2022 Transfer Portal Discussion

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fan of Ray Williams said:
Looked up his Twitter this afternoon.
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Yeah, that's an impressive list of suitors in a short period of time. Well, he earned it. And I agree with the Tweeter. Few freshman rated much higher than him played as well.
 


MNVCGUY said:
We know Johnson didn't get some of the bigs he went after in the portal, those guys tend to be really sought after.

Some will continue to pretend that it should have been easy to just go pluck some additional impact bigs out of the portal after the injuries and I will continue to disagree. :)
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If you're not getting any of the bigs you're going after, then you're going after the wrong bigs. Set your sights lower (but not as low as Daniels and Ogele). There were better players than them around in July who went to lesser programs than ours. He should have gone after bigs first. Fox was hurt early and Ihnen surely wasn't going to be enough even if he had been healthy.

Are you going to continue this apologist line for Ben throughout his tenure here? "Oh, well, he offered really good players but none of them wanted to come here, so what can you do?" If you can't get commitments from enough competent players, you lose your job. That's why they give coaches at least a million plus at jobs like this.
 



cjbfbp said:
If you're not getting any of the bigs you're going after, then you're going after the wrong bigs. Set your sights lower (but not as low as Daniels and Ogele). There were better players than them around in July who went to lesser programs than ours. He should have gone after bigs first. Fox was hurt early and Ihnen surely wasn't going to be enough even if he had been healthy.

Are you going to continue this apologist line for Ben throughout his tenure here? "Oh, well, he offered really good players but none of them wanted to come here, so what can you do?" If you can't get commitments from enough competent players, you lose your job. That's why they give coaches at least a million plus at jobs like this.
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It isn't about being an apologist for Ben it is about being a realist about the situation this team was in this year. If we are seeing the same issues year after year with Ben I will be right there with the complainers but I refuse to overreact to year one or make assumptions that it was an accurate predictor of what we are going to see going forward.

To your first paragraph....that is a massive oversimplification of the process of recruiting transfers. It is easy for us sitting behind keyboards to say they should have recruited this guy or they should have gone after that guy.
 

cjbfbp said:
If you're not getting any of the bigs you're going after, then you're going after the wrong bigs. Set your sights lower (but not as low as Daniels and Ogele). There were better players than them around in July who went to lesser programs than ours. He should have gone after bigs first. Fox was hurt early and Ihnen surely wasn't going to be enough even if he had been healthy.

Are you going to continue this apologist line for Ben throughout his tenure here? "Oh, well, he offered really good players but none of them wanted to come here, so what can you do?" If you can't get commitments from enough competent players, you lose your job. That's why they give coaches at least a million plus at jobs like this.
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Are you and BB tag teaming with the apologist BS now? Give me a break. The poster provided an explanation of what happened LAST year in the portal. We KNOW all of the reasons why he wasn't successful in the portal. They are not excuses. They have been rehashed on here so many times that I could regurgitate them point by point by memory in my sleep in five foreign languages.

Ben Johnson did not wake up in March 2021 after getting this gig and suddenly become Coach K. This hire is about growth. Everyone knows this will take time. Who wants to play for coach with no experience as the head coach? It takes special players to see through the BS and take a chance. It takes hard work and relationship building. If Johnson pulls together a class of mediocre bench players from the portal this year, we have a pattern. One year does not a pattern make.
 

MNVCGUY said:
It isn't about being an apologist for Ben it is about being a realist about the situation this team was in this year. If we are seeing the same issues year after year with Ben I will be right there with the complainers but I refuse to overreact to year one or make assumptions that it was an accurate predictor of what we are going to see going forward.

To your first paragraph....that is a massive oversimplification of the process of recruiting transfers. It is easy for us sitting behind keyboards to say they should have recruited this guy or they should have gone after that guy.
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Jinx!
 

