Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - WHAT IF Melvin Council is Granted Another Year + Do Kansas Jayhawks NEED Another Big-Time Transfer?

Starting point is 00:00:00 So what happens if Melvin Council does get another year? How does it affect KU? Would they even bring him back? You are Locked on Jayhawks, your daily podcast on the Kansas Jayhawks, part of the Locked on podcast network, your team every day. How's it going, Derek Johnson here? And on today's edition of Locked on Jayhawks, we're going to break down some of the latest news of KU baseball,

Starting point is 00:00:30 KU softball, and KU golf. We'll get into what? What is the difference of adding a top tier player in the portal at this point if Kansas can muster up the money? And we'll get started right here with what if Melvin Council is granted another season in the end. Now, I don't know the likelihood on this with this whole five and five thing that seems likely coming down the pipe any day now. That would probably make it less likely for Melvin Council because even as he's going through a different process, he's trying to get a waiver for another year basically by saying his juco years shouldn't count. He's played two years of juco ball. He's played three years of D1 with Wagner, St. Bonaventure in Kansas. He's trying to say none of my juco years should count

Starting point is 00:01:16 instead of just, you know, one of them not counting, and that therefore I could have one more year of play. But how would that work out if the five and five passes, where it's just you get five years once you graduate high school or once you turn 19? At that point, he would be exhausted by it, or would he be grandfathered in? So a lot of questions that come out of this, And I don't know, like, I guess if I was just guessing if I was making an educated guess, I'm kind of under the assumption he's not going to be granted the eligibility. But let's play the game. What if it does happen?

Starting point is 00:01:47 Because I do think it is a fascinating question from a standpoint of, you know, Kansas is filling up their roster and they're making moves as if counsel's not going to be on the team. And then what happens here? And I think that leads to the first question you have to ask here is if counsel does get granted that extra year, would he return to Kansas? I know it seems like a foregone conclusion that he would because Bill South certainly loved Melvin Counsel. I guess loves. He's still alive. I think counsel clearly loves his time, loved his time at Kansas, right? And I think in general, like the fan base loves Melvin Counsel. So like from all those standpoint, it's like, well, why wouldn't he be back,

Starting point is 00:02:28 right? But it's just like, when is this decision to come? What if the decision doesn't come until, you know, or August. And at that point in time, what if KU already has their roster pretty much set in stone? Now, we've seen KU bring players on in August, Diggy Koi, Johnny Furfee come to mind when you're thinking about some of those. But what complicates that a little bit more this go around is that the money standpoint. Because if you're, and that's part of it too. Like if it doesn't happen until that late in the game, a lot of teams are going to be out of money. It wouldn't just be Kansas. But like, I don't think Kansas is setting aside, hey, let's make sure we, we, you know, save this amount of money just in case Melvin Council gets eligible. I don't think that's happening.

Starting point is 00:03:16 Now, all it would take is, again, like a beloved player, maybe he comes back on a slightly cheaper deal that, you know, he knows he's going to get more NIL deals because he is the, at that point, if he's coming back, one of the faces of the team, and because he is so beloved. in the area, like he would probably get a lot of the local NIL deals where he would be able to make some of that money back. So it could certainly work out. But like, I don't know, the rumor I always heard about Melvin Council was that this past year he was making around a million dollars, maybe plus minus somewhere around there for this year at Kansas. But the way that the numbers in the market has skyrocketed, what would have Melvin

Starting point is 00:03:55 counsel have gotten if he were, if he did have another year and he was on the open market from the very get go in the transfer portal? Would he get two, two and a half million dollars? I mean, there was that Yahoo article that mentioned Leroyd-Blyden getting, I think, 2.1. And you could say, okay, well, Blighton's the better shooter. And as a younger player, you could say counsel did it at a power level, less efficient. So maybe it's just around there. Maybe you say he's getting $2 million.

