Comparison of Coron Williams to CJ

[Deac83]

If my aunt had balls she'd be my uncle. Ability to work hard is just as much a skill as leaping ability or shooting ability. Few in history matched Muggsy in that area.

Of course Travis has a lot of responsibility for that. But given his situation that responsibility is to himself, not to us.

Ultimately the responsibility to get a player to maximize his potential for the sake of the team or the program (or to go a different direction if he doesn't) is on the coach. Our coach has not lived up to that responsibility.

Well Bzz must have done a heck of a job on CMM in the last year. Add Cav to that as well.

 

[stevewhite14]

FWIW, Travis has had the best career of that class of five that Dino blessed us with.

 

[RChildress107]

Well Bzz must have done a heck of a job on CMM in the last year. Add Cav to that as well.

And Bzz should get some credit for that. Unfortunately for him getting your players to play hard should be a minimum expectation for a coach. Given the university he is at and the talent he had coming in and has now if Buzz has any ability to develop/motivate players it will show up in the win column.

If he gets this team to 9-9 in the ACC it shouldn't be enough to save his job (shouldn't be judged on just one year) but it would demonstrate more coaching ability than he has shown so far.

 

[Strickland33]

Well Bzz must have done a heck of a job on CMM in the last year. Add Cav to that as well.

Something tells me that credit for CMM's progress should go to Chill. That said, props for Cav and Andre (and, to a lesser extent, Devin) go to Buzz. The irony is that, in the case of both Cav and CMM, Buzz is actually utilizing them in ways that play to their strengths. For whatever reason, we didn't see that last year.

When I watch this team play this year, I wonder just how much Buzz's incompetence set back guys like Travis and Moto, neither of whom really fit in this offense in any meaningful way, despite their production.

 

[stevewhite14]

CMM is a much better player because he lost some fat and decided to step up his game. Coaches don't deserve credit, CMM does.

 

[Deac83]

CMM is a much better player because he lost some fat and decided to step up his game. Coaches don't deserve credit, CMM does.

So CMM deserves the credit as does Bogues, but for Travis it's Bzz's fault. IMO, it's the role players and marginal players the coaches are going to have the most impact on. The guys that have the talent are usually going to drive themselves to get better. Tim Duncan would have been good at whatever school he went to.

FWIW, against the team Travis supposedly would like to beat, he took 5 shots today. He's supposed to be one of our 'big 3' and he's taking 5 shots.

 

[Deac65]

Maybe even Washington too.

 

[Deac65]

So CMM deserves the credit as does Bogues, but for Travis it's Bzz's fault. IMO, it's the role players and marginal players the coaches are going to have the most impact on. The guys that have the talent are usually going to drive themselves to get better. Tim Duncan would have been good at whatever school he went to.

FWIW, against the team Travis supposedly would like to beat, he took 5 shots today. He's supposed to be one of our 'big 3' and he's taking 5 shots.

83, no sense arguing; anything that goes right is the players; everything wrong is Bzz.

 

[VaDeac]

FWIW, Travis has had the best career of that class of five that Dino blessed us with.

He's the captain of the Titanic in that regard.

 

[RChildress107]

So CMM deserves the credit as does Bogues, but for Travis it's Bzz's fault. IMO, it's the role players and marginal players the coaches are going to have the most impact on. The guys that have the talent are usually going to drive themselves to get better. Tim Duncan would have been good at whatever school he went to.

FWIW, against the team Travis supposedly would like to beat, he took 5 shots today. He's supposed to be one of our 'big 3' and he's taking 5 shots.

I gave the coaches credit where credit was due with CMM (whether it was Chill or Buzz). They shouldn't get all of the credit as I'm sure CMM has been working his but off to make himself better.

And it's not all buzz's fault that Travis has developed. Travis could have certainly put in more work. I just happen to think that Travis's situation excuses him while Buzz's doesn't.

 

[RChildress107]

83, no sense arguing; anything that goes right is the players; everything wrong is Bzz.

