It's June 1st, do we think we are done with portal additions? We have spots available as we have continued to go after players since picking up Lawrence and Carter.

I really like the additions of Lawrence and Carter and I think they are going to help this team. But honestly if this is it, then it's been a disappointing portal season in my personal opinion. I expected with the successful season we would be more attractive than the past couple of years and we would add 4-5 good players via the portal. I think we could use another perimeter player and a big.

I worry about our inside play. I like Garcia and Solo but If Marble goes down with an injury, this team is likely screwed as we will be rolling out an extremely small lineup at all times. Even with a healthy Marble this team needs another big with length as Marble is really the only true "big man" on this team today.

Last year our bench was extremely weak on the perimeter. Most of SEC play it was Gordon and Hefner as first off the bench. We lost Dexter and added two guys on the perimeter, so we did improve depth some as both Carter and Lawrence should be ahead of Gordon and Hefner in the rotation. A healthy Manny improves depth some as a healthy Manny pushes Gordon and Hefner down a spot as well. I just really think we need another guy on the perimeter. Maybe that guy is Lindsay or Lee and they challenge Hefner and Gordon for minutes.

We still have time to add more pieces, but the list of available players is growing slim and things seem really quite on that front.

I think we add another guy.

Method Man said:

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I think we add another guy.

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A big? A perimeter guy? A towel waiver who doesn't matter what position he is?

We don't have a juco and Buzz said he will always have a Juco. But we could find 800 Jucos willing to walkon here.

I don't care as long as they're a dawg.

I think you're gonna have a hard time convincing a true difference maker to come here with basically the whole team returning (and most are committed now anyway)

I could see them going after a young guy that may be able contribute down the road though

AggieCrew44 said:

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I think you're gonna have a hard time convincing a true difference maker to come here with basically the whole team returning (and most are committed now anyway)

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So before it was tough to get players to come here because we weren't good enough to get to the NCAA tournament. Now we are too good for players to come here.

A 6'11" shot blocker, rebounder, finisher would be nice, but there's a limited number of those types of humans on the planet. I'm sure we could pick up an Aku that's out there, but that would not be manna from heaven.

I'm pleased with the 2 wing types we added. Hopefully one of them can give a few minutes at the point after Boots and Wade T so we don't have endure Gordon. Or maybe Gordon finds some confidence and snaps out of his 2-3 year funk. Lindsay looks like he can really handle it and score as well, but he'll be a skinny freshman (6'3" 170) playing against grown men.

MarcAg said:

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AggieCrew44 said:

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I think you're gonna have a hard time convincing a true difference maker to come here with basically the whole team returning (and most are committed now anyway)

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So before it was tough to get players to come here because we weren't good enough to get to the NCAA tournament. Now we are too good for players to come here.

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Im talking about this late in the cycle but ok

AggieCrew44 said:

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MarcAg said:

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AggieCrew44 said:

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I think you're gonna have a hard time convincing a true difference maker to come here with basically the whole team returning (and most are committed now anyway)

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So before it was tough to get players to come here because we weren't good enough to get to the NCAA tournament. Now we are too good for players to come here.

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Im talking about this late in the cycle but ok

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Why does this late in the cycle matter?

MarcAg said:

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AggieCrew44 said:

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MarcAg said:

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AggieCrew44 said:

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I think you're gonna have a hard time convincing a true difference maker to come here with basically the whole team returning (and most are committed now anyway)

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So before it was tough to get players to come here because we weren't good enough to get to the NCAA tournament. Now we are too good for players to come here.

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Im talking about this late in the cycle but ok

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Why does this late in the cycle matter?

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Because there aren't many difference makers left? Transfer guys want playing time and we have one of the deeper rosters in the country.

There aren't many guards left out there better than Wade and Radford. We are 4 deep at the 4 and 5 positions.

But the argument was we have almost everyone coming back, which has nothing to do with the cycle which is why I was confused.

Well it does when we've also added 2 transfers expecting to contribute to said team

AggieCrew44 said:

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Well it does when we've also added 2 transfers expecting to contribute to said team

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Don't kids want to compete for championships? I would think our roster today helps us. This roster isn't so strong that a difference maker can't get a ton of playing time here and even starts. I think there are 2 starting positions that aren't locked down. Boots, 4 and Marble probably have starting spots locked up. And in addition to 2 starting spots for the taking there are tons of bench minutes for the taking.

AgEfan said:

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AggieCrew44 said:

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Well it does when we've also added 2 transfers expecting to contribute to said team

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Don't kids want to compete for championships? I would think our roster today helps us. This roster isn't so strong that a difference maker can't get a ton of playing time here and even starts. I think there are 2 starting positions that aren't locked down. Boots, 4 and Marble probably have starting spots locked up. And in addition to 2 starting spots for the taking there are tons of bench minutes for the taking.

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They do but they want to play first and foremost

I just think it's unlikely to get a legit instant impact player at this point. If you don't already have a destination at this point in June there is likely a reason for that

I don't think anyone is expecting a star at this point or actually any kind of addition at this point . We also usually aren't landing star players ever

And that's exactly what I originally said. Maybe could land a young guy that has more of a future outlook

I was hoping we would add one true difference maker. Basically we are just running it back with last year's team. Which isn't bad. Last year was fun. But one more guy could have really pushed this team to the next level.