Starting point is 00:04:19 But again, I don't think Kansas is reserving $2 million for him. So would the money line up or would he entertain another place? And would it be like a mutual decision to be like, hey, listen, Melvin, we would have to have you back, but because this decision is so late, it's in your best interest. You're going to get more playing time if you find somewhere else and more money if you go somewhere else or with that situation arise at Kansas. So again, I feel like he would be back if he gets in another year. I'm just kind of going through the process of being like, I don't think it's a guarantee though either because it could come too late in the game where Kansas has already like, what if Kansas does add another, you know, ball handler or combo guard from the portal and now you have Kenny Blyden and the other combo guard. And it's like, well, you can't have Melvin counsel from a standpoint of like you've promised all these guys roles. And it could just get sticky and complicated. Now, is it interesting at all that maybe Kansas hasn't been looking for another, you know, combo guard or point guard off the bench? Like it feels like most of the guys they've been looking into.

Starting point is 00:05:23 You think of Abdi Bashir, he's more of a shooting wing. You think of Dennis Parker Jr. more of a shooting wing. Are they intentionally leaving the, you know, backup? point guard roll empty in the case that he does have another year that they can basically be like, hey, you come on and we'll figure out who's coming off the bench. And worst case, if it gets August and you haven't joined, we'll try to make a G and Gala. We'll try to make a D.E. Coit type of addition to just give us an extra ball handler as like a ninth or tenth man or something like that, right? Now, let's say he does get the extra year and does come back to Kansas, despite some of those,

Starting point is 00:05:58 you know, questions. What does Kansas do? That becomes a very interesting conversation. 2. Does Taylin Kinney come off the bench? Does Leroyd-Blind come off the bench? Does Melvin counsel come off the bench? Because you're not going to start all three of those guys next to each other. Probably only starting two of them. So who comes off the bench? Because in counsel's case, you could say, hey, he's the returning starter. Of course, he's not going to come off the bench. The case for it would be, he would be electric energy off the bench. And by joining late, it would do the least to, you know, upset the balance of the team, so to speak. I also think, I actually do think like Melvin Counsel is kind of a perfect fit

Starting point is 00:06:42 player next to a Taylin Kinney or Leroyd-Blyden because both of them can be shooters. In the case of Kinney, you know, counsel becomes kind of a yin to his yang. Like, counsel's the more athletic of the two. He's the better defender. With Kinney, he's the better shotmaker. You know, with Blighton, you're getting three-point shooting if you're playing him next to counsel. So I do think that can work.

Starting point is 00:07:03 But my question more so with counsel wouldn't be how he would work with those guards. I think it actually is a good fit. It's how would he play next to Stokes? I don't know that counsel is a great fit next to Stokes because if Stokes is going to be initiating the offense a lot, we've seen it before. Counsel isn't as good when he's an off guard player. Now, if Stokes is going to be more of the Josh Jackson role as opposed to initiating as much, I mean, Jackson initiated here and there, right?

Starting point is 00:07:29 But he was sharing time initiating with DeMonte Graham and Frank Mason. So, you know, what does that look like? And how does that potentially impede on that? Do you have Taylor-Kinney come off the bench as your sixth man and take pressure off him? But I would imagine from Kenny's standpoint, like he came in as a McDonald-Fal American expecting to start. And that was one of the quotes he gave in talking about committing to KU,

Starting point is 00:07:52 that like he was told he was going to be handed the keys to the car. Well, you're not really handed to the keys of the car if you're, you know, in the passenger seat, right? And then you have Leroy Blyden who's like, okay, maybe he could be the perfect six man coming up from a new level. But again, if that Yahoo report is right, that he was getting $2.1 million, are you really paying that much for a sixth man? So it does get a little bit complicated with what you want to do here in general. I do think, you know, you'd be adding another leader to the fold. He'd be the best guard defender on the teams.

Starting point is 00:08:22 That would be a good thing. I would personally welcome another, you know, year of Melvin. He was such a fun player to watch. And yes, there would be certain questions that I just kind of went over. But I do think the roster around him, if you're looking at what they have right now, would work better than this past year's one. Here's the reason why. I just think they have more decent shooters on the floor at all times.

