Latest / Spiders Sound Off / Episode 15: UR Media Day Misadventure

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Episode 15: UR Media Day Misadventure · Spiders Sound Off

• 0:06
  Hey everybody. Welcome back to Spider.
• 0:09
  Sound off. This is Tom.
• 0:10
  And this is Porter. And today we're going to talk
• 0:13
  about U of Rs men's media day that they had on campus.
• 0:18
  That was followed by a practice I was at a town Porter got to go
• 0:23
  to that. So we'll give you a little
• 0:26
  update on the men's team. Yeah, so really, really good
• 0:29
  day. I was excited to be invited to
• 0:32
  the media day. We are media now, by the way,
• 0:35
  we. Are media and it's that's an
• 0:37
  unusual thing. And I'll tell you how how media
• 0:39
  I am here in a second, but I got to go.
• 0:42
  Jason Vida invited me and I, I showed up at the Queerly Center.
• 0:47
  Jason was kind enough to say, hey, just, you know, come to the
• 0:50
  center. You usually can find your way
• 0:51
  down to the floor. Do you have a special pass?
• 0:53
  How did that work? I don't have a pass, but you
• 0:56
  know I can. You can.
• 0:58
  You can draft in on somebody who opens the door, which I did
• 1:01
  successfully. And then I found my way to the
• 1:04
  perch where we watched the practice the first time
• 1:06
  together. And I was looking at, you know,
• 1:09
  the team practicing a little. They were doing a light warm up,
• 1:12
  and directly below the perch was the mics and where all the media
• 1:16
  was setting up. So I realized I had to get
• 1:17
  downstairs. And that's where my problems as
• 1:19
  media began. So all of the doors from the
• 1:23
  upper level to lower level are locked or passcoded and I didn't
• 1:26
  have the code, Maybe intentionally, I don't know, but
• 1:28
  I didn't have the code to get downstairs.
• 1:30
  Did you have your own U of R ID? Did you try that I?
• 1:32
  Do have AU of R ID but it's a it's an old person's ID now.
• 1:36
  It's called an Osher ID so. So it doesn't actually work to
• 1:39
  open doors, as I found out. So I decided the best way to try
• 1:44
  to get downstairs was actually to take the elevator when
• 1:47
  somebody came up. So I waited at the elevator
• 1:49
  door, somebody came up, hopped on the elevator door, closed.
• 1:52
  None of the buttons worked, my Osher ID did not get me
• 1:55
  anywhere, and I was stuck on the elevator.
• 1:58
  At which point in time I realized this could be
• 2:00
  interesting, right? Like you're not going to do much
• 2:02
  of much media from inside the elevator.
• 2:04
  Hard to interview from the elevator by yourself.
• 2:07
  From inside the elevator. So I called Jason.
• 2:09
  He was kind enough to tell me the code he was coming to get me
• 2:13
  as the elevator started to move and then he told me the code to
• 2:16
  get in downstairs and I was able to to to navigate off the
• 2:20
  elevator and onto the main floor for the for the media.
• 2:22
  Center was the code like 1234? I don't even recall what it was,
• 2:26
  but it was, it was kind of an embarrassing moment, my first
• 2:30
  moment as an official media member to to get stuck on an
• 2:33
  elevator and, and there's not a whole lot of interviewing that's
• 2:36
  taking place there. Yeah, congratulations.
• 2:38
  Yeah, but I did make my way to the floor and it was, it was a
• 2:41
  cool day at John O'Connor was there from the Richmond Times
• 2:43
  Dispatch. Bob Black was there and that was
• 2:46
  my first time meeting Bob when you you've had a meeting with
• 2:48
  him. But I didn't get a chance to go
• 2:49
  to that because I was out of town.
• 2:51
  Was he one of the interviewers or he was just there as kind of
• 2:53
  a UR media person to help with the process?
• 2:56
  I think he was both. I think he was a UR media person
• 2:58
  interviewing. He also has an ESPN show, so
• 3:00
  he's official media. So he did ask questions of Coach
• 3:05
  Mooney and Mike Walls. So but I actually got a chance
• 3:08
  to tell him. I mean, you know, you know, I
• 3:09
  grew, I I spent 30 years away. So Richmond basketball to me has
• 3:16
  been kind of it has been, it has been displayed through the the
• 3:22
  voice of Bob Black. And so when I hear Bob's voice,
• 3:24
  I think Richmond basketball. So I just thanked him for just
• 3:26
  being the awesome announcer that he is and told him a little bit
• 3:30
  about our Scrocky episode and said that, you know, asked him
• 3:32
  if he really turned off Jeff Myers mic.
• 3:34
  And he laughed and said, yeah, I did.
• 3:36
  But, but yeah, it was great meeting him and John O'Connor,
• 3:39
  both professionals. And it was, that was fun.
• 3:40
  There was also two or three other folks there I didn't
• 3:42
  recognize, I think presumably from Channel 8, Channel 6,
• 3:46
  because the mic stands that were in front of where Mooney and and
• 3:48
  Walls were going to talk were 8:00 and 6:00.
• 3:51
  So I figured that's probably where they were from.
• 3:53
  Does O'Connor still have a great mustache?
• 3:56
  I you know what I don't? I don't even remember if he had
• 3:59
  a mustache. I wasn't really looking at his
• 4:00
  face too much. I was just chatting with him so
• 4:02
  I don't even remember. That's something we need to work
• 4:04
  on. One of us needs a mustache.
• 4:05
  Yeah, that's true. That's true.
• 4:07
  I vote you. You could go full rooster,
• 4:09
  actually. So.
• 4:12
  But I did get a chance to talk to Mike before the cameras were
• 4:14
  on. Mike Walls.
• 4:15
  Mike Walls? Yeah.
• 4:16
  And what a what a nice young man.
• 4:17
  I mean, he's he's so confident, well spoken.
• 4:20
  I mean, he really represents himself well.
