Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - KJ Adams Returning for Senior Season with Kansas Jayhawks Basketball in 2024-2025

Episode Date: April 3, 2024

Kansas Jayhawks men's basketball will have KJ Adams back for his senior season in 2024-2025 after he tweeted out his return to the KU for next season. Why Adams had an underrated season, is the heart-beat of the team and a ton of fun. Why it also creates interesting questions and uncertainty about how Bill Self will play and construct the rest of the roster with returners, the offseason and the transfer portal and what it means for KU moving ahead into next season.Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors! RobinhoodRobinhood has the only IRA that gives you a 3% boost on every dollar you contribute when you subscribe to Robinhood Gold. Now through April 30th, Robinhood is even boosting every single dollar you transfer in from other retirement accounts with a 3% match. Available to U.S. customers in good standing. Robinhood Financial LLC (member SIPC), is a registered broker dealer.Amazon Fire TVFire TV recently created Fire TV Channels to deliver a constant supply of the latest videos from your favorite sports brands, all for free. That includes all of us at Locked On and most of the big pro leagues and college conferences as well. To Learn More, visit www.amazon.com/LockedOnFireTVLinkedInThese days every new potential hire can feel like a high stakes wager for your small business. That’s why LinkedIn Jobs helps find the right people for your team, faster and for free. Post your job for free at LinkedIn.com/lockedoncollege. Terms and conditions apply.GametimeDownload the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDONCOLLEGEfor $20 off your first purchase.FanDuelNew customers, join today and you’ll get TWO HUNDRED DOLLARS in BONUS BETS if your first bet of FIVE DOLLARS or more wins. Visit FanDuel.com/LOCKEDON to get started. eBay MotorsFrom brakes to exhaust kits and beyond, eBay Motors has over 122 million parts to keep your ride-or-die alive. With all the parts you need at the prices you want, it’s easy to bring home that big win. Keep your ride-or-die alive at EbayMotors.com. Eligible items only. Exclusions apply. eBay Guaranteed Fit only available to US customers.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)

Hey, Kansas has KJ Adams back for senior year. As he announced, let's discuss what it means on this episode of 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 give me a follow on Twitter at DJohnsonRadio. Thanks for making Locked on Jayhawks your first listen every day. We are free and available anywhere you get your podcast,

including on our YouTube page where you can like and subscribe to the show. And on today's edition of Locked on Jayhawks, we're talking KJ Adams. He is back for more, back for his senior season at KU, which he took to Twitter to announce. So we're going to break that down. K.J. Adams, what it means for him and coming back and everything. Possible fit and expectations for Kansas in 2024 to 2025. What it means for the rest of the offseason and kind of an inventory check

on where everything's at with the roster for KU at this point in time, because KU also landed Zeke Mayo, a transfer portal recruit from South Dakota State. A few days before, KU landed Riley Kugel, a transfer from Florida. Check out any of those episodes anywhere you get your podcasts here with Locked on Jayhawks that we had in the past. KJ Adams is officially back for his fourth season at KU. He posted to Twitter, I guess, so I'm taking it. He posted this to Twitter on Tuesday afternoon, 2.30, something like that.

And it was a picture of him in Allen Fieldhouse. And he just said, never was leaving, period, hashtag rock chalk with blue and red hearts. Now, the reason I think this is addressing never was leaving, there was a question asked to him. I think it was by Shreyas Lada of the Kansas City Star. Does excellent work with the star that he asked him in post game after the ncaa tournament like are you planning on coming back and i forget the exact quote that he gave but it was something to the notion of like that hasn't been decided or i'm not totally sure like you know has to whatever i don't know if that was just something where you know he was just leaving it open because he wanted to have kind of a fun announcement, like what kind of happened here, and didn't want that to be kind of just ruined in a post-game situation.