Starting point is 00:08:46 Like, it's not that I think KU has a bunch of knockdown elite shooters. Maybe they do. Maybe Blyden's that. Maybe Rosario can develop into that. Like, who knows? Maybe it can happen. But it's like, okay, Dawes is a compliment. shooter. Bluyden is a good shooter. I think Stokes will be a competent shooter. I think

Starting point is 00:09:01 Kenney will be a good shooter. I think Rosario will be a competent shooter. And when you look at all of those coming together, can you add another Ben shooter as well? There's just more at least competent shooters to good shooters than they were on this past year's team, right? And so I think it can work a little bit better. I also think there's this narrative going around that like counsel just completely tanked over the last whatever two months of the season. And I don't think that's totally accurate because in February, he still averaged 13 points, five rebounds, four assists on 32% from three. He had the really bad games in the two Big 12th tournament games and the first NCAA tournament game, but also like the regular season finale, he had 17 points, 10 assist, eight rebounds.

Starting point is 00:09:42 And in the St. John's game, like the last like 23 minutes of the game, he was awesome. Like, KU got down so much so you're not noticing it as much until the very end. But if we just look at from the three minute mark of the first half through the end of the game. So for that like 23 minute stretch of game time, he went five of seven, 13 points, five rebounds to assist in a block for just that portion of the contest. Like he did show up in, you know, make or break time at the end of the game for KU. I should probably also mention this. Like if you add Melvin council back on Bart Torvick, it changes KU from the 11th best team with the number 25 offense, number eight defense,

Starting point is 00:10:18 into being the ninth overall team with the number 23 offense and then number eight defense, the rated slightly better. But yeah, I guess. I guess overall the way I look at it, like, KU still needs one to two more decent to good players on the team. And I'm not entirely sure where that's going to come from. And so if Melvin Council wants to be one of those guys and it works out with the extra year, then sure, I'm all about it. All right, let's continue on. What is the difference for KU if they can add one of these top tier portal players, if they can somehow scrounge up enough money to land a player like Milan, Mom Chilovitz, or Tunei,

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Starting point is 00:12:00 Right now, Kansas, as I just mentioned, is ranked 11th on part Torvick in the preseason, which I guess kind of the funny part here, do you know what Kansas was ranked in the preseason on Torvick last year? Okay, the correct answer is 17th in the preseason. So the irony is, and I get it, like, I'm not trying to compare to last year and be like, well, you should be happy with a four seed in the second round exit. No, you shouldn't be happy. You should want more than that. My point, though, is that last year's team still had a. decent season. It wasn't as good as any of us wanted, but it has decent season. It wasn't like a disaster or anything. And this year's team has actually picked to be six spots higher on Torvik,

Starting point is 00:12:38 which is weird because you do look at the rosters. And like, if I were just to compare one to one, I'd be like, okay, Florey's a big advantage over what KU has at five this season, although I am a believer in Reeves and Mbia. You know, Dawes is a big upgrade over Tiller. If you're reviewing Stokes is the three, that's an upgrade over white. You look at the two black. Biden being compared to Peterson. Obviously, you're taking Peterson, though you hope to get more games out of Blyden. And then at the point guard position,

Starting point is 00:13:07 you're comparing Melvin Council to Tailen Kinney, which that becomes a difficult conversation because it's like, I think counsel probably would have a bigger impact of the two, but could Kenny be a more amiable piece with the rest of the roster? And then you look at the bench, though, and, you know, this team doesn't really have a bench right now, but last year's team had one and it didn't really make an impact,

Starting point is 00:13:26 so could it be better? So I don't know. It's hard to say, like, this one is better than, last years. What I think is different is that right now, there is more openness in the college basketball world. I think there's some teams at the top next year. You look at what Florida has coming back. You look at what Duke has coming in. Like, there are some teams that are going to be as elite as we've seen in the last couple of years. But I think maybe that this is just going out of a random number. I don't actually know like the exact numbers I would go with. But let's say like team seven

Starting point is 00:13:53 through 20 or whatever, I think it's a softer area than it was last year. if that makes sense. So Kansas could be theoretically like the same level of team as they were last year, but could be ranked higher because some of the other teams aren't as good, if that makes sense. So I do find that interesting. As much angst as it feels like the Kansas is still ranked 11th on Bartorvik, which would project them for, you know, by season end to get a three seed,

Starting point is 00:14:17 which I don't know, if you offered me a three seed right now in the NCAA tournament, I think I'd take it, right? Now, here's the deal. Can Kansas get one more big piece to get them over the edge, though, to where you're not just like, okay, you're a pretty decent team. You're one of the teams. And I think that would take getting one of these big portal players available, right?

