Did I say I was a multimillionaire? What are you even talking about? Are you saying that if you were in Pike’s position, you wouldn’t have been more aggressive in getting wealthy donors to help you fund a legit center? If that’s what you’re saying then your comment makes sense.
I've never
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Just curious… how do you know how aggressive he was? Like I said before…. He was rumored to have money lined up and Hobbs was a road block.
Because it was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and in that situation you don’t take no for an answer.
He's means that the donors wanted to be able to write off their donations but hobbs would not allow the donations to be structured in a way that would allow that.
come to think of it, that actually may be why Rutgers has terrible NIL support for all sports. They aren't playing ball lolAll NIL collectives for all universities were operating under the same guidelines, that donations for NIL were not tax deductible. It didn’t stop wealthy donors from giving and it shouldn’t have stopped Pike from trying.
In hindsight, he certainly shouldn’t have played it off as if he was confident in what he had at center. That’s for sure. But to be fair, he had to be careful not to scare off Dylan and Ace too. He was basically in over his head and didn’t know how to manage the situation he was in.
Are you sure about that? From what I understood some universities, mainly in the sec provided ways around that...but yeah I agree, definitely shouldn't stop you from trying.
Exactly. You can’t just walk away from a big donor because they were hoping to get a tax break.
If I had a donor say he’d give a million dollars only if he could save 370k on his taxes by writing it off, then I’d tell him to just give me $630,000 since he would be out that amount anyway.
RU had an Athletic Director who was telling rich donors not to get involved in NIL
So if Pikiell convinced a rich donor to give money without requiring a tax break, Hobbs would have turned it down? I don’t believe that.
We’ll never know the behind the scenes details, but what we do know is that Pike didn’t even try to plead with the fan base. He needed to manage Ace and Dylan internally. He should’ve told them - I think getting an established center could be the difference between us being in the natty picture or not and engage them in the process too. We was scared of losing Lathan and ending up with nothing but in the end, all he ended up with was Lathan and Lathan wasn’t ready. The situation was poorly managed.
I do feel cautiously optimistic though about the forward looking situation Pike is in right now. It’s much more his comfort zone (of course that’s operating under the assumption there’s already an understanding between the staff and Tariq of the plans for next year). It seems that way based on how Tariq is being used recently but that doesn’t mean Tariq won’t be influenced by offers once the season ends of course.
If Pike is in a position to recruit defense from the portal, there’s reason to at least hope next season will be more successful. He was not in a position to approach the portal that way this year. He returned literally nobody who could put the ball through the net outside of an occasional 3 from J Mike or Grant. The rest of Dylan’s offense is dependent on being a diversion from someone else and we didn’t have that someone else at the start of portal season. So Pike had no choice but to prioritize offense at least to an extent. With TF and the complements we have - he can focus on fixing the D. I’m not saying the offense is “great” but it’s going to clog in near top 3 or so of the Pike era and that’s very limited transition opportunities due to how bad the D is.
Completely disagree! Can’t handle the ball at a high enough level to be a true starting caliber point. Too small to be a legit shooting guard. Definitely does not guard at an elite level.
Can he get a bucket? Absolutely!!!!
There is a reason he came off the bench for so long. Opposing starters would be a little tired or he would go against teams second units.
Guy is a walking iso bucket! But on a legit team he is the 8th option maybe.
Agreed but trying to find one thing to give Pike a semi pass on. He had made sooo many bad decisions.
You disagree that our 2021-22 team that played a grand total of 5 players more than like 12 mpg would have DRASTICALLY benefitted from his services? I’m sure Pike loved having Paul and Caleb on the floor together for 30 mpg on offense along with Geo for 34+ minutes. After that - it was Jalen Miller. Come on dude. If you think that team wouldn’t have been at least a 7 seed with TF on it, I don’t know what to tell you. And no, he wouldn’t have been 8th man. He’d play 25 mpg at least.
And don’t you dare try to point to Paul or Geo’s assists to make a case that’s why they are so much “better” than Tariq when they had RHJ and Cliff playing along side them in the front court. A little different - yes?
No sorry I disagree you stating he is not an 8th man on any team. He doesn’t start and struggles to play on Mich, Duke, Iowa St, Arizona, etc
As far as the 21-22 team you forget who are coach is. With that team and its tough defensive brand of basketball Pike never lets Tariq prove his worth. His lack of size and defensive prowess with the other guys on the roster forces Pike to leave Tariq on the bench. (Pike blindspot)
Would he have been a huge asset? Sure ! I just know Pike would have not used him the way he currently does!
Tariq isn’t that bad on defense. He would’ve been fine on that team. Not an issue. Caleb covered up for a lot. Geo and Paul weren’t exactly defensive super stars. Tariq isn’t Jaden Jones on D. Not even close. Not even earlier in the season and he’s improved. He plays like a junior. His physical limitations may be there but he’s always in the right position. He’s not a massive liability.
The reason he came off the bench is because he wasn’t being selfish as a starter and was too focused on getting the team going rather than himself. When he checks in later, he could just get to work.
