Bring your Tigers football, basketball and recruiting questions, and talk to Eli Hoff in a live chat at 11 a.m. Thursday.
Live transcript
Eli Hoff: Good morning, all! Welcome to another Mizzou chat. We've got the end of basketball season, the spring game, diamond sports and an AD search to talk about. Feel free to pepper your questions in over the next few hours.
Oh, and I want some recommendations! My job, of course, has been to focus very closely on Mizzou basketball. And now that that's over... I'm realizing how little I know about the broader college basketball landscape this season and what's going on outside of the SEC. So, my question: What teams are you watching during the rest of championship week? Who are you excited to see in the NCAA Tournament? I want to watch some fun hoops during this wonderful time of the basketball calendar.
People are also reading…
seniorÌýscramble:ÌýI can't for the life of me figure this out. Women's basketball program must be in total confusion mode. No word on the future of the coaching situation. I wonder what the young players must be thinking. The interim AD needs to come out and tell the fans what is going on. If they wait for the new AD to be hired and make a coaching change the new coach will be so far behind in portal recruits and by that time the young good players Mizzou has, could be gone. To me it is total incompetence by Mizzou leadership and shows they don't really care about trying to have an SEC. women's basketball program. Thanks for the chat I look forward to Thursday's and your chats.
Hoff:ÌýYes, there's a lot of uncertainty on the women's basketball front. The decision really needs to be made, like, now. Players are already entering the transfer portal, including Mizzou's Mama Dembele. It isn't really surprising for the Tigers — I'd been told that she'd played her last game at Mizzou, and it seemed like she was going to try for a spot in a pro league. She'll have one more year to use elsewhere as a potential springboard to that. More pressingly for Mizzou, there are young players in this program who I imagine any head coach would like to keep around. They could always enter the portal and still come back, but that might not be uncertainty worth navigating. And letting Pingeton coach into the last year of her contract doesn't exactly incentivize her thinking of the program's future.
I'd written this two weeks ago, and most of it still applies today. I'm just now sure how Missouri can really "win" the women's basketball situation this time around the sun. There's no reason why MU couldn't or shouldn't be a player in the women's basketball space. It just takes some decisiveness and a clear direction. Some clarity on the coaching front would help with that, I think.
South City Steve:ÌýI am a casual Mizzou basketball fan but I have been a staunch Gates defender to anyone who was quick to pass judgement on him based on this season. However, the last 3:27 of last night’s game was an absolute embarrassment. Sloppy passing, sloppy play calling, just very undisciplined basketball. How many step back threes from do you need from Honor in a 5-point game?
Hoff:ÌýYou're smart to still be backing Gates. You'll be on the winning side of that debate that shouldn't even really be a debate. The problem with some of the shot selection down the stretch is that there just weren't many great options — something of a tale of the season. For example... on open catch-and-shoot 3s (ie the type of shot that Noah Carter missed in the corner that really ended chances of a comeback), Sean East shot 61.5% this season, Tamar Bates shot 45.7%, Nick Honor shot 37.5% and Carter shot 29.8%. Nobody else attempted enough to be statistically relevant. Ideally you'd go to East, but he was 3-12 on the night. Honor was 2-9 from 3 alone. So all Georgia really had to do was monitor Bates, contain East and Honor and let Mizzou funnel the ball to Carter. The lack of shooters hampers the gameplan and makes a lot of things easy for opponents in those critical situations.
And as for Honor specifically... he's a legitimately good 3-point shooter, compared to the rest of this roster. Mostly situationally, but generally as well. So is a deep stepback what you want from him? Probably not, but it's better than any shot he can try from inside the 3-point line. It comes back to the broader personnel point that dominates this season. With Bates and East, there were two offensive threats. If either were off, there wasn't much anybody could do to help this team.
And this team had three — three!!! — shots on one possession. But none of them went in. That's what really stings.
South City Steve:ÌýThat's fair, and my belief in Gates doesn't change - just look at the incoming class. But Carter's inbound pass that got stolen looked late and lazy. And the lay-up that followed caught every player flat-footed. That last 3:27 looked exactly like a team that went O'fer in conference which was disappointing given the opportunity in front of them to end teh season on a positive note.
