Let's read way too much into these Bill Self quotes
Last week, The Athletic’s Jayhawk beatwriter CJ Moore published his annual KU preseason preview. I regret to inform you that a subscription to Streak Talk does not get you a subscription to The Athletic; I won’t cannibalize its content too much out of journalistic solidarity, but let’s just say it presents a very rosy look at next season’s prospects, a perspective brimming over with comparisons to the 19-20 heavyweight Hawks team that looked like the real deal.
Anytime a report like this comes out—and I’m sure the Star will publish one soon, if they haven’t already—I zoom straight in to the Self quotes. Quotes like:
“This year seems like to me we have more really good players,” Self says. “I don’t know that we’ve been this deep with solid players, but I don’t think we have the top-heavy lottery pick either.”
For those of you who have been reading the newsletter for a while—thank you, love you!—you know that I love to really overanalyze everything Self says. I’m not going to go as far as saying I think Bill Self is some kind of philosophical genius/basketball mystic. You have to remember that all of these college and pro head coaches who are double-digit millionaires would be unemployable in almost any other context. Like, what would future KU football head coach Mike McCarthy be doing if pro coaching wasn’t a thing? I’ll leave that answer to you, dear reader, but there’s definitely a suspension of disbelief required to sift through any coach quotation.
That being said, Self’s quotes are always revealing. Let’s really pick apart the above, which appears to be a pretty straightforward thought: while this team is deep and talented, they might not get the attention they deserve, because there’s not one single player the media or casual fans will isolate to watch. You have to be a real fan of late-lotto talent if the thought pops into your head, “Wow, KU is playing OU tonight at 9PM on ESPN2. I gotta watch Ochai Agbaji!” Here, I think the comment about the lottery pick talent is telling, because KU’s lotto picks haven’t always been the team’s best individual players. So, there’s that.
Let’s do another:
“We lost the best defender in the country (in Marcus Garrett), but we’re better defensively,” Self says. “We should be better defensively.”
That’s … pretty interesting, given how much they put on Garrett last year, who would at times guard fours and fives out of sheer necessity. But it also stands to logic: in Bill Self’s conception of defense (I always cite this video of him coaching through the shell drill), a great defense has to have a high floor, meaning that the defense is only as good as the weakest defender allows it to be. It’s a group concern, and while Garrett’s individual defense earned him an NBA contract on basically that skill alone, there’s only so much one wing defender can control. An older team means increased familiarity with one another, so a lot of the pre-play stuff will feel more natural. Or at least, one can hope.
“We played with one guard last year, for the most part,” Self says.
As soon as I read this, I thought to myself… wait, so who did Self think the guard was? The article answers that he was talking about Garrett—“And that one guard was Garrett, who was playing out of position,” Moore writes—but I think that might just be a read Moore is making? Maybe it isn’t. But let’s speculate anyway.
What I think Self means here is “ballhandler,” which tracks the most to me, since he refers to both Agbaji and Christian Braun as guards most of the time, and ballhandling is, uh….. not their strength. It’s certainly true that Garrett ended up with the ball more than most expected, even though the early season made it fairly clear that Garrett was better served away from the ball. Does Bill Self remember that DaJuan Harris exits, or is this one of those low-key challenge things for Harris? (“Harris came on strong the final month of the season, and Self believes he is one of the more improved players in his program,” per Moore).
Remy Martin solves some of this stuff. But I’m definitely clocking how Self categorizes this roster in an increasingly position-less climate.
On CB:
“So much, so much stronger, and he seems to be more confident and seems to be better with the ball,” Self says. “I’m expecting big things from all these guys, but I’m expecting CB to have a breakout year, so to speak. He had a really good year last year, and he had a really good freshman year. But I think there’s a big, big step he can still take and look forward to watching him do it.”
This is a classic challenge in the disguise of a compliment. CB disappeared during important stretches last year, and if he does that again this season, he won’t play.
SHOT/CHASER, Jalen Wilson wooooooooo:
“He’s in unbelievable physical condition,” Self says. “He was so much better than he was as a freshman when he came back last year, and he’s a lot better than where he was when the season ended. I’m just totally impressed with how hard he’s worked, and his skill seems to be better — more consistent shooting the ball — and he is just a more competent, more aggressive basketball player.”
Given how last season ended, it can be a little tough to remember that Wilson blew away expectations during his RS freshman season. Wilson has a knack for the ball around the basket, and KU needs to get him in that area more. “More aggressive” is “nearer to the basket” in Self-speak.
I have a feeling most Jayhawks fans will find a way to read CJ’s preview, which also includes some good stuff about Remy Martin, who sounds almost too bought in, given the feedback he received during the NBA Draft process. KU needs a playmaking guard, but many of Self’s great playmaking guards have scored the hell out of the ball also.
See you Friday for Late Night, where I certainly have some unsolicited thoughts about this whole Run-DMC thing.