MNVCGUY said:
It is easy for us sitting behind keyboards to say they should have recruited this guy or they should have gone after that guy.
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This is the job. There are hundreds of D1 high school players out there and apparently, just as many transfer portal guys. You have to prioritize guys you can get. You have to identify guys who fit your system that may be overlooked by other programs. Yes, it's easier for us in hindsight, but they get a million dollars to know more than us before we know it.
 




Hates Monikers said:
This is the job. There are hundreds of D1 high school players out there and apparently, just as many transfer portal guys. You have to prioritize guys you can get. You have to identify guys who fit your system that may be overlooked by other programs. Yes, it's easier for us in hindsight, but they get a million dollars to know more than us before we know it.
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Yep.....nothing to it.....get hired as a first time head coach in late March.....assemble a staff......evaluate hundreds of transfer prospects and accurately determine who fits your system, who is interested in coming here, who you can get.....go out and build a whole team......lose a few guys to injury but that is no big deal....plenty of other players out there that are easily identifiable....have the team ready to take the court in November....yep.....easy.....nothing to it.
 

MNVCGUY said:
Yep.....nothing to it.....get hired as a first time head coach in late March.....assemble a staff......evaluate hundreds of transfer prospects and accurately determine who fits your system, who is interested in coming here, who you can get.....go out and build a whole team......lose a few guys to injury but that is no big deal....plenty of other players out there that are easily identifiable....have the team ready to take the court in November....yep.....easy.....nothing to it.
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It is a tough job to be really good at it (that's why they get paid so much) but it doesn't mean it's not his job.

I give Ben a bit of a pass in season 1, but I do think Ben should get some dings to his resume with being unable to find playable players with those spots. He may have been better off offering a few of the best MIAC players than what we ended up with in those spots.

I'm not saying it was easy. I'm not saying it's a huge deal. I'm just saying that it bothered me how those scholarships were used.
 

Bob_Loblaw said:
It is a tough job to be really good at it (that's why they get paid so much) but it doesn't mean it's not his job.

I give Ben a bit of a pass in season 1, but I do think Ben should get some dings to his resume with being unable to find playable players with those spots. He may have been better off offering a few of the best MIAC players than what we ended up with in those spots.

I'm not saying it was easy. I'm not saying it's a huge deal. I'm just saying that it bothered me how those scholarships were used.
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He deserves more than a bit of a pass for year one but I know he won't get it from many in here so pointless trying to give any sort of reasons for why this was a crazy difficult situation for any coach but especially a first time head coach to walk into.

I need to spend more of my time on the football board where the team is through the transition phase and the people who hated the hire are now for the most part on board. Hopefully Ben has enough success over the next few years to win the skeptics over on the basketball side the way Fleck mostly has on the football side. Time will tell I guess.
 



MNVCGUY said:
He deserves more than a bit of a pass for year one but I know he won't get it from many in here so pointless trying to give any sort of reasons for why this was a crazy difficult situation for any coach but especially a first time head coach to walk into.

I need to spend more of my time on the football board where the team is through the transition phase and the people who hated the hire are now for the most part on board. Hopefully Ben has enough success over the next few years to win the skeptics over on the basketball side the way Fleck mostly has on the football side. Time will tell I guess.
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Row the Boat, Ski U Mah, Go Gophers!
 

MNVCGUY said:
He deserves more than a bit of a pass for year one but I know he won't get it from many in here so pointless trying to give any sort of reasons for why this was a crazy difficult situation for any coach but especially a first time head coach to walk into.

I need to spend more of my time on the football board where the team is through the transition phase and the people who hated the hire are now for the most part on board. Hopefully Ben has enough success over the next few years to win the skeptics over on the basketball side the way Fleck mostly has on the football side. Time will tell I guess.
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You're kind of deflecting from the premise and arguing that the only way people wouldn't be annoyed with anything Ben Johnson has done is because they couldn't get over the initial hire. That's simply not true.