I don’t think 5 mins of game time is going to make a meaningful difference in D1 athletes.
The point is he’s the type of player who scores is a variety of ways and would be of great value to a lot of teams. Not every team would go after him. I dont know that he would’ve been a great addition for instance to the 2020 team where we had a kid like JY already. The point is to any team that doesn’t have a guard who puts up a lot of points he’s an asset and not in an Oskar Palmquist type of 8 man role. Hes playing 24+ min on whatever teams go after him without question.
Also - Tariq’s paper metrics do not do justice to how efficient he is as a player either. If you swapped junior Cam Spencer in place of Tariq and asked him to command the ball and make things happen he would not have prettier looking metrics. No guard in RU history outside of Dylan Harper would. He’s not a selfish player at all. Selfish = Tez. Tariq doesn’t play like that. He picks his spots and now it’s his designated role to try and draw contact and put something up in iso if we can’t find someone open running the offense after a certain point in the shot clock. That’s not being a ball hog. He’s our best option at that point.
Sorry - my post might have been confusing. During the minny game, the announcers were saying he was too unselfish as a starter, too focused on his teammates, so the staff switched him to the 6th man. Don’t think there’s any confusion about who our best player is. Really hope we can add some pieces around him.
I love his game and how smart/instinctive he is - never thought I’d be so excited watching a guy constantly draw fouls from 3 pt territory.
3 year slide is that we had Cliff but when he had to rest, we had Ogbole in which was hold your breath. We followed that up by having only Ogbole last year as a real center. We followed up that disaster last year by once again having only Ogbole as a real center. The 5-10 minutes of agony per game have now been the entire 40 mins, then when he’s also had enough of Dortch we’ve had Badalau at center. 3 years wasted with no center. Horrible
I've been following Rutgers basketball since Tom Young was leading the team and I don't recall a poorer front court than what Rutgers has now. None of them would start , let alone be recruited , by any of the top 10 Big programs. Other than Francis , Lino Mark has improved more over this season than any other player and he's rumored to be leaving. Kaden Powers has had his moments. I like Pikiell a lot. But his defense -oriented coaching style has a high floor but low ceiling. Pikiell's coaching style does not work in today's NIL and easy transfer rules that hurt development programs . To me , it's simple. We need better talent , a better offensive approach and ultimately a better coach..
This is one of the wildest comments I’ve ever read on this board.
It’s been noted many times. The universities who are serious about competing in athletics have found ways to allow tax deductible donations to contribute. Hobbs would not allow it.
One example… Penn State’s NIL collective / BPS Foundation arrangement – Donors could route contributions through an affiliated charity, BPS Foundation, which then made funds available to the collective that supported athletes at Penn State and other schools. This offered a tax deduction while still supporting NIL activities.
How does that make my statement “100% incorrect” that NIL donations are not tax deductible?
And btw, you picked a bad example:
From Google AI:
“The BPS Foundation, which acted as a nonprofit partner for various NIL collectives including those linked to Penn State (such as Happy Valley United), announced it would close by the end of 2024.
The foundation decided to dissolve due to increasing legal risks, IRS scrutiny, and inquiries from state attorneys general regarding the tax-exempt status of NIL.”
The huge mistake Pike made that may ultimately cost him his job it that he had ACE and Dylan locked up due to Fanatics. All he had to do was pay Cliff and pay Mag and we have a Sweet 16 team that with the right breaks or draw likely makes the Final Four. He went into the season without a rim protector and a lockdown defender with 2 of the most gifted offensive players we might ever have. That is the faux pax . Cliff should have been given 2 million so that Alabama became an afterthought with the vision of a Final Four . What ever problems happened with mag should have been ironed out with the vision of the big dance and chasing history. That was such a simple fix that was botched. Too many games were lost because we couldn’t defend the lane and at the rim allowing layup lines. Would never have happened with Cliff and Mag and it cost us center stage , back on everyone’s radar and all the taking heads would be heaping praise on Pike. Instead , we lose a bunch of close games , Harper gets hurt or sick and defense is non existent and the season fails . Fault can be passed to Hobbs or lack of Nil but ultimately blame is on Pike for not allowing the country to see that team compete . He will regret it forever
Yup - I think this is what some are failing to understand. The big advantage you seemingly have as an incumbent is the ability to “overpay” up front to lock someone down up front. It may seem like “overpaying”, but if you can’t get something comparable to transfer into your program for said dollars it’s not overpaying. We needed to offer Cliff the moon and more and not worry about who we would get with whatever remained. Didn’t need to start out by grabbing Martini, Acuff, Dercack, etc.
There’s also a domino effect advantage to locking down impact returners which many are not accounting for. If we tell Francis (for example) peace out - your not worth 1.5M - now we’re entering the transfer cycle with no vision of what our offense is going to look like since he’s the nucleus of what we would theoretically be looking to build on. If we had a great defense, that’d be fine to try to rebuild from scratch, but to have any chance of being good next year we must focus on fixing the D. The trouble with letting Francis go is while hes not perfect, he’s the center of our offense right now and without him, what the offense will look like is a massive question mark. Why would a defensive center choose to come play for a program starting over on offense. The answer is - they probably won’t - not with all the choices they will have. Every other player we have is a complimentary piece right now. We hope they develop but even if they do, you can’t sell what that will look like to convince the pieces you need how they would fit in. I think that was a problem last year when we tried to promote Grant as our feature returner.