• 4:22
  And I think, you know, whatever he decides to apply himself
• 4:25
  towards, whether it be basketball or, or future
• 4:29
  endeavors, I think Mike's going to do well for himself because
• 4:31
  he's just, you know, really squared away.
• 4:32
  OK, so they got this media set up with the microphone and I
• 4:36
  guess the just a place for the media to stand where you had
• 4:39
  chairs or you're all standing. We're all standing kind of on
• 4:42
  the floor and the players were kind of practicing that.
• 4:45
  They weren't going hard. It was more of a light practice
• 4:48
  in the background. And Mike Walls was up first
• 4:50
  before. Coach Mike Walls was up first.
• 4:51
  The video that the the university released actually
• 4:54
  flipped them. Mooney went first, but Walls was
• 4:56
  actually the first. You know, it's interesting too.
• 4:57
  I just think about like this was followed by media day.
• 5:01
  I think they went from here to media day.
• 5:03
  Is that right? Yeah.
• 5:04
  So in some ways it was like a practice for both of them.
• 5:07
  You know, Mooney doesn't need the practice, but you know,
• 5:09
  Walls is still, you know, in that leadership, well, really in
• 5:13
  that leadership spot for the first time where he's the guy.
• 5:15
  So it was a good practice for him before he went to Pittsburgh
• 5:18
  and got a bunch of questions from people that are maybe less
• 5:21
  friendly or potentially less friendly.
• 5:23
  Yeah, I mean, I don't think anything up in Pittsburgh was
• 5:25
  super unfriendly if you if you kind of saw some of those
• 5:28
  videos. But at the end of the day, I
• 5:29
  think, you know, Mike was ready for it and, and I wasn't the 1st
• 5:34
  to go. I just kind of, I had to, as you
• 5:36
  know, being new media who just got stuck in an elevator, I had
• 5:38
  to figure out like what my order of asking things were going to
• 5:41
  be. So I waited till kind of the
• 5:42
  questions had gone around the circle with all the other
• 5:44
  reporters there, and then I asked my first question of them.
• 5:47
  What were some of the questions everyone else was asking?
• 5:49
  Do you remember? Kind of.
• 5:51
  I was more intent on making sure that I didn't ask something
• 5:54
  completely, you know, inappropriate.
• 5:56
  I don't want this. Just talk about what you guys,
• 5:57
  weren't you there? Don't you remember anything
• 5:59
  else? You know me, I don't listen half
• 6:00
  as well as you do, so there you go.
• 6:02
  OK, Porter, what we really want to know what all of our fans
• 6:05
  want to know if, what were the questions that you asked Mike
• 6:09
  Walls? Yeah, so my first question to
• 6:11
  Mike was, you know, on about why he stayed all four years when so
• 6:15
  many others were leaving their school.
• 6:17
  And and you know, John O'Connor put a nice video out there of
• 6:21
  where Mike actually answered that question.
• 6:23
  It's on his Twitter feed. But I will say this, you know,
• 6:27
  Mike also asked answered the same question at the a 10 day up
• 6:30
  in up in Pittsburgh. And, you know, he talked about,
• 6:33
  hey, it's not all about the money for him.
• 6:35
  The school made an investment in him.
• 6:37
  He felt like, you know, what they were building in his
• 6:40
  confidence and in in his character, you know, led him to
• 6:44
  also put an investment in the school.
• 6:45
  And so it was just a really professional, polished answer
• 6:48
  about why he was, I think, one of only four players in the A10
• 6:51
  to play all four years for the. Yeah, I think that's right.
• 6:54
  And I think there was some version and maybe this is more
• 6:56
  of the A10 media day, but it's kind of he felt like he owed it.
• 6:59
  Yeah, to Richard. So I don't think it was ever a
• 7:01
  thought to go looking elsewhere. It was kind of a given.
• 7:05
  It was an interesting note that I think it was more at the 8:10
• 7:09
  meeting versus this one that I think Mooney brought up that,
• 7:12
  you know, he's hoping Tyne is that next year.
• 7:14
  Yeah. So if you know, assuming Tyne is
• 7:17
  here his fourth year, he'll also be another 4 year senior, which
• 7:20
  is rare these days. It is.
• 7:22
  It is the next question I asked Mike was about his you know, you
• 7:25
  know, he led the team in three-point percentage last
• 7:27
  year. I don't know if you knew that,
• 7:28
  but he led the team in three-point percentage.
• 7:29
  And so I, I just asked him, hey, I mean, given that and you took
• 7:32
  a, a meaningful number of three pointers, are you going to shoot
• 7:35
  more threes this year? And he said absolutely.
• 7:37
  Coach wants him to make 50 this year, 53 pointers.
• 7:41
  And and by the way, that would translate if you figure 30 games
• 7:44
  to about 1.6 per game, which means he's got to shoot 4, 3
• 7:48
  pointers per game. So that's a big number.
• 7:50
  Do you know how many 3 pointers he's made in his U of R career?
• 7:53
  I do not. 26. OK, wow, you one up to me on the
• 7:57
  research. Well done.
• 7:59
  Now mostly he had 20 last year, so he didn't, you know, do a
• 8:02
  whole lot prior to last year. I'll tell you.
• 8:05
  I mean, I love that there's a goal and he kind of knew was
• 8:08
  able to talk to that 50. I don't like and I like your
• 8:12
  question. Yep.
• 8:13
  I, I kind of wish his answer was, you know, 3 pointers are
• 8:18
  important for me, but my real game needs to be inside.
• 8:22
  And my goal is to get 10 rebounds a game.
• 8:24
  And if the three pointers come, they come.
• 8:27
  But my target is to get 10 rebounds per game.
• 8:29
  And, and, and maybe he has that too.
• 8:31
  I I don't want to say that's not the case, but the fact that him
• 8:35
  and coach had a conversation about trying to hit 50 threes,
• 8:40
  doesn't it make me feel warm and fuzzy inside?