Hoff:ÌýFair point there. I (and many other people) have wondered consistently this season if there's any sense of doom that sets in for these Mizzou players at a certain point in the second half — even subconsciously. I'd think that you can only lose so many games in the final 10 minutes before you start thinking "When's the hammer going to drop?" That, paired with some fatigue (Bates, East, Carter played the entire 2nd half, Honor and Vanover played 17 mins each) seems like something that could fuel a game -losing drought like that. Or maybe it's just whatever factors we can pinpoint that made Mizzou lose the previous 18 games.
LarryÌýM:ÌýCan you refresh the portal opening and closing dates for football and basketball. Thanks
Hoff:ÌýOf course! Basketball portal opens Monday (it's always the day after Selection Sunday) and remains open until May 1. The football spring portal opens April 15 and closes April 30 — 15 days there. The disclaimers: Players can announce their *intent* to enter the portal before that point. You're seeing some of that happen already this week on the basketball front. And once they're in the portal, they don't have to pick a new team by the end of the window. The window is merely to enter.
Larry M:ÌýWhat is with the slash ratings for MU softball 11/12 or whatever. Are those different ratings depending on the source?
Hoff:ÌýYou're right on. There are a few different sources for softball polls, from outlets (D1Softball being the main one) to coaches polls. There isn't consensus on which to follow as the "main" one, hence the slash. That's where football might be heading, in all honesty. We, as a newspaper, use AP Poll rankings. Networks that televise the game use the CFP rankings, since that's where they're invested. There are often minor differences between them, which can produce some confusion.
bigron:ÌýEli, enjoy your coverage of MU sports. Assuming MU Bball has this year's 3 freshmen, the 4 freshmen coming in, Bates and Shaw, who else stays from this years team, and how many come in from the portal and what positions do they play?
Hoff:ÌýThanks! With your formula (there are actually 5 freshmen coming in), that's 9 roster spots filled. This is pure speculation at this moment, since I haven't asked either of them, but I think one or both of Grill and Tonje look likely to be back. That would be 11 spots taken up if both return. Assuming that all the remaining current players leave (Carralero Martin, Lewis, Majak, Brown), there are two portal spots to work with. Take out one more player in the Shaw/Grill/Tonje group and there are three portal spots. Gates really is going to be limited in what he can add by who walks out the door. That's what leads me to predict that there will be 2-3 portal spots, with chances of there being only one or being four.
Ah, shoot. I did my math wrong there. Let me rephrase, for the record:Ìý5 incoming freshmen, 3 rising sophomores, Bates and Shaw gets you to *10*. The Grill/Tonje combo could have you up to 12. If both come back (and everyone else leaves), that's 1 portal spot. If only one does, that's 2. The broader point about needing departures to make room still stands.
The general rule of thumb you can follow this offseason: After the first transfer/opt out (there needs to be one to make room for the freshmen), every departure creates room for a portal addition.
DCG:ÌýI'm not for firing Gates--yet--, but I'm a bit baffled that your belief in him is absolute. He's really getting a free pass for about as bad of a season as a team can have. I've brought this up before, but two seasons of wretched half-court defense and inept rebounding really call some things into question about his coaching. Lack of development of Aidan Shaw does, too, especially since you continue to cite development as a strength. I don't have high hopes for next season given how young the team will be. I just don't think a team can produce a season this bad and not have some real questions about the coaching.
Hoff:ÌýI find Gates' stature as a coach to be a little higher than most in here do, it seems. Some of that, for what it's worth, is based on what other coaches and people in college basketball have said about him. They've forgotten more about basketball than I'll ever know, so I trust their judgment. And the reason it's absolute is that he isn't going anywhere — at least not this offseason. I don't make firing decisions, but I'm confident that the people who do (and the incoming person who will) aren't going to show him the door for this. Hence why debating whether he should be fired right now is pretty pointless. He won't be.
