Danny Nee had players from Houston Select

Danny Nee, the current head coach of the US Merchant Marines and the former head coach of Duquesne and Nebraska, was implicated by Gary Parrish and Jeff Goodman as an investor with David Salinas, the founder of the Houston Select AAu program.

Nee denied the report to an Omaha newspaper which drew the ire of Parrish, who, in turn, made Nee look foolish. You see, Nee had a testimonial on a brochure for Salinas' investment company saying:

I have been a client with J. David Financial Group since I was referred to them in 1995-96. After several financial planning sessions, I became very comfortable with their long-term visions and investment style. More importantly, I marvel at their track record in both up and down markets."

Yeah.

Win, Parrish.

Why is this interesting?

Because in 1997 and 1998, Nee landed (at least) two players -- Rondey Williams and Louis Truscott -- from the Houston Select program.

If Nee's investment was legitimate, why would he feel the need to lie about his involvement?
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Whitey Reid sings the blues

Everybody reads Gary Parrish's Poll Attacks. It's one of the few "absolute-weekly-must-reads" in the college basketball blogosphere.

I may never get to the point where I am able to vote in the AP top-25 poll, but I will at least know who Gary Parrish is.

Why do I bring this up?

Only because apparently there is a Division-I college basketball beat reporter who does not know who Gary Parrish is, or what the "Poll Attacks" are.

His name is Whitelaw (Whitey) Reid, and he is the Virginia Cavaliers beat reporter for the Charlottesville Daily-Progress.

You see, Parrish ripped Reid in his most recent Poll Attacks, and I guess Reid got a bit offended. Well I take that back. Reid wasn't offended that he got ripped, he just didn't understand why he was getting ripped.

Reid didn't have Tennessee in the top 25. That's an issue in and of itself, but Parrish handled it in the Poll Attacks.

What irks me more is the fact that Reid states he didn't know who Gary Parrish is.

How the hell is that possible?

Look, Gary has a big enough head already. The last thing I want to do is build make his ego any bigger. But Parrish is one of the best, most established college hoops writers in the country. Before he took the job as CBSSports.com's lead college basketball columnist, he spent five years as the Memphis Tiger's beat reporter for the Memphis Commercial-Appeal. The same Memphis team that was coached by John Calipari. Parrish also is known for scooping the "Albert Means Recruiting Scandal" that made Alabama's Logan Young the first booster in NCAA history to be sentenced to prison for essentially buying a prospect.

Now I know that in the age of monopolizing sports news outlets it is entirely possible for somebody to get all their sports news from the World Wide Leader. After all, I did this for a good number of years before I became a true college hoops junkie and started to branch out.

But I don't get to vote for the AP top 25.

Our buddy Whitelaw does. I have to judge Whitelaw's newsgathering skills if he works in college basketball media world and doesn't know who Gary Parrish is.

Maybe he's just lucky that Parrish knows who he is:


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John Calipari is pushing to remove the July evaluation period

And guess how he's doing it.

Via twitter. Surprised?:

I enjoy watching ball, but I don't believe we should recruit in the summer. My time would be better spent on campus with our guys.

He's 100% correct. His time would be much better served working with his players. Because he is John Calipari. And he coaches the University of Kentucky. Why does he need (or want) to spend two-thirds of July on the road sitting in hot gyms watching basketball for 10 hours a day when all he needs to do is pick up the phone to call just about any recruit in the country and automatically shoot into that player's top five schools?

Because that's how it works when you're the "hottest" coach in the country coaching at the school with arguably the best basketball tradition this side of Pauley Pavilion.

But what about the other guys? The coaches that can't fall back on their name, their tradition, or their private jet when it comes to recruiting?

Gary Parrish takes a look at those guys and how they use the July recruiting period in his latest column.

And he hits it right on the head.

When you are a high-profile coach at a high-major school, you don't go out with the intention of identifying players. I can guarantee that the Roy Williams and Bill Selfs and Ben Howlands of the world already know the guys they want from the class of 2014, also known as rising 8th graders. They pick and choose who they want from top 100 lists, and travel to games simply to be seen in the stands.

At the mid-major level it is different.

These coaches aren't going to land top 100 players on the regular.

They need to get out on the road and find the guys that the big boys don't know about yet. The kids with high-major talents and low-major reputations. They need to find the Stephen Curry's (too small) and Eric Maynor's (not athletic enough) and Lester Hudson's (character and academic problems) of the world.