• 8:42
  Well, I. I actually want to see him hit
• 8:44
  50 threes, But I I agree with you like we need him to average
• 8:47
  10 rebounds inside as well. Because I mean, Mike Walls looks
• 8:50
  like a center. He looks like a basketball
• 8:53
  player. I mean, he is physically
• 8:54
  impressive. He is big, he is strong.
• 8:57
  He is the A10 has a huge number of very, very powerful inside
• 9:02
  players. And if Richmond is going to make
• 9:04
  the postseason this year, it's going to be really because Mike
• 9:08
  Walls steps into his role and becomes the all A10 player that
• 9:12
  we know he's capable of. And so I agree with you.
• 9:14
  I want him to hit 50 threes and I want him to grab 10 rebounds a
• 9:17
  game, and I wanted to play fantastic defense against these
• 9:20
  other A10 big men because he's going to have to do all of those
• 9:23
  things for us to have a meaningful postseason this year.
• 9:26
  Yeah, that's right. One thing from the interview I I
• 9:29
  liked, I don't know if it was from your question, the spin off
• 9:32
  from that or something different, but there was one of
• 9:34
  the media members asked Walls about, you know, what's
• 9:36
  different from this year's team to last year's team.
• 9:39
  There was talk about summer practice being a lot harder this
• 9:42
  year than in the past. Yeah.
• 9:43
  We've witnessed that A. Lot of good conversations about
• 9:45
  that, but they asked about the team and what was interesting to
• 9:49
  me, maybe it's a bit of a surprise.
• 9:53
  Was he, he openly said when Delani Hunt got hurt last year
• 9:57
  that the team had little leadership on the court because
• 10:03
  they really were counting on Delani as that kind of vocal
• 10:06
  leader on the team. And I, and I think Mike in a
• 10:08
  sense, was admitting he wasn't comfortable being a vocal
• 10:10
  leader, you know, a year ago. And the team suffered because
• 10:17
  not just Delaney's points and assists, but really his
• 10:20
  leadership was gone. And there wasn't an obvious #2
• 10:24
  on that team. And then Mike talked about how
• 10:26
  this team, not only is he more vocal, and I think he mentioned
• 10:29
  time being more vocal, but the transfers that came in are all
• 10:32
  kind of leaders from their old teams and are bringing that to
• 10:35
  leadership here. So part of what he was saying is
• 10:38
  that this team has got lots of leadership and last year had one
• 10:42
  great leader who got hurt. And we all know what those
• 10:45
  results look like. But what was surprising to me,
• 10:46
  and I just had never thought about, you know, what happens if
• 10:49
  you've got any sort of team, whether it's a sports team or a
• 10:52
  work team and you've got one strong leader and that person is
• 10:56
  gone or on the sideline as a, as a injury would take you kind of
• 11:00
  the impact that can have to morale across the whole unit.
• 11:03
  And it's not. It's less surprising now how bad
• 11:06
  our season was if not only did we lose his points, but we lost
• 11:10
  the one leader on the court. Yeah, I mean, and that also is
• 11:13
  partially a function of the era we we're playing in these days.
• 11:16
  I mean, with so many kids transferring in and out every
• 11:20
  year, I mean, continuity is such a hard thing to to build
• 11:23
  because, you know, you just don't have those players who
• 11:26
  stay in the system for for the years that you need them.
• 11:29
  So leadership is, is probably an underrated trait of, of any of
• 11:33
  these teams that do well coming in this era because you know,
• 11:36
  you, you are having to mold multiple pieces together very,
• 11:38
  very quickly. And so having the recipe for
• 11:41
  doing that, you know will go a long way to to success in the
• 11:45
  NIL. Era and and I'll say like we've
• 11:47
  talked about this in a couple cases and seen it in other
• 11:51
  podcasts. Like I think what's clear is
• 11:53
  that when Mooney recruits, whether it's high school kids or
• 11:57
  through the portal is like number one or two on his list is
• 12:01
  character. But you know, having a strong
• 12:04
  character does not mean you're a strong leader.
• 12:07
  And so I wonder if Mooney, you know, haven't gone through the
• 12:09
  portal a few times looking at least the the folks he got this
• 12:13
  year. Is it like character slash
• 12:15
  leadership, like moving up in his ranks because he knows
• 12:19
  you're remoulding A-Team and you can't just rely on your
• 12:22
  undergrads to necessarily be the leaders of your team?
• 12:25
  You need to, you know, find that through the portal.
• 12:28
  Yeah, it's a good question. OK, so then Mooney came on.
• 12:32
  Yeah, same crew interviewing him.
• 12:35
  I assume there wasn't any kind of new folks showing up.
• 12:37
  Correct. Yeah, same group of people
• 12:39
  asking questions. I kind of went towards the end
• 12:41
  of my question with my question and I really had kind of two
• 12:45
  questions prepared and only one I asked and and that was just
• 12:50
  hey, with six weeks to go for the before your first game, what
• 12:54
  is your biggest concern going into the year?
• 12:57
  And his first sentence he he actually had a longer.
• 13:00
  Did he mention elevators as a concern?
• 13:03
  Not but then again he had not heard my story yet so you know
• 13:07
  definitely it was. It was not mentioned but it
• 13:09
  might be in future if I get a chance to interview him on this.
• 13:12
  That's your concern, not his. My concern is he mentions the
• 13:15
  elevator publicly. What was coach's concern?
• 13:18
  He the first sentence was memories of last year and it, it
• 13:21
  got me thinking. And here's the thing I was
• 13:23
  thinking about like, you know, we everybody knows that Richmond
• 13:27
  men's basketball did not have the year it wanted to have last
• 13:29
  year. And it's very, very important in
• 13:35
  any field, whether it's business or sports.
• 13:39
  My life experience shows me this to like, you know, a body of
• 13:43
  motion stays in motion, a body of rest stays at rest winning
• 13:46
  and is contagious. You start winning, it's you.
• 13:49
  You start to build on that momentum.