I think there are very valid questions to be asked after two years of his tenure. The rebounding and half-court defense can be part of that. But I actually don't think it's fair to issue a verdict on either. Last season, Mizzou benefitted from some luck. Think of the buzzer beaters, the close-game wins. This year, there was no luck to go around. That's sports. But this year, I don't think Gates got to do what he wanted to do. His personnel just wasn't consistently available for that to happen. That doesn't void questions — part of being a coach is working with what you've got, of course — but I think it's a relevant disclaimer to the broader discussion of Gates.
Questions about Aidan Shaw's development are also valid. He might be having them, too — it's going to be an interesting offseason for him, among others. He's one data point, though. And so much of the development piece, both positive and negative, happens behind closed doors.
And one more thing that should factor into evaluating Gates: culture. This team didn't check out. You could tell from they way they spoke, but also the way they played. The head coach deserves credit for that. If Eli Drinkwitz gets credit for the culture he created during a winning season, Gates should get that in a losing season, too. It matters to players.
Keith:ÌýHowdy Eli! Just curious your thoughts and maybe the scuttlebutt on Drew Pyne as the new QB in the house. I realize he is getting a late start after graduating ND, but it would seem he gives us a couple of years after Brady Cook to look forward to. Do folks there think he can be the guy for the future? Cook is a tough guy for sure, but it is NICE to have someone with some big time experience to step in just in case.
Hoff:ÌýHe fits the mold pretty exactly of what the ideal backup quarterback would be. He's got some experience, so if Mizzou needs him, there's that. He's got the ability to compete for the job after this season. That doesn't mean he's suddenly the heir to the starting QB job. But it's another potential route the Tigers (and Pyne) can go a year from now, if they want to. Giving yourself options without being too tethered to any one thing seems like a good strategy in modern college sports.
JimÌýB:ÌýHowdy Eli ...East put up a good number of points over the season but his inability/unwillingness to play defense and the large number of lazy, bad pass turnovers sure seem to me to show him to be an average at best player. I was always taught that a good player also makes the players around them even better. East and his dribble, dribble, dribble into trouble and then attempt a forced a bail out, awkward pass didn't seem to me like much of an on-court leader. Your thoughts?
Hoff:ÌýI'd challenge that notion pretty strongly. East was in the top 100 players in the country in scoring. In the top 81 for field goal percentage. That means productive and efficient. He was a top 150 player in assists. And his assist-to-turnover ratio, 4:3 per game this season, was the best of anyone on the team. He ran more pick and rolls than 96% of college basketball players, and scored more per possession on those possessions than 86% of college basketball players. His runner was in the 88th percentile, in terms of effectiveness. His jumper, in open catch and shoot situations, was in the 99th percentile. Off the bounce, the 90th percentile. He was No. 23 in the SEC in steals. Defense is hard to quantify besides that. I would look at those numbers paired with the game tape and say he played effectively and efficiently, creating offense for a team that had two players capable of creating their own shot: East and Bates. Everyone else needed to be passed to or to get a very favorable individual matchup.
Does that mean he was perfect? No. Not at all. His struggles last night were one of the reasons Mizzou lost. He probably could've done more on the defensive end. But when he was playing 35 minutes a night, the Tigers needed his juice more on the offensive end.
In terms making other players better, I'm not sure what he could really do there. There weren't many players on this team who opponents would try to really make uncomfortable, besides East and Bates. So East had to do what he had to do to get production and value out of a lackluster offense.
In terms of leadership, he was very much an on-court leader. If you heard a Mizzou player yelling after a sequence (in the arena or on the broadcast), it was East the vast majority of the time. He was the guy who would pull aside struggling players and give them the tough love of "we needed that rebound" or "you gotta make that shot." He was providing verbal on-court leadership in a way that no other player did this season.
And not directly in response to your question, but in general: I feel like I do a lot of defending of men's basketball personnel in this chat. I don't want that to seem like I'm some blind supporter of what they do. If you've read my stuff this season, I think you've seen that I'll write what goes wrong. This season was a bad one. There were a lot of ugly things. But it's possible to both acknowledge that and the legitimately decent things that also came out of the season. Sean East was one of those. So was the culture that Dennis Gates solidified.
