re: LSU basketball hasn' signed a New Orleans high school player in 8 years

New Orleans hoops have been horrible for a long time. In fact, Louisiana hasn't produced many big time players lately.

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New Orleans hoops have been horrible for a long time. In fact, Louisiana hasn't produced many big time players lately.

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Fortunately Wade has cast his net far and wide. There was a time when St Aug under Bernard Griffith was cranking out big time college prospects every year. Maybe Katrina changed it ,but agree the state has not produced many big time players lately. Need another era like Baby, Tyrus, Taz ,Garret and D Mitch. Their offspring should be coming of age in the next 5 to 10 years. Keep the Shaq babies coming and convince Jabari Junior how the fans will love him like they did Pops and power house in motion.

Keep an eye on Class of 2022 Power forward Kyran Ratliffe. 6-8 & 190. He plays at Booker T Washington. Plays EYBL with Randy Livingston program Fleur de lis. Holds offers from Houston, Arkansas and Georgetown. He can jump thru the roof. Still growing. Good all around game. Top 100 player in the class of '22. LSU has been showing interest but no offer yet.

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New Orleans hoops have been horrible for a long time. In fact, Louisiana hasn't produced many big time players lately

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In all honesty, BR (and the metro area) is probably the better "basketball" part of the state right now. The three scholarship players from LA on Wade's roster are all from BR metro (Smart, Leblanc, Cook). Beekman, top ranked HS player in the state last year played at Scotlandville (though he isn't a BR native). Going back even further you had Mays, Sampson, Jacob Evans, Jarrell Martin and Damian Jones.

I know NOLA is the state's largest city and where we think most of the talent should be located (as it is with football). But if you are looking for basketball players in LA, Baton Rouge is the first place to look.

they were in it, but he fit howland's scheme better.

the last big name from nola was DJ Augustine (i know he prepped senior year at Hightower in texas). LSU probably lands him if katrina doesn't hit. then again he's probably glad he didn't come here for the post brady, trent johnson era

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Jared Butler has turned into a nice player at Baylor already, we signed Smart over him that year. Will be interesting to see how both careers turn out.

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Going back to this earlier post, might be a safe bet Butler will be turning out better than Smart

Dude is on a mission this season so far, incredible start for him. He was an AP preseason all-american which kind of shocked me. He was good last year but didnt think he was THAT good to get that kind of recognition. He is off to an hot start though.

LINK

I’m fairly certain that Cook is from New Orleans.

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Going back to this earlier post, might be a safe bet Butler will be turning out better than Smart

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I don't know how this season will turn out; but I actually did a response post comparing the 2 of them a week or two ago.

If you look at their first 2 seasons, Smart actually had better stats across the board than Butler. Now, for the most part they were marginally better; but still better. The only thing Butler was better was in PPG in year 2; however, if you look at conference only stats, he was only marginally better than Smart in points as well.

The argument I make is that Butler is probably more of a true PG than Smart, who is much better as a combo guard; so that limits Smart's stats some.

The other thing that limits Smart's stats in comparison, especially scoring, is the team they have playing around them. Last year, for example, Butler was by far the highest scoring player on the team, whereas Smart was 3rd or even 4th best scorer; and not b/c he was bad, but just b/c he had teammates like Mays, Watford, Williams, and Days around him. In fact, 1-7, LSU's roster outscored every comparative player on Baylor's roster. So LSU didn't need Smart to score like Baylor needs Butler to.

Finally, I think Butler gets the recognition that he does b/c he is the best player on one of the best teams in one of the best conferences in the country. We all know that sort of thing often helps players garner more accolades even though statistically they may not be better than many others at their same position.

Damien Jones, Scotlandville and Vanderbilt. Plays for PHX SUNS.