What we are seeing is that recruiting has never been as simple as fans think it is or should be.

There are more motives out there than we tend to imagine.

Some blame A&M's failure to pull in media-hyped transfers on lack of NIL dollars.

Some blame A&M's failures in recruiting highly ranked individual talent on Buzz's philosophy or recruiting ability.

Some blame A&M's failures on weaknesses in our facilities and lack of a great record in big games in terms of atmosphere and exciting wins.

Those are obvious candidates, but there are many other less noticeable factors out there too.

I think first two are legit.

NIL is definitely a factor.

I think Buzz is super selective about the type of kid he recruits and then he's also going up against some killer recruiters in the SEC. So we see the type of players Arkansas, Bama, Auburn, Tennessee, LSU and now Ole Miss get and it's on a different level. You know who isn't killing it in the portal? Kentucky. They have sucked at it last 2 years and I don't really understand why.

I think we're a top 15-20 team as is, and I like Coleman as a college big more than Marc does, but yeah, if the second weekend or beyond is our goal then right now we're banking on significant improvement from Manny or Solo. Would have been nice to get a semi-proven perimeter guy with length or a rim protector.

I'm sure Cal really wishes the transfer portal didn't open until after the NBA Draft withdrawal deadline. Big difference trying to recruit transfer bigs when you do, and then don't, have Tshiebwe on the roster.

bobinator said:

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I think we're a top 15-20 team as is, and I like Coleman as a college big more than Marc does, but yeah, if the second weekend or beyond is our goal then right now we're banking on significant improvement from Manny or Solo. Would have been nice to get a semi-proven perimeter guy with length or a rim protector.

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I definitely think we have a really good team next year. I just thought with a couple more additions you take this team to a possible final 4 team. That can still happen, but you are depending on a lot of internal development as you really added one new part if you factor in one of the transfer essentially replaces Dexter. I think Garcia and Solo are your prime candidates for improvement. I'm not hopefully on Manny, but that might be because I've been disappointed in his first two seasons and I don't want to let myself get burned again We need Lindsay or Lee to be a player. Lee looks the part, but it's probably too much to expect a former walkon to be an impactful guy in year 2 on a top 20 team.

I'm hoping we see a different Coleman next season. Somebody on this board said he had ab injury a lot of the season. That makes me hopeful. But he's still 6'6.

He's 6-6 but he's really strong. He plays bigger than 6-6 defensively as long as he's not defending one of those rare freak athlete types. The problem is offense, where I think he almost is a victim of his own intelligence. He finds ways to get open a lot so he creates situations where he *almost* makes a good play, which makes it more frustrating to watch him than, say, Solo who basically doesn't do anything offensively at all. If he could just work on softening his hands he'd be a practically automatic double-double guy. Even as frustrating as he was last season at times he was still getting 9 and 6 per game.

I wish Garcia was a tad quicker or Solo could score a little better and you could play them on the wing and you'd go from a small team to a big team pretty quick.

We didn't really use Solo well last season but that's understandable because he didn't really come on until late, but we need to be using him to create space on offense. Have him setting screens and if the defense cheats off of him he should be able to catch and dunk a lob from basically anywhere inside 15 feet on one or two steps. Absolute freak athlete.

There has to be a 6'9 245 guy out there you can have on your bench just to come in on occasion and bang and grab a rebound.

At some point soon it's going to be too late to add someone because of the fact that they will have to establish relationships with the players/coaches and be ready for their summer workouts. That player would have to be a unicorn or have a sizeable dawg factor in them because I'm not sure we'd add a body just to add a body.

I think as long as they are here in August they will be fine. That will give them time to get to know their teammates before bootcamp.

GrayMatter said:

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At some point soon it's going to be too late to add someone because of the fact that they will have to establish relationships with the players/coaches and be ready for their summer workouts. That player would have to be a unicorn or have a sizeable dawg factor in them because I'm not sure we'd add a body just to add a body.

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When did Dexter arrive on campus last year?

OP, agree, need to add another perimeter guy and a big. I think they have been working on both. IIRC, I think Looch or one of the staffers made it sound as if they still had a surprise coming. We never got an update after that so I don't know if that is still in the works or has gone by?

Also, I never heard anything final on Brandon White? He is a true big with legit length and the type of athleticism Buzz wants from his players.

I will also leave you with this. If we aren't as successful in the portal as you would like, sure some of it maybe we just missed out and some of the targets went elsewhere by their own choice but, it's still recruiting and it wouldn't surprise me if some of their targets went elsewhere b/c Buzz vetted them and decided not to pursue further. He has a very strict and detailed recruiting process and sometimes that is why some higher ranked studs out of HS don't sign with us, is b/c of Buzz deciding his program is right for them.

We had one.

is Cashius McNeilly available?

EliteZags said:

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is Cashius McNeilly available?

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We should be back in the rotation at some point.

EliteZags said:

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is Cashius McNeilly available?

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He is. You can find him sitting on the bench in street clothes.

He just transferred to a different bench.