Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - What Kansas Jayhawks Are Impacted Most by the Return of Kevin McCullar for 2023-2024

Episode Date: May 26, 2023

Kevin McCullar is returning to Lawrence for his second year with the Kansas Jayhawks basketball team. Will he play more at the three (small forward) or at the four (power forward)? What other players could he impact playing time the most of, such as Nick Timberlake, KJ Adams, Arterio Morris, Elmarko Jackson and Marcus Adams? And who stands to gain the most from his return such as Bill Self and Hunter Dickinson.Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!BirddogsToday's episode is brought to you by Birddogs. Go to birddogs.com/lockedoncollege and when you enter promo code, LOCKEDONCOLLEGE, they’ll throw in a free custom birddogs Yeti-style tumbler with every order.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

On today's Locked on Jayhawks, how will Kevin McCullers return to Kansas for another season impact the rest of the team? Who will be impacted the most? Who will it help the most on the team? That on today's 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. Johnson, you can hear me as well, Monday through Friday from 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 talking more about Kevin McCullough returning to the fold for KU. Who else does it impact on the team in terms of playing time, in terms of positively helping them? All that on today's episode of the show.

First, though, today's episode of Locked on Jayhawks is brought to you by Bird Dogs. Go to birddogs.com slash locked on college and when you enter promo code locked on college, they'll throw in a free custom Bird Dogs Yeti style tumbler with every order. Who does Kevin Kohler's impact return the most? We'll get into some specific players who it impacts in terms of playing time the most, who it impacts in terms of you know playing time most who it impacts in terms of uh just you know being good for them on the floor but i want to start with the root of

this question which comes down to where exactly will kevin mcculler be playing now i think the the real answer here is that he'll probably be playing a little bit of both but is he going to be more of a three is he going to be more of a three is he going to be more of a four right is is he in the starting lineup if your projected starting lineup is dewan harris nick timberlake kevin mcculler kj adams and hunter dickinson which that's not the unanimous starting lineup but i think it's the most popular one that i've seen going around right now with ku fans is he going to play more minutes at the three or does it even matter? You know, if he starts at the three, is he going to play half his minutes at the three? Is he going to play half his minutes

at the four? But I think if he plays a majority of his minutes or when he is out there specifically playing a three role, kind of that small, small forward role. I think if KU does this, it's going to be about trust, right? I mean, that would be the trust lineup, right? You have Kevin McCuller in there with KJ Adams and DeJuan Harris, your kind of trust lineup. It would also be a super great defensive lineup. KJ at the four, Kevin McCuller at the three, DeJuan Harris at the one. Those are three good defenders. And in the case of Kevin McCuller and DeJuan, those might be the two best defenders in the Big 12. So that would be a super good defensive lineup that you could throw out there with. I kind of lean toward the idea that, yeah, that would be the starting lineup, that Kevin

would be starting at three, at least at the beginning of the season, right? Maybe we get to January or late December or something, and there's just not enough shooting, there's not enough spacing on the floor. And things do adjust and change around. But I think at the start of the season, Bill Self goes with the guys he trusts and wants that defensive side of things, which is why I would expect that to be the case. But even though I would expect that to be the starting lineup, I do still expect him to play minutes at the four. Maybe, though, you get more minutes of him at the three than you do at the four, right?

Maybe he plays 20 minutes per game at the three. Maybe he plays 10 minutes per game at the four position. And then that would leave you with more minutes at the four right maybe he plays 20 minutes per game at the three maybe he plays 10 minutes per game at the four position and then that would leave you with more minutes at the four in that situation now what if it does change up what if uh it does get to a point where kevin mcculler is more of your four man he's starting as a four you have kj adams coming off the bench as a super sub to either fill in for uh kevin mcculler when he's off and or hunter dickinson when he's off at the five position and you're just kind of plugging him and playing him whenever this would be more about I think offense and floor spacing if you're you're running out this lineup with Kevin at the four because it would allow you to basically you'd be subbing KJ Adams for an extra guard out there whether it's an extra ball