It's not true with PJ Fleck - - I supported that hire and I think he's a great coach, but I complain on some of the things he does. I don't like how he uses the RBs. I criticized the Sanford hire, I'll sometimes mock some of the PJisms. It's okay, the totality of what I see as a coach, I feel like we're lucky to have him.

It's similar with Ben. I didn't like the hire but there are many things I liked about season 1. I liked how the team played (stylistically), I really like his first recruiting class, and I liked that his team played really hard for him. There are some things I didn't like - - his usage of some of the scholarships (he gets somewhat of a pass) and how he used the bench. Now I already said I give him somewhat of a pass, but he doesn't get more than that from me for how he used the scholarships because my expected bar was SO low. My expectation wasn't for him to round the roster with quality bench players it was an incredibly low bar that factored in his situation.

It's okay to like Ben Johnson and disagree with some of his decisions. It's okay to think he is a good coach and disagree with how he handled certain situations. It's okay to disagree with some of his decisions and it not be rooted in some 14 month seething grudge against the hire.

We do it with every other coach. We certainly do it with PJ on the football board and he has built something I haven;t seen at the U in my lifetime.
 

Hates Monikers said:
This is the job. There are hundreds of D1 high school players out there and apparently, just as many transfer portal guys. You have to prioritize guys you can get. You have to identify guys who fit your system that may be overlooked by other programs. Yes, it's easier for us in hindsight, but they get a million dollars to know more than us before we know it.
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All correct and we can safely say he knows much more than anyone here long before we know it.
 

MNVCGUY said:
He deserves more than a bit of a pass for year one but I know he won't get it from many in here so pointless trying to give any sort of reasons for why this was a crazy difficult situation for any coach but especially a first time head coach to walk into.

I need to spend more of my time on the football board where the team is through the transition phase and the people who hated the hire are now for the most part on board. Hopefully Ben has enough success over the next few years to win the skeptics over on the basketball side the way Fleck mostly has on the football side. Time will tell I guess.
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There will always be a group that will want us to take the shortcut they believe exists. There is no shortcut to being great. There are shortcuts to the top, but then the fall is steep and quick. You still see people get upset about Fleck using the “year zero” term, but that’s the path Ben took too. Clean up the negativity and get the foundation right again. Then work on building it. For many they see that as making excuses, but for me I’m focused on the build. That’s actually really fun to watch imo.
 

Gopherfan84 said:
There will always be a group that will want us to take the shortcut they believe exists. There is no shortcut to being great. There are shortcuts to the top, but then the fall is steep and quick. You still see people get upset about Fleck using the “year zero” term, but that’s the path Ben took too. Clean up the negativity and get the foundation right again. Then work on building it. For many they see that as making excuses, but for me I’m focused on the build. That’s actually really fun to watch imo.
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There isn't a shortcut, but the coaches who go on to prove they are a great, long term hire, usually have a breakthrough season within the first 3 years. Ben still has 2 years to do that.

Fleck made a lot of progress building that foundation with young players in 'year 0'. Ben really didn't, and finished in last place with an old team that he handpicked himself. That's what worries many on this board including myself.
 

ecoperson said:
Are you and BB tag teaming with the apologist BS now? Give me a break. The poster provided an explanation of what happened LAST year in the portal. We KNOW all of the reasons why he wasn't successful in the portal. They are not excuses. They have been rehashed on here so many times that I could regurgitate them point by point by memory in my sleep in five foreign languages.

If Johnson pulls together a class of mediocre bench players from the portal this year, we have a pattern. One year does not a pattern make.
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My complaints exclusively are about the front court players he recruited (or, more appropriately, didn't recruit) last summer. I have no complaints about the guards he recruited.

"The poster provided an explanation of what happened LAST year in the portal."

No explanation was needed. I lived through it and watched those portal players daily. I know who was available and where they went. What you refer to as an "explanation" is just a hollow justification for the view that this situation was unavoidable. It was not.