• 13:51
  But you know what, so is losing. And so when he says memories of
• 13:54
  last year, he needs to get this crew to expunge the memory of
• 13:59
  last year's season from their memories as quickly as possible
• 14:03
  so that we can start building a new momentum story.
• 14:05
  And I think we will do that. By the way, I, I, I know
• 14:07
  there's, there's been some people who grumble about the
• 14:10
  schedule not having any marquee names.
• 14:12
  In some ways, if you're trying to build a winning culture
• 14:16
  again, that could be good. We need to go out, as I
• 14:20
  mentioned on a couple of these episodes and beat teams by 2025.
• 14:24
  Thirty points, bad team still, but beat them by 20 or 25
• 14:27
  points. And that momentum will build and
• 14:29
  hopefully build into the Atlantic 10 season where we
• 14:32
  start playing good teams and maybe the winning is contagious
• 14:35
  and we can just beat the good teams.
• 14:36
  I'll I'll say something maybe a little bit different.
• 14:40
  I mean, I agree with what you said and obviously I wasn't
• 14:41
  there. I've just seen it on video.
• 14:44
  But when I hear him say that, I think he's including himself in
• 14:48
  that. It's not it's not just the
• 14:50
  players, but like he's not used to seasons like last year and
• 14:54
  and I and he obviously he didn't feel good about last year's
• 14:58
  season and he needs to avoid himself.
• 15:02
  You know, if we go one and two of not in the, oh, here, it's
• 15:07
  here it is again, right? And he needs to make sure that
• 15:11
  he's doing everything he can to coach these guys to, to win even
• 15:15
  when we have a bad game and bad games will come.
• 15:19
  But yeah, I, I did hear some of that in him and I'm
• 15:22
  interpreting. But it's not just the returning
• 15:24
  players, 'cause obviously the new players don't know that,
• 15:27
  don't know what we did last year or didn't live it.
• 15:29
  But I think him and the coaching staff also have a fresh start
• 15:33
  after a grueling year, and they need to forget last year as much
• 15:39
  as they can. Yeah, and if you think about it,
• 15:41
  I mean, I, I, we weren't doing this podcast last year going.
• 15:45
  Into yeah, we're the difference. Yeah, we're, well, we have one.
• 15:47
  Yeah, let's before we say that, let's make sure we win.
• 15:49
  But like we, we weren't doing it.
• 15:51
  So what what I mean by that is we we didn't have any context to
• 15:54
  practice and we didn't have any, any eyes on, you know, the
• 15:57
  effort. But I could almost guarantee you
• 16:00
  that before the first game last year or at least before the 1st
• 16:04
  scrimmage last year, Mooney and the coaching staff probably
• 16:07
  thought they were going to be pretty good, right?
• 16:09
  Because you just don't know until you play another team.
• 16:11
  And so I think that, you know, we believe we're going to be
• 16:14
  pretty good this year, but you just don't know until you play
• 16:17
  another team and a. And a couple things just
• 16:19
  reflecting on what I saw in the the interview.
• 16:21
  So I think 1, you know, let's, let's assume that pure honesty
• 16:27
  in these interviews, like I think Walls was saying this team
• 16:30
  is better now than it was a year ago this time Now again, there's
• 16:33
  six weeks till the first game. So there's no one, there's no
• 16:37
  finished product. There was 6 when I went ahead to
• 16:39
  this interview. I think we're down.
• 16:40
  To five, it was good to hear Walls at least feel confidently
• 16:43
  say that he feels like this team is better in a better place than
• 16:46
  last year. A couple other things that if if
• 16:49
  you folks listening haven't seen this interview, it is available
• 16:53
  on YouTube. It was interesting for a coach
• 16:55
  to reflect. There's a question about the
• 16:57
  schedule and he reflected on how we looked at date and schedule.
• 17:00
  And that was like one example of kind of the shining light in our
• 17:03
  conference with not just good, you know, top 100 away games,
• 17:07
  but a couple top home games. So you could tell he was like
• 17:10
  that. That's the one to model, but in
• 17:13
  a in a sense then said, but the rest of the A10 schedule didn't
• 17:15
  really impress him. So I know he knows that the A10
• 17:19
  needs to keep working on this. A side note, I read something
• 17:22
  interesting and I'll say this is speculative because I I couldn't
• 17:26
  get to know there's 100% truth, but it sounds like if you want
• 17:31
  to do a buy in game as an A10 team, you need the conference to
• 17:37
  approve it. I didn't hear that.
• 17:40
  You can't just say, hey, UCLA says if we want to play there,
• 17:44
  they'll give us 250,000 and go play that game.
• 17:46
  Like you need to go to the commissioner and say will you
• 17:49
  approve this? And then and this came up in, if
• 17:52
  you've been following Saint Joe's, their coach kind of
• 17:55
  deserted them and went to the NBA.
• 17:57
  They needed a new coach. They dropped out of a
• 17:58
  conference. They needed a game.
• 18:00
  They got a buy in game at Syracuse just like a week ago.
• 18:04
  And the story came out like, well, they had to get approval
• 18:06
  to do that because I think the A10 doesn't want their teams to
• 18:10
  like having to just, you know. You don't want to lose that 30
• 18:14
  on it and hurt the whole conferences, you know, power
• 18:17
  rating because of a game you're not prepared.
• 18:19
  For the other thing that I kind of already mentioned, some kind
• 18:22
  of both Mooney and Walls talked about how this this summer's
• 18:25
  been. Mooney kind of warned the
• 18:27
  returning players like this summer won't be like last
• 18:30
  summer, like we're working harder this summer.
• 18:32
  So there's all agreement to that.
• 18:34
  And then I think with Jayden, do you want to give an update on
• 18:37
  kind of what the plan is to bring?
