Nice article about MSU's 2 redshirts

[Wufan]

Starting bigs at 6-9 and 225 or bigger:

Bradley: Will Egolf (6-9, 230) - 8 points, 4 boards
Creighton: Greg Echenique (6-9, 260) -10 and 7
Drake: Seth VanDeest (6-11, 270) - 9 and 4…also Clark
Evansville: The new frosh is 6-10, 225 but won't start. Moore is 6-7 and 230
Illinois State: Jackie Carmichael (6-9, 240) - 14 and 10…also Wilkins
Indiana State: RJ Mahurin (6-9, 225) - 7 and 2
Northern Iowa: Seth Tuttle (6-9, 255) - 9 and 5
Southern Illinois: Davante Drinkard (6-9, 235) - 4 and 2
Wichita State: Carl Hall or Orukpe or Lufile will start here. Orukpe and Lufile are both "projects" and Hall is only 6-8, 240 so he misses the criteria…

Kirk is 6-7, 225. He will be the smallest center in the league . He averaged 4 and 3 last year as a freshman. I think he will have a hard time defensively against the MVC starting centers over 6-9 and 235…of which there are 5. As to the 6-8 220 lb centers you spoke of…Kirk comes the closest at 6-7, 225 followed by Moore at 6-7, 230 and Hall at 6-8 240. Mahurin and Egolf squeeze in to the upper range at 6-9 225 and 6-9 230 respectively.

[Wufan]

We are definitely a little undersized. Its a concern. We wont match up well against CU at the 5 for sure. McCullogh does look like the real deal for 2013/2014.

That will help Kirk and MSU next season.

By the way, saying Kirk is undersized is not a knock on him. He's just out of position to maximize his ability unfortunately.

[BEARZ77]

Starting bigs at 6-9 and 225 or bigger:

Bradley: Will Egolf (6-9, 230) - 8 points, 4 boards
Creighton: Greg Echenique (6-9, 260) -10 and 7
Drake: Seth VanDeest (6-11, 270) - 9 and 4…also Clark
Evansville: The new frosh is 6-10, 225 but won't start. Moore is 6-7 and 230
Illinois State: Jackie Carmichael (6-9, 240) - 14 and 10…also Wilkins
Indiana State: RJ Mahurin (6-9, 225) - 7 and 2
Northern Iowa: Seth Tuttle (6-9, 255) - 9 and 5
Southern Illinois: Davante Drinkard (6-9, 235) - 4 and 2
Wichita State: Carl Hall or Orukpe or Lufile will start here. Orukpe and Lufile are both "projects" and Hall is only 6-8, 240 so he misses the criteria…

Kirk is 6-7, 225. He will be the smallest center in the league . He averaged 4 and 3 last year as a freshman. I think he will have a hard time defensively against the MVC starting centers over 6-9 and 235…of which there are 5. As to the 6-8 220 lb centers you spoke of…Kirk comes the closest at 6-7, 225 followed by Moore at 6-7, 230 and Hall at 6-8 240. Mahurin and Egolf squeeze in to the upper range at 6-9 225 and 6-9 230 respectively.

I only see a couple of those that are close to legitimate.Tuttle was 215 as a freshman, so if he's 255 now, he's been on steroids[ the official UNI roster has him at 6'8,225]. Mahurin is a perimeter shooting 3/4[ the ISU roster lists him at 225] .Egloff has a few inches but no weight on Kirk. Drinkard is injured and only a marginal guy at best anyway. Moore and Hall are guys Kirk matches up with well. Like I said,I don't see it excpept at a couple places.

[Wufan]

Sorry, that's Koch not Tuttle at 255. I know Koch is more of a PF, but someone has to guard the big body. I count four staters that are just too big for Kirk to be effective...Koch, Greg E, VanDeest and Carmichael. If you believe he's big enough to handle 7-0, 250 lb EO or 6-9, 250 lb Chadrack Lufile, or 6-8, 240 lb Carl Hall, that's fine. If you wish to dismiss the other 4 Valley centers, okay by me. That puts Kirk as the 5th best center. I said he wouldn't be top half. I guess I was wrong.

IMO his height and weight will put him at a disadvantage to the other centers that his athleticism won't make up. At PF I would have a different perspective.

[pawball]

Heck, the Michigan Final 4 team way back didn't have anyone over 6'6 as I recall. This convosation aint' about nothin, but otoh, may be 'bout way less than the import it seems to imply. Guess we will see when they git out on the floor.

[BEARZ77]

Learn to read Wufan and you won't have to waste as much band space. Not only were you wrong on some of your players and sizes, no where did I say what rank Kirk had in the league. I just said he could hold his own against most of the guys in this league other than the 2-3 legit centers. Also Koch likes to play on the perimeter and shoot the trey, so again unless he plans on becoming a legit back to the basket low post guy at this point in his career, weight isn't much a factor at 20 feet from the basket. Tuttle scares me alot more on the blocks and again he's maybe a inch taller and about the same weight as Christian. I think Tuttle is a stud in this league the next 3 years and he will not be among the bigger post players. Look at your own team last year, you were best playing one big and a 6'5 guy at pf most of the time. It didn't work when Stutz and Hall were together on the court. My guess is you'll spend alot the time this year with Hall and Early on your front line. That's a pair of 6'8 guys , and yet as you pointed out, other than CU, you by far have the most size on your roster.

