It's funny, I happened to read Bryant's recruiting report while browsing recent classes last night, and I'd forgotten that he read to be a WHOLE lot better than he's turned out. I finally remembered why I thought he was going to be an adequate replacement at the point back when it was looking like we wouldn't get Dee back. I guess that's just the difference between juco and D1 competition. Still, he's a solid backup and I'm more comfortable with him than I was with Twany... he just doesn't need to be in the game when we have a chance to tie on a dead shot clock.
As for Benock, he's not terrible. He's not great either, although he might be if he just didn't hesitate on almost every playmaking opportunity put in front of him. I'd call him our best on-ball defender if he didn't always seem to be giving up cheap fouls; maybe he is even despite that.
I consider arguing that Dee directly hurt us with the 14 missed games to be a moot point. I think the only alternative is that he's playing in Europe right now, because I have little doubt he fully intended on going pro at or at least not long before the withdrawal deadline. Arguing that him not getting into this mess at all is not a realistic alternative in my opinion, as we have no idea when he made the decision that he was going pro. Out of what I consider the only two viable options, we're lucky he chose to change his mind and come back. At that point, the 14 games are outside of his control (the 9 games obviously and the additional 5 because the reason he didn't go to school in the spring is because he didn't think he was coming back). Sorry if that doesn't make much sense or seems a little contrived.