handler like Artario Morris and Marco Jackson who's athletic or getting you know Artario and El Marco in there with Nick Timberlake at the three and Kevin at the four. It would just give you more spacing, more offense, more creation, more shooting out on the floor if that's what they want to go with. And you would have that better chance of shooting threes well, given that specific lineup, which could be one of the questions for this year's team,

which means that it wouldn't be shocking at all to see that eventually be the be shocking at all to see that eventually be the lineup KU goes to. Heck, it wouldn't even be surprising to see KU at times close games. Like if you're trying to sit on a defensive lead, we saw Bill Self throw KJ Adams his freshman year as just a defensive player in the last couple possessions of games to try to get a stop. Like he was on the floor for the last play of the national championship game. Could you see if KU is up four with a minute left? Could you see KU throw out a lineup where KJ is at the five, Kevin McCuller is at the

four? You have, you know, Artario Morris, DeJuan Harris pressuring the ball at the one and two. And then maybe Elmarco Jackson is at the three or you have, I don't know, Marcus Adams before and McCuller at the three, just the more switchable lineup. I don't know, but there are a lot of different lineup, you know, machinations that you can kind of use Kevin McCuller in that four spot. And I expect him to play both positions. So I think you're going to get it divided a little bit of both at the beginning of the year. I do expect him to start three and I would say, yeah,

maybe 20 minutes per game at the three, maybe 10 minutes per game at the four. But it wouldn't shock me if as the season goes on, maybe he starts at the four, maybe it's 15 minutes at each, right? Or maybe it's, you know, 18 minutes at the four and 12 minutes at the three. And, you know, maybe him being a starter at one or the other means more minutes at that one or the other. It could still be a 15, 15 split, but realistically he's playing both either way for double-digit minutes per game. So keep that in mind as we go through some of this stuff. Now, as far as which players,

which players would it impact the most in terms of playing time? Which players would it impact the most in terms of maybe helping them stay on the court or hurting them, you know, possibly on the court? We'll get to that coming up next with locked on Jayhawks. First of the episode of the show brought to you by bird dogs, bird dogs fit super comfortably.

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They're going to fit just nice. If you have, you know, a couple too many beers and you're feeling a little bloated, not a worry. You're perfect with bird dogs. So go to birddogs.com slash locked on college. And when you enter promo code locked on college, they'll throw in a free custom bird dogs yeti style tumbler with every order okay uh on to what this means for playing time of some other players well um if you see him play more minutes at the three this has a big impact on one of if not all of arterial morris uh nick timberlake and el marco jackson so if you view dewan harris i i guess pretty much one through three at those one through three spots you have 120 minutes to divvy out right but you know dewan harris is i think he played 34 minutes per game last year now you could convince me that goes down to 32 this year because you do have more ball handlers that you trust more

in theory. And last year with Bobby and Joe, they never really secured the spot in the rotation. So maybe with more competition, the number does go down to 32, but most often we don't see numbers go down on starting players from one year to the next. So I think it's just safe to say, let's just put it at the same number, 34 minutes per game for DeJuan. That means that you have 86 minutes remaining. Like I said with Kevin, even if he was just starting three and he's playing more minutes there, let's say he's playing 20 minutes there and then he's giving you another 10 minutes at the four position. Now you're left with about 65, 66 minutes per game to divvy out at the one through three positions for these three players and

obviously this it doesn't even include chris johnson and jamari mcdowell um this would create less opportunity for both of those guys but i'm not sure there would have been much opportunity for chris johnson or jamari mcdowell anyway that i don't know how much it does impact but then that means again at that point you have 66 minutes to divvy out with Artario Morris, Elmarco Jackson, and Nick Timberlake. If you just divvy it out evenly, you give 22 minutes to each guy, maybe that could work.

