on that level of efficiency, 97th percentile in the country. Again, very impressive. 69th percentile on offensive rebounds and the like putbacks there. So he was obviously somebody who was able to finish on those offensive putbacks, but it's something that he did a lot too. He had the top offensive rebound rate in Mountain West only games, and he was top five in defensive rebound rate. So this is a kid who is an elite rebounder. Again, the best offensive rebounder in Mountain West, top five defensive rebounder in Mountain West, and he gets stickbacks there, ranking in the 69th percentile there. He was in the 65th percentile on post-ups, so at least he was proficient at it.

Starting point is 00:07:28 He was above average to solid at it. But if you're specifically, like the one thing he did really well in post-ups was hook shots. He was in the 88th percentile in hook shots. So maybe not a full complete post game yet, but the hook shot certainly was a go-to for him that he hit at a very high efficiency. 70th percentile is a pick-and-roll role, man. So again, you're just chalking up all these things that he is at least like above average to good at,

Starting point is 00:07:54 and that was just a young freshman where you expect growth from year to year. He was good in pick-and-roll. 79th percentile as a cutter. And here's a fun one, 98th percentile in transition. So he is a big man who runs the floor really, really well. Now, he only ranked in the 46th percentile in spot-up shooting. He was 8 of 24 on spot-up threes. Very limited volume there.

Starting point is 00:08:15 But honestly, I don't know. If you're talking about what's the fit for Kansas, you're playing him in a frontcourt next to Hunter Dickinson or next to KJ Adams. If you throw a frontcourt out there with Toppin and Dickinson, even though Toppin's not shooting the high volume of threes, that's two big men who can shoot threes if you leave them wide open here, right? He was in the 63rd percentile in catch and shoot. He went 11 of 31, 35 and a half percent from three on catch and shoot threes. So if you leave him open, he will make them even if it's not at a very high rate of how often they're coming overall he was

Starting point is 00:08:45 78th percentile with his jumper so that tells you that if he wasn't shooting a ton of twos that he probably shot really well from kind of the mid-range area he also shot well on runners he shot uh 50 on low volume on runners which is a good number to have there and he was in the 87th percentile at the rim where he shot 68 at the rim 67 on layups and he had 33 dunks which we talked about if you're in everyday or you saw this with our episode nick schwert 33 dunks would have ranked second on kansas by almost double the amount of what second place hundred egginson had 17 would have had last season so somebody who is a good athlete runs runs the floor well, can dunk the basketball, has shown a little bit of ability to space the floor as a kind of spot-up big man

Starting point is 00:09:33 when you need him to, is an elite rebounder, and is a good defender. I think there are some real arguments to be had that he is the best remaining player in the transfer portal. And I don't say that lightly because I think there's still a lot of really good players out there like Jackson Robinson and Wuka Poplar and Chaz Lanier and maybe some other guys we'll have a chance to get to deep dives to. But the question is, how well does he fit KU's roster? Because being a 4-5 man, that might make it a little tougher.

Starting point is 00:09:59 So let's discuss that fit, how they would make it work on this episode of Locked on Jayhawks. First, this episode of the show is brought to you by Yahoo Finance. Let's get straight to the point. You want to grow your portfolio to deal with the rising costs of inflation, to pay off your debt or your mortgage, pretty much anything standing in the way of you and financial freedom. With Yahoo Finance, you can get access to the news, data, and tools that you need in order to help you reach that financial freedom. With Yahoo Finance, you can get access to the news, data, and tools that you need in order to help you reach that financial freedom. For more than 25 years, Yahoo Finance has been the brand behind every great investor. Whether you're a seasoned investor or looking for that

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Starting point is 00:11:12 That is yahoofinance.com. Continuing on with this episode of the show with more on JT Toppin, possible fit with KU, a little update on the off-season portal and KU baseball. And then tomorrow we're going to have a football Friday episode of the show. So that'll be fun as we continue to move under the 100 days to go. We have the 100 days out countdown show a couple days ago here. So thank you to the everydayers tuning in to those. Okay. So the big question here with JT Toppin is, you know, unlike these other players that are guards, that are wings where you can bring them in and conceivably they could play

Starting point is 00:11:50 the one or the two or the three, or if they're a wing, they could play the two or the three or the fourth. There are a lot of different positions they can go into that they can find minutes at to try to make it work. It becomes a little bit more difficult with the four and five man, which is funny because when you actually look at the positions, the KU has, like if you're talking, who are the wings on the roster? Well,

Starting point is 00:12:10 you have Ryland Griffin and you have her keys pass more and you have AJ store and, you know, KJ by nature of playing some four minutes, the four is kind of a wing position, even though he's not truly a wing, but you know what I mean? That he's kind of dipping his toe into that water a little bit.