For a mid-major coach, the July recruiting period is when you earn your money. If you land a Courtney Lee or a George Hill, not only does it bring your program success (and hopefully a raise or promotion to a bigger school) but it lends credibility to your team - you can produce pro's.

And how does a mid-major coach land kids like that?

By spending two-thirds of July in hot gyms, watching as many kids as possible play. Get rid of July's evaluation period, and you get rid of the mid-major's chance to compete.

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More Gary Parrish bashing

For those who remember, back in February I wrote a scathing harmless critique of a post Gary Parrish made on his blog "The Thoughts" (he even responded to me).

Here comes another one.

Before anyone jumps down my throat, I have a great deal of respect for Parrish. I believe my exact words were

I like Gary Parrish. In fact, he is probably the college basketball writer that I read the most. Why? Because he and I have very similar viewpoints on most things college hoops.

Faux-hawk be damned, Gary Parrish can write.
(photo credit: CBSSports)

But as in any industry, when you are one of the best, people expect the best from you.

About a month ago, Parrish had a column discussing how pointless it is for juniors with no chance of getting drafted to declare for the draft. Today, he reiterated that point with a post on his blog about BYU's Jonathon Tavernari titled "Tavernari is out, but why was he ever in?"

I've touched on this twice before (here and here), but we'll go for round three.

Before I get into the meat of this post, let me drop some quick knowledge for those that don't know. The way that eligibility and the NBA Draft works right now is that anyone is allowed to declare for the NBA Draft so long as they are 19 years old and one year removed from high school (the rules get a bit more complicated for international players and fifth year high school seniors, but that doesn't matter here). They can withdraw from the draft once and keep their college eligibility intact so long as that player pulls their name out of the draft before the deadline (this year it is June 15th) and he does not sign with an agent, although they are allowed to contact an agent for guidance and advice.

So if you are a junior in college, you have not yet entered your name into the draft, and you have any kind of aspirations of playing in the NBA one day, you should be entering your name in the NBA Draft.

I repeat, every junior in the country with NBA aspirations should be entering their name in the draft.

Why?

Its simple really. Even if there is a "0.00 percent" chance for that player to get drafted this year, he still has an opportunity to get direct feedback from people directly associated with the NBA. Maybe you don't get invited to a workout by any NBA teams, or maybe you get told flat out that you are not good enough to get drafted, but I guarantee that at the very least they will get some kind of critique on what they need to improve on to up their draft stock for next season from someone who is not afraid of hurting the kid's feelings.

This is why the NBA instituted the rule allowing players to "test the waters".

Let's use Tavernari as an example. He is a 6'6" wing player that can score (15.7 ppg), but he relies heavily on his perimeter shot to get his points (38% from three on 6.8 attempts per game, with just 1.7 FT's attempted per). He is not overly athletic and needs significant improvement on his all-around game if he wants a shot at being drafted in 2010.

Jonathon Tavernari has withdrawn his name from draft consideration.
(photo credit: Examiner)

I know this. Parrish knows this. BYU coach Dave Rose knows this. Hell, Tavernari probably knows this.

Even if Tavernari doesn't get invited to any workouts, I guarantee that NBA scouts know who he is and what he can do, especially when he has played most of his career with Trent Plaisted and Lee Cummard. In a worst case scenario, I'm willing to wager all that is holy that Tavernari can get a scout on the phone, and that scout can tell him exactly what he needs to improve individually to get more looks next season.

That is the important part. Individually. What he needs to refine in his game to make himself a better NBA prospect. This is the time (the summer) when basketball players get a chance to develop their game - to make themselves a better shooter, a better ball-handler, a better defender, more athletic. I fail to see any negatives for the players when they get, at the very least, someone telling them what they need to do to make their game more compatible with the NBA style.

So whether or not Tavernari actually believed he had a shot at making an NBA roster come October (he didn't) is irrelevant. Given the way the rules are structured, he played the game to perfection, and hopefully got some useful advice along the way.

On another note, I have absolutely zero qualms with kids like Jeremy Wise from Southern Miss or David Huertas of Ole Miss leaving school to sign with an agent and make money playing basketball (well, one qualm - it hurts the college game I love so dearly). And to be fair, Parrish agrees with me here. If a kid decides he no longer wants to go to school and instead wants to start making more than the boosters pay money playing basketball, who am I to tell him not to? College kids do it all the time, and I bet that Wise and Huertas will be making more than most college dropouts in this economy anyway.