And to be clear, that's Shreyas' job to ask, and the players get a bunch of NIL money to be asked those questions. Anyway, I don't think there was anything wrong there because I did see some people saying that, but whatever. So to give KJ the runway to basically announce this. And so now he'll be back for one final season. He came in right after COVID. So he won't be one of those players who has the option to come back for another year after that next year will be his final season as a senior. And I'm already honestly looking forward to the senior day speech because I think he's going to have one of those fantastic ones. You think of guys who have, I don't know, meant a lot to the program in a lot of ways where, you know,

he's just kind of done everything that's been asked of him. And he's got the story, obviously, that we know of his mom. And he's such a passionate player and an energetic player that I'm, I think he's going to be kind of the heartbeat of next year's team. In a lot of ways, he kind of was of this year's team too. But, you know, I know a lot has been made about what is KJ's fit on this team. What is KJ's fit for Kansas in general, especially if you, you know, have Hunter Dickinson come back.

Can you play him at the four or should he shift to being a five? You know, if Hunter doesn't come back, are you cool rolling out with kj adams and floyd badunga as your five men and then maybe you know either zach clements comes back and then that's your three uh center room or or you add somebody else in the portal who can kind of be back up there um that would be you know kind of my preference i think there's a lot of fun ways you can play and a lot of guards you can kind of build around that but if hunter digginson does come back like are you going to roll it back with playing a four and five next to each other?

Are you going to, at that point, basically make KJ like a super sub where, you know, maybe you, well, I guess you could still start him in name and have him play, you know,

10 minutes together next with Hunter Dickinson and the other 30 minutes of the game, you're playing, you know, an extra wing or an extra guard out there. And then he's getting, you know, 10 minutes as, as the four and maybe 10, 15 minutes,

10 to 12 minutes is kind of the backup, five to 100, I can say. But how often do we really see a player get demoted from the starting lineup? How often do we see a player get less minutes? They had one year to the next under Bill South, at least sizably less minutes. Even the minuscule less minutes, it's like a handful plus of guys. I know we looked at this last offseason, but the big minutes, it's very rare. So I'll just say this about KJ. I have so much respect for the dude, and this dude has just absolutely produced and done everything that has been asked of him.

If you want to blame the roster construction or Bill Self for playing a too big lineup. I think that's fine. And I think that's understandable in the current age of the game, though. I do have actually some thoughts on that, but you, I don't think you should ever blame KJ Adams for just constantly playing his ass off in whatever role is needed of him. He went from being a defensive bench guy as a freshman to being a guy who the next year you couldn't really count on the other centers and you were like, ah, just throw him out there. And he did an admirable job in that, even though it wasn't perfect, he still did a lot

of things really well. And then this past season, having to make the transition to playing as a four-man again, playing on the wing and playing next to a guy in Hunter Dickinson, which that was going to be a new challenge in its own way. And so he put up 12.6 points, 4.6 rebounds, and 3.1 assists per game. That is really good production as a junior. I know you'd like to see the rebounding numbers go up for a guy that's that chiseled and strong and athletic.

There's no reason he couldn't be averaging, you know, six, seven, eight rebounds per game, and I would agree with that. But, you know, since 1992 to 1993, this is how far back college basketball reference goes back. So, you know, basically three decades, a little over 30 years of of data here the list of KU players to average at least a dozen points over four rebounds and three or more assists per game is Frank Mason twice Devontae Graham Kirk Heinrich Devon Dotson Steve Woodbury very underrated player from the 90s, Keith Langford, Kevin McCuller, Jared Haas, Ryan Robertson, and KJ Adams. Now what's weird about that list,

because that is a very good list of players at KU, what's weird about that list is a lot of those are guards. And so obviously, again, this goes back to the idea of you're basically needing him to be more of a big man. And the exception there too, is that KJ doesn't shoot threes like the other guys on this list do, you know, to different extents like Devante Graham, Kirk Heinrich, like knocking down a lot of threes,

Devon Dotson, like lower shooting threes and stuff like that, but whatever, you know, so it's just weird. Cause he, he sticks out cause he's, he's not like the others.

The others are guards on that list, but like point being, he had to readjust to a new position. You've asked him to play basically very different roles each of the three years here. And he's done it each and every year. And even though it wasn't the best fit overall for Kansas this year, he produced from the start in a way that, you know, I don't know, makes him very unique to other KU players. So the fit becomes the big question here of where does he play?

