So it was an eventful last 24 hours over at Duke for basketball. Also, North Carolina got some good news today about Portal University transfer. And I will say that we will talk with Jon Shire on Thursday's program. I guess we'll just get a state of play for Duke and maybe a look at the landscape and how it is. All coming together.
We got a lot of stuff to do. If you are just tuning in, Kyle Filippowski kind of forecast this yesterday. He has decided to play another year at Duke. Jalen Withers will transfer from Louisville through the transfer portal. He will go to North Carolina. We'll see if Duke is also going to pluck somebody from Portal University.
Brendan Marks from The Athletic covers both programs. He joins us on the Adam Gold Show at Brendan R Marks on Twitter. I think you and I were in agreement yesterday that when Kyle Filippowski joked that he missed his window during the Jeremy Roach announcement on Twitter. That Filippowski was joking because he was probably coming back.
Explain Kyle's decision as best you can. I think the best place to start is looking at what he turned down, which is probably a late first round draft spot. Had he decided to go to the draft this summer. You know, our Sam Vasini, who's our draft expert at The Athletic, had him at number 21 on his latest big board. And from the scouts that I've spoken to, that's about Filippowski's range.
It would have been 22. You know, the first couple of picks in the second round. The difference here is now by coming back rather than risking potentially being a second round or being the late first rounder.
And the difference between those two is obviously some some hefty guaranteed money. He now has the potential to really play himself into the lottery, depending on how next season goes. But he's going to have an opportunity to really, really improve his draft stock and find himself in a better long term situation in the NBA. At the same time, he gets to work on his skills. You know, he can stand to improve his three point shot for as good as he was, can still continue to get stronger, continue to fill out his frame.
So from the skill side development side, that's there. And then from the Duke side, there's this number one. I think Kyle was frustrated with the way Duke season ended, falling to Tennessee in the second round.
I think wanting to go further. And as he mentioned in his announcement, creating a legacy is something that's important to him. But the other thing that I would mention is Filippowski is is one of the first multi year Duke players in the NFL era who is fairly marketable. And so I think he's going to, as a result of coming back, see his NIL opportunities increase. And so he's going to be able to mitigate some of that money he would have made going to the draft this summer with what should be a lot of NIL opportunities that behoove a preseason All-American on a potential number one team. How, I mean, I don't know if it impacts Jeremy Roach's decision.
They're probably completely separate. Roach did pretty well for himself this past year with NIL opportunity. I know he and Armando Bacott shared a client.
So what is Roach looking at? He decided to go through the draft process, but his statement basically reads, you know, I'm leaving it open to come back because he very well might. He's a six foot 280 pound, you know, really a combo guard, right?
And that's kind of hard to make it. He does have some injury history, had the ACL in high school, obviously dealt with a nagging toe injury last year. So there's a couple of things working against his favor. But I think what this is to me, I read Jeremy Roach's situation is despise him more time by going through the NBA draft process. He can now go and he can talk to teams. He can get feedback. He does have a lofty pedigree as a former five star guy. So scouts are aware of him.
They know his name. And now he gets to go and he gets to get feedback from decision makers, from evaluators, gets to hear the things that he needs to improve at. I'm sure that they're going to tell him that he needs to up his assists.
He needs to up his three point percentage again. And he's going to get an opportunity to see where he stacks up. I do not believe that he would be drafted were he to stay in the draft this year. But there is a chance now that the NBA is adding an additional two way contract to every team.
That's 30 more two way contracts. And could he be potentially sneak into one of those? I think he might. So to me, I think this likely ends with Jeremy Rose coming back to school. But at the same time, there is some part of people that all of his buddies, all the guys he came in with are in the pros right now.
At some point, you want to move on to the next phase of your life. So if he does end up making that decision, you can certainly understand the logic. I mean, I know that mail money is real, but what are the possibilities that he could equal or surpass that kind of financial intake by playing in Australia or in Japan or one of those leagues? Yeah, you know, I think for Jeremy, you know, you're talking about a guy who, again, is going to be a multi year starter coming back to a preseason top five, maybe preseason number one team, a team that's going to have a legitimate national title aspiration. And the NL opportunities have been there for him previously, and they're going to continue to be. Certainly, they're going to be better opportunities than if he were to sort of languish in the G League.
