Keeping Up With Old Friends Thread

[mjmaherjr]

That Tom guy. His words sound familiar. It's almost like he sits next to me in 114

 

[Beasts of the East]

Unfortunately your post is 1000% correct.
Imagine SJU bringing back Zuby and RJ this year for their senior seasons ? Am i I pleased with Hopkins from the portal, you bet I am , but for the most part I love our kids ( see Grady Reynolds and Jack Wolfinger to name a few undesirables) and I am always sad to see them go. RJ should have returned to SJU for his senior season to reach greater heights than we did this past season and as Beast said to make a ton more money.

I, like you, like all of the kids in our program. Actually, when I went to the athletic awards dinner 2 years ago and was with a large number of our 350 D1 athletes, it's hard not to immediately like them and be proud of the type of kids we recruit.

Even with the two you mentioned as possible exceptions, i remember reading about the difficult circumstances Jack Wolfinger grew up with, living alone at 15. Even with Rysheed Jordan, who probably should have chosen a school that was far away from questionable friends from Philly and did some bad things himself i feel for him. Neither Father Rock nor Lavin ran from him.

But back to RJ. To be clear, he is one of my all time favorite kids. Deep faith he outwardly wore, good teammate, comes from a close family. I defended even the indefensible with him.

I can only imagine that maybe he was influenced by Felipe's story. Sonny Vaccaro has said that Felipe's star was brightest at st johns after freshman season and had he left then he was a lottery pick. My guess is that after BE player of the year, BET MVP, a BE reg season and BET championship and top 10 ranking 30 win season he decided to strike when the iron was hot. It probably influenced his play vs Arkansas, trying too hard to do too much to show he was 1st round material.

Still, lots of undrafted players go the longer route and make the league eventually, some becoming stars.

Wishing him the best to reach his dream.

 

[logen]

I, like you, like all of the kids in our program. Actually, when I went to the athletic awards dinner 2 years ago and was with a large number of our 350 D1 athletes, it's hard not to immediately like them and be proud of the type of kids we recruit.

Even with the two you mentioned as possible exceptions, i remember reading about the difficult circumstances Jack Wolfinger grew up with, living alone at 15. Even with Rysheed Jordan, who probably should have chosen a school that was far away from questionable friends from Philly and did some bad things himself i feel for him. Neither Father Rock nor Lavin ran from him.

But back to RJ. To be clear, he is one of my all time favorite kids. Deep faith he outwardly wore, good teammate, comes from a close family. I defended even the indefensible with him.

I can only imagine that maybe he was influenced by Felipe's story. Sonny Vaccaro has said that Felipe's star was brightest at st johns after freshman season and had he left then he was a lottery pick. My guess is that after BE player of the year, BET MVP, a BE reg season and BET championship and top 10 ranking 30 win season he decided to strike when the iron was hot. It probably influenced his play vs Arkansas, trying too hard to do too much to show he was 1st round material.

Still, lots of undrafted players go the longer route and make the league eventually, some becoming stars.

Wishing him the best to reach his dream.

Regardless of Luis’ reasons, he will make a fine living playing pro basketball somewhere if not the NBA. Did not appear to hurt Berry or Cook one bit to not make the league and there are countless other examples just from the Johnnie’s rosters alone.
As always, getting a kick out of people here who want to judge other people’s life decisions.

 

[bamafan]

I, like you, like all of the kids in our program. Actually, when I went to the athletic awards dinner 2 years ago and was with a large number of our 350 D1 athletes, it's hard not to immediately like them and be proud of the type of kids we recruit.

Even with the two you mentioned as possible exceptions, i remember reading about the difficult circumstances Jack Wolfinger grew up with, living alone at 15. Even with Rysheed Jordan, who probably should have chosen a school that was far away from questionable friends from Philly and did some bad things himself i feel for him. Neither Father Rock nor Lavin ran from him.

But back to RJ. To be clear, he is one of my all time favorite kids. Deep faith he outwardly wore, good teammate, comes from a close family. I defended even the indefensible with him.

I can only imagine that maybe he was influenced by Felipe's story. Sonny Vaccaro has said that Felipe's star was brightest at st johns after freshman season and had he left then he was a lottery pick. My guess is that after BE player of the year, BET MVP, a BE reg season and BET championship and top 10 ranking 30 win season he decided to strike when the iron was hot. It probably influenced his play vs Arkansas, trying too hard to do too much to show he was 1st round material.

Still, lots of undrafted players go the longer route and make the league eventually, some becoming stars.

Wishing him the best to reach his dream.

Re Felipe if he came out after frosh seasons he may have been a lottery pick but probably would have been out of the league pretty quickly. Instead he played for about 5 years was improving greatly and was in the verge of getting a pretty sizable contract when he wrecked his knee in an exhibition game if memory serves with Minnesota Timberwolves so if you ask me he made the right choice.

 

[paultzman]

Re Felipe if he came out after frosh seasons he may have been a lottery pick but probably would have been out of the league pretty quickly. Instead he played for about 5 years was improving greatly and was in the verge of getting a pretty sizable contract when he wrecked his knee in an exhibition game if memory serves with Minnesota Timberwolves so if you ask me he made the right choice.

Saw Felipe a lot in high school. Imo he was a dominant player at that level, but did not achieve to that level in college. Obviously he was a good player at SJU, but not a super one.