And it's maybe just as simple as like, maybe we're overthinking it. I do remember going into, which I think there's some comparisons here. Kansas in 2021 has kind of a down year by Kansas standards, gets smacked in the second round by USC, and then returns four out of five starters. And they end up winning the national title. And I remember some, I don't know, brief conversations, because I don't remember how long it was into the offseason before Bryce Thompson eventually transferred. I think he was a little bit of a later transfer, though, if I'm not mistaken, like maybe May or June or something. But I remember conversations

from KU fans, from being on the radio, stuff like that. Like, do we expect maybe a guy like Bryce Thompson to take a next step in year two? And maybe he usurps a guy like Christian Brown into the starting lineup. And that was at least like, I don't know how much we entertained the conversation, but like, at least it was a conversation among some KU fans. Turns out Bryce Thompson transferred away. Christian Brown turned into a first round draft pick and was like this unbelievable player. Right. And so I guess my point being is we get under this idea of like, this can't work, yada, yada, yada.

And I'm sitting there like, and to be clear, like I am more under the idea of you should be playing like the Villanova style basketball, like playing with a bunch of wings, playing with a bunch of versatility. And that allows you to get through different matchups over the course of the NCAA tournament. And I think that's the best way to go about it. But given the roster you have here,

I don't know, like a lot of the final four teams are playing two bigs. You know what I mean? Like, and Duke who nearly made it, like they're playing two bigs too. Now it's a little bit different in what some of the bigs are doing necessarily. But like, hypothetically, I guess I would put it this way.

Because I don't know. Like for all we know, maybe KJ Adams would be that super sub and start at the four, but play some minutes there and play some minutes as the backup five. Or maybe the minutes would go down or whatever it is. But like, I still feel like that's unlikely because that just doesn't happen in the Bills South era. Who's to say that this year wouldn't have actually just worked if KU would have had better production from Nick Timberlake

and Omarco Jackson, you know, to where even though they were playing KJ Adams next to Hunter Dickinson, let's say Timberlake would have been a 40% three-point shooter from the jump and Omarco Jackson would have been a guy who like, you know, in, in early mock drafts was seen as a first round draft pick where people were like, Oh, he's showing NBA flashes. If you were getting that from the guard positions with DeJuan and the healthy Kevin McCuller and a healthy Hunter Dickinson, would it have mattered about the fit of playing two big KJ and Hunter Dickinson? Like, would they have just been a great team anyway? You know what I mean? So like, I don't know that there was a part of me that wonders if you just basically run it back with you know DeJuan Harris and possibly Hunter Dickinson and KJ Adams

and let's say you can get Furphy back and you have Kugel on board and Zeke Mayo on board if Kugel gives you more than what uh I don't know Marco Jackson gave you last year and if Zeke Mayo gives you more than what Nick Timberlake gave you last year and you have a better bench overall and DeJuan is better and KJ is better and all this stuff could you just be a better team in general even playing that same style that has a few flaws you know and getting used to it a little bit more and figuring that out I don't know I don't have the answer to that but I'm definitely not going to eliminate that possibility so of course in all of this is what is KJ's game going to look like next season? And part of this, too, is what does the rest of the offseason look like?

You know, if Johnny Furphy decides to come back and Liam McNeely commits, does that make it more likely that you want to start a couple of those wings and start a couple of those guards? If Hunter Dickinson doesn't come back, does that mean KJ's more likely to be the five? If he does, does that mean he's more likely to be a four? There's a lot of things that external factors kind of have an impact on some of this stuff here. And part of it, too, is with KJ's game. Like we saw him take a few threes in the Dominican Republic games.

Is he going to iron that out more in the offseason and at least be willing to take some, even if it's a low percentage? Is Bill Self going to even want that? Or can he at least just be a more consistent mid-range shooter? Or can he become kind of an elite of the elite driver where it's like if you're sagging off of him, he's just going to take advantage to be a bowling ball in the lane and you're never going to stop him at the rim?

Or can he be more consistently, you know, getting seven to 10 rebounds where it's like, okay, if you are playing too big basketball, even if you have some questions about the shooting or the spacing, even though you have better guards now, hopefully you would hope and that are knocking down those shots. Can he, you know,

give you those extra possessions that that's usually the plus of playing two bigs. Even if you lose some shooting, you're getting extra possessions with the rebounds. Can you do a little bit of that? So I think part of it just kind of depends where he improves or where he's tasked to improve and KU's vision of where he plays. But we have plenty of time throughout the offseason to discuss and see those decisions come back and see what the fit specifically is going to be for him. But I'll say this. You need guys who bring energy.

