Alex Legion leaving Illinois


Wow! First Kentucky, then Illinois. What is he, a nomad?
 

Not that its that big of a deal but Jeff Jordan quit BB after last season in order to concentrate on academics. I am pretty sure working for the Jordan brand will be more productive then any basketball career he had any slight chance of having.
 

Jeff Jordan is back with the Illini now, and playing quite a bit.
 

Well, I think we know it better than anyone but it is useful to remember that most transfer did not succeed at their first school.

I would not take scholarship transfers unless i coached at a low level D-1 school or they were good players at their previous school (but then why are they transferring?)
 


A lot of hype out of high school and again around the transfer time. His stat line puts him 4th among guards - more than 12-20 min less than the frosh guards ahead of him. Less than 30% fg & 21% 3pt fg will not get you much time in any league. Maybe a great athlete, but obviously over-hyped as a player. I hope he is getting an education and looking for somewhere he can play & have fun for his last year.

Players Pts Reb Asst Min FG% 3PT% FT%
A. Legion 2.7 0.9 0.5 9.9 29.7 21.1 66.7
 

I apologize Selection, I was not aware. Thank you for the correction.
 

Well, I think we know it better than anyone but it is useful to remember that most transfer did not succeed at their first school.

I would not take scholarship transfers unless i coached at a low level D-1 school or they were good players at their previous school (but then why are they transferring?)

I think most of the Gopher transfers over the past decade have worked out for them. Although they were not superstars, they were better than the alternatives the Gophers had if they didn't come back (to the state of Minnesota).
 

Obviously things have not worked out well for Legion, but he's a great talent and I hope he finds his right spot.
 



"I think most of the Gopher transfers over the past decade have worked out for them. Although they were not superstars, they were better than the alternatives the Gophers had if they didn't come back (to the state of Minnesota). "

Such as? Monson had way too many transfers. Tubby has none. Looking back, most of the Minnesota kids were not worrthy of scholarships. If someone leaves and excells but wants to come back, maybe, but most of these guys didn't. Football has a big enough roster to take trasnfer, basketball doesn't.

Boone? Nope.
Margrow? Nope.
Lawton. Yup but he came from a small school and walked on.
MacKenzie. Maybe but again why did he transfer? Because he was not good enough to play on Oklahoma. I think it is not a coincidence that Gophers did not have much success in years he played.
Williams. Nope. Though size might make it a gamble worth trying.
Ben Johnson. Yup but only because no scholarship. Not worth a scholarship.
Bickerstaff and Simmons. Both worthy of scholarships but both were non- Minnesota kids so presumably had other options.
 


"I think most of the Gopher transfers over the past decade have worked out for them. Although they were not superstars, they were better than the alternatives the Gophers had if they didn't come back (to the state of Minnesota). "

Such as? Monson had way too many transfers. Tubby has none. Looking back, most of the Minnesota kids were not worrthy of scholarships. If someone leaves and excells but wants to come back, maybe, but most of these guys didn't. Football has a big enough roster to take trasnfer, basketball doesn't.

Boone? Nope.
Margrow? Nope.
Lawton. Yup but he came from a small school and walked on.
MacKenzie. Maybe but again why did he transfer? Because he was not good enough to play on Oklahoma. I think it is not a coincidence that Gophers did not have much success in years he played.
Williams. Nope. Though size might make it a gamble worth trying.
Ben Johnson. Yup but only because no scholarship. Not worth a scholarship.
Bickerstaff and Simmons. Both worthy of scholarships but both were non- Minnesota kids so presumably had other options.

I would disagree on LMac. IIRC, he played extensively as a frosh at Oklahoma, and his spot was taken by Drew Lavender the next year. Lavender eventually transferred to Xavier, but he was a very good player, and having your spot taken by a player like that doesn't mean you are not good enough to play at Oklahoma.
 

"I think most of the Gopher transfers over the past decade have worked out for them. Although they were not superstars, they were better than the alternatives the Gophers had if they didn't come back (to the state of Minnesota). "

Such as? Monson had way too many transfers. Tubby has none. Looking back, most of the Minnesota kids were not worrthy of scholarships. If someone leaves and excells but wants to come back, maybe, but most of these guys didn't. Football has a big enough roster to take trasnfer, basketball doesn't.

