Post of the Day

This comes from an LJWorld article about Quintrell Thomas. 

Self praises freshman Thomas’ attitude

In the comments section, jaybate wrote the following....this is classic.  We've got to recruit this guy to come over here.

Again, this is attributed to jaybate on the LJWorld/KU Sports comments board.

"The Slings and Arrows of Outrageous Four-ness."--William Self Shakesepeare

As alluded to yesterday, KU has a crisis at the 4. Marcus Morris is the only player on the team with the physical attributes and scoring ability to play it elegantly, but his freshman progress has been fitful.

Self has been a patient man about Marcus. He has accentuated the positive. He has looked for bright spots. He has noted improvements. Finally, versus ISU, Self layed down the ultimate challenge to Marcus, he staged his basketball bar mitzfah, his right of passage to basketball manhood, he gave him his dragon to slay, his chance to become the hero with a thousand faces. He put his trust in Marcus. He assigned Marcus to guard the opponent's best scorer, Craig Brackins.

Brackins hung 42 on him.

Marcus fouled out.

Sometimes the hero does not pass the test...at least at that moment.

Self gave a similar test to David Padgett his freshman year at Kansas. He said you're our big man. The position is yours. David Padget failed, too. He wound up in Louisville.

Let us say a prayer for Marcus Morris. He is a good person. He has tried and tried to do what the coaches wanted. He has helped KU to a very good record for a reloading year. He actually has good numbers for a freshman big. He has been a slender Jayhawk put in harm's way. And he has kept coming.

But 42 points? 42 points can break through a lot of coaching denial.

"I asked for defense (he gave me gasoline)."--Bill Howlin Wolf Self

It is hard to put into words what scoring 42 points against a Bill Self defense means to Bill Self. Scoring 42 points against Bill Self is like publicly gelding him and forcing him to become lead soprano in the Vienna Boys Choir. It is like making him coach from the bench in a pink crinoline, while sipping herbal tea from bone china with his pinky finger out in front of hooting Kansas and Oklahoma oil men. It is like lying that his wife and daughter are women of easy virtue in the reception line at church on Sunday morning. It is like making him bend over buck naked at the Hooker's Ball and forcing him to say, "Thank you, Madam Dominique, give me one more." It is like forcing him to play zone at a KU/Okie State game attended by Hank Iba, Doyle Parrott, Paul Hansen, Jack Hartman and Eddie Sutton. It is unmanly. It is disgrace. It is a fall into Dante's inner most flaming ring of the Inferno, while carrying a mineral water bottle full of gasoline. It is immoral and it signals a crisis of scheme of play of biblical proportions.

"Crash on the levy, momma,
Defense gonna overflow..."--William Robert Dylan Self

The public Bill Self made all the right moves, as usual. He praised Brackins. He noted Cole handled Brackins okay at the end. But the private Bill Self, the game tape watching Bill Self, the Bill Self who suffers from an acute medical condition called Defensive Compulsive Disorder (DCD); that Bill Self had to have had the basketball coaching equivalent of the bends on the bus ride home from Hilton Hell-iseum. And those bends had to have continued into Sunday as he climbed into his own private hyperbaric chamber, the den at his house with the tape and DVD player that he fastforwards, and rewinds, skips and slow-mos through until his eyes are glazed over at 3AM.

He probably went to bed in despair. Good coaches do from time to time.

And when he awoke, he did what all coaches suffering from acute DCD would have done. He clenched his jaw and said, "To hell with scoring out of the 4. To hell with playing the 4 elegantly with someone who has all the tools. We're going to guard somebody and we're going to block out and screw the rest of it. If we can't be any good at the 4, well, then by god we'll be mean. We'll guard every second, or people will not play. We'll enforce at the 4, or let no man come back alive!"

Good coaches all have a streak of General Patton in them.

Persons with DCD also cannot help but think this way, when scored on 42 times by tall, skinny 4s on bad teams.

We had a crash on the levy, Bill thought, and now, by god, defense is gonna overflow.

"The Four? You can't handle the Four!!"--William Jack Nicholson Self

Stories like this one above about Quintrel Thomas getting back in the rotation and not getting his dobber down--they never come out unless a tipping point has been reached.

Self watched the ISU tapes, or was it DVDs? Marcus graded out even worse than Self thought. It was late January and Marcus still had no clue on defense. The kid was trying his butt off, but tryin' ain't doin', as ol Eddie used to say. He didn't even foul hard, when he fouled.

Peg Leg Little at least committed hard fouls, but Little was 6'5" tall and operating on one and a half wheels. Bill called Eddie, who was grillin' some burgers for him and the wife. "Figured you'd be callin' 'bout now, Billy Boy." Bill had called Gillispie and Janks, too, but it was Eddie's wisdom he really wanted. They all said the same thing. Little's good, but you've been kidding yourself that you can score your way out of your defensive problems at the 4 with Marcus and Little. Until Marcus learns to defend, he's got to sit more, even if it means bad blood. "What about Kieff?" Bill asked Eddie. Eddie palmed his craggy face and shook his head. "Billy boy, I thought I taught you betterin' that!" Eddie said. "Ol' Kieff?" Eddie asked incredulously, "he'll be uh good'un in a couple years, but not today, kid. Ol'Kieff's sufferin' what I used to call defensive retardation. Ya follow me,Billy?"