The bias is clearly with you and some others. If some of us don't give Ben a free pass on everything, you accuse us of being disgruntled about the hire and of having impossible expectations.
 

https://m.startribune.com/gophers-m...fer-portal-ben-johnson/600163246/?clmob=y&c=n
A year ago, Ben Johnson sat in his basketball office as a first-year Gophers head coach feeling the weight of taking over a program that lost 10 players to the transfer portal.

Johnson had barely any pieces to work with, instead inheriting the most ravaged roster in the Big Ten.

Only a year removed from one of the biggest rebuilds in team history, Johnson has no players in the transfer portal.


“It's definitely a better feeling, a more reassuring feeling. Now it's what we can add to make sure this team is as good as it can be.”
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Ben Johnson


Instead of worrying about who is leaving, the Gophers expect everyone back who can return — and they're focused on adding talent with transfers and freshmen for next season.

"It's a lot easier when you have a chunk of guys on the roster versus having to fill an entire team," Johnson said Thursday. "The other good part is you know what you have, too. And so you know what you need to add, which helps when it comes to the portal."

Johnson expects to have five scholarship players return from a 13-17 team, including forward Jamison Battle, who led the team in scoring (17.5 points per game) and rebounding (6.3).

Eight scholarships are open for next season, and the Gophers have four high school recruits, so transfers will make up the remaining newcomers. Replacing the starting backcourt is the top priority. Payton Willis, Luke Loewe and E.J. Stephens ran out of eligibility.

"Losing Payton, Luke and E.J. on the perimeter was tough," Johnson said. "If there's an opportunity to get older at a couple of those spots, we'll do it. You still want the young guys to develop, so it's the balance of finding an older guy but not somebody who is going to demand 38 minutes a game."

The Gophers have contacted more than 20 transfers this spring, mostly guards. Some of them have Minnesota ties, including Davidson's Michael Jones (Woodbury), Wofford's Ryan Larson (Cretin-Derham Hall) and Illinois State's Josiah Strong (Champlin Park).

Jones, who played his last game with Davidson against Michigan State in the NCAA tournament, said he is visiting Stanford this weekend, but he also has been talking to Iowa State, Wake Forest and Clemson.

Johnson can't discuss specific players who haven't signed, but he said the Gophers have an advantage recruiting Minnesotans who are already familiar with him and the program.

"The early stages of me being a head coach, one of the advantages in the recruiting part is that the guys in the portal I either knew them, saw them or recruited them at Minnesota or Xavier," Johnson said. "Minnesota for years was a state with only one Division I team. If you couldn't go here, you had to go somewhere. So now if a bunch of Minnesota kids do enter the portal you hope that coming back home is attractive."

In the U's 2022 high school class, Pharrel Payne, Braeden Carrington and Joshua Ola-Joseph are from Minnesota. Jaden Henley, who has committed to the Gophers and will sign this month, is from California.

Johnson is searching the portal for a frontcourt piece, but he believes the 6-9, 230-pound Payne can provide an immediate inside presence as well.

"In our league, size and having a presence down low is huge," Johnson said. "That's one thing we're so excited about Pharrel. ... Even as a freshman he's physically ready."

Also returning in the frontcourt from the current roster are forwards Parker Fox and Isaiah Ihnen, who missed last season with knee injuries. Both should be ready when practice starts again in June, Johnson said.

“It's a lot easier when you have a chunk of guys on the roster versus having to fill an entire team.”
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Ben Johnson
Freshmen Treyton Thompson and Abdoulaye Thiam were the Gophers players who seemed most likely to enter the portal after playing sparingly this season, but they will be back.

Johnson said he might have one of the only Big Ten teams that has a full roster of players excited about returning and not looking into transferring.

"It's definitely a better feeling, a more reassuring feeling," Johnson said. "Now it's what we can add to make sure this team is as good as it can be. Being aggressive, getting a few breaks in the portal and seeing where we can take it."
 

cjbfbp said:
My complaints exclusively are about the front court players he recruited (or, more appropriately, didn't recruit) last summer. I have no complaints about the guards he recruited.