Boone? Nope.
Margrow? Nope.
Lawton. Yup but he came from a small school and walked on.
MacKenzie. Maybe but again why did he transfer? Because he was not good enough to play on Oklahoma. I think it is not a coincidence that Gophers did not have much success in years he played.
Williams. Nope. Though size might make it a gamble worth trying.
Ben Johnson. Yup but only because no scholarship. Not worth a scholarship.
Bickerstaff and Simmons. Both worthy of scholarships but both were non- Minnesota kids so presumably had other options.



- So in Adam Boone's years, would you have preferred Aaron Robinson, Wade Hokanson or Miles Webb to start at PG?
- Hargrow came here originally and played decently for two years. Probably shouldn't have taken him back as he turned into a head case.
- McKenzie scored 1400 points as a Gopher and was honorable mention All-Big 10? But he didn't work out? Who was on the bench that he was holding back?
- Ben Johnson was second on the team in scoring his senior year. Who would you have preferred to play over him? Stan Gaines?
- Williams wasn't a transfer.
- Dan Coleman didn't work out did he?
- Or Mitch Ohnstad?

Our transfers worked out far better than scholarships players like Gaines, Webb, Alou Kane, Kerry Wooldridge, Brandon Smith and Kevin Payton.

As I said, they weren't superstars but they were better than the alternatives we had on the bench.
 



In some we are arguing chicken-egg. The talent in the past regime was so low that the transfer did play. That said I enjoy the argument so here goes:

-In Boone's years, I absolutely would take AROB over Boone. I think it is not a coincidence that the only year we were good, Arob played and Boone didn't.
-We won little with MacKenzie but he was one of the transfers I would have gambled on.
-Johnson was fine becasue he had no scholarship. Being second leading scoreer on a bad team does not strengthen the argument that he was a good player.
-I forgot Coleman but really what value did he bring? BTW, Williams is as much a transfer as Coleman. Williams went to St. John's for about the same time as DC went to BC.

My personal belief is that our former coach was desperate and lazy. Transfers who fell into his lap made recruiting easy. Players initiate contact and the deal is done. Maybe if he hadn't been handing out 2 scholarships a year to transfers he could have brought in better players.

Wishful thinking perhaps but all those transfer did was take a 10th place team and put it in 9th.
 

In some we are arguing chicken-egg. The talent in the past regime was so low that the transfer did play. That said I enjoy the argument so here goes:

-In Boone's years, I absolutely would take AROB over Boone. I think it is not a coincidence that the only year we were good, Arob played and Boone didn't.
-We won little with MacKenzie but he was one of the transfers I would have gambled on.
-Johnson was fine becasue he had no scholarship. Being second leading scoreer on a bad team does not strengthen the argument that he was a good player.
-I forgot Coleman but really what value did he bring? BTW, Williams is as much a transfer as Coleman. Williams went to St. John's for about the same time as DC went to BC.

My personal belief is that our former coach was desperate and lazy. Transfers who fell into his lap made recruiting easy. Players initiate contact and the deal is done. Maybe if he hadn't been handing out 2 scholarships a year to transfers he could have brought in better players.

Wishful thinking perhaps but all those transfer did was take a 10th place team and put it in 9th.

Again, my argument is those transfers were better than the alternatives that were on the roster. I think Boone was better than Robinson at that time because Robinson was horrible when he first got to Dinkytown (credit to him though, he might have been the only Monson recruit who improved year by year). I would rather have Ben Johnson start over Stan Gaines. I would rather have Dan Coleman start over Travis Busch.

It's easy to say that some mythical recruit would have been better than the transfers. But do you have any names of players that were coming here and didn't because we didn't have any scholarships available?

And Williams committed to St. John's but he never attended classes there. After his senior season at St. Cloud Apollo, he went to a prep school in Mass. If Williams is a transfer, then Kris Humphries was a transfer from Duke.
 





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