• 18:40
  Yeah, so so bring Jaylen back. So in the press conference,
• 18:43
  Mooney said that, you know, Andy McPherson, their their their
• 18:46
  trainer has put together a calendar for Jayden to work his
• 18:49
  way into game shape. And so when I describe kind of
• 18:55
  when we go through the practice that I witnessed, I'll tell you
• 18:57
  a little bit more about what I saw with Jayden, where he was
• 19:00
  and we'll get into the actual player notes, which you know,
• 19:03
  might be a good time now to. Say, yeah, let's do that.
• 19:04
  So this was first time we saw practice and what a month and a
• 19:09
  half, maybe even two months. So we saw kind of early practice
• 19:13
  it's. Been over two months actually.
• 19:14
  And you got a chance to see them practice again, kind of what was
• 19:19
  that environment like compared to what we saw earlier?
• 19:22
  So I asked Jason if I could go upstairs, you know, using the
• 19:25
  infamous elevator again, right. And but this time I took the
• 19:28
  stairs because I could get out the door from from the lower
• 19:30
  level. Good work.
• 19:31
  Yeah. And watch from upstairs because
• 19:32
  you get a much better viewpoint from that second level.
• 19:35
  You can watch everything instead of just standing on the floor
• 19:37
  and kind of, you know, getting lost in the in the players.
• 19:40
  So I went up there and I sat there were two other people up
• 19:42
  there. One was looks like a look like a
• 19:45
  long time fan. And then the other 1 ended up
• 19:48
  telling me he was a trainer off season for two of our players,
• 19:51
  which was just an interesting side note.
• 19:54
  But yeah, so that so that was where I was sitting as I was
• 19:57
  doing this. What I'll say about practice was
• 20:02
  it was very intense. And if we are not good this
• 20:08
  year, it's not going to be because.
• 20:10
  Coach Mooney and the team haven't been working hard.
• 20:13
  They have been working hard. I've now seen two practices and
• 20:16
  they are going all out. It's intense.
• 20:18
  They're they're working hard to prepare themselves as best they
• 20:21
  can for the season. Was there any view of like
• 20:24
  starters versus backup? So you there was no indication
• 20:26
  of any of that. No indication of that.
• 20:29
  The drills were very similar, similar to what we saw in July.
• 20:33
  The assistant coaches were providing feedback along the
• 20:35
  way. I, I think coach Boykin, the
• 20:37
  more I listen to him, looks like a, an excellent teacher.
• 20:39
  I mean, he really, really works hard on defensive positioning
• 20:42
  and helping the big man understand where they need to
• 20:44
  be. And then after like would run a
• 20:47
  set of a set, they would often half of them would go over to a
• 20:50
  video screen and work with one of the assistant coaches to see
• 20:55
  what had happened and to learn. So there's a lot of teaching
• 20:58
  going on, which is great. They take free throws and at
• 21:02
  each, you know, intense interval break after some intensity.
• 21:06
  So they're, they're replicating game conditions that's still
• 21:08
  going on. And it, it it's definitely like
• 21:14
  you can tell you're getting closer to the season because
• 21:15
  guys are guys are definitely chippy and they're working hard
• 21:18
  at, at getting ready. And so your question about
• 21:21
  Daughtry. So Daughtry did not practice
• 21:23
  again. So, so coach gave the answer
• 21:25
  that, you know, he's getting ready, he's going to schedule.
• 21:28
  I mean, I can only interpret what Mooney meant by when he's
• 21:31
  going to be ready. My guess is seeing how hard they
• 21:34
  were practicing in July and how much of this is getting into the
• 21:37
  flow of the offense and how hard they're still going, you know,
• 21:39
  in late September, early October, is that Daughtry is not
• 21:43
  going to be ready to start the season.
• 21:44
  That's just total speculation. I don't have any data on that,
• 21:48
  but I mean, given that he's not running and they they've been
• 21:51
  running this for months, he's just not going to probably be
• 21:53
  the starter day one. So interesting thing to reflect
• 21:56
  on from the A10 media day when coach was asked about him, the
• 22:03
  question was more was less about the heart condition because
• 22:06
  that's we're past that. But it was more about, hey, he
• 22:10
  scored. What was it like over 13 points
• 22:12
  per game and how efficient is he?
• 22:13
  And like, why didn't he play more?
• 22:15
  And Mooney said he had the same question like when he first
• 22:18
  looked at him on in the portal. And what coach Mooney said was
• 22:23
  stamina. So now again, it's hard to do
• 22:28
  all this interpretation. But if you put the kind of the
• 22:30
  hard condition aside, it sounded like Mooney said, like even
• 22:33
  coming in before this heart condition, like one of these
• 22:38
  Jayden had to work on so that he could play 35 minutes a game was
• 22:41
  his stamina. And maybe that was a reason why
• 22:43
  he didn't play as much per game in his prior school.
• 22:48
  So if you combine the two, like if one of the things he needed
• 22:52
  to focus on was game stamina and now he's two months behind, like
• 22:56
  that, to your point, like I think it's going to be a slow
• 22:59
  build to like, you know, do we even see him in a game the first
• 23:03
  few games? And then do we finally get 5
• 23:05
  minutes, 10 minutes? And then by December, is he
• 23:09
  playing 20 minutes a game? And now about the start.
• 23:11
  I mean, we're not going to need Jaden for Southern Virginia,
• 23:13
  let's be honest, but you are going to need him for the A10
• 23:17
  conference play. And so my speculation is this,
• 23:20
  you know, he probably misses the first handful of games and then
• 23:23
  he starts in at a like a 5 minute clip and builds to 10 and
• 23:27
  builds to 15 and builds to 20 and and with the goal of having
• 23:30
  him ready to be, you know, Max effort by the first day 10 game.
• 23:35
  So maybe the reason we have this, I'll call week schedule
• 23:42
  the first few months is just to allow the right opportunities
• 23:45
  for him to build up his game. Is this like a long?
• 23:48
  I'm pretty that has nothing to do with it.
• 23:51
  I, I coach Mooney, would love to have Daughtry from day one.