Starting point is 00:14:34 You think of the Milan Mom Chilovich, a Tunei Yesafu. I heard from a bunch of people with the Tunei Yesafu episode that we did on the deep dive earlier, like, oh, he's staying in the draft. Let me just reiterate this. I've only seen one Twitter account, which, again, like it seems like a pretty knowledgeable dude on Twitter. I don't know. I think it has like 1,700 followers be like, Tunea Yesafu is staying in the draft. I'm cold by his agent. I haven't seen a single other outlet report on that.

Starting point is 00:14:58 So can we not just like, assume that's factual. Maybe it ends up being factual. I don't know, but like, I don't think it's a for sure thing. Anyway, point being, um, if you add Milan Momchilovich or tune to yes food to the Kansas roster, regardless of who it is, it jumps Kansas from 11th to sixth on Bart Torvik. And again, the likelihood of doing that is probably pretty small. It would take a donor offering a huge sum of money. Now, um, I don't know, could Bill Self throw in some of his contract money or something to make it happen, especially if it'd be his last year. That'd be pretty, I'm pretty cool if he did that.

Starting point is 00:15:30 But is that a big deal? Is being sixth compared to 11th? Is that such a huge deal, right? Here's what the 2026 final four teams look like on Bart Torvik in the preseason. Michigan was third. Yukon was 10th. Arizona was 12th and Illinois was 8th. Okay.

Starting point is 00:15:49 What if we go back to the 2025 final four? Florida was 37th. Houston was first, Duke was second. Auburn was 8th. Okay, let's go back one more, 2024. Yukon was third in the preseason. Purdue was first, and then you have Alabama at 19th, you have NC State at 69th, but, you know,

Starting point is 00:16:08 when you have a Cinderella, that's just like weird March Madden Cinderella things. Probably shouldn't look into preseason priors. But based on all that, it's not that big of a difference to be sixth versus 11th. Again, you're looking at 8, 8, 10, 12, making it to the final four, right? 37, 19.

Starting point is 00:16:25 So it's like, is there really that big a difference? between being number six and number 11, for instance. And you could say, okay, well, you know, what makes like Arizona is different, though, even though they were 12th in the preseason, it was 12th of the high ceiling because if Braden Burries and Coa Pete ended up hitting, it changes the ceiling of what they are. And both of them did hit and it did change the ceiling. Couldn't you make the same argument, though, for Kansas by saying, well, Kansas is 11th, but they do have a higher ceiling because if Tyrant Stokes hits and Taylor and Kinney hits,

Starting point is 00:16:56 same kind of idea, right? Now, what if we look at this from an inverse perspective? Like, how often do top six teams on Bart Torvick in the preseason do X and Y? I'm just going to look at last year. I don't know, it feels like every year is kind of a changing thing. And I could do this over and over again, but I'm running out of time. Last year, the Torvick preseason top six were this, Houston, Duke, Michigan, Florida, Purdue. And then for some reason, when I went back and looked at it, had BYU and St. John's, like, tied.

Starting point is 00:17:26 for the next spot. So anyway, I guess there'd be seven teams for six spots. But like those seven teams collectively combined for five top two seeds, five sweet 16s, five out of seven pretty good hit rate, three elite eights, almost half and a title winner. That's a pretty good track record for the teams that were preseason top six, right? And if we wanted to count St. John's is the number six preseason and not BYU, then you would be saying five of the six

Starting point is 00:17:53 made the second weekend. And the only team that didn't was a team who, got a freaking one seed and was just upended. So I think it's less of, you know, to be in a lead eight or to be a final four team, you have to be pre-ranked in this zone or in this spot. That's generally just not true. Teams make both of those like all the time from all over. The statement that I would be comfortable making from all this is if you are a preseason top six team, usually you have a really fun and excellent season. It's not a guarantee. Kansas a couple years ago was in that top six. Wasn't a very fun season. They got a 70, but for the most part, that is the case.

Starting point is 00:18:36 And so can Kansas be a final four team as constructed if you're the 11th team in the preseason on Bartor? Absolutely, right? But wouldn't you want to increase your odds as best chance possible? Wouldn't you want to have the very best chances and the very best team possible? I know, I certainly would, right? I don't know. If I'm playing blackjack, like, you know, just because I know I'm probably going to lose to the dealer doesn't mean I'm not going to try to play smart and try to increase my odds, you know. I'm not a rich donor. So I don't have any say in this. So nothing I can do, but talk about it here on my show.

