The off topic thread

[Jack Williams]

No player is perfect is a given. Downplaying his importance to last years success is another story.

That is fair

I'll speak for myself, I think Kadary Richmond and Zuby were more important to our teams overall success than RJ. Is my intention to downplay RJ by saying that? I mean personally, I don't think that is the case. He was immensely important to what we did last season. But I personally valued what Zuby and Kadary brought to the team a ton.

But yes I totally understand how comparing their impact can be seen as downplaying RJ, so I will take note of that in future discussions about him

 

[mjmaherjr]

That is fair

I'll speak for myself, I think Kadary Richmond and Zuby were more important to our teams overall success than RJ. Is my intention to downplay RJ by saying that? I mean personally, I don't think that is the case. He was immensely important to what we did last season. But I personally valued what Zuby and Kadary brought to the team a ton.

But yes I totally understand how comparing their impact can be seen as downplaying RJ, so I will take note of that in future discussions about him

They are the Mount Rushmore those 3 of the last 25 years. Having Zuby or Kadary is absolutely fine. Take 1 out of the 3 out if the equation we don’t go nearly as far as we did. That’s what us RJ supporters are saying. We loved all 3 just don’t dump on RJ for 1 game . We loved all 3

 

[Jack Williams]

They are the Mount Rushmore those 3 of the last 25 years. Having Zuby or Kadary is absolutely fine. Take 1 out of the 3 out if the equation we don’t go nearly as far as we did. That’s what us RJ supporters are saying. We loved all 3 just don’t dump on RJ for 1 game . We loved all 3

I get that.

Regarding the one game thing. That might take some time for me. The Arkansas game still bothers me sometimes, even though I remain very proud of what we did last year. RJ's an easy target in that one because Zuby was fantastic, and Kadary you can make the argument that it was the refs fault. But I think we just need to get to next season so I can turn the page on that game.

 

[NCJohnnie]

They are the Mount Rushmore those 3 of the last 25 years. Having Zuby or Kadary is absolutely fine. Take 1 out of the 3 out if the equation we don’t go nearly as far as we did. That’s what us RJ supporters are saying. We loved all 3 just don’t dump on RJ for 1 game . We loved all 3

Yup they were the triumvirate. Kadary was great after a very slow start, Zuby was super consistent and RJ was our highlight reel who had some absolutely huge games in some of our biggest wins against the likes of Creighton, Marquette & UCONN. They will all be remembered as great Johnnies wherever their professional careers takes them.

 

[mjmaherjr]

I get that.

Regarding the one game thing. That might take some time for me. The Arkansas game still bothers me sometimes, even though I remain very proud of what we did last year. RJ's an easy target in that one because Zuby was fantastic, and Kadary you can make the argument that it was the refs fault. But I think we just need to get to next season so I can turn the page on that game.

I blame 2 bs fouls on Kadary especially the last one but I admit that you tube selective breakdown isolating RJ looked horrible and his worst game of year imo by far

 

[mjmaherjr]

I don’t think any of us RJ guys would deny that

 

[Jack Williams]

I blame 2 bs fouls on Kadary especially the last one but I admit that you tube selective breakdown isolating RJ looked horrible and his worst game of year imo by far

definitely picked a bad time to have his worst game. But hey, same could be said about Scott, who I love, he couldn't hit anything. But his hand was jacked up by that point too.

 

[mjmaherjr]

definitely picked a bad time to have his worst game. But hey, same could be said about Scott, who I love, he couldn't hit anything. But his hand was jacked up by that point too.

It was just a culmination of things. We really hadn’t faced a team that long and athletic. Unlike some others if we won that game I thought we were going far

 

[panther2]

On the flip side I think some fans get way too easily offended about players being critiqued. RJ won all kinds of accolades for us. He was a part of a team that won 30+ games. That is awesome. i have certainly never seen anything like last season in my time as a fan. But as a fan of basketball does this mean there is not a space to be able to talk about some of his positives and negatives on the basketball court? I mean I think we can all agree no player is perfect right

Jack what disturbs me about the posts regarding RJ is the redundancy. As soon as we lost to Arkansas, some posters came down on RJ. Understandable, because he had a bad game.