• 23:54
  I mean Daughtry, Daughtry is going to be very, very important
• 23:59
  for us to have post season aspirations because when you get
• 24:02
  into the A10 you're going to need him and his size inside
• 24:07
  playing against those A10 players.
• 24:08
  I like, I think one of the way Mooney described him the A10
• 24:12
  media day was like an unconventional Richmond player
• 24:17
  because he's an inside body, wants to body up people inside
• 24:22
  shooting. Not that he can't shoot from the
• 24:24
  outside, but he wants to play inside and play that kind of
• 24:27
  dirty power forward role. That Yuvar.
• 24:30
  He mentioned KO as a comparable, not that their game is the same,
• 24:33
  but like the last time we've had a player who prefers to be
• 24:37
  inside side. So having that is going to be
• 24:40
  great when we have it. And the good news is that he's
• 24:44
  got two years of eligibility. So not that we're looking for
• 24:48
  looking ahead to next year, but you know, he doesn't have to get
• 24:51
  it all figured out as as urgently as possible. 100%.
• 24:56
  OK, so you saw practice. What's your hot take?
• 25:00
  You have any players you saw that compared to last time?
• 25:04
  You've changed your opinion one way or the other.
• 25:06
  Yeah, so I have changed an opinion.
• 25:09
  Here's here's the biggest hot take I can give our fans or or
• 25:12
  our listeners. The player who's taken the
• 25:15
  biggest leap forward from July to now is Aidan Argabe, right?
• 25:21
  He was a nice player in July. I think we talked about him
• 25:23
  being confident who looked like he was going to be a good player
• 25:26
  for us at the at the one. I'm now upping my prediction to
• 25:30
  say two things. 1 he will be a superstar in the Atlantic 10 He
• 25:36
  he does have, you know, 1 slight gap, which is he's, he's
• 25:39
  physically not as strong as Tyne or Thomas.
• 25:41
  He's he's he's he hasn't had those years in the weight room
• 25:44
  yet that those guys have had. But before it's all said and
• 25:48
  done, he'll be an all 810 point guard.
• 25:51
  I don't know first or second team or what that means, but he
• 25:53
  will definitely be he's that caliber of talent.
• 25:55
  And here's here is the hot take of of the of the whole practice.
• 26:00
  If there's any slippage in times play the I believe Arga Bright
• 26:05
  could be the starter come the A10 tournament.
• 26:07
  And I mean he's just, he's just so confident with the ball.
• 26:10
  He can pass. He sees the court well, he
• 26:12
  shoots the three well. He's going to be a really good
• 26:15
  player for us. And, and what I, what I like
• 26:17
  about what you're saying, some of that is the way basketball is
• 26:22
  today. Like I, I doubt Mooney is
• 26:25
  thinking of him and thinking of like the four year development
• 26:28
  plan so that by the time he's a senior, he can be first teammate
• 26:32
  10. Like if he's showing the ability
• 26:35
  to be a great player for us, he's, he's going to play.
• 26:39
  And so, you know, I'm, I'm, I'm bullish on time as really being
• 26:44
  our kind of star this year. Time's going to start.
• 26:47
  Time's going to start from day one.
• 26:48
  But I'm telling you, Arga Bright is really going to be good and I
• 26:52
  don't know when he's going to muscle his way into 2025
• 26:55
  minutes, but it won't be. It won't be that long in my
• 26:58
  opinion. OK.
• 26:58
  What about, you know, we have a bunch of transfers, we talked
• 27:00
  about them a lot 2 months ago when we saw practice.
• 27:03
  What you see this time? I mean, it comes down to Will
• 27:06
  Johnston again. He's the He's got the best 3
• 27:08
  point stroke I've seen on a Richmond men's player since
• 27:12
  Jordan King. Better than D Hall.
• 27:14
  Better than D Hall and D Hall could.
• 27:16
  He was money from three man. Let me tell you, D Hall did not
• 27:18
  miss, but Johnston is is he has got a really quick stroke and he
• 27:24
  has the most repeatable 3 point shot on the team and every
• 27:27
  single shot either goes in or it rump it it, it just goes around
• 27:32
  the rim to the point where you're like man, it should have
• 27:34
  gone in and he's just really, really good.
• 27:35
  Is the rat tail still there? Yeah, yeah.
• 27:37
  I mean, he's still sporting the rat tail.
• 27:39
  Here's the thing. Like he didn't get any love in
• 27:43
  any of the all A10 teams up in, you know, during the the A10
• 27:47
  meetings and you know, he wasn't listed as one of the, you know,
• 27:51
  the top 20 players in some of the pre season podcast to cover
• 27:55
  the A10. But I he's my early pick for
• 27:59
  leading the Spiders in scoring this year.
• 28:00
  Yeah, there are. If I looking at it, I think we
• 28:03
  had eight transfers in the 18 players who are in those top
• 28:09
  three teams. So he is not considered one of
• 28:13
  the top 8 transfers. I I agree with you.
• 28:15
  I think, I think we will find him on one of those teams at the
• 28:19
  end. Of the yeah, I really think he's
• 28:20
  going to lead us in scoring. He's got the prettiest shot from
• 28:23
  three that I've seen since Jordan King.
• 28:26
  OK, so how about the other guys? Lopez, Thomas.
• 28:29
  Yeah, so we talked him, if you remember back to episodes 3 and
• 28:32
  4 where we were talking about practice, we weren't sure who
• 28:35
  was going to be a starter, you know, because Lopez and and it
• 28:38
  feels like Tanner kind of play the same position.
• 28:40
  Lopez is going to be a starter for sure.
• 28:42
  He showed really well in this practice.
• 28:44
  He's confident he can take you off the dribble.
• 28:46
  He's got a nice mid range shot. He also had a couple really nice
• 28:49
  passes. He's aggressive on grabbing
• 28:51
  rebounds. I I just can't see an
• 28:54
  environment, you know, what Coach Mooney needs to, to, to,
• 28:57
  to go out and win games by 20 points early on.
