BREAKING: Elijah Hawkins to transfer

Recruiting is nobody's strength today. Players are purchased, not recruited.

When you go out to get a better car do you recruit it or pay for it?

This is mostly nonsense. Are there players that care about money above all else? Yes, but they are still in the minority.

If a player is getting several similar offers it will come down to the relationship with the coach, chance to play/compete, school, etc.

A more expensive car is not always a better car, or a better fit for the person. The Gophers can't afford the most expensive cars, but they can afford a nice vehicle with enough bells and whistles to drive them comfortably to the NCAA tournament on a regular basis.
 

That's the issue with the recent landscape

It essentially nullifies recruiting honestly, it has become how much $ you offering and everything else is secondary.

It actually has increased the importance of X's and O's
 

This is mostly nonsense. Are there players that care about money above all else? Yes, but they are still in the minority.
Not among those that have high end ability. The coach is going to certainly play into recruiting in a big way in terms of scheme, personality and just being there- but that is going to become a tie breaker for high end players. They are going to be viewing themselves as employees. If they can get an extra 100k- 9 times out of 10 they are going to take it. I would have at age 20 and so would you have.

Players the next rung down - sure they are going more to the place and coach and not a lot of money will be on the table. They are how you build depth. Now there is the Canadian angle... :)
 

Kids chasing money is the new norm in college basketball recruiting. If Ben is a good recruiter, then he has to adapt his skills to the times. Otherwise, recruiting will not be his strength.

Sure. But teams from top to bottom of college basketball are having issues with the transfer portal. This isn't unique to Minnesota or Ben Johnson.
 

Not even close to the line. Provoke at will. I, for one, enjoy it because it's so much fun to see little pea brains explode.
Little Pea Brains...oh no I am sure everyone is very concerned that rando keyboard warrior insulted their intelligence 🤣
 


lol....If you want to pretend like other schools aren't losing starters that is on you. I am not going to waste my time pulling together readily available examples of other starters leaving for you.

I'm not pushing a specific narrative but I know that is your thing to always look for or pretend there is some ulterior motive behind everything.....so more power too you.....my fault for engaging with you....
Has he claimed its all clickbait yet?

I remember when he was so sure that Oregon and Washington would never be invited to join the Big Infinity...he must have spam posted for weeks about it claiming all stories about it were just liars clickbaiting and he knew better. Oops :D
 


Not among those that have high end ability. The coach is going to certainly play into recruiting in a big way in terms of scheme, personality and just being there- but that is going to become a tie breaker for high end players. They are going to be viewing themselves as employees. If they can get an extra 100k- 9 times out of 10 they are going to take it. I would have at age 20 and so would you have.

Players the next rung down - sure they are going more to the place and coach and not a lot of money will be on the table. They are how you build depth. Now there is the Canadian angle... :)
Just say Rayology
 





Sure. But teams from top to bottom of college basketball are having issues with the transfer portal. This isn't unique to Minnesota or Ben Johnson.
The point is ... of all the key elements of a head coach, UMN ignored most of them and were strident about focusing on the one that was going to blowup their face. They caved to political pressure to start checking demographic identity boxes rather than focusing on core skills.
 

The point is ... of all the key elements of a head coach, UMN ignored most of them and were strident about focusing on the one that was going to blowup their face. They caved to political pressure to start checking demographic identity boxes rather than focusing on core skills.

Yeah.....I don't think anyone needs you to explain that you don't like Ben Johnson. You've made it pretty clear all throughout the season. I just hope Williams Arena doesn't leak over the summer. You'll be telling us how it's Johnson's fault for not patching the roof.
 

That's the issue with the recent landscape

It essentially nullifies recruiting honestly, it has become how much $ you offering and everything else is secondary.

It actually has increased the importance of X's and O's
I think all of this is an opportunity.

It doesn't matter that the Gophers don't have a history of championships, or a state of the art arena, or a celebrity coach, or the very best facilities, or an academic reputation on par with Stanford. And so on. Just produce the $$.