Starting point is 00:19:11 But like, that's kind of the precipice approaching Bill Self and these rich donors. Can that one guy change everything? Or could you get there in what you have? All right, let's finish up with some news. KU baseball, KU softball, KU men's golf. This is Lockdown Jayhawks. Thanks again for joining us. Don't for you, anything to the show ad free at Lockdown Jayhawks.

Starting point is 00:19:35 Dot Supercast.com by joining the everyday air club. All right, KU baseball fell on Tuesday, and there's a tough one. They're up eight to six on Creighton. Bullpen's been a little shaky. Bodie Ray has been excellent closing the door in games, but kind of that middle relief is at times and up and down for KU this year. And it cost them against Creighton. They lose nine to eight and 13 innings on Tuesday.

Starting point is 00:19:55 night and Creighton just, I guess, has KU. Creighton and Arkansas, man, those two teams. Like, I'm, I can't watch KU have to play those teams anymore. Creighton obviously beat Kansas in the first round of the, or their first game of the NCAA tournament last year as well. And it dropped KU, I think, just like one spot on RPI or something like that. So you don't want to be losing games, but it didn't, you know, wreck anything. The bigger deal for KU is this weekend in the three game set against West Virginia.

Starting point is 00:20:22 But, you know, it does add more importance to win. some of those games if you want to be in the best position possible to be hosting because KU is on a very fine line right now if they want to be potentially a top eight seed which gets to host through the super regional right. Now meanwhile for KU softball they're I think looking good to make the NCAA tournament but certainly wouldn't hurt if they can gather another win in the big 12th tournament. They've got a good opponent if they can do it. You would definitely feel good about it. They're in the four five matchup. They're the five. UCF is the four seed.

Starting point is 00:20:52 That'll be an 11 a.m. on Thursday. It's a single elimination tournament. So this isn't, you know, the double losses where you get more chances. KU was one and two against UCF in the regular season. And at the time of play, UCF was a top 25 opponent. So the good news is by like an RPI perspective, I believe this will help KU whether they win or lose. But a real good opportunity to, again, I think Kansas should be an NCAA tournament team regardless,

Starting point is 00:21:18 but I feel like you win that game. You're going to feel even better about yourself. right now speaking to kU softball some awards came out today and the uh usa today's sports network big 12 coach of the year was uh jennifer mcfalls the head coach for the k u softball team so that was really cool to see and well deserved obviously with you know the turnaround that she's had there meanwhile haley cripe was named the all big 12 co defensive player of the year so cool honor there and then k u had a couple players named to the All Big 12 first team in both Ella Boyer, who was named, I believe, the freshman of the year in the conference, and then Anna Solis, just a really good year.

Starting point is 00:21:57 And that's exciting, too, that you have the freshman of the year in the conference that it's like, what could you build out of this long term and already what's been a really good season. So be keeping an eye out for KU softball on Thursday against UCF at 11. Last bit of news here comes from KU men's golf. We mentioned recently the KU Women's Golf team is making the NCAA tournament for, I think, the fourth time already in the Lindsay Cool era, which they had like one NCAA tournament appearance all time in program history before she took over and has done a great job there. Now, KU Men's Golf moving on to the NCAA tournament, and it'll be the 10th consecutive

Starting point is 00:22:31 NCAA regional appearance for the KU Men's Golf Team. They got put in the Athens Regional. It is also the 26th NCAA regional appearance in program history. So we'll be keeping an eye on the golf seasons coming to a a close here as well. And yeah, I guess speaking of golf, Gary Woodland going at it this weekend, too. See if he can make any noise before the PGA championship next week. All right, that'll do do it for this episode of Lockdown Jayhawks. You can find our show anywhere you at your podcast, including on our YouTube page, we'll have a Milan Mom Chilovich deep dive coming out for you as well.

Starting point is 00:23:05 So make sure to tune into that one and see you next time with LOJ.

Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - WHAT IF Melvin Council is Granted Another Year + Do Kansas Jayhawks NEED Another Big-Time Transfer?

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