So yeah, like the NIL element, again, we've talked about this in the past with other players. It is something that is attractive to players who are considering coming back, certainly, and Jeremy Rose falls into that category. That Brendan R. Marks on Twitter covers Duke and North Carolina for the athletic. One more thing about the Blue Devils, and then we'll flip quickly to North Carolina because there's news there too. Mackenzie McBocco, I don't know if I pronounced that name right at all.
It's probably sort of close, but maybe not. He was a five star power forward from Roselle Catholic in New Jersey, and he was coming to Duke. And really, before we saw the decision of Filipowski, I think we all knew it. He asked to be out of his, you know, let out of his letter of intent to go to Duke. He's going to reopen his commitment. It's easy to say that it's tied to Filipowski's decision. What's next? Yeah, so I know a lot of Duke fans are probably bummed to see that their top rated incoming recruit is not going to be there.
And like, listen, I'm not going to lie. Mackenzie McBocco is a really, really good play. You know, he, by all accounts, just had a fantastic week at the Nike hoot summit, look like a guy who, you know, physically might be ready to play in the league now. So certainly losing him, he's, I went up to Roselle Catholic in December, actually, to meet with him and to meet with UNC commit Simeon Wiltshire. They were teammates this season and the way he stretches the floor at his side, you get why he's such a coveted prospect. Next for him, there are a couple of options. You know, I've heard Louisville is as someone that might be attracted.
I've heard the G league overtime elite. One of those professional routes is potentially being an option for him. As for the Duke side of things, I think to know here is now independent of Jeremy Roach's decision or not, Duke has an available scholarship, which it did not previously have. And what that allows John Shire and his staff to do is to go to the transfer portal and to get a big man, a rim protector that quite frankly, they don't have right now on the roster. With Philipowski back with Sean Stewart coming in with Ryan Young, there are offensive scoring threats that Duke can play, but it doesn't necessarily have a defensive anchor.
And now it has the freedom to go and get that guy. So I'm not going to say it's a one for one trade off with Philipowski and Imbaco. The situations are certainly connected, but it doesn't necessarily have to be a bad overall outcome for Duke because it allows them to sort of go and get the last piece of the puzzle, so to speak. Look, I hope Imbaco does well if he goes to Louisville because we need that program to not be four and whatever.
Brendan Marks is joining us here on the Adam Gold Show. Alright, Jalen Withers from Louisville to North Carolina. What are the Tar Heels getting? Yeah, so, you know, Jalen Withers, he's a guy who's originally from Charlotte, Huntersville area, played at North MEC, spent the last couple of years at Louisville, redshirted his freshman year, but you know, this is a guy who is coming in to compete on the wing and to compete at the power forward spot. You know, average, I know some people sort of just look at the counting stats, they look and they see, oh, 8.9 points, 5.3 rebounds. That's nothing crazy. This is a guy who shot like 41% from three last year on three attempts a game.
So it's not crazy volume, but it is certainly helpful volume. And again, that percentage easily would have been the best on North Carolina's roster so far last year. He's a really strong defensive rebounder. To me, I look at this as a guy who is not necessarily going to be handed a starting spot, but it's certainly someone who has experience can compete to start will be part of the rotation. And again, you're talking about filling out the roster around Armando Baycott, Jalen Washington and RJ Davis.
And this is a guy who shoots and gets rebounds and does that. So I like the fit. I'm just curious to see where North Carolina goes next in the portal. Yeah, they are going to have to do that because they lost a bunch of players to the portal, including one rumor that has Dontress Stiles possibly landing down at NC State.
Brendan R Marks on Twitter. I thank you very much. I know you're hard at work on the next on the next big thing.
Any preview you can give us? You know, just trying to continue shifting through the portal. I don't know if I don't know if, you know, fans are aware of this or not, but high school recruiting and portal recruiting are they're one in the same because they count for the same.
But they are totally different animals, just like coaches are trying to figure out how to navigate the portal. So to our idiot hacks like myself trying to trying to swim in the waters and not drown out. Don't don't don't don't get accused of tampering Brendan. All right. I'm doing my best.
Don't do that. All right. Thanks, man. I appreciate your time as always. Yep. Talk to you soon. You got it.
Whisper: medium.en / 2023-04-11 20:11:30 / 2023-04-11 20:16:17 / 5