HookEm

I was never worried about RT's ability to recruit. When he was at Fresno, he signed the #59, 66, and #71 classes in a 4 year stretch. While not super impressive in an absolute sense, their long-term average is ~#126. At Texas he has superb facilities, a dump truck of NIL money, NBA players to assist, and a top-notch staff filled with elite recruiters. I have no doubt we are going to be up there with the best schools in the country.

Weaver just needs to relax a little. Right now his athleticism is a liability, not an asset. Once the game slows down for him and he plays more under control, he could be very good. Kind of like Kerwin Roach.

I'm not too worried about our free throw shooting. We have the pieces to be fantastic from the line. I'm going to assume the players are just not in great shape yet and that is translating into poor FT shooting (i.e. tired players leaving them short and being out of rhythm).

Shedrick 1/1 from 3. In his entire 76 games for Virginia across 3 years he only shot 7 3s. He can clearly shoot as evidenced by his ~80% FT rate. I wouldn’t mind seeing him take a 3 per game.

I will never... NEVER... understand why Shaka abandoned everything that made him successful as soon as he got to Texas. Everything was set up for him to be so successful here. He could run Havoc with Texas-level recruits - something every fan wanted to see. Nope. Occasionally we would get behind and start pressing and everything would open up. It was beautiful. Just a small taste of what could be. Then like a fart in the wind it was gone. We would grind things back down again and lose. FFFFFFFFFFFFFffffffffffffffffff.

No. Next question. Zero chance outside of injury.

Chris Simms was the #1 player in the country coming out of high school. He was very similar to Arch Manning in a lot of ways given his family pedigree and skills. If Mack had done with Simms what we are doing with Arch, everything would have been so much better. Imagine the following: 1998 - Major Applewhite starts while Ricky wins Heisman 1999 - Major Applewhite starts and earns Big 12 Offensive PoY. Chris Simms redshirts 2000 - Major Applewhite starts. Simms gets mop up duty instead of splitting 1/3 the stats. Same 9-3 record but both QBs keep confidence. 2001 - Major Applewhite starts. We still barely lose to OU, but this time we beat Colorado and play Miami for the title. Simms gets a lot of run since we had nine blowouts. Major Applewhite graduates with two Big-12 titles and a National Title appearance. 2002 - Chris Simms starts as a RS-JR - Maybe a more confident Simms improves on our 11-2 record, we beat Tech and play for another title? 2003 - Chris Simms starts as a RS-SR - There is no Vince Young vs. Chance Mock debate. Instead Vince backs up Simms and gets plenty of mop-up time. At this point Simms was a great QB. No way we lose to Arkansas. Instead of 10-3, we go 11-2 or 12-1 and likely win another BCS bowl. 2004 - Vince Young starts Those teams were absolutely loaded and the QB mismanagement cost us at least one trip to the MNC game, maybe two.

It wasn't just Vince-Colt. It went: Major Applewhite: 1st Team All-Big 12 and a boat load of UT passing records Chris Simms: 26-6 as a starter and a boat load of UT passing records Vince Young: Davey O'Brien Award Colt McCoy: Davey O'Brien Award Not to mention Chance Mock with a 16-2 TD/INT ratio and a 148.7 QB Rating in 2003 splitting time with VY. What a great string of QBs.

Future SEC with 8 of the top 21 (but no top 5 teams). Future Big 12 with 6 of the top 27 (but 3 of the top 7).

I guess he will just have to come back and win the Heisman and get a statue at DKR. He is a unique runner at Texas. Not especially fast. Not especially powerful. No amazing cuts. But he has patience and vision that are really elite. He follows blockers perfectly and picks up 5 yards when it looks like the play is busted. I don’t think an ACL tear is going to hugely impact him over the long term. And our line is going to be even better next year. Hopefully if he does decide to come back we reward him with a monster year.

I think our whole season hinges on how good Disu is when he comes back. If he is as good as he was last March, we are going to be so hard to beat.

Lot of gamblers biting their nails right now.

I like that our team has an all-business vibe for the 2nd straight year. I credit RT for bringing in the right guys and not chasing knuckleheads.

Yeah we will have a lot of turnover next year. Out of eligibility after this year: G - Max Abmas G - Ithiel Horton F - Brock Cunningham F - Dylan Disu Likely also gone G - Tyrese Hunter F - Dillon Mitchell Returning G - Chendall Weaver G - Chris Johnson F - Devon Pryor F - Ze'Rik Onyema F - Alex Anamekwe C - Kadin Shedrick (I'm pretty sure he will still have a year of eligibility after this year, but not totally sure) G - Cam Scott - #37 National recruit. 6'5, 165 PF - Nicolas Codie - #46 National recruit. 6'9, 200 We are also a strong player for National #5 recruit Tre Johnson and a few other National top-100 recruits. And I'm sure we will be very active in the transfer portal. Hopefully people will relax a little this year. Just expect total chaos from April to July and know that at the end of the day we will get way more than our share of elite transfers.