That's doable. $$ is doable. The U of M can produce more $$ than most schools. So, actually, the Gophers are in great shape.

So why is everyone so upset?
 



I think all of this is an opportunity.

It doesn't matter that the Gophers don't have a history of championships, or a state of the art arena, or a celebrity coach, or the very best facilities, or an academic reputation on par with Stanford. And so on. Just produce the $$.

That's doable. $$ is doable. The U of M can produce more $$ than most schools. So, actually, the Gophers are in great shape.

So why is everyone so upset?
So far we haven't had enough dollars to keep our own guys (Hawkins and Payne). My assumption is that they would have stayed here if the money was even. So right now it doesn't seem like we have adequate funding.
 

Exactly. So why was just recruiting skill enough to hire an inexperienced head coach who need training wheels and didn't check off one other box for critical coach skills?
Why don't you ask someone who hired him? Pretty dumb (almost USSR stupid) to ask people who had nothing to do with it thousands of times why it was done.
 

This is mostly nonsense. Are there players that care about money above all else? Yes, but they are still in the minority.

If a player is getting several similar offers it will come down to the relationship with the coach, chance to play/compete, school, etc.

A more expensive car is not always a better car, or a better fit for the person. The Gophers can't afford the most expensive cars, but they can afford a nice vehicle with enough bells and whistles to drive them comfortably to the NCAA tournament on a regular basis.
Did Hawkins or Payne leave to get similar offers to what they had been offered here? Or is that notion mostly nonsense?
 

Little Pea Brains...oh no I am sure everyone is very concerned that rando keyboard warrior insulted their intelligence 🤣
If you think I was including you, maybe your self esteem is a little out of tune.
 

Yeah.....I don't think anyone needs you to explain that you don't like Ben Johnson. You've made it pretty clear all throughout the season. I just hope Williams Arena doesn't leak over the summer. You'll be telling us how it's Johnson's fault for not patching the roof.
Well, so much for that. Lose the argument and go for the ad hominem fallacy.
 

Why don't you ask someone who hired him? Pretty dumb (almost USSR stupid) to ask people who had nothing to do with it thousands of times why it was done.
Did I ask a rhetorical question or not?
 

Any chance he comes back like those two guys at UNC just did?

Pick and roll with Payne down in college station?
 

Any chance he comes back like those two guys at UNC just did?

Pick and roll with Payne down in college station?
If that happens, set up a preseason game with the Aggies just to give them Battle x 2. Great promotion opportunity too. Benedict Arnold three corner hats. Tee shirts with a growling Goldy chasing down the dodgers. I’m sure creative people could figure out something better.
 

If that happens, set up a preseason game with the Aggies just to give them Battle x 2. Great promotion opportunity too. Benedict Arnold three corner hats. Tee shirts with a growling Goldy chasing down the dodgers. I’m sure creative people could figure out something better.

Hoping Payne and Hawkins play in 2025 NIT
 

No but if we had been a tourny team at least people would feel better about the prospects that Ben could ride the storm out and probably put something together. Coming off an up and down year where we lost early in the NIT and being raided is pretty demoralizing.

It’s cumulative - my dobber is down and I don’t really care anymore
 

pretend like other schools aren't losing starters
First of all, just starters? That’s not it.

Do you really think this level of depression/hysteria by the fanbase would happen if Hawkins was staying but Mike Mitchell was leaving??

Nope. So no, even losing starters is not comparable to the thing I’ve consistently said from the beginning: other schools losing a player of the magnitude of losing Hawkins for us.

I can buy that Wisc losing Hepburn is comparable. That’s one. You haven’t the slightest clue how many other schools are in the same boat. I’ll wild guess it’s in the range of 5% of P6 schools.


However, if we define starter as anyone who started 33% or more of games last season, I wild guess that is less than 50% of the P6 schools. Again, you have no idea what the true number is. You want it to be like 90%, and will tell anyone who will listen that that’s what the number is.