Tahart27:ÌýA very frustrating trend with Mizzou basketball that I have noticed in particular last couple of seaons is what seems to be a lack of transparency in terms of player injuries. Felt like they led us Mizzou fans on(perhaps the media too) last year for instance on the transfer from Missouri State(can't think of his name offhand but you probably know whom I'm referring to). They would never reveal for instance if he was going to be dressing out for a game until right before the game. They did this the whole season from each game on after his last appearance playing for the team sometime in December of last season. Never even revealed to us what kind of injury he was nursing(or if it was off-court related, which I realize is their right to not let the fans know the precise reason). This year, same thing with Grill--arguably the one who was the best of the transfer portal guys Gates picked up this season.Ìý
they told us he'd be out about 6-8 weeks with the type of injury he had and was estimated to return some time in February. February arrives....we are told he is doing good and is recovered and will rejoin the lineup any day now.
Obviously, Grill never returned, but we were led to believe he could return any day now at the time. Very infuriating, very misleading, very non-transparent. Agreed?
Hoff:ÌýOh, you've asked about one of my favorite topics in college sports: A lack of transparency around injuries. Get ready for another long answer...
I'll start by saying this: It's not a Mizzou problem. It's a college sports problem. There are no rules saying teams need to provide any status updates on players. They do it as something of a legacy courtesy to fans, reporters, etc. There's no incentive for them to do it — why spare an opponent having to scout a player by saying said player won't go? And I think most players and coaches would, frankly, prefer to keep injury status private. It's the same as you or I not necessarily wanted to put on blast that we, say, came down with buckle fractures in both wrists in an embarrassing scooter accident. (That happened to me when I was 12, and I feel comfortable disclosing it now, ha!) And this goes for football, too, for what it's worth.
This is a problem in an era where there are large amounts of money riding on game outcomes. College sports need to figure that out. Otherwise betting on games that could be impacted by injuries/player availability is susceptible to almost insider trading. Like, for example, when Sean East was ruled out 75 minutes before a game — that's something that I'd guess sways a spread or how people want to bet on a game. Probably information that should be out there!
Now, there are true game-time decisions. Very often. So sometimes Mizzou wouldn't know until 75 minutes before a game whether a given player was a go. But without the sort of regular injury reporting of a league like the NFL or NBA, those come off as secretive, late decisions.
That's the end of that. With the individual scenarios you mention... I don't know about Mosley. I wasn't on the beat then. That's something that's between him and the program. And it's the past. With Grill, I asked Gates pretty point blank about this on Monday, since you're right: It went from 6-8 weeks to him being in return to play conditioning to him evidently being done for the year. The challenge with him was that his wrist was not coming along as expected — it would keep swelling, making progress and then moving backward. So it's not that anyone was lying about the 6-8 week timeframe, it's just that the setbacks kept popping up. I think the team genuinely believed he was getting closer to a return. It just never happened.
In some cases, Mizzou would benefit from being more transparent. Less flack would've flown John Tonje's way if the team had said that he was dealing with a nagging injury that might require surgery. There would've been less incorrect speculation if they'd said that Trent Pierce couldn't board a plane or participate in contact drills because of a nasty ear infection that required surgery. I assume there were good reasons why they didn't disclose that. Again, with no rules requiring disclosure, protecting your players' privacy becomes a very valid reason for not doing it. So this is something far more big picture.
Tahart27:Ìýsomehow only found out recently that Mevis declared for the NFL draft! Help me Eli--I don't want to break out into a panic attack over this! Please tell me what if any Kickers are on the roster and/or new Kicker-position recruits who might have any chance of even adequately being a replacement for The Thicker Kicker!
Hoff:ÌýThe succession plan has been in place! Blake Craig has been the primary kicker in spring camp and been making the few field goals that the team reps early in the portion of practices that is open to reporters. I don't think he has the same leg as Mevis, but he's only a sophomore — and I haven't seen him trying the same kind of kicks. But he was with the program last year and was the No. 2 kicker (a five-star at that position) in his class. Nick Quadrini is his technical competitor there, though I haven't seen enough to really think it's a race.