Once RJ put his name in the portal, the hate towards him resurfaced. Now people are saying the exact same things in the thread, NBA Draft. What is the purpose of saying the same thing over and over again.

My take is as follows, RJ and the team had a great season. He played poorly against Arkansas. I appreciate his contributions to St John's over the past two seasons and wish him well as his journey continues.

 

[Jack Williams]

Jack what disturbs me about the posts regarding RJ is the redundancy. As soon as we lost to Arkansas, some posters came down on RJ. Understandable, because he had a bad game.

Once RJ put his name in the portal, the hate towards him resurfaced. Now people are saying the exact same things in the thread, NBA Draft. What is the purpose of saying the same thing over and over again.

My take is as follows, RJ and the team had a great season. He played poorly against Arkansas. I appreciate his contributions to St John's over the past two seasons and wish him well as his journey continues.

Understandable Panther. I don’t think anyone should be expressing “hate” towards RJ. Kid made a decision he felt was best for his future. And he will always remain a great Johnnie.

I’m not sure who made the initial comparison between him and Ponds, but it’s the type of offseason conversation that kind of invites weighing the pros/cons of players in a way that can absolutely be redundant, so I hear you

 

[logen]

It was just a culmination of things. We really hadn’t faced a team that long and athletic. Unlike some others if we won that game I thought we were going far

You guys act like the game was a mismatch which it was not by a long shot. We were down 2, TWO, one possession with 4+ minutes to go, right in the game! Right in the game in a season where we had come back in numerous games in which we had played poorly for long stretches. Where our best players, many, many times Luis, ramped it up big time at money time, which is exactly where the game was.
Pitino lost that game plain and simple or at the very least pi$$ed away any chance of winning with one of the worst coaching moves of all time. You guys can plant HOF in front of his name all you want, but like Jack Williams said about Luis, being BE POY and 2nd team AA doesn’t shield him from criticism and neither does HOF in front of Pitino’s name.
And as Panther shared, you guys falling over yourselves to keep the Luis criticism alive thread after thread kinda motivated me to jump back in and remind the board what really happened.
And before we get a ton of posts about how poorly Luis played, he certainly did, but you guys know why Zuby was exhorting Luis to get it together, because he was well aware he was our best chance to win, something Pitino completely lost sight of as the ensuing 4 minutes proved.

 

[Marillac2]

We don’t handle nuance well here. RJ had a tremendous season and seized every opportunity.

At the same time, the stars aligned for him in a major way. The conference was down, we were surging for the first time in 25 years with a HOF coach, Kadary was impossibly unselfish, nobody dominated the ball or commanded lots of looks, and we couldn’t shoot.

I wanted him back 100%, but I don’t think he would have had as good of a season — especially from an accolades standpoint.

 

[redmannorth]

You guys act like the game was a mismatch which it was not by a long shot. We were down 2, TWO, one possession with 4+ minutes to go, right in the game! Right in the game in a season where we had come back in numerous games in which we had played poorly for long stretches. Where our best players, many, many times Luis, ramped it up big time at money time, which is exactly where the game was.
Pitino lost that game plain and simple or at the very least pi$$ed away any chance of winning with one of the worst coaching moves of all time. You guys can plant HOF in front of his name all you want, but like Jack Williams said about Luis, being BE POY and 2nd team AA doesn’t shield him from criticism and neither does HOF in front of Pitino’s name.
And as Panther shared, you guys falling over yourselves to keep the Luis criticism alive thread after thread kinda motivated me to jump back in and remind the board what really happened.
And before we get a ton of posts about how poorly Luis played, he certainly did, but you guys know why Zuby was exhorting Luis to get it together, because he was well aware he was our best chance to win, something Pitino completely lost sight of as the ensuing 4 minutes proved.