For some reason you’re desperate to push the narrative that Hawkins leaving is happening to almost every school and it’s just a run of the mill thing. I have no idea why you want that to be true. It’s not.
 

For some reason you’re desperate to push the narrative that Hawkins leaving is happening to almost every school and it’s just a run of the mill thing. I have no idea why you want that to be true. It’s not.
Good lord you are tiring.....You are just making crap up at this point and have made my decision to return you to my ignore list an easy one.
 

You claim I’m making everything up, but you never supplied a single shred of evidence beyond Wisconsin in support of your belief.

Lazy and lame.

I’m happy that I debunked your claim and exposed it.
 

I can buy that Wisc losing Hepburn is comparable. That’s one. You haven’t the slightest clue how many other schools are in the same boat. I’ll wild guess it’s in the range of 5% of P6 schools.
I'm not really trying to weigh in to the bigger fight going on here, but off the top of my head in the B10, you've got Perkins from Iowa and Omoruyi and Mag at Rutgers leaving for bigger paydays (perhaps other factors at play, too). OSU lost Gayle, Key, and Okpara and Michigan lost McDaniel, but they had coaching changes. Gillis at Purdue was a key rotation player, if not a starter. I'm sure there are others if I looked into it, but if the B10 is typical, it's considerably more than 5% of P5 teams dealing with a lost starter - probably over 50%, if had to guess
 

I'm not really trying to weigh in to the bigger fight going on here, but off the top of my head in the B10, you've got Perkins from Iowa and Omoruyi and Mag at Rutgers leaving for bigger paydays (perhaps other factors at play, too). OSU lost Gayle, Key, and Okpara and Michigan lost McDaniel, but they had coaching changes. Gillis at Purdue was a key rotation player, if not a starter. I'm sure there are others if I looked into it, but if the B10 is typical, it's considerably more than 5% of P5 teams dealing with a lost starter - probably over 50%, if had to guess
As I specified in the post, my wild guess was less than 50% for losing any starter. Might be slightly low but guessing it’s nowhere near the 90+% that MVC was implying.

Hawkins wasn’t just any ol starter for us. Proof: what if Hawkins was staying but Mike Mitchell was leaving? (Hate to pick on MM, but it proves the point.)
 

I'm not really trying to weigh in to the bigger fight going on here, but off the top of my head in the B10, you've got Perkins from Iowa and Omoruyi and Mag at Rutgers leaving for bigger paydays (perhaps other factors at play, too). OSU lost Gayle, Key, and Okpara and Michigan lost McDaniel, but they had coaching changes. Gillis at Purdue was a key rotation player, if not a starter. I'm sure there are others if I looked into it, but if the B10 is typical, it's considerably more than 5% of P5 teams dealing with a lost starter - probably over 50%, if had to guess
There is no fight going on....just MPLS being MPLS.....That said, nice list and you didin't even include Wisconsin. You have far more patience than I do to compile info for him to prove that other teams are losing starters too, not just us.
 

First of all, just starters? That’s not it.

Do you really think this level of depression/hysteria by the fanbase would happen if Hawkins was staying but Mike Mitchell was leaving??

Nope. So no, even losing starters is not comparable to the thing I’ve consistently said from the beginning: other schools losing a player of the magnitude of losing Hawkins for us.

I can buy that Wisc losing Hepburn is comparable. That’s one. You haven’t the slightest clue how many other schools are in the same boat. I’ll wild guess it’s in the range of 5% of P6 schools.


However, if we define starter as anyone who started 33% or more of games last season, I wild guess that is less than 50% of the P6 schools. Again, you have no idea what the true number is. You want it to be like 90%, and will tell anyone who will listen that that’s what the number is.

For some reason you’re desperate to push the narrative that Hawkins leaving is happening to almost every school and it’s just a run of the mill thing. I have no idea why you want that to be true. It’s not.
Wisconsin - Hepburn
Iowa - Perkins

Kind of run of the mill if you ask me, this is even the same position.
 




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