"The poster provided an explanation of what happened LAST year in the portal."

No explanation was needed. I lived through it and watched those portal players daily. I know who was available and where they went. What you refer to as an "explanation" is just a hollow justification for the view that this situation was unavoidable. It was not.

The bias is clearly with you and some others. If some of us don't give Ben a free pass on everything, you accuse us of being disgruntled about the hire and of having impossible expectations.
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:clap::clap::clap::clap::clap::clap::clap::clap:
 

GopherWeatherGuy said:
There isn't a shortcut, but the coaches who go on to prove they are a great, long term hire, usually have a breakthrough season within the first 3 years. Ben still has 2 years to do that.

Fleck made a lot of progress building that foundation with young players in 'year 0'. Ben really didn't, and finished in last place with an old team that he handpicked himself. That's what worries many on this board including myself.
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I agree within 3 years you see the trajectory rising and I'd expect at minimum a NCAA invite/being a bubble team. That's not really an argument anyone is having imo.

The foundation part is where I disagree. I see a group that was assembled and overachieved. I see a solid base committed to this year (waiting on our transfers of course) that will not be picked 14th by every single publication if any at all. I'd guess they will be listed between 8th-12th in most publications depending on our additions (one of whom I am very confident will be a difference maker). That would be moving forward and building a foundation and a base. I can understand the being worried if you looked at just results last year, but I saw a coach who had a total rebuild and basically met the coach we previously had results (which obviously are not good enough) in an odd year. It just doesn't worry me yet.
 

cjbfbp said:
My complaints exclusively are about the front court players he recruited (or, more appropriately, didn't recruit) last summer. I have no complaints about the guards he recruited.

"The poster provided an explanation of what happened LAST year in the portal."

No explanation was needed. I lived through it and watched those portal players daily. I know who was available and where they went. What you refer to as an "explanation" is just a hollow justification for the view that this situation was unavoidable. It was not.

The bias is clearly with you and some others. If some of us don't give Ben a free pass on everything, you accuse us of being disgruntled about the hire and of having impossible expectations.
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Who were the frontcourt players he didn't recruit? I can get with being upset he didn't land them, but the net was cast far and wide in the frontcourt. Most cases he lost them to the pros or to programs on more solid footing than us. I'd like to know who you think we didn't recruit that would've been the game changer and that much better over Eric Curry.
 


Gopherfan84 said:
Who were the frontcourt players he didn't recruit? I can get with being upset he didn't land them, but the net was cast far and wide in the frontcourt. Most cases he lost them to the pros or to programs on more solid footing than us. I'd like to know who you think we didn't recruit that would've been the game changer and that much better over Eric Curry.
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According to some on GH, only certain portal players are recruited by MN. We cant expect the net to be cast far and wide.
 

Gopherfan84 said:
Who were the frontcourt players he didn't recruit? I can get with being upset he didn't land them, but the net was cast far and wide in the frontcourt. Most cases he lost them to the pros or to programs on more solid footing than us. I'd like to know who you think we didn't recruit that would've been the game changer and that much better over Eric Curry.
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I'm surprised people also gloss over the fact that Isaiah Ihnen and Parker Fox were supposed to be major contributors to the frontcourt and would have taken pretty much all of Curry's minutes. Yeah, gotta deal with injuries, blah, blah, blah, but let's not pretend they weren't expected to contribute.
 

Gopherfan84 said:
I agree within 3 years you see the trajectory rising and I'd expect at minimum a NCAA invite/being a bubble team. That's not really an argument anyone is having imo.

The foundation part is where I disagree. I see a group that was assembled and overachieved. I see a solid base committed to this year (waiting on our transfers of course) that will not be picked 14th by every single publication if any at all. I'd guess they will be listed between 8th-12th in most publications depending on our additions (one of whom I am very confident will be a difference maker). That would be moving forward and building a foundation and a base. I can understand the being worried if you looked at just results last year, but I saw a coach who had a total rebuild and basically met the coach we previously had results (which obviously are not good enough) in an odd year. It just doesn't worry me yet.
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As far as a breakthrough within the first 3 years, I'm talking about making the NCAA tournament at minimum, and winning at least one game. Nearly all of the good coaches in college basketball accomplished this in their first 3 years regardless of what they inherited. Being just a bubble team in 3 years is not good enough.