WillyPete:ÌýI have confidence in Gates, because I saw a team lose 19 in a row, but I did not see a team quit. They could not win, because he missed the right talent mix in the portal, not because he cannot coach. He did not have two to three 6’8â€/10†players with strength and shooting ability. Next year will start a big turnaround. It can be quick if he can get a couple of experienced, muscular forwards/centers in the portal, otherwise it will be slower as the talented freshman mature.
Hoff:ÌýYeah, my bigger questions would be regarding portal evaluations. Hodge and Bates hit. Grill and Tonje got hurt. Vanover and Carter didn't play up to the roles envisioned for them. Honor and Gholston had their moments. That's just what jumps out at the front of mind, portal-wise. Being a head coach is just as much about finding the Jimmies and Joes as it is the X's and O's. They're very intertwined and impossible to separate. But I think one is more open to critiques than others — and I've said a few times this year that wondering about the portal process is a prudent endeavor.
DCG:ÌýThank you for your lengthy response to my comments about Gates. One thing you cite is other coaches and their comments about him. But have you ever talked to coaches about another coach and had them be critical? I mean seriously, have you ever had a coach say to you, "Yeah, Coach X just doesn't know what he's doing?" or "He's not the right guy to lead that program?"
Hoff:ÌýOh, I definitely haven't. And I don't think I would. But I do think there's something to parsing through the way that coaches talk about each other. Buzz Williams (Texas A&M) unprompted talking about how hard Gates' style is to prepare for compared to the rest of the SEC stands out to me from this season. He could've just said "They're a well-coached team." But he didn't. Others have praised what Gates had done before getting to Mizzou. So when I say he's held in high esteem by other coaches, I don't mean just the cursory paying of respects. It seems like more than that.
Tigggerfan:ÌýEli: If I’m a 4 star MBB freshman who just signed at Mizzou and I’m looking at a 19 game loosing streak I might be having second thoughts about my decision. Question: can those signees rescind their commitments at this point?
Hoff:ÌýYou might — but they haven't had those thoughts. All five of the freshmen are signees, which means they're contractually bound to Mizzou. They would need to be released from those letters of intent by MU to pursue other schools. That has not happened. Dennis Gates has visited with them as this season has gone on. They all know what the situation is. And I suspect most view it as more of an opportunity to come in and produce right off the bat.
Tigggerfan:ÌýAlso, any takeaways from spring FB? Things to be looking for tomorrow?
Hoff:ÌýI'll answer this one a little coyly, just because I've got a "what to watch for in the spring game" story set to come out before the game. Two takeaways from what I've seen in practices and heard from players/coaches that I think will appear in the game: The passing game is crisp. And really, really good. So I would encourage fans to enjoy watching that — when was the last time Mizzou's wide receivers went into a season saying they think they can be the best group in the country? And then the competition at running back is very open. Each back has his own style, which gives the offense options. Right now, it looks likely to wind up as a committee. But it's worth establishing a baseline of what each can do.
FloridaÌýAl:ÌýHi Eli. I really enjoy the thought and detail you put into your responses on this chat. Great job! I was wondering what your thoughts are on whether we’ll ever see anything like the Michigan Fab 5 in college basketball again…a totally dominant team of freshmen. It seems with the transfer portal that teams are rebuilding and maturing so quickly that it would be really difficult for any team to have that level of success again with all freshmen.
Hoff:ÌýGlad you enjoy it! I take these interactions seriously and want to impart my thinking with y'all when I can — and find out what's on your minds!
We've seen so many older players in part because of the pandemic eligibility year. That "generation" will be moved on soon, which will be a slight shift back to getting younger. But I don't think it'll ever go back to so many freshmen contributing. The other factor is the NBA here, too: If the league says players don't have to go to college, a lot of those really skilled young players will skip out on trying a year or two at the college level.
And think about it this way, too: Dennis Gates has assembled a Top 5 recruiting class of five freshmen (it's been Top 2 at times, even). Would you feel comfortable with those five being the starting five? No, everyone wants some 22, 23 year-old transfers to come in and lead. So I don't even think a team could set itself up to play freshmen heavily without that becoming a preseason problem.
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