Noone is saying anything that extreme. But in general it is part of a coach's job to motivate/develop players. A coach is naturally going to spend more time motivating players who aren't self-motivated and developing players who aren't developing on their own.

It's logically consistent to give CMM most of the credit for his development if he's the self-motivated type (Buzz should get credit for recruiting CMM though) while still holding Buzz accountable for not getting more out of Travis.

 

[deacvision7]

The shitting of Travis McKie, as the last Dino recruit, this season was just so predictable.

 

[forensicdeac]

Travis is such a frustrating player. He does just enough good things (clutch three today) to get someone to buy in, but also does stuff to stifle the offense (dribble in corner and get stuck) and play disinterested. Even if he is not pouting and that is his max effort, I am not sure that's what I want in a player, especially a senior leader.

 

[Deac83]

The shitting of Travis McKie, as the last Dino recruit, this season was just so predictable.

For me, I don't care who recruited Travis. The guy should be our #1 option as a senior and based on his history. At worst he's our #3 option. How does one of our supposed top 3 offensive option take 5 shots in a game against a team that he supposedly wants badly to beat?

I just find it hard to believe that Bzz's plan is to keep Travis under 10 shots a game.

People act like he's being criticized for not scoring 20 a game as a senior. He's being criticized for dropping from 13.8/gm on his career to 10.6 for this season against crappy competition.

Rebounds are down from 7.1 to 5.5.

People are being critical of him because he's not even putting up the same numbers he did in the last 3 years.

It won't be long before Tyler is ahead of Travis in scoring as he's at 9.0/gm, that will drop Travis to #5 this year.

Sure I get that Travis has had a rough 3 years, but for whatever reason he decided to stay. So you come into this year and clearly CMM has stepped up and Coron is bring us the outside shooting we need. Most guys would say, 'hey I might be able to play in the post season, so I'm going to step it up', instead it 'seems' Travis is mailing it in. Good enough for 10/5 a game but we need him for 15/8. That could be the difference between a 4 year career with no post season play and getting an NIT big and a long shot at an NCAA bid.

Say what you want the numbers and his effort on the court don't lie. He's not Ari, who just stopped playing, but I'd say he's doing the minimum. He needs to wake up and maybe he can take away one positive memory from his career at Wake.

 

[RChildress107]

Travis is such a frustrating player. He does just enough good things (clutch three today) to get someone to buy in, but also does stuff to stifle the offense (dribble in corner and get stuck) and play disinterested. Even if he is not pouting and that is his max effort, I am not sure that's what I want in a player, especially a senior leader.

1. That player you don't want is our second - fourth best player. He is second on the team in win shares (which is a better measure of a players contribution than OMGPOINTS!!1)

2. He's not a leader, he would probably be the first to admit it. Teams are typically best off when their best player is also the team leader. In our case that would be CMM and he's molding into that role nicely.

3. If you don't want Travis who exactly are you going to replace him with? Moto? Rountree?

 

[RChildress107]

For me, I don't care who recruited Travis. The guy should be our #1 option as a senior and based on his history. At worst he's our #3 option. How does one of our supposed top 3 offensive option take 5 shots in a game against a team that he supposedly wants badly to beat?

I just find it hard to believe that Bzz's plan is to keep Travis under 10 shots a game.

People act like he's being criticized for not scoring 20 a game as a senior. He's being criticized for dropping from 13.8/gm on his career to 10.6 for this season against crappy competition.

Rebounds are down from 7.1 to 5.5.

People are being critical of him because he's not even putting up the same numbers he did in the last 3 years.

It won't be long before Tyler is ahead of Travis in scoring as he's at 9.0/gm, that will drop Travis to #5 this year.

