Rocket Watts?

[CL82]

Rocket Watts presented by Rocket Mortgage

An NIL natural baby!

I look forward to recruiting GEICO Daniels and Kraft Foods Davis at some point in the future.

 

[Hungryhusky99]

My thing is, the dude was a freshman. Very few freshman have impact years, year one. Why wouldn’t he improve with Hurley?

Hurley is a better coach than Izzo now ?

 

[superjohn]

His numbers look bad but the kid was the 35th ranked player out of high school and was on the Big 10 all freshman team.

 

[UCfor3]

Was it not posted that Kentucky and Baylor are after him? I mean that's pretty good company if true. Putting aside the freshman, we need an upgrade at guard. Would I prefer he shot lights out from deep? Of course. We also need someone who can break his man down though. He has talent and has had some big games. Perhaps a change of scenery and a different voice and system can be a tipping point for him. Seems worth a dice roll with the way things are shaking out. It also doesn't preclude us from still going after a shooter.

 

[MDHuskFan]

Cam Thomas is what ppl originally thought Rocket would be

 

[Nebraskan18]

Do any insiders actually know if we are even in contention here? Or is this whole thread for nothing haha

 

[aburks41]

Do any insiders actually know if we are even in contention here? Or is this whole thread for nothing haha

Whole thread was started because of a story as believable as the guy at the carwash lmao

 

[Watchdog]

Gaffney: 6.1/1.5/1.5. 19mins, 41% from the field, 36% from 3.

Rocket: 7.7/1.7/2.7. 23 mins, 34% from the field, 25% from 3.

Rocket is still probably the better player because he can handle the ball more, but it's hardly cut and dry. The kids is a terrible, terrible, terrible scorer. Hard pass.

Should we talk about defense? Rocket had 0.1 (yes, that is not a typo) steals per game, 0.3 per 40. Gaffney had 0.8 per game, 1.6 per 40.

Offensive rating? 88 vs 110, guess whose was above 100?

Defensive rating? 111 vs 101, guess whose was better again?

Facts, Schmacks, who needs them when a "name" recruit we missed on two years ago is available again?
Forget the recent transfer and other recruits that will crowd his playing time in East Lansing..............

 

[auror]

Do any insiders actually know if we are even in contention here? Or is this whole thread for nothing haha

Well some people at least claimed we reached out:

 

[ClifSpliffy]

no more guards who can't dunk, unless they look like what mr diggins might be.
im pretty sure even mr sool has some dunking ability in him.
mr. watts looks like he has one repeatable shtik- the soft floater 10 feet in. nice, valuable, but not 'my kingdom for a horse' valuable. pass.
and, why can't we ever have that white kid from peoria who falls out of bed in the morning jacking 3s, and making half of them?
seriously, what the heck is that all aboot as it's been going on long enough here to make the honest observer wonder 'what's up with that?'
yeah, i said it.

 

[rip7774]

It’s wild that people talk about Cole - who is basically a 40% three point shooter - like he can’t hit the broad side of a barn and then want to bring in a kid who actually can’t hit the broad side of a barn.

Cole is slower than half of us on here, I don’t follow Rocket but is he real quick? We need a guy that can break down his man. If he’s really quick I’d take him. Wanted Fatts. He was a monster when healthy as a junior. We mentored a starter at URI so watch a ton of their games. Don’t @ me about his senior year, Fatts was hurt most of the year.

Cole is a decent shooter but plays with the quicks of us middle aged Y hoopers.

 

[UCfor3]

Cole is slower than half of us on here, I don’t follow Rocket but is he real quick? We need a guy that can break down his man. If he’s really quick I’d take him. Wanted Fatts. He was a monster when healthy as a junior. We mentored a starter at URI so watch a ton of their games. Don’t @ me about his senior year, Fatts was hurt most of the year.

Cole is a decent shooter but play’s it’s the quicks of us middle aged Y hoopers.

He would be our quickest guard.

