I have a freshman starter who has had some significant fluctuation in performance from game to game (20 pts one night, 0 for 11 one night). Is that kind of volatility to be expected from frosh players? I've taken into account the variation in defensive strengths of my opponents I think.

Yes. He will become more consistent as his offensive and defensive IQ's increase.

Thanks J-

yeah, I have the same thing with my freshman this year. They impress you for a couple games, then just have an awful game. Stick with him though. The more experience he gets, the faster his IQ will rise, in addition to his core ratings.

A bit of advice for the future is to plan it out to where you NEVER have to start a FR. The lack of IQ will cost your team wins because of just that one player starting.

Quote: Originally posted by porkpower on 11/24/2009A bit of advice for the future is to plan it out to where you NEVER have to start a FR. The lack of IQ will cost your team wins because of just that one player starting.

I generally defer to the vets like porkpower, on this I want to add a possible caveat however, and if I am mistaken, I am sure I will be corrected. My limited experience with this has me believing that if the incoming frosh runs your offense and defense in HS (and therefore has some IQ already) you can start him without such an impact. It is not always easy to find appropriate freshmen though...

Quote: Originally posted by dacj501 on 11/24/2009

Quote: Originally posted by porkpower on 11/24/2009A bit of advice for the future is to plan it out to where you NEVER have to start a FR. The lack of IQ will cost your team wins because of just that one player starting.

I generally defer to the vets like porkpower, on this I want to add a possible caveat however, and if I am mistaken, I am sure I will be corrected. My limited experience with this has me believing that if the incoming frosh runs your offense and defense in HS (and therefore has some IQ already) you can start him without such an impact. It is not always easy to find appropriate freshmen though...

the impact is certainly lessened, but not by all that much. about 7-10 games is the difference from a guy who didn't play your set. generally, i am sad to even start a soph, although you can still have a very good team if you start just 1. so to start a freshman is pretty bad. its bad enough that you have to use them as backups! i feel like 20 mins of freshman backups (so like, 2 for 10, or 1 for 5 and 1 for 15), is not a big deal, but any more than that and you definitely start to feel it. i've really become a fan of as balanced of classes as possible because the diff between a senior and a junior is nothing next to the diff between a soph and a freshman.

Agreed billyg. If they ran your sets in high school, they usually come in with like a C- in your set. That is the equivalent of about a half of a season of practice, which is not that much.

One exception I will throw out there is that I have seen on rare occasions FR come in with a C+/B- in a Offense or Defense. I would prob consider starting a FR if he came in with a B- in my O/D but these players are very rare and almost impossible to identify during recruiting.

I have signed players whose evaluations gave every indication that they REALLY knew my set and then they show up at school with a D+/C-. It is too random of a variable to count on.

which brings me to this... I got this message from a D1 recruit eval today, which i have never seen before. Anyone want to hazard a guess as to his incoming M2M IQ? I was going to say B.

"Defensively, they played mostly a halfcourt press/man to man. Based on what I could see, he has a great understanding of the man to man, as good as some collegiate upperclassmen. Based on their sets, he seemed like he knew where to be while running press, but there were a couple of times he was out of position."

Got this on a recent soph juco tranfer. He showed up on campus a High b- (was B within 5 games)

My guess?

C in M2M and D+ in Press

I would def not count on getting anything higher then that. It is possible but highly unlikely in my experiences.

JUCO's get a boost unlike any FR for their extra year of playing, kann.

sure pork, but I am assuming the read on them is the same if it says has a great understading... it means the same...

Hmm.. I do not know for sure, kann. Have never really studied a JUCO's Evaluation correspondence in great detail. I will start paying more attention.

i've gotten Cs before with much less emphatic wording than that...