Sure I get that Travis has had a rough 3 years, but for whatever reason he decided to stay. So you come into this year and clearly CMM has stepped up and Coron is bring us the outside shooting we need. Most guys would say, 'hey I might be able to play in the post season, so I'm going to step it up', instead it 'seems' Travis is mailing it in. Good enough for 10/5 a game but we need him for 15/8. That could be the difference between a 4 year career with no post season play and getting an NIT big and a long shot at an NCAA bid.

Say what you want the numbers and his effort on the court don't lie. He's not Ari, who just stopped playing, but I'd say he's doing the minimum. He needs to wake up and maybe he can take away one positive memory from his career at Wake.

So much wrong with this post. I'll start with the bold.

Travis should never have been and should not now be our #1 option. The fact that anyone can say that with a straight face is an indictment of the buzz era. The word on Travis coming out of high school was that he would make a great glue guy. A guy that plays D, gets garbage points and hits a few threes every game.

How anyone could watch this team and think anyone but CMM should be our #1 option is beyond me. I doubt that bzz has gameplanned for travis to take only 5 shots a game. However, if he were a good coach that's what he would do. The sad thing is that we finally have a team where Travis should be able to play the way he is best suited to play. CMM, Coron, Cav, and Devin are all capable of producing on offense to varying degrees. And Travis has not played with anyone as capable at creating for himself as CMM.

It will be interesting to see if 1. Buzz is able to realize this and adjust accordingly and 2. If the coaching staff is able to get Travis to buy into playing this role after asking him to shoulder way to large a burden for the past 3 years. It didn't work out 8 years ago but if Buzz wants to save his job once again Travis is his only hope.

 

[Why the Deac Not]

If my aunt had balls she'd be my uncle. Ability to work hard is just as much a skill as leaping ability or shooting ability. Few in history matched Muggsy in that area.

Of course Travis has a lot of responsibility for that. But given his situation that responsibility is to himself, not to us.

Ultimately the responsibility to get a player to maximize his potential for the sake of the team or the program (or to go a different direction if he doesn't) is on the coach. Our coach has not lived up to that responsibility.

For a guy who makes a lot of solid points and even backs them up with supporting facts / data / stats what have you, I'm quite perplexed by your statement in bold. So because Muggsy knew he was one of the quickest players in all of CBB, it enhanced his ability to work hard?

The desire to work hard comes from within and while it may be something that can be coaxed or motivated out of you by an external force, ultimately the choice to work hard comes from within. And it is a lot more a matter of personal pride and internal drive, not so much a skill. Sure it something that can be improved and even perfected (like a highly motivated body-builder or prize fighter who learns how to be more efficient, proficient, work smarter etc.) over time. But it is mostly a matter of will.

What exactly has Travis demonstrated over his career that would lead someone to say, "Man Travis has really improved in his ability to _________?" He certainly had the potential to improve, but apparently the will and drive was lacking. That can be mitigated by a good coach or motivating external force, but ultimately the blame lies heavily and primarily with Mr. McKie. But if he wants to keep floating around the perimeter chucking up ill-advised threes like the last 2 full seasons, go right ahead. He will continue to lose minutes on an improving team.

 

[Strickland33]

So much wrong with this post. I'll start with the bold.

Travis should never have been and should not now be our #1 option. The fact that anyone can say that with a straight face is an indictment of the buzz era. The word on Travis coming out of high school was that he would make a great glue guy. A guy that plays D, gets garbage points and hits a few threes every game.

How anyone could watch this team and think anyone but CMM should be our #1 option is beyond me. I doubt that bzz has gameplanned for travis to take only 5 shots a game. However, if he were a good coach that's what he would do. The sad thing is that we finally have a team where Travis should be able to play the way he is best suited to play. CMM, Coron, Cav, and Devin are all capable of producing on offense to varying degrees. And Travis has not played with anyone as capable at creating for himself as CMM.

It will be interesting to see if 1. Buzz is able to realize this and adjust accordingly and 2. If the coaching staff is able to get Travis to buy into playing this role after asking him to shoulder way to large a burden for the past 3 years. It didn't work out 8 years ago but if Buzz wants to save his job once again Travis is his only hope.