They overachieved in the non-conference against a weak schedule. They were as bad as everyone thought they would be in the B1G. They were not competitive in the majority of those games.

We'll see what happens in the transfer portal. If they are not able to land at least two significant guard transfers, they will be picked to finish 13th or 14th again. Ben chose the total rebuild last year, and he chose it again this season.

Recruiting is why Ben was hired. He should be able to out recruit other coaches for good players.
 

GopherWeatherGuy said:
As far as a breakthrough within the first 3 years, I'm talking about making the NCAA tournament at minimum, and winning at least one game. Nearly all of the good coaches in college basketball accomplished this in their first 3 years regardless of what they inherited. Being just a bubble team in 3 years is not good enough.

They overachieved in the non-conference against a weak schedule. They were as bad as everyone thought they would be in the B1G. They were not competitive in the majority of those games.

We'll see what happens in the transfer portal. If they are not able to land at least two significant guard transfers, they will be picked to finish 13th or 14th again. Ben chose the total rebuild last year, and he chose it again this season.

Recruiting is why Ben was hired. He should be able to out recruit other coaches for good players.
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Nailed it.

Some are unwilling to accept these facts. Excuse gonna excuse.
 

GopherWeatherGuy said:
As far as a breakthrough within the first 3 years, I'm talking about making the NCAA tournament at minimum, and winning at least one game. Nearly all of the good coaches in college basketball accomplished this in their first 3 years regardless of what they inherited. Being just a bubble team in 3 years is not good enough.

They overachieved in the non-conference against a weak schedule. They were as bad as everyone thought they would be in the B1G. They were not competitive in the majority of those games.

We'll see what happens in the transfer portal. If they are not able to land at least two significant guard transfers, they will be picked to finish 13th or 14th again. Ben chose the total rebuild last year, and he chose it again this season.

Recruiting is why Ben was hired. He should be able to out recruit other coaches for good players.
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Winning an NCAA Tournament game is hands down the worst metric to use for success. Making the tournament sure? Winning is terrible when you include that many variables and it's a single elimination. I put bubble on there because sometimes teams who are worthy don't get in cause the committee makes the wrong decision. It would be very rare, but I do believe we can/should expect a tourney birth by year 3.

Also if you can't make excuses for them finishing last, then you don't get to make excuses for them winning their non con. As far as who will be picked where, Nebraska and NW will have a lot of reloading and be predicted below us. In fact the B1G in general is fully reloading. It's pretty wide open.

Finally Ben was hired to win basketball games. Recruiting is a part of that. Coaching and building a program is the larger thing. Teams like Purdue and Wisconsin take guys in the 100-200 range almost every year and win B1G championships. We really shouldn't evaluate rankings and recruiting until we have more data than one year.
 

Marooned said:
I'm surprised people also gloss over the fact that Isaiah Ihnen and Parker Fox were supposed to be major contributors to the frontcourt and would have taken pretty much all of Curry's minutes. Yeah, gotta deal with injuries, blah, blah, blah, but let's not pretend they weren't expected to contribute.
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Agree, and some of those same people ding Johnson for not having a backup plan to deal with the injuries to guys who would have been key pieces of the roster he assembled.

Not having a solid backup plan is a fair criticism for a coach who has been at a place for multiple years (Pitino absolutely fell into this category). But for a coach building a full roster from the ground up, losing two key parts of that rebuilt roster before the season even starts is going to be something very hard to overcome.

I think some also forget that when Fox and Ihnen went down, their roster spots were still filled, it isn't like fantasy sports where you get an IL spot and can then pick up a new player.
 

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