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Which Point Guard Would You Take To Lead Your Team In The NCAA Tournament: Gary Parrish Got It ... Right?

Yesterday, we wrote a column critiquing the decision of Gary Parrish to select Steph Curry as the point guard he would want to lead his team through the NCAA tournament.

Well, he caught wind of the post and was kind enough to email me a response:

First, thanks for the note and the kind words. I've got your blog bookmarked, and somebody had actually already sent this to me.

As for your post, I don't completely disagree with your points, but I think you're coming at the question differently than it was presented (or at least differently than I did). I wasn't asked who would I take as my guard. Or shooting guard. Or who I'd want to play beside Stephen Curry. I was asked a very simple and specific question, and that question was who would I want starting at point guard for me from the list provided by the reader.

I guess I could've explained that I don't want to consider Curry a point guard, that I would take Ty Lawson and then put Curry beside him, but that seemed like a lot of trouble. Thus, I decided that if I could only pick one guy off the list, and if Curry was labeled a point guard for these purposes, then there's no way I was passing on Curry, not after what I watched him do in last season's NCAA tournament.

In other words, I interpreted the question this way: Who is the one guy on this list you want in March?

The answer to that question is Stephen Curry.

But if you want to take it deeper, what I'd really like to do (if it's all up to me) is use Ty Lawson as my point guard, Stephen Curry as my shooting guard and James Harden on the wing. Then I'd put Hasheem Thabeet in the middle and place Blake Griffin beside him, and I think I'd be ready to march to the Final Four, barring a concussion to a key player, of course.

I can't really argue with that.

Anyway, a big thanks to Gary Parrish for getting back to one of us little guys so quickly. Continue reading...

Which Point Guard Would You Take To Lead Your Team In The NCAA Tournament: Gary Parrish Got It Wrong

I like Gary Parrish.

In fact, he is probably the college basketball writer that I read the most. Why? Because he and I have very similar viewpoints on most things college hoops.

Well, usually that is.

If you're not familiar with Parrish's blog, he runs this segment called "Dear Gary", where he answers questions emailed in by readers. On Tuesday, a reader asked him what point guard he would take to lead his team in the NCAA tournament.

Parrish said Steph Curry.

I disagree for one, simple reason: the point is not Curry's best position.

Curry can take over a tournament, but can he do it as a point guard?
(photo credit: Streeter Lecka/Getty Images)

Yes, he can play the point and if this season is any indication, he can have success playing that role. But why would you want to take a guy to run the point when it is not his best position on the floor?

Think about it like this. Who would Curry be more effective with when paired in the back court: Ty Lawson or Wayne Ellington? Levance Fields or Jerel McNeal? Nick Calathes or James Harden?

The answer to each is the point guard.

Just look at his numbers from last year to this year: his points and assists are up, but so are his turnovers while his shooting percentage from deep has dropped. Granted, much of this statistical change is because Curry is the main, and a lot of times the only, offensive threat on the floor for Davidson and thus the main, and a lot of times the only, defensive focus for opponent's (crazy stat of the day: The Citadel lost to Davidson at home by 15 when the Wildcats had Curry, but beat Davidson at Davidson by 18 without Curry).

Those changes become even more drastic when you look at Curry's numbers against tournament teams. In five games against Oklahoma, West Virginia, Purdue, Duke, and Butler, Curry put up these stats: 26.6 ppg, 6.2 apg, 6.2 t/o's, 33% FG and 23% from deep.

Again, a lot of that is because he is the one and only offensive threat on his Davidson team. But are you really going to rest your tournament hopes on a kid that has not proven the ability to run the point efficiently against top caliber competition?

I'm not.

If I had to choose a point guard, it would be either Ty Lawson (most talented offensive PG) or Sherron Collins (as good as anyone, but is a proven winner). Right now, I think I take Collins.

This is not supposed to bash Curry. In fact, out of anyone in college basketball right now, if I were picking a player for a tournament run, Curry would be my second choice, right behind (a healthy) Blake Griffin and right before Jerel McNeal.

Parrish is right about one thing. Curry has proven the ability to take over a game, the ability to hit tough shots in the clutch, and the ability to create for himself while still being able to find the open man.

Which is why he is my second choice for a player to lead my tournament team.

Just not at the point. Continue reading...