You said “All NIL collectives are operating under the same guidelines”. That was 100% incorrect. I gave you one example. That collective offered tax deductions for NIL donations and it was later stopped for another process. Schools all over the country were offering tax deductions. Hobbs said no.
I really don’t think Francis is going anywhere. No other team is going to let him do whatever he wants on offense like Pike has done. But he is not worth 1.5 million because he is not Bruce Thornton or Boyd or Blackwell or Braden Smith or any of those guards that are going carry there teams to victory. Francis has carried us to victory in a few but not enough.
The focus has to be bringing back Lino , Powers, Zrno , Buchanan and what I mean is that we have to pay them. Everyone else JMike , Dylan , Dorsch , Badalau are expendable . Keep Nwuili and Ware on the cheap. Got get 2 major front court players at center and at the 4 , preferably in my opinion a power forward. Those 2 should be impactful offensively and defensively . Then you have a start at a competitive team with front court scoring and rim protection , a fast guard and point guard who is getting better every day , Francis your scorer that will have Wooten coming in as well . Your 3 point shooters in Zrno and Powers and your Swiss Army knife in Buchanan . That should be the build and focus in my opinion
Hopefully, Pike’s “people” understand how to manage the market better now than they have in the past. We have to offer Francis enough to lock him down at the start of the cycle - whatever that amount is. Your right - he’s not going to have an opportunity for a role like the one he has right now anywhere else so that will hopefully carry a good amount of weight. But Sean is unfortunately right - there are going to be very few high major players in the portal who averaged 16+ ppg and that production would render attention should he choice to enter. It took 2 years, but Marcus Carr did end up as the go to guy at Texas after transferring from Minn… He attempted more shots as a senior at Texas than he did his last season in Minnesota. Tariq, by the way, also better metrics that Marcus had his last year in Minnesota.
What I said was 100% correct, NIL donations were not tax deductible. What you described was donors giving to a charity first, as a way around those guidelines, which has since been stopped.
Regardless, Pike could still have gotten donors to give money without a tax deduction.
Friendly reminder you attacked me for saying Dylan Grant wouldn’t play at KANSAS. Now 2 months later he’s “expendable”. Funny how that goes.
And therein lies the problem… letting him do whatever we wants on offense
I’ll be the first to eat crow I didn’t think he could score at this level and he’s proven he can
ultimately he still has a ball dominant mentality and is not a GOOD ENOUGH playmaker with the ball to win like that… that holds true in college the pros
you need a guy with Kyrie Irving, James harden, Luka doncic level skills to win when you demand the ball and that’s your offense
To a lesser extent there are teams that win with this approach in college but it is really hard and it is EVEN HARDER to convince guys to come play for you when they see on tape they aren’t going to get the ball much
which links to the big issue which cannot be solved by any 1-2-3 players is we have no identity and no system to hold players accountable to offensively
and now we aren’t all that good defensively either
Funny how some players take huge leaps as sophomores after an okay freshmen year like Thornton , Braden Smith , or the tens of players around the country that I could list but you wouldn’t be interested. Dylan started the year aggressive , attacking the rim , shooting , getting to the foul line. Competition stepped up and in my opinion he lost his confidence. I partially blame Pike because he chose not to prioritize him because he hates his defense and once Dylan lost his confidence he is not the same player he was at the beginning of the year. He hasn’t taken the sophomore leap we were expecting and is a shell of himself. He hadn’t responded after being sat down for 7-8 minute stretches in a game and forgotten . He still doesn’t have his confidence back. He got blocked at the rim after receiving good passes and instead of going up strong and flushing it , he feebly went up and got blocked. That is a confidence thing not a talent issue. His defense has become really bad as the year goes on which gives Pike more of a platform for not playing him for stretches. To think that Pike thinks Badalau is worthy of prime minutes really has one scratching their head. Dylan has regressed and under Pike I do not think he will get his confidence back . That is why he is expendable especially if he is looking for prime &$$. Things change as a year goes along so that is why opinions change . Hopefully that is helpful for your understanding
It appeared early on that Francis was a ball hog and also trying to prove how good of a scorer he was . He was never passing to a big on a pick and roll nor to the wing for a three. As the year has gone on , and he has seen Powers and Zrno can score as can Buchanan and Dylan , he has not played like he did earlier. His assist total or what I call attempted assist total because basket didn’t go in , has improved. He sprays it to ZRno now or Powers now. Wish he would pass more on the pick and roll but not looking to shoot every trip down court . He has improved playing the point guard role in his distribution but it is taking a toll on his shooting as his efficiency numbers are declining over the last 4-5 games. Put him back in the microwave role and I think we will see better efficiency and more scoring as well as more passing.