Starting point is 00:12:24 You have a lot of guys that can play those minutes. And even in the sense of if you're going to play a three-guard lineup for any minutes at a time with DeJuan, El Marco, and Zeke Mayo, then basically one of them becomes wing-like in that sense. So you have a lot of guys who can play the wing position. You have a lot of guys who can play the guard position, right? DeJuan Harris, El Marco Jackson, Zeke Mayo, Ryland Griffin, a lot of guys who can play it. When you DeJuan Harris, Marco Jackson, Zeke Mayo, Rylan Griffin a lot of guys you can play when you're talking about like actual true number fours

Starting point is 00:12:49 I mean in theory it's like okay KJ Adams is a four um who else are four it's like well Rylan Griffin can play the four in a pinch like AJ Storr maybe in today's day and age is more of a four that's okay but he's not a great rebounder so he's maybe more of a three um you you have like less guys who play that position like Zach Clemens playing there would be out of position a little bit in my opinion and what that would do like ball screen wise defensively and everything but um I I just think it's it's weird because there's less players at that position yet I feel like it would be more of an issue to bring on a player like that and the reason why is because you you know, there's going to be, if you're bringing on a four or five, you know, there's going to be at least 28 minutes a game, probably.

Starting point is 00:13:30 I don't know. Maybe if you want to go lower 26 minutes per game, but realistically probably closer to 30 minutes per game for Hunter Dickinson at the five, right? So a majority of the minutes are being eaten up there. Whatever you think is going to happen with KJ Adams, whether he's coming off the bench or he's starting, he's playing a big role on the team. He's playing 20-plus minutes per game, right? 22, 25-plus minutes per game.

Starting point is 00:13:50 And it could be 28, it could be 30, it could be 32. I don't know. But those minutes are probably coming at the four. Maybe he gets a few as a backup five, but yeah, those minutes are coming at the four. And so you run out of minutes that you would have there for JT Toppin, right? And that kind of becomes the issue because you're not going to play a lineup where KJ is next to JT Toppin and next to Hunter Dickinson. Now, could you make this work in a way that you could make

Starting point is 00:14:15 the minutes work where you basically just said, we're going to have a basically three big man rotation for the four and five spots between KJ Adams, Hunter Dickinson, and JT Toppin. Toppin's going to play the four and the five. Dickinson's going to play the five. KJ's going to play the four. And we'll still have a little bit of minutes available to play AJ Storr there, but for the most part, we'll play those two guys.

Starting point is 00:14:38 And then we'll have spot minutes or foul trouble or throw a guy out for a handful of minutes here or for, you know, one lineup stretch with Zach Clements or Florio Badunga or something like that. Maybe that's entirely possible for KU. And maybe you can make that work even. Maybe you could even convince KJ to come off the bench. And I don't know, but there's something to the idea of a lineup with JT Toppin next to Hunter Dickinson that would really excite me. You know, even if it's JT Toppin playing 20 minutes a game and KJ playing 20 minutes a game and Hunter playing 28 minutes a game

Starting point is 00:15:07 to keep everybody happy, but to give everybody minutes, I mean, competition ain't a bad thing. And the idea of what I talked about earlier, where you could have two big men in Toppin and Dickinson who can both stretch out and shoot threes at least a little bit to keep defenses honest,

Starting point is 00:15:21 that Dickinson was like the best defensive rebounder in the conference, and you would be adding another the best defensive rebounder in the conference and you would be adding another really good defensive rebounder in Toppin who's also an elite offensive rebounder that you should dominate on the glass that you would have a guy in Toppin who's more of your mobile big man who gets blocked shots and a bunch of dunks that could be basically your like Hunter's not really your big man that's going to come over and help defense and block a shot away. A guard gets blown by by the other guard, and your Jeff Withey's going to come by and erase it and block the shot. That's not really Hunter's game.

Starting point is 00:15:53 He'll get the occasional block here or there, more of a positional one-on-one post-offensive. But Toppin, he's more of that, yeah, he can come over weak side and get that big shot block. And I think that would be an elite big man pairing. Now, what is the likelihood of this? I don't think it's very likely. And there's a reason why KU has not had that contact with. And, you know, it's easier for me to sit here today and say, this fascinates me and would excite me if that were the case.

Starting point is 00:16:16 And I think he's the best player left in the portal. And so to that point, you just try to make it work. But it's another thing if you're Bill Self. It's another thing if you're these people in the staff because you do have to worry about the locker room. You do have to worry about who we keep in happy a little bit. And there is a fine line there. You can't just completely give in to that.

Starting point is 00:16:35 You do have to add competition, and you can't just lay down for somebody to kind of take command, for one player to take command or a handful of players to take command. But there still is a line, I don't know where it is, about, you know, we are trying to add competition. We are trying to – you have to earn your minutes and all that sort of thing. But also, we don't want to screw you over, you know, and make you lose a ton of minutes going into one of your final seasons.