Was Artario Morris under the impression he was going to be playing starter-level minutes, though? Does that need to go up? Elmarco Jackson, your top-rated recruit, how good is he going to be? If Elmarco Jackson has an MJ Rice-type season where he just struggles to make the rotation, then all of a sudden it's like oh no DeJuan's playing 35 minutes Kevin's playing 32 minutes Artario's playing 30 minutes Nick Timberlake is playing like 30 minutes

but I don't really expect that to happen I expect a Marco Jackson to be a solid contributor for you in some role or form or fashion on this team and then you get into the the part with nick timberlake where it's like well in overall as as a player like when you combine the defense and the ball handling and everything he might be the first but because he has the best shooting ability the team and this team needs that he's probably number one most important of that list so you could convince me nick timberlake because the defense struggled a bit at Towson. If the defense isn't there, that Bill Self says, ah, but I trust Arterio and Omarco more. And Timberlake's only getting at 15 minutes per game. And now you have 50 minutes, 51 minutes to divvy out between Arterio and Omarco Jackson.

And one can play 30, another can play 20, or both can play kind of in the mid to high 20s at that point. But realistically, you need Nick Timberlake in as much as possible to be a floor spacer on this team. can play 20 or both can play kind of in the mid to high 20s at that point but realistically you need nick timberlake in as much as possible to be a floor spacer on this team i don't think it would be crazy for him to play 30 minutes per game for him to play 28 minutes per game because of just the necessity of the three-point shooting you don't have a lot of that and you kind of need that guy and so if he does play 28 minutes per game now all of a sudden you're left with only 38 minutes to give out to arterial morris and el marco jackson so they both play 19 one i'm gonna play 25 and the other's only gonna play 13 right it gets hard so if kevin mccall is

playing more of his minutes at the three one of those gets pinched a little bit or all three of them just get pinched a little bit and shave off a few minutes here or there now if Kevin is more so playing the four right let's flip this to eventually gets a point later in the season where KU starts the the year out with McCuller at the three KJ at the four and Kevin's playing 20 minutes per game the three 10 minutes per game at the four is kind of a backup when KJ goes out and then later in the year Bill's like no I think it's going to be better if we have more floor spacing and Kevin starts at the four KJ is out. And then later in the year, Bill's like, no, I think it's going to be better if we have more floor spacing. And Kevin starts at the four. KJ is going to be our backup for we'll still get KJ 2022, 24 minutes per game as a backup for slash five. He'll still be playing starter level minutes, but we'll now have more minutes with Kevin McCuller at the four. And now Kevin's going

to play 20 of his minutes at the four and 10 of his minutes at the three and now all of a sudden that math equation that you get into um about arterio morris and marco jackson nick timberlake you have 10 more minutes to divvy out and instead of what we cut it down to where it was like oh if you give nick timberlake 28 minutes per game now you only have 38 minutes for arterio morris and marco jackson instead of that it would be now we have 48 minutes for those guys. And that seems a lot more doable for the combination of those two to where you could further play some of those guys. But then who it would negatively impact in terms of the playing time at the four

is I think Parker Brown. I mean, this one kind of goes in line with the Chris Johnson and Jamari McDowell, but I think maybe not to the same extent. If KJ is playing a lot of his minutes at the four, maybe Parker Brown will play five, six, seven, eight minutes per game as the backup center. But if KJ is coming off the bench and he specifically you're looking to fill him minutes as that kind of super sub role, then he officially is playing all the backup five minutes. So Parker Brown gets knocked out of the way officially, but KJ might play the backup five minutes, even if he is the starting four, just when Dickinson goes out. So I don't know that that might, that might not affect things there. Um, it would

certainly affect KJ Adams and Marcus Adams. So in this scenario where Kevin McCuller was playing 20 minutes per game at the three and just 10 minutes per game at the four, that would leave you a 30 minutes per game at the four. You have 20 of those to KJ Adams. He plays another eight as the backup center. Boom. He's playing 28 minutes per game. And then you're still left with 10 minutes at the four. Boom. Marcus Adams plays 10 minutes per game. Bit of a developmental end of the bench rotation type role. Maybe he can work into more if he clicks. And then you feel like he, if you got some flashes out of him, that he's ready to take that jump in his sophomore year and can maybe be one of those ku players who jumps up to being like a really good player in year two but if kevin mcculler is playing more of his minutes at the four and kevin's giving

