Question about basketball and Simmons...

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Is it limiting to the offense to have Simmons handle the ball to initiate the half court offense? Would it be better to have him post up or move about the baseline while a ball handler such as Quarterman or Gray look for opportunities to penetrate or distribute?

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Simmons does both. Whenever he does post up our guards really don't try or know how to get him the ball and most of the time he has his man sealed pretty good. It's truly a shame really b/c that goes to show you just how poor of a coach Jones is. Entry to the post are basic fundamentals middle school coaches teach.

The real problem with bball is we have many problems. #1 being we do not have a competent PG. Ben is our best, thus we want the ball in his hands, but he's also the best on the block. Add in the fact that Johnny is not a good X's and O's guy and it compounds the issue. Ideally we would like Gray/TQ to penetrate, however gray gets into the lane and gets stuck...then TQ just wants to shoot 3's and miss

Agreed with Topwater.

Ben is amazing, but mentally he isnt getting the college game. He wants to play outside. But we need him to be a big. Durant, AD, melo, all these guys played pf, c, pf, then moved to sf, pf, sf in the pros.

Yes, it very much hurts our team for our pf to play positionless basketball. His passing would help us way more from the post.

People saying he has to play pg and pf dont know shite. Tq, jalyn patterson, and josh gray were fine as our pg's last year, but they are relegated to catch and shoot bystanders while simmons tries to play like CP3. And Victor is down low by himself.

You need at least 2 bigs in basketball, even in the nba. We just dont have it. We dont have bigs playing big boy ball.

Against arky, blakeny snagged a rebound and had to waive off ben to start the break. Ben ran towards the ball. But what he is really supposed to do is streak down the floor and use his speed to beat other bigs back.

Thats part of what makes AD and blake griffin so effective in the pros. But ben is not sprinting back off the rebounds from teamates, he's sprinting to the ball. He wants to walk it up, when he should really let the guards do same.

Jarrell martin routinely did this last year, like ad/blake griffin, getting back really quick off of other guys rebounds, and finishing monster dunks off same. He went between the legs off one. The other teams bigs couldnt keep up. We just dont have this in any fashion anymore, and we are a run n gun team.

It makes no sense for ben to be this ball dominant outside of the paint. Our guards have been reduced to spectators, and have no doubt lost confidence.

Edit: blakeny is more than capable of starting a break. Ben running to blakeny to stop ball/take ball is just unneccessary and frusterating.


Thats literally something CP3 would do that if deandre jordan rebounded the ball, i.e. your big man who cant dribble.

Blakeny is making the right move by starting the break. Ben is supposed to run the floor not run to the ball in such situations. Makes no sense to go and take the ball from your guard. Its not like darcy malone had the rebound, which I would understand.

Biggest problem I have with Johnny is he wants to be a running team, but he doesn't use timeouts or substitutions well enough to run properly. You can't be a run and gun team with only playing 6 guys. Arky coach put in guys that might not be extremely good but they are bodies and run and press teams can hide a lot of deficiencies by not allowing a team to get settled.

Tq, josh gray, and patterson did well last year. Ben needs to play inside point blank.

Proof is in the pudding. Are we winning? No.

But we smashed Kentucky playing bully ball.

I promise you, ben figures this out again now, and we win 5 straight. Please ben, please.

Edit: ben has has some really bad and lazy turnovers 2nd half of sec play. 8 TO's against tenn. Let the guards be guards and kill the middle. We will win if he does it.

Watch ben in the post. If he doesnt get an entry past immediately he gives up and comes out.

Seriously. Just pay attention. Last year we had martin and mickey constantly fighting for position. Thats the point. Ben isnt. After a few tries he comes out to play with the ball. He needs to play bully ball as a big. This means you play OFF ball and constantly get position.

Ben fouled out kentucky's bigs in ONE HALF. He sat out the first with fouls.

He draws fouls on bigs even OFF ball, while fighting for position. He must do this all game, and we will win.

We still can win out and pull some shite off. We just need ben to be a monster and dominate the middle.

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but he doesn't use timeouts or substitutions well enough to run properly. You can't be a run and gun team with only playing 6 guys.

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That really isn't the case this year. Last season LSU played four guys over 30 minutes a game, two more over 24 minutes a game. The 7th most minutes played was 6.6 minutes by Bridgewater.

This season 8 LSU players average over 13 minutes per game, 11 average over 9 mpg.

Criticize CJJ all you want, but he has a much deeper team this year & utilizes it. The players haven't always performed, but he's definitely giving more guys more minutes. FWIW I think's he done a better job with timeouts & substitutions, but I think LSU's issues run a little deeper than CJJ's perceived in-game coaching flaws.