You need guys who pump up the crowd. You need experience. You need guys who endear themselves to the fan base. And when I think of the good memories of this past season's team for KU, yeah, maybe there were some less than some past years for KU when they've been one seeds and they've been this dominant team. But a lot of the great highlights and top plays and memories I think of this past season are KJ throwing down awesome dunks

and then having an awesome fist pump afterwards and getting the crowd fired up. And KJ to me is the most likable player on this Kansas team. He has bled crimson and blue for this team. And even though Bill Self is going to have to get creative with this roster's construction, I'm a big KJ Adams fan as a person and a player in the right fit.

And I'm excited to get to watch him for another year. All right, let's talk more about the KJ Adams coming back on this episode of Locked on Jayhawks. Fire TV is your destination for sports from live games to highlights to in-depth analysis. Fire TV offers amazing viewing experiences with the Fire TV stick that you can plug into your existing TV that provides access to millions of movies and TV episodes as well as free and live TV. Whether it's opening weekend for baseball, college basketball tournament, you're going to want to have a Fire TV. They recently created Fire TV channels to deliver a constant supply

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To learn more, visit www.amazon.com slash locked on Fire TV. So what decisions now are most important for KU in the offseason? I think for one, I would say the Hunter Dickinson one, and that was already kind of the most important, not just, I mean, you could say he was your most decorated player. And in theory, by awards, you would say he was your best player since he earned the highest degree of like all American status. So theoretically that was already your biggest decision there. But I also think the Hunter Dickinson decision is your biggest decision in terms of figuring out what the roster construction is going to be. Because like I said, if Hunter Dickinson, you know, decides to come back,

then it becomes the bigger question of, okay, how are we playing KG Adams? Are we running it back? If we are running back with playing the four and five man, then you approach the off season a little differently at this point in time. Right? Because at that point you have added Riley Google and Zeke Mayo, and maybe you're less likely to add a bunch more wings or something like that. Versus if Hunter Dickinson decides to go, are you going to play KJ Adams at the five? And then does that open up more minutes at the guard in the wing positions that you can go add

another big impact player from the transfer portal there? Or if Hunter Dickinson goes, are you going to go for a big center like a Cliff Omerui to kind of replace him? So that's kind of the biggest decision left to be had for KU. The other big one is Johnny Furphy. And for my money, this is maybe the biggest decision in terms of the impact on the team. Now the Dickinson one has the biggest in terms of the impact on how you build the rest of your roster and the style of play. But I think Furphy, when you're looking at it, if you are going to play KJ Adams next to Hunter Dickinson again, what are you looking for? You're looking for shooting and scoring around them.

Well, you accomplish that with Zeke Mayo. You accomplish that with Riley Kugel, who, when he's right, is an elite shot creator and shot maker. And so if you have good shooting around him, well, Johnny Furphy would be a knockdown shooter as well and a knockdown scorer, and that would give you only another perimeter option to kind of play around those guys that would make it for a better fit i think it probably also makes the liam mcneely decision a little bit more important for ku2

because knowing that kj is back is probably the increased likelihood of playing too big basketball and so then again uh you need more shooting you need more scoring to fill around that because this kansas team didn't have enough scoring and shooting around it. And so, like I said, there is a chance that Kansas could continue to play too big basketball with KJ Adams and Hunter Dickinson. But if you just have better shooting and scoring around it, it could actually work or remain to be seen on that. And so you just need to load up on shooters. Well, again, checkmark with Zeke Mayo, checkmark with Riley Kugel, especially if he gets back to kind of his freshman year. And checkmark if you could get a guy like Liam Neely. So I think those are the big offseason decisions for KU to come.