• 28:59
  And, you know, you got an experienced player who knows who
• 29:01
  knows how to score. I mean, Lopez is going to be
• 29:03
  starting for us. So I think he's, that was
• 29:05
  something I I noticed, yeah. That was probably my second
• 29:09
  biggest kind of transfer take. Yeah, I saw he had a kind of a
• 29:12
  media piece that U of R put out talking about his unconventional
• 29:15
  shot. And so he kind of admitted that
• 29:19
  he never, never found time with playing so much basketball to
• 29:22
  really redo his shot. So I think fans, when you get to
• 29:24
  see him shoot, you'll you'll wonder how did that come to be?
• 29:28
  He's happy to talk about it, but he's confident with it and he'll
• 29:31
  be shooting threes. But when he drives, I think
• 29:35
  that's where his his game is going to be best.
• 29:37
  Yeah, and if we talk about the other transfer, Thomas, I mean
• 29:39
  Thomas who I think of as a point guard, but maybe he's a two.
• 29:43
  I'm not quite sure what what, what the goal is going to be for
• 29:45
  Thomas right off the bat. He looks good too.
• 29:48
  I mean, the the if I look at Tyne and I look at Thomas and I
• 29:52
  look at Arga Bright, there's different traits and
• 29:55
  characteristics of each. Like Tyne's a really aggressive,
• 29:58
  good defender. Thomas is a little taller and a
• 30:00
  little bit stronger and bigger than both Tyne and Argebrite,
• 30:04
  and he looks really, really confident as well.
• 30:06
  And then Argebrite, I just mentioned my take on him.
• 30:09
  We have three good point guards on this team.
• 30:11
  I don't know, like, do you move Thomas and play some 2 to spell
• 30:14
  Johnston? You know, I think what's going
• 30:17
  to end up happening is defense, whoever really is the lockdown
• 30:21
  defender will dictate minutes to some degree.
• 30:24
  And then I think from Thomas's perspective, because he's a
• 30:26
  little taller and bigger, if we get up against a team in a non
• 30:29
  con or in the 18 who has a bigger point guard, you could
• 30:32
  see Thomas maybe matching up against that player.
• 30:35
  OK. And now then we've got our
• 30:37
  freshman, our kind of our returning freshman, the red
• 30:41
  shirt freshman from last year. You've got the next Marcus Camby
• 30:45
  and Bryson. I think you you said that last
• 30:47
  time. Compared him to Marcus Camby,
• 30:48
  yeah. How did he look?
• 30:50
  You know, Bryson is still by far the most athletic player on the
• 30:52
  team. You know, he is, he's really,
• 30:55
  really gifted athletically. I, there's something that's not
• 30:59
  quite there yet and it, to me, the way I would describe it is
• 31:03
  he looks like he's overthinking where he needs to be instead of
• 31:07
  just reacting and being there. And so that tells me he's still
• 31:10
  learning the system, right? So the way that translates is,
• 31:13
  you know, he's sometimes a step out of position, right?
• 31:16
  So like a step out of position on defense means your guy gets a
• 31:19
  three pointer that's you're, you're a foot away from being
• 31:22
  able to contest it. Or on offense, maybe you, you
• 31:25
  know, you need to make the cut one step sooner.
• 31:27
  He's I think he's making progress.
• 31:29
  I just am not sure, you know, his he's there yet in the
• 31:32
  system. But I think for us to be, you
• 31:35
  know, a team that, you know, dominates teams, if Mooney can
• 31:39
  figure out a way to give him meaningful minutes against some
• 31:43
  of these lesser teams to build his confidence, I think that'll
• 31:46
  be a pretty much of an imperative for him to to to take
• 31:49
  take on a meaningful role. And then what about Jalen
• 31:51
  Robinson? Yeah, you know, Jalen was my
• 31:53
  pick for for being the starting four if Daughtry wasn't out.
• 31:57
  That's five people start. What's that?
• 32:00
  Starting 5. No, this the starting 44R5,
• 32:03
  right? So this the starting power
• 32:05
  forward, because he's built like a power forward.
• 32:08
  I didn't think he had the greatest practice this time
• 32:10
  around. I mean, I was, I actually went
• 32:11
  in thinking, man, if he dominates again, I'm going to
• 32:13
  have all kinds of hot takes about him.
• 32:14
  But it just, he was kind of muted in this practice.
• 32:17
  He didn't flash. There were other guys who I
• 32:19
  thought just looked better, you know, at the four in this
• 32:23
  practice. I thought AP had a nice
• 32:24
  practice. I mean, Beagle, who plays more
• 32:26
  of a 5, looked really good. It didn't he didn't look bad out
• 32:29
  there in any way, shape or form, but he just didn't have that
• 32:31
  like that July practice. We were like, holy cow, he's
• 32:34
  like he's in on everything. He didn't have that in this
• 32:36
  practice. So I'm I'm not off of him by any
• 32:39
  means. I still think he's going to be a
• 32:40
  great player for the Spiders, but it wasn't his best practice.
• 32:42
  OK, so you know before when we did our starting 5 predictions,
• 32:47
  the big difference was that you had Daughtry and I had API.
• 32:52
  Think you you've already said it's unlikely Daughtry is
• 32:55
  starting Game 1. He may not even play as he
• 32:58
  builds himself back up. So where do you sit now in terms
• 33:01
  of who is in that, that last spot of a starting 5?
• 33:06
  Yeah. So I think, and this was going
• 33:10
  to be my take towards the end of of of our whole episode I.
• 33:13
  We're at the end. OK, well, I'm going to give it
• 33:15
  to you real quick. So I think we're going to go
• 33:18
  small in this to start the season.
• 33:19
  I think what you're going to see is you can see Tyne at the one,
• 33:23
  Johnston at the 2, Tanner 'cause he knows the system and he
• 33:26
  plays, you know, very confidently in the system.