 

[Fishy]

So by all means let's bring in a combo guard who is a much worse shooter.

I also like how we can make stats worse by stripping away the games where he did well.

Cole is a good shooter and he is, in fact, a point guard.

 

[UCfor3]

Why is this an "either or" with Cole? How about both. The list of schools above plus Kentucky that have reached out to him kind of speak for themselves. That's a pretty strong group. People complain about our guards and now nobody is good enough for us. He is far from perfect and doesn't fill the shooting need, but he at least he has a couple skills we are lacking in the backcourt...Quickness and the ability to get by his man off the bounce.

 

[bendm]

i can talk myself into almost any new players....would watts not be our best player off the dribble? who on the roster can create their own shot besides sanogo and occasionally gaff?

think we're going to see a lot of zone defense next year so if watts can penetrate and dump it off to our bigs or just create a little bit of space for cole/hawk/gaff/polley to catch and shoot then that will help a lot

i'll take a 3 way split at SG with watts/hawk/gaff and a 3 way split at SF with aj/martin/polley

gotta hope at least 2 of those 6 would play well any given night

 

[BigErnMcCracken]

Cole is a decent shooter but plays with the quicks of us middle aged Y hoopers.

The craziest part of this is that I have a feeling you might actually believe it.

 

[7774]

I also like how we can make stats worse by stripping away the games where he did well.

Cole is a good shooter and he is, in fact, a point guard.

I'm not trying to strip games away where he did well, they all count and we certainly would have had a worse record if he wasn't on the team. But to get to where we want to be, we need to beat Villanova/Creighton level teams and up, and he strugged shooting against teams of that level. Beyond struggling actually.

And he's not a point guard. He does play the position of point guard on our team though.

 

[Ratso]

cole will be special next yr facts

doesn‘t change the fact that we need snipers

 

[bendm]

slicin' dyson comparisons/potential if we're being really generous? he was only ~6'3 and watt's is listed ~6'2

dyson was a bad 3 point shooter as well (29% as a senior) but made up for it with his slashing ability

 

[husky429]

slicin' dyson comparisons/potential if we're being really generous? he was only ~6'3 and watt's is listed ~6'2

dyson was a bad 3 point shooter as well (29% as a senior) but made up for it with his slashing ability

Rocket made 9 layups all season, only stole the ball 3x all season, and had 0 dunks all season. All things Dyson excelled at.

Not sure of a great comp but I think his passing and handle are his best attributes.

 

[HuskyHawk]

Checked this thread just now, because I had no idea how it was still going and generating new posts.

We have 3 point guards. Watts is not what we need and we are not what he needs.

 

[bendm]

Checked this thread just now, because I had no idea how it was still going and generating new posts.

We have 3 point guards. Watts is not what we need and we are not what he needs.

i might have it backwards but i think the reason he's transferring from MSU is b/c izzo wanted him to be a pure point guard but he is not one

we could use a combo guard with a good handle and passing ability that can beat his man off the dribble. not sure if we have anyone on the roster that can do that consistently right now. best bets would be gaff and aj...

 

[HuskyHawk]

i might have it backwards but i think the reason he's transferring from MSU is b/c izzo wanted him to be a pure point guard but he is not one

we could use a combo guard with a good handle and passing ability that can beat his man off the dribble. not sure if we have anyone on the roster that can do that consistently right now. best bets would be gaff and aj...

Didn’t @husky429 say he made only 9 layups? He shot 25.3% from 3. 33.6% from the floor. He’s only 6’2. His PER is 6.9. Brendan Adams was 8.9 last year. Watts was worse than every guard on our roster. By a lot. He was better as a freshman, but still I don’t see how he is what we need.

 

[olehead]

We need talent.

 

[AntG168]

Even if he can penetrate more effectively than what we have he will have no shooters to kick out too , and he can’t finish at the rim .

We wouldnt only add Watts......add watts and shooters. It's really simple