We know we're undersized and this year will be a challenge down on the blocks for Kirk and all our frontline guys. But this just isn't a league where there are that many quality bigs, so while some teams might have some size on their rosters, when it's all said and done the # of those who put up solid numbers night in and out usually is pretty limited. We had two guys last year at 6'11, 250 and 6'10, 255 and while Patterson was talented offensively, neither was a force on the boards or defensively.

We are very very young, very undersized on the frontline, but we will play 10, are pretty athletic, and have excellent guards. Not expecting a top 4 finish, but we could surprise after that

[Wufan]

Learn to read Wufan and you won't have to waste as much band space.

I think you should heed your own advise.

Not only were you wrong on some of your players and sizes, no where did I say what rank Kirk had in the league.

I was wrong in that I stated Koch's size and listed Tuttle. I also correctly stated Mahurin's size. You corrected it by repeating what I said…read and don't waste bandwidth…I was the one who stated he wouldn't be a top half (top 5) Valley center. You objected.

I just said he could hold his own against most of the guys in this league other than the 2-3 legit centers.

All but two or three? I think you are starting to see my point that there are a lot of big centers in this league. I'll answer this with your own words because I have been reading:

Once you get past the "Big E" at CU, things are pretty uncertain in the Valley at the post.

All but one?

I guess I don't see those guys but at 1-2 schools; anybody that size besides at Drake or CU is a project. Most of the quality returning guys at EU/UNI/WSU/ISU are at best 6'9 230 if that.

All but two? now we're at 2 or 3 so getting closer. The second part isn't true…See Carmichael and Koch, and Lufile is not a project. Hall is 240 (though only 6-8 and a banger).

Also Koch likes to play on the perimeter and shoot the trey, so again unless he plans on becoming a legit back to the basket low post guy at this point in his career, weight isn't much a factor at 20 feet from the basket.

If you put someone that is 6-7 and almost 230 on him, you can bet that he will post them up.

Look at your own team last year, you were best playing one big and a 6'5 guy at pf most of the time. It didn't work when Stutz and Hall were together on the court. My guess is you'll spend alot the time this year with Hall and Early on your front line. That's a pair of 6'8 guys , and yet as you pointed out, other than CU, you by far have the most size on your roster.

We were best playing one post and one guy that could stretch the D. It did work with Hall and Stutz…they played greater than 15 mpg together most games. My guess is that we will play Hall and Early together sometimes but Early will spend most of his time at the wing and Hall will spend a considerable amount of time at the PF and will be backed up by the 6-8, 230 lb Jake White (that's center size based on your definition). Actually we are bigger than CU. All that said, I'm not sure what that has to do with Kirk being able to guard all but 1 (GE) or all but 2 (SVD) or all but 3 (Koch/Tuttle) centers…I guess he'll probably own Carmichael at 6-9, 240?

We know we're undersized and this year will be a challenge down on the blocks for Kirk and all our frontline guys. But this just isn't a league where there are that many quality bigs, so while some teams might have some size on their rosters, when it's all said and done the # of those who put up solid numbers night in and out usually is pretty limited. We had two guys last year at 6'11, 250 and 6'10, 255 and while Patterson was talented offensively, neither was a force on the boards or defensively.

We are very very young, very undersized on the frontline, but we will play 10, are pretty athletic, and have excellent guards. Not expecting a top 4 finish, but we could surprise after that

Totally agree with the above. There's nothing wrong with being undersized, it just makes things more difficult. I think we both agree that Kirk would do VERY well against the league's PFs, but by putting him up against a big body you risk fouls and take away some of his strengths on the defensive end.

BTW, thanks for talking basketball!

[BEARZ77]

Creighton has a 7 footer, a 6'11 guy and the Big E , that's a little bigger than you. One of your 6'9 guys is inelgible and you have several 6'8, so you have a few more bodies 6'8 and above, but not the true bigs CU has.You still might want to test your reading skills; sentences are written in order in a paragraph for a reason. Changing the order changes the meaning. You might want to look up the word "uncertain", the meaning is different than non existent.While your there check out the phrase "hold his own", it doesn't mean better than or dominate.

But hey, like you said, nice basketball discussion.

[Wufan]

Starting to split hairs. We will see what happens. There have been successful centers at Kirk's size.

How is Gavin looking? I see he is officially listed at 6-6, 223. I'd have guessed 6-7, 215 when he left Wichita. Lots of athletic potential in Gavin. What are the early reports saying about his play in practice?

[Ricardo del Rio]

Creighton has a 7 footer, a 6'11 guy and the Big E , that's a little bigger than you. One of your 6'9 guys is inelgible and you have several 6'8, so you have a few more bodies 6'8 and above, but not the true bigs CU has.You still might want to test your reading skills; sentences are written in order in a paragraph for a reason. Changing the order changes the meaning. You might want to look up the word "uncertain", the meaning is different than non existent.While your there check out the phrase "hold his own", it doesn't mean better than or dominate.

But hey, like you said, nice basketball discussion.

Since you are giving English lessons, I thought you should know that "your" does not equal "you are."