you 20 minutes per game specifically just at the four position kj's now moved to the super sub role okay kj's playing eight minutes per game as the backup five let's say at that point you know you're even given KJ only 15 minutes at the backup four to Kevin that gives KJ 23 minutes per game that only leaves you with five minutes to give Marcus Adams and maybe that's not the end of the world right it's a true freshman coming into a team that has national title hopes and you know if he's if he's ready he'll prove more into it but it certainly puts it puts a pinch on one of kj adams or marcus adams if he is in at the four so both those guys either of those guys could be drastically affected depending on how he ends up playing and then you get into another situation

here i mean it seems that i i don't know that I would expect KU to necessarily land Grant Nelson but I don't know that I would be surprised by it at this point either like it seems like there still might be some sort of communication there and that you know I think KU is content holding in what they have with their 11 scholarship players but if Grant Nelson's like hey I want to come to KU, and you're talking about, and you could insert name here, right? Arthur Kaluma, Julian Phillips, whoever, right? If one of these good transfer portal players

who's at the upper tier, elite tier of who's still available is like, yeah, but I really do want to come to KU. I don't think KU would be like, nah, sorry. It would probably be like, okay, let's have more competition. Let's have more talent, and it'll figure it out from there. If anybody's unhappy, we're fine. We're going to get good players no matter what.

And it would suck if that were the case, if it led to any more movements from players that you wouldn't obviously want to leave. But then that would get even dicier with trying to figure out the minutes of where those guys go. Heck, what if Ernest Uday shocked some people and decided to come back to KU, right? Then there goes the backup center minutes that KJ was going to have an opportunity to play to get himself

even more minutes in the game. So if now Kevin's playing the four and all the backup minutes are going to a different center, KJ only playing 15 minutes a game. And how much is that going to make him pissed off about how the season went after he was the big 12, most improved player last year. Would he transfer this season? Would he transfer next year? Right. You get into a lot of difficult situations.

Should some stuff happen here. So I think it almost, it's it behests Kansas. If Kevin can play a majority of his minutes, I almost feel like at the three in terms of, I don't know, maybe the political side of things, right? That standpoint with KJ, then again, maybe you would have to worry about, well, would Artario Morris and Marco Jackson be upset if he's playing at more of the three? But with Morris, he already used his free transfer. You know what I mean?

And then with Nick Timberlake, he's in his last year of school. So from like a playing time headache standpoint, it might be better if he plays the three. But from a standpoint of what's going to make the team best, it might end up Kevin McCuller be at the four. And that could be a butting of heads really at the beginning of the season for KU this year. Let's finish up.

Who does this help or hurt most? Kevin McCuller coming back to the team, that with locked on Jayhawks. Who does this help or hurt with Kevin McCuller coming back to the team with locked on Jayhawks? I think it's hard to say it would hurt anyone. I think if you go back to the playing time discussion, you could argue this hurts KJ Adams

because ideally if, like for KJ Adams to get his most run at the four you need good shooters around it right and uh for for Kevin that's been kind of the inconsistent so far in his career so like you know I guess you could say that because it just hurts his playing time but I don't think it hurts his level of play in terms of the actual level of play i i think this helps mainly three guys one is nick timberlake um so from a nick timberlake perspective he's an elite shooter and has not been known to be a good defender now he's going to be taking on less of a role with ku than he has been at towson so i'd imagine and because bill self is going to demand it his defense will be better this year than it was last year I feel very confident saying that but will it be to a point

where he's a really good defender I don't know probably not can you just get to what Isaiah Moss was Isaiah Moss was like a below average defender but he was a floor spacer he had threes for you on a team that needed that like you had Doku obviously couldn't shoot threes Devon Dotson wasn't shooting threes very well like Ochia at that point was kind of inconsistent you had christian brown off the bench you needed isaiah moss and that's how i view nick timberlake here and so if you're going to have someone who you maybe do worry about well would they get would they get targeted on defense having other good defenders around them that can be good team defenders that can maybe stick on their guy and that can just kind of insulate you are so important.