Starting point is 00:17:03 So, you know, you can understand, and there's a little bit of a political game there, both in terms of the current team and also in terms of future recruiting that you don't want it used against you negatively, that you have some other coach being like, hey, you don't want to go there. They're just going to over-recruit you. You know, they're going to tell you you're going to get this big role, and then a week later they're going to bring on another player out of the transfer pool. So there is the kind of political game here that I get, but I don't know, man. I just think Toppin is such a good player

Starting point is 00:17:32 and that lineup of even being able to say, hey, we're going to play a lineup where when Dickinson goes on the bench, you use Toppin at the five and KJ at the four, and that's a super athletic front court. And that's fun for minutes. Or the lineup with Toppin next to Dickinson. That's fun for minutes. And I don't know who comes off the bench. I don't know who plays more. I don't know if somebody plays 28 minutes per game, somebody plays 20, whatever it is.

Starting point is 00:18:00 I just think if you're trying to collect the best level of players, if you're trying to add that, I think this is the best one available there. And somebody, if he does end up coming back to college, could stay in the NBA draft is going to get an absolute steal late in the portal in JT Toppin. All right, let's continue on the latest in the transfer portal and a little update on KU baseball on this episode of Locked on Jayhawks. First, this episode of the show is brought to you by FanDuel Sportsbook. It's winner take all time in the NBA and the NHL, and FanDuel's giving you a shot to bring home a big win of your own. Right now, new customers get $150 in bonus bets with any winning $5 bet.

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Starting point is 00:19:02 If you could have found a way to alt-line it over over 11.5, I would have loved seeing those odds, and that would have been great, and you would have been a big winner yesterday. FanDuel, America's number one sportsbook and official sportsbook partner of the Locked On Podcast Network. All right, finishing up here with the latest in the offseason for KU basketball and a little KU baseball update on this episode of Locked On Jayhawks. So this is back to back times that we had an episode where we like talked about Javon

Starting point is 00:19:30 Small and then he committed to West Virginia. The first we did like a Javon Small deep dive several weeks ago and then literally the day of that that got released like hours after it got released he committed to West Virginia and then we had an episode earlier this week and we brought up the Javon small thing. It wasn't as much of a deep dive, but we did bring it up. And then he basically reaffirmed his commitment and like signed his letter of intent with West Virginia. So that is officially off the radar for KU. And the number of possible targets starts to dwindle down a little bit more there and maybe makes it more likely of what

Starting point is 00:20:05 Kansas is going to have. Now, the ones you still kind of look at here is what's Johnny Furphy going to do? What's Jackson Robinson going to do with the NBA draft? I don't know. Do they push harder for a guy like Wuga Poplar, Chaz Lanier? Do they come out of the blue for a guy like we've been talking today with JT Toppin or maybe somebody that will try to have a deep dive on next week. I don't know. That kind of becomes the question here. And then KU baseball, meanwhile, they're playing today, depending when you're watching this or listening to this, they might've already played, but 1230 on Thursday against Oklahoma, who's one of the best teams in the country. This is a great opportunity for Kansas. Like you wanted this to happen, not because it's going to be easy.

Starting point is 00:20:47 Oklahoma's a really good team. And so this is going to be very difficult for Kansas, but they need to right now. They're in a position coming into this big 12 tournament where they're on the outside looking in to the NCAA tournament. They put up a great season and it's been an unbelievable step in year two for Dan Fitzgerald. But to make that step, get to the NCAA tournament,

Starting point is 00:21:03 they got to do some special stuff this week down in Arlington. And what better opportunity than to try to beat one of the top 10 teams in the country. And that's what they can do if they can beat Oklahoma. And so the RPI and the KPI there, everybody knows what the RPI is. That's been around forever. The KPI is kind of a new metric that, or I don't know if it's new, but it's new that they're using it in the NCAA tournament committee this year. KU's a little bit higher on that. The K-State win certainly would help them in both those metrics. You win a game like this over Oklahoma, that could be the difference of you ending up on the right side of the bubble. Now, they probably, in my eyes, need to do even more than beating Oklahoma. Like the way I view it, maybe they have to go to the Big 12 championship game based on where some of those metrics are.

Starting point is 00:21:45 But because that is a new addition to the process of the tournament committee, we don't really totally know how it's going to affect the selection process for better or for worse. But I do think this, if you're Kansas, just win the whole thing, you know, just take care of business yourself. But yeah, win this Oklahoma game at the very least. And then you start getting people talking about could you be on the right side of the bubble. But yeah, either way, it's been a great season for KU baseball. Let's see if they can finish strong this week in Arlington. That'll do it for this episode of Locked on Jayhawks.

Starting point is 00:22:15 You can find our show anywhere you get your podcasts, including on our YouTube page, or you can like and subscribe to the show. We'll be back tomorrow for a Football Friday episode of Locked on Jayhawks.

Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - Kansas Jayhawks Basketball Transfer Portal Target Deep Dive: New Mexico Lobos Forward JT Toppin

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