Assumptions, assumptions and assumptions.
Maybe Pitino was right and maybe he was wrong , but we will never know. Thé game will not be replayed and you are assuming Pitino lost the game for us. Again just your opinion which you are more than entitled to. You are reminding the board of your opinion as to what transpired not fact but your opinion. Repeating what you said a few weeks ago, which you are more than entitled to.
To myself and others RJ lost the game for us plain and simple. Thé bs fouls on KR were terrible.
And maybe some people comment to remind others about RJs play as other posters have the audacity to compare RJ to Mullin and Berry.
Never mind Mullin and Berry RJ didn’t come close to Sealy or Mark Jackson.

 

[mjmaherjr]

You guys act like the game was a mismatch which it was not by a long shot. We were down 2, TWO, one possession with 4+ minutes to go, right in the game! Right in the game in a season where we had come back in numerous games in which we had played poorly for long stretches. Where our best players, many, many times Luis, ramped it up big time at money time, which is exactly where the game was.
Pitino lost that game plain and simple or at the very least pi$$ed away any chance of winning with one of the worst coaching moves of all time. You guys can plant HOF in front of his name all you want, but like Jack Williams said about Luis, being BE POY and 2nd team AA doesn’t shield him from criticism and neither does HOF in front of Pitino’s name.
And as Panther shared, you guys falling over yourselves to keep the Luis criticism alive thread after thread kinda motivated me to jump back in and remind the board what really happened.
And before we get a ton of posts about how poorly Luis played, he certainly did, but you guys know why Zuby was exhorting Luis to get it together, because he was well aware he was our best chance to win, something Pitino completely lost sight of as the ensuing 4 minutes proved.

As momma mjmaherjr used to say. Look who is calling the kettle black

First thanks for quoting my post with a post so long Kranmars is having a heart attack for lack of spacing

Second I was at the freaking Arkansas game with others here I sat with SJU85 and IDRAFT 10 feet away from each other and I thought we were going to win. Personally I thought we we going to win before the game and I thought we were going to win and come back during the game

But when selection Sunday matched us up with them I thought it was going to be a very tough matchup. Should I not have because I don’t have the Logen wisdom ? During the Kansas Arkansas game I was telling posters here I'd rather be playing Kansas.

Personally I thought we got screwed because Kadary got taken out of the Game with fouls but we all know that theory is BS because the almighty Logen thinks you never criticize refs and the fact that Kadary had played the least minutes roughly in a game all season had nothing to do with anything because he said so

RJ ? I’m one of the guys freaking defending him here. But why let a good long no space rant post facts

Much easier to criticize rightly or wrongly one of the best college coaches of all time and lay blame on him because the only one who knows anything is the guy who puts holes in Sheetrock in basements throwing beer cans ( no wait let me change my story to red cups because redfans won't know how to use the search feature to find my original post because now they will really believe I'm always right) against the wall in his moms basement during a St. John’s game when things don’t go his way

My guess is you had to call a contractor after the Arkansas game

( mjmaherjr saving the world 1 beer can and 5 cent deposit at a time )

 

[Marillac2]

You guys act like the game was a mismatch which it was not by a long shot. We were down 2, TWO, one possession with 4+ minutes to go, right in the game! Right in the game in a season where we had come back in numerous games in which we had played poorly for long stretches. Where our best players, many, many times Luis, ramped it up big time at money time, which is exactly where the game was.
Pitino lost that game plain and simple or at the very least pi$$ed away any chance of winning with one of the worst coaching moves of all time. You guys can plant HOF in front of his name all you want, but like Jack Williams said about Luis, being BE POY and 2nd team AA doesn’t shield him from criticism and neither does HOF in front of Pitino’s name.
And as Panther shared, you guys falling over yourselves to keep the Luis criticism alive thread after thread kinda motivated me to jump back in and remind the board what really happened.
And before we get a ton of posts about how poorly Luis played, he certainly did, but you guys know why Zuby was exhorting Luis to get it together, because he was well aware he was our best chance to win, something Pitino completely lost sight of as the ensuing 4 minutes proved.