All of this. Travis being a top option had to do with CJ being unselfish (which I would guess was Buzz's doing given our lack of stable PG play - think back to when JGray took the reigns from the Hale/Dukes dumpster fire) and our team lacking ACC-caliber talent.

Christ, we were playing Chase Fischer and Ty Walker significant minutes. Not to mention the fact that we were throwing out less than talented freshmen out of need. Travis exceeded expectations - which fooled most of us, not to mention scouts and analysts - but has come back to earth.

I still don't understand why folks feel the need to rip on Travis when he's performing relatively on par with expectations, doing a good job of attacking a back seat to more talented players, and we are winning games.

 

[DCDeac]

I still don't understand why folks feel the need to rip on Travis when he's performing relatively on par with expectations, doing a good job of attacking a back seat to more talented players, and we are winning games.

Are you kidding? You don't know why people would criticize Travis? He was a 4 star recruit, top 10 at his position coming to Wake. His Scout profile said he had tremendous upside, high major prospect, and noted he needed work on ball handling and developing inside. Now he's our only senior and you're praising him for taking a back seat to Cavanaugh? He still can't handle the ball and has no inside game. He disappears frequently in big games. His level of effort routinely doesn't pass the eye test.

You guys rip Cav all year last year as non-ACC caliber but Travis regresses and it's undeserving of criticism or it's understandable because [Redacted] is to blame?

The criticism is fair. The guys ranked one spot above and below him in 2010? One is averaging 17 and 7 at Stanford, the other 19 and 6 at Florida. A "good coach" would game plan Travis to only take 5 shots a game? And that's meeting his expectations? You guys are taking crazy pills.

 

[RChildress107]

Are you kidding? You don't know why people would criticize Travis? He was a 4 star recruit, top 10 at his position coming to Wake. His Scout profile said he had tremendous upside, high major prospect, and noted he needed work on ball handling and developing inside. Now he's our only senior and you're praising him for taking a back seat to Cavanaugh? He still can't handle the ball and has no inside game. He disappears frequently in big games. His level of effort routinely doesn't pass the eye test.

You guys rip Cav all year last year as non-ACC caliber but Travis regresses and it's undeserving of criticism or it's understandable because [Redacted] is to blame?

The criticism is fair. The guys ranked one spot above and below him in 2010? One is averaging 17 and 7 at Stanford, the other 19 and 6 at Florida. A "good coach" would game plan Travis to only take 5 shots a game? And that's meeting his expectations? You guys are taking crazy pills.

Who's to say what Travis would be doing at either of those programs.

Are there fair criticisms of Travis? Of course. Have those criticisms changed much over the past 3 years? not really. It just seems odd to attack him now, especially after all he has done for the program.

I posted this hypo on another thread and I'll put the same question to you now.

3 1/2 years ago Guy gets hired to run the IT department at your company. He's highly regarded coming in and people are excited. The same year your company gets a new CEO, he shuffles things around a bit, a bunch of people leave the company and IT guy ends up having to oversee product development.

The next three years at the company are rough, more people leave and profits disappear. The only thing that keeps people sane is IT guy. He's actually decent at product development but there just isn't enough around him to keep the company successful. Everyone agrees it would be a lot worse without him though. In fact a few years ago he thought about leaving and everyone begged him to stay.

This year one of the guys who came in last year steps up and says he will take over for product development. He's better than IT Guy at it and IT guy just wants to do IT so he steps aside assuming that he will now get to do what he was hired to do (run IT). Instead the CEO places him in charge of HR. IT Guy shows up to work each day but you can tell his heart isn't in it. The HR department isnt falling apart but everyone knows that IT Guy could get it running better if he put in a little extra effort.

If you are a shareholder of that company where are you placing your blame? If you work for the company are you more pissed at your CEO or IT guy?

If I was going to spend 2-3 hours a day expressing my distaste with the situation I would probably spend 95% of it on the CEO.