No problem. I actually screwed up and named one of our recruits "Ithiel Hunter". Should be Ithiel Horton. Guess I had Tyrese Hunter on the mind. I also neglected our freshmen: Chris Johnson - National top-50, 6'5 combo guard originally committed to KU. Decommitted and signed with Texas after KU added Arterio Morris. (We got the better end of that deal). Has great size and strength for a guard and has the mentality and skills to be a lock down defender. Has a long relationship with TJ Ford who has coached and mentored him. Will be an important piece next year along with Chendall Weaver. Hopefully he will get enough minutes that we keep him. Devon Pryor - 6'7 SF who was originally a 2024 LSU commit. He decommitted, reclassified to the 2023 class and signed with Texas in July. Ranked #19 recruit in Texas but was moving up the 2024 charts before reclassifying to 2023. High ceiling, young player who will need some time to grow. Very athletic kid. The sky is the limit and he is apparently impressing in practice. In the offseason, we also lost a commit from Ron Holland, the likely #1 overall pick in the 2024 draft. He ended up going to the G-League. That was a painful loss, but probably cleared the way for Dillon Mitchell to return (which may actually be better for the single year we would have either of them).

That will be a fun lineup for sure, but I don't see any way that Disu isn't in our best lineup if he comes back and plays like he is capable of. He will demand double teams anywhere near the paint, which will allow everyone else to bomb. Disu is also close to a 80% FT shooter. Mitchell.... isn't. I do like the idea of playing Mitchell and Cunningham as our small ball 4/5 at times throughout the game. Would love to really push the ball with such a lineup and hit corner 3s off the break (with Mitchell crashing). Would also enjoy seeing us press with a lineup like that.

I thought it was ASS-mas. As in, "more ass" for our Spanish speaking friends. But I stand corrected.

I guess I disagree with this. It just isn't feasible for UT to keep up with the growth in Texas. Having 100,000 kids enrolled with half the classes being online is garbage. My son is a freshman at UT and has an online Calculus class and it is a terrible learning environment. That isn't what we are paying for. I would MUCH rather the UT System pick a another school and REALLY invest in it. Make UT-SA a top-tier school with a top-tier academic and athletic program. A school that can compete directly with A&M and Tech. Or take the steps to convert UT-Dallas or UT-Arlington from commuter schools to universities with some school spirit. Right now Texas and A&M are basically the only major Texas university options if you want a respected academics, major athletics and in-state cost. I keep waiting for Texas Tech to get to that level, but I'm not sure it will ever happen.

Here is another more extended power poll of what the full conferences look like with next year's moves. And I forgot that Beard is now at Ole Miss. That will be yet another fun game to add in future years. Average SEC - 38.4 Big 12 - 42.2 Median SEC - 36.5 Big 12 - 43.5 Big 12 #1 KU #6 Houston #14 Arizona #16 Baylor #30 K-State #31 TCU #38 Iowa State #43 Colorado #44 Texas Tech #49 Cincinnati #53 BYU #55 Utah #61 Oklahoma State #69 Arizona State #80 UCF #85 West Virginia SEC #10 Tennessee #13 Arkansas #15 Texas #17 Aggy #18 Kentucky #19 Alabama #26 Auburn #34 Mississippi State #39 Missouri #41 Florida #47 Oklahoma #59 Georgia #63 Vanderbilt #70 LSU #71 Ole Miss (They will soon be top-25 with Beard) #73 South Carolina

SEC is also a very good basketball conference. Here are current top-40 BPI rankings. SEC #3 Tennessee (will be fun to play Barnes) #9 Aggy (will be fun to play those clowns again) #10 Auburn #14 Texas #19 Arkansas #23 Florida #25 Alabama #35 Kentucky (good blue-blood KU replacement) #39 Mississippi State Big 12 #1 Kansas #2 Houston #7 Baylor #18 Arizona #20 TCU #24 K-State #31 Iowa State #34 Colorado Here is the CBS top-25+1 power poll SEC #10 Arkansas #13 Tennessee #14 Aggy #16 Kentucky #20 Texas #26 Alabama Big 12 #1 Kansas #6 Houston #17 Arizona #18 Baylor It isn't going to be a big step down at all. There will be just as many top-tier games. What we will miss are those blood bath games on the road against a top-50 team like Okie State that are so freaking tough.

Massey has us with 21.5 wins, 7.5 losses and favored in 24/29 games. #11 in the country as a starting point.

I realize he is a big, but I would add Disu to the “shooters” category. He shot 37% from 3 on decent volume at Vandy. And was 40% from 3 in conference last year. We can put 5 shooters on the floor if we want and still have a well constructed lineup that can play D and match up with anybody.

I'm not too worried about the minutes. We will settle in to 7-8 players getting the majority of minutes and play a variety of big and small lineups. I like the idea of staring big with Hunter, Abmas, Mitchell, Disu and Shedrick. Then have Horton be the 1st guy off the bench for Shedrick and bump up the tempo with a smaller athletic lineup. Next in would be Brock for Disu and we go even smaller with 4 shooters and Mitchell playing the 5. Then Weaver and Onyema get minutes as needed.

Horton has a little junkyard dog in him. I like having bigger guards like that who can play multiple positions. I think Mitchell is going to eat into his minutes when Disu comes back and we go bigger.

See... yall mocked me for putting Perryman in lineups. Now he is out here draining 3s. Lol.