A for effort and grit. F for execution.

 

[SJU85]

Isn’t there an RJ Luis thread? A slew of these posts in the last few pages are about him in terms of what he did or didn’t do here, comparisons to Pointer or Ponds, why he isn’t coming back and how much NIL he should or could get and not about the 2025 NBADraft.

 

[lawmanfan]

Isn’t there an RJ Luis thread? A slew of these posts in the last few pages are about him in terms of what he did or didn’t do here, comparisons to Pointer or Ponds, why he isn’t coming back and how much NIL he should or could get and not about the 2025 NBADraft.

You must be new here. Let me explain:

2021: Every thread is a Julian Champagnie thread
2022: Every thread is a Posh Alexander thread
2023: Every thread is a Mike Anderson thread
2024: Every thread is a Daniss Jenkins thread
2025: Every thread is an RJ Luis thread
2025: Every thread is a (I'm guessing Ian Jackson but we shall see) thread

 

[IDRAFT]

You must be new here. Let me explain:

2021: Every thread is a Julian Champagnie thread
2022: Every thread is a Posh Alexander thread
2023: Every thread is a Mike Anderson thread
2024: Every thread is a Daniss Jenkins thread
2025: Every thread is an RJ Luis thread
2025: Every thread is a (I'm guessing Ian Jackson but we shall see) thread

Back when Mullin was coach I opened a thread simply called Mullin as every single thread was derailed into a coaching thread. Seemed simple to me. Nobody used it. I did screw up by not adding “is he the guy?” We live we learn, incrementally.

It can’t be easy to be a moderator here.

 

[logen]

Assumptions, assumptions and assumptions.
Maybe Pitino was right and maybe he was wrong , but we will never know. Thé game will not be replayed and you are assuming Pitino lost the game for us. Again just your opinion which you are more than entitled to. You are reminding the board of your opinion as to what transpired not fact but your opinion. Repeating what you said a few weeks ago, which you are more than entitled to.
To myself and others RJ lost the game for us plain and simple. Thé bs fouls on KR were terrible.
And maybe some people comment to remind others about RJs play as other posters have the audacity to compare RJ to Mullin and Berry.
Never mind Mullin and Berry RJ didn’t come close to Sealy or Mark Jackson.

Your opinion, and you are equally entitled to it. I thought that was what the board was all about but apparently some opinions count more than others.
Funny how you never clarified or commented on the many opinions praising Pitino for benching Luis and the FACT that the team he chose to go into battle with in the last 4 minutes failed miserably.
And I believe the comparisons to past Johnnie’s greats were more geared to his post season awards than comparison as players, but again my opinion.

 

[Larry Wright]

Jack what disturbs me about the posts regarding RJ is the redundancy. As soon as we lost to Arkansas, some posters came down on RJ. Understandable, because he had a bad game.

Once RJ put his name in the portal, the hate towards him resurfaced. Now people are saying the exact same things in the thread, NBA Draft. What is the purpose of saying the same thing over and over again.

My take is as follows, RJ and the team had a great season. He played poorly against Arkansas. I appreciate his contributions to St John's over the past two seasons and wish him well as his journey

Jack what disturbs me about the posts regarding RJ is the redundancy. As soon as we lost to Arkansas, some posters came down on RJ. Understandable, because he had a bad game.

Once RJ put his name in the portal, the hate towards him resurfaced. Now people are saying the exact same things in the thread, NBA Draft. What is the purpose of saying the same thing over and over again.

My take is as follows, RJ and the team had a great season. He played poorly against Arkansas. I appreciate his contributions to St John's over the past two seasons and wish him well as his journey continues.

The posters on here took their cue from the coach who threw him under the bus. I know they are pros basically now but still don’t think I have seen a college coach specifically a ST John’s coach use that tactic before Pitino.