Well, now, if Nick Timberlake goes out there, there's a good chance that he's going to be on the floor at the same time as DeJuan Harris and Kevin McCuller. And now you have two of the best defenders in the country that kind of insulate your defense, which makes it even more fine to have one guy who maybe isn't like a plus defender. So that's a positive for Nick Timberlake

so that he can just more focus on doing what he does which is hit threes because you have the other pieces around him where you know it'd be one thing if you put nick timberlake next to nadir tharp you might not be able to play nick timberlake as much right because of the fact that you have like you you can only have so many holes on on one end of the floor or something right and now you don't really have to worry about that. So that is a huge positive for Nick Timberlake. And it also, I think, gives more minutes to Nick Timberlake because if Kevin McCullers out there, you know, he hasn't been known for being a knockdown shooter.

It further adds to the idea that, well, whoever's playing this position for us needs to shoot threes really well. And that is Nick Timberlake. So I think it certainly helps him a lot. I think it really helps Hunter Dickinson too. With Hunter Dickinson, I mean, first of all, with Kevin, he's a good passer, good feel for the game. So that's another guy that can kind of enter into the post. Kevin McCuller is a really good cutter,

really smart player. And Hunter Dickinson, I think is going to have himself a fun little day. You know, you might watch the Nuggets in the NBA finals right now. You might see Nikola Jokic throw it to guys as cut. And if you're good cutters you're going to get benefited with some easy buckets right we've seen christian brown be able to do that with with the nuggets that's going to be kind of a it'll be a light version because i'm not going to try to say hunter dickinson is nicole yokich you know but um dickinson has good feel for the game and good passing acumen and with mcculler his cutting ability there's going to be some good baskets this year where ku is able to just have mcculler his cutting ability there's going to be some good baskets this year where ku is able to just have mcculler beat him and dickinson catches the ball on the block or in

the high post and is able to feed the cutting mcculler so it's good for dickinson there i think it's also good for dickinson in the same vein of kind of the defensive insulation conversation um with dickinson he's a solid enough rim protector he's a good kind of post-up defender he's more of a drop big man though he's not somebody who's going to defend out in space or maybe sometimes struggles in pick and roll. So what's the best way to help a center? Have good perimeter defenders that, A, know how to communicate and work well in team defense.

B, know how to trap the post. Kevin McCuller good at that. And C, having players that are going to cut other perimeter players from even getting to the lane where you have to worry about it. And with Kevin Kohler and Dwan Harris, you apply so much ball pressure and you have guys that can cut them off before they even drive in and get to the lane that it helps Hunter Dickinson on the defensive end, helps him maybe stay out of foul trouble. And then you have less concern further helping him. The third guy in the final guy is Bill Self. Just having more trusted players, having a leader you can go to, right?

I think he's going to be the vocal leader on the team, which I think is very important to have on each and every team. You can lead by example, but I don't think all your leaders can lead by example, right? Like it's fine if let's say you have two main leaders on the team. If one leads by example and one leads by vocalization, I think that's kind of perfect uh maybe you can have too many vocal guys but you know i think back to like the 2020 to 21 team like marcus garrett was your team leader he was more of a lead by example and i don't know how much that mattered to anything but you look back to some of the great ku teams you had those vocal leaders i think it is important jalen wilson was the guy the last two

years for you i mean i guess christian brown i don't know he just more like to at people. I don't know how much he was a vocal leader in the locker room, but I don't think it could have hurt. Um, and then you had, you go back to like 2018 Devante Graham, kind of a vocal leader as he was for really a couple of years, right? You have to have some of those guys that can help you out. And with DeJuan Harris, he's more of a lead by example guy, right? With, with some of the newcomers, it's hard to be that guy. If you're new with Kevin McCuller, he can be that guy. You have that trust with Bill Self. It's always best for him when he has Bill Self experienced players in the team. Now you have three or five starters back. So those three, I think have the biggest benefit from Kevin coming back. All right, that'll do it for this episode of Locked on Jayhawks. We're going to finish out

this week. We'll have a Saturday episode because it'll be a long weekend. Does Kevin McCullough returning cement KU as the preseason number one? I say yes. We'll discuss why in tomorrow's episode. This is Locked on Jayhawks. You can find us anywhere you get any of your podcasts, or you can find us on YouTube, like and subscribe to the show. See you next time with LOJ.