And so Bill got off the phone and went to town on the Crispy Cremes for awhile. What in god's name was he going to do?

Then it hit him.

Quintrel got 4 reebs, and at least didn't foul out immediately. Closer inspection revealed that Thomas actually slid his feet a little and bodied Brackins a time or two.

But Quintrel can't hit the backboard with a Howitzer from a foot away! Bill thought killing the last old fashioned and slugging down the rest of the milk in the gallon jug.

Then Self had one of the existential coaching moments; the kind where the old coach has to say, well, I got that exactly wrong. He knew he had put Thomas on ice, because Thomas just couldn't provide scoring Self needed to keep opponents off Cole's back. He knew he had also iced Thomas, because Thomas just didn't want to get physical enough to be what he could be for KU--an enforcer type. And, well, Self knew that Self himself had gotten spoiled by last year's team, too idealistic, too hoity toity, too full of himself and all his ideas about the beauty of the game, to look honestly at the 4 position and do what had to be done.

Self called Eddie back.

"I figured you be callin' me again about this time. Outta doughnuts, eh? Man, I don't miss this part of coaching even a little, kid. So whattya want outta Ol'Eddie? You know what you gotta do, kid. Ya gotta go tough and hard at the 4. No more pussy footin. Some 4s have gotta start learnin' just how hard the wood in James Naismith court is." Eddie swigged some Lipton. "God, I wish I could have a beer." He paused and collected his thoughts. "I know what you're thinkin'. We ain't thug ballers. 70-point-take-what-they-give-us ain't about hurtin' people." Eddie cleared his throat and hawked a lugie down in Stillwater. "Well, kiddo, sometimes ya gotta get your hands dirty like the rest of us. I know you lead a charmed life, Billy Boy, and you always find the slickest way through the pa-pa patch, but this time you gotta face facts. It always comes down to defense. You know that much. That's Rosetta Stone, Billy. When you cain't find yer hind end with both hands fallin' down a mine shaft, well, pick out someone and guard'em till you hit the bottom; then get up and guard'em some more. And if you ain't pretty like Brandon Rush, then bite and scratch and push and shove until they've can't stand you no more. And if that don't work, put'em on the floor. I watched that game. I saw Marcus fly swattin' at Brackins. That young man has not figured out that this is competition for who gets to eat. Now young Quintrel Thomas, you got a fire lit under him already, Billy Boy. You yanked his minutes to get his attention. You give that young man half a chance, and he'll put some of them 4s in the cheap seats where they belong. Have you forgot one of my cardinal rules I taught you? Bigs who step out and pop threes need a finger in the eyes and a kick in the knees."

Bill Self shrugged. He knew exactly what the old coach was saying. He had gone soft after winning it all. He had thought he could finesse his way around the 4 with scoring. He felt ashamed of himself.

Ol Eddie laughed.

"You're takin' it too hard kid and you're makin' it too hard. Thinkin' too much. Redefine the 4. It ain't gonna be a finesse 4 no more. Its a butcher ball 4 now. This new 4, he's going to be a head hunter. He's going to bump, and shove and head hunt, and put people down so much that the opponents are not going to be able to concentrate on Cole. Dennis Rodman is the model. Give that Quintril tape of Rodman...before he died his derned hair, of course. And some tapes of Buck Williams, too. Opponentas are going to have to watch out for your 4. Screw scoring out of the 4. Its a pain dispensory. Guys enter your paint, they pay. Bigs step out, they get scratched corneas. Simple, Billy, simple. Between Little, Quintrell, and Marcus, if he will man-up and play this way, you've got 15 hard fouls to give, not fifteen fly swats. Give'em. You're going to play a little like Maryland did back when Gary Williams still cared and loved them prison bodies."

"But I don't have any prison bodies, Coach," Self said.

"You've had so much talent the last few years, you've forgotten how tough young guys can be taught to play. You think Ol' Bo Ryan up at Mad-town has prison body cheese heads." Both coaches laughed. "Heck no. And no knock on Danny Manning, but he was a finesse player if there ever was one. He's not the one qualified to coach this stuff. You're going to have to go work with them yourself on this. Don't go having a guilt complex either. Playing rough out of the 4 goes all the way back. Like ol' Chuck Daly used to say. You ain't tryin' to hurt nobody. You're just turnin' it into a contact sport, you know. Now I gotta go. Scott's got some problem over at ORU with the offense and I gotta go wipe his nose for him, too."

So Self calls Gary Bedore and asks him to do a little story about Quintrel getting out of the dog house. And he prompts Gary on a quote about Quintrel needing to become KU's enforcer to get the crowd ready for the change.

And starting the next game, or whenever the matchups look right for the change, Quintrel's minutes go up, Little's stay the same, and Marcus' go down. And the bodies start flying in the paint.

Move over Buck Williams and Dennis Rodman. Here comes Quintrel Thomas.

"I love the smell of napalm in the paint."--William Charles Kilgore Self

End Note: All of the above is entirely fictional, of course.