Obviously, we're still waiting on, you know, is anybody going to transfer? What's going to happen is with guys like Zach Clements and Marco Jackson, are they going to come back for another year? Are they going to decide to transfer away or whatever, anything like that? By the way, I was actually looking at this, going back to the KJ Adams stuff, because I mentioned, you know, getting more consistent on the mid-range shot. I think that's fair. But I did think this was actually looking at this, going back to the KJ Adams stuff, because I mentioned getting more consistent on the mid-range shot, and I think that's fair. But I did think this was actually funny.

In the paint twos, which is defined as anything in the box but four and a half feet or further, so like the push shots that are in the paint technically but not actually at the rim, he actually shot 47%, which is in the 68th percentile. He did only shoot 29% once he got outside of the box though on true mid-range twos which was uh below average nationally so i guess keep both those numbers in mind all right how does this impact ku's pursuits in the transfer portal we'll discuss that on this

episode of locked on jayhawks well first this episode of the show is brought to you by fanduel sportsbook the sports calendar is loaded and fanduel is making it even more exciting to get Well, first, this episode of the show is brought to you by FanDuel Sportsbook. The sports calendar is loaded, and FanDuel is making it even more exciting to get in on the action because right now, new customers get $200 in bonus bets with any winning $5 bet. That's $200 you can use to bet the tournament, MLB, NBA, NHL, and so much more. You can get in on a future.

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So KJ Adams back for his senior year. We know Zeke Mayo, Riley Kugel in tow. How does this affect KU's pursuits in the transfer portal? Right now, they're full up on scholarships in terms of everyone being back, at least at the time of recording. Who knows? This news kind of works pretty fast at this point in time. But KJ Adams certainly makes it so that I would be surprised at this point

if you brought in like a four man I think you could bring in a wing who could play the four but like when we did our offseason bigs preview the other day you know we had guys like Jacoby Coles from TCU who was a four slash five man at TCU like that guy probably isn't a thing anymore since you could be given a lot of minutes at the 40 KJ Adams you could be given a lot of minutes at the 40 KJ Adams, you could be given a lot of minutes to like one of the shooting wings, like potentially Liam McNeely, or I don't know, maybe a Johnny Furphy or something like that at those minutes specifically.

So I think that would be more likely. I think the center position just kind of depends on if Hunter Dickinson's back, you don't add anybody. If Hunter Dickinson leaves, then you probably add somebody else. Then again, you could convince yourself you're fine with KJ, Flory, and if Zach Clements decides to stay. So that's kind of how I look at that one. And then right now, maybe you're in a bit of a holding period

with the guards and the wings outside of like that top, top tier guy. If you're like, again, like a Liam McNeely, you're like, yeah, if you want to commit, we take you. Like, you know, no ifs, ands, or buts about it. But the other guys, like maybe it's more of a holding pattern of like, hey, we're waiting to see what happens with these other kind of decisions at this point in time. But again, going back to the idea of the shooting,

I think it makes it even more important now that you know KJ Adams is back to just add a bunch of shooters and scores. You know DeJuan Harris is a good defender. You know KJ Adams is a good defender. Although I do think – I think KJ is almost a better defender you know KJ Adams is a good defender um although I do think I think KJ is almost a better defender at the five than he is at the four but I do think KJ is a solid defender with another year he should get even better there um then it kind of comes down El Marco if he you know sticks around the roster he's a good defender and by the way he was in like the 90 something

percentile on a synergy when I was looking at his defensive grade so I didn't, he was in like the 90-somethingth percentile on Synergy when I was looking at his defensive grade. So I didn't realize he was that high. But anyway, you just want shooting and scoring. You want shooting and scoring around it. And, you know, to make it work on the offensive side of the ball, open up the spacing a little bit. And the more you open up the spacing, honestly, the more effective KJ gets because he is a good passer out of the short roll. And he'll throw down more dunks because there's more spacing. And he'll have more driving lanes to get to the rim.

So in a lot of ways, the shooting just doesn't help him play as the four, but it helps him be a more effective player too. So we'll see what the rest of the decisions come, and we'll talk about it right here on Locked on Jayhawks, anywhere you get your podcasts, including on our YouTube page. Don't forget to check out our Zeke Mayo episode. Don't forget to check out our Riley Kugel episode. We'll be back for more. We'll also have Football Fridays coming up starting this Friday with LOJ.