• 33:28
  At the three. I think you'll see AJ Lopez
• 33:31
  playing another hybrid three. You'll get to kind of those two
• 33:33
  threes position less basketball and you'll have walls at the
• 33:36
  center. I think we're going to go small
• 33:37
  to start. We won't need the size inside
• 33:40
  against some of our early opponents, especially like
• 33:42
  Southern Virginia, But I do think what you'll see given the
• 33:45
  depth of this team and Mooney. The second part of my question
• 33:49
  to Mooney about what concerns you the most.
• 33:51
  He talked about how does he get the depth involved so that they
• 33:55
  they have a an impact on the game that's positive.
• 33:59
  And I want to give you the exact quote that he talked about.
• 34:02
  It's he said, I got it. They got to be aggressive and
• 34:05
  complete. So, so playing a team that's
• 34:09
  aggressive and complete, I think, and if I recall, there's
• 34:11
  a time maybe 10 years ago, maybe maybe even longer maybe than 15
• 34:15
  years ago now where we played a concept where it was a full line
• 34:18
  shift 5. And I seem to remember it being
• 34:20
  called the posse. I don't.
• 34:21
  I don't know if you recall that. I do not.
• 34:23
  OK, well maybe D Hall and I talked about it as being the
• 34:25
  posse. But anyway, there was a full 5
• 34:27
  man line shift and it seemed to remember that it was in the
• 34:30
  teams that had either John Collins or Jonathan Collins
• 34:33
  inside or or or maybe it was Darius Garrett, one of those
• 34:35
  teams who had you had that really athletic backup center.
• 34:39
  We have 11 players who are going to be really meaningful to the
• 34:44
  season this year that I can tell right now.
• 34:46
  I think you're going to see a full line shift in game one
• 34:48
  against Southern Virginia. I think you're going to roll out
• 34:50
  the five I just mentioned and then you're going to come in
• 34:52
  with Arga, Bright, Thomas, you going to bring in Robinson,
• 34:57
  you'll probably have AP and Beagle.
• 34:59
  That'll be the second line shift.
• 35:01
  And then you got Bryson McLaughlin, who's the 11th,
• 35:03
  who's going to be floating in and around all of this stuff
• 35:05
  because you know that's the guy you want to develop for the
• 35:07
  future. So.
• 35:08
  Yeah, it's interesting. I mean, when we watched the
• 35:11
  women's team last year, like they did that for the first four
• 35:13
  or five games and then it got serious and they stopped doing
• 35:17
  that. So like, I'm fine if when you
• 35:19
  have these early games that you know, you get a lead or you feel
• 35:22
  confident it or you're just not confident on who the best seven
• 35:27
  or eight are yet that you got that you need to do that.
• 35:31
  Like this is not a hot take to say that out of those 11,
• 35:35
  they're not all getting significant minutes this year.
• 35:37
  No, they're not. And there's going to be two or
• 35:38
  three who don't. And they may not be with us next
• 35:41
  year because they don't get the minutes they deserve or feel
• 35:44
  like they need. But that's that's college
• 35:46
  basketball right now. Like you can't.
• 35:48
  There aren't many game, aren't many teams who are playing ten
• 35:51
  players, you know, over let's say 15 minutes. 100 people agree
• 35:55
  with you. And are successful.
• 35:56
  And here's the thing, that 11 doesn't even include Daughtry,
• 35:58
  who's number 12, right When he comes, he's going to be
• 36:00
  definitely taking a lot of minutes.
• 36:01
  So I, I, I like the depth because I'm hoping, I mean, the
• 36:05
  coach isn't going to say this directly, but they need to, they
• 36:08
  ought to know that they're all not getting 15 to 20 minutes per
• 36:11
  game. And so they got to work hard,
• 36:13
  not just in practice, but they got to impress in this first
• 36:16
  five games if they want, by the time the 810 season comes
• 36:20
  around, to be one of those keep starters or key players off the
• 36:24
  bench. Well, and I mean, we didn't talk
• 36:25
  about Donovan Richardson. He looks super confident out
• 36:28
  there. He's smooth and confident.
• 36:29
  I mean, Will Harper had a much better practice this time around
• 36:31
  than he had in July. You've got you've got really 14
• 36:34
  players right there, plus Hominik, you know who's a big
• 36:37
  man? I you know, I would love to I'd
• 36:39
  love to get Hominik. You know, I would love to get
• 36:41
  hominik a red shirt just because I think with his size, he could
• 36:44
  be a special big man. I don't know if that'll be done,
• 36:47
  but I I could I would love to see it.
• 36:49
  And then you got you know, you got Kirby Mooney, you got a lot
• 36:51
  of you got 16 players on this team.
• 36:52
  But I what I'm saying about this full five man live line shift is
• 36:56
  if you're playing a team that is, you know, net ranking 333
• 37:00
  and you dominate, you're one through 5 is going to dominate
• 37:02
  them. Well, guess what?
• 37:03
  You're 6 through 10 is going to dominate them too.
• 37:05
  I'd love to see some lot full line shifts early in the season
• 37:08
  to give these guys confidence and experience.
• 37:11
  But that's really going to be the trick for this coaching
• 37:14
  staff this year is to figure out how do you take this very, very
• 37:17
  deep team and allocate minutes in a way that builds for March,
• 37:23
  right, Because by the end of, you know, the non con schedule
• 37:26
  and by the end of a 10 play, what you're going to need to
• 37:30
  have is chemistry that's built and ready for the Atlantic 10
• 37:34
  tournament, right? You're going to need confidence.
• 37:37
  You want guys right now who are just potential to be like, you
• 37:39
  know what, I'm the man, I can do this.
• 37:42
  You get and you're going to need players to develop in college
• 37:44
  basketball when in some cases all they've ever played is high
• 37:47
  school basketball. You need those three things.
• 37:49
  And then if you do that right, you know, you have a chance come
• 37:52
  the a 10 tournament of of of making some noise, you know,
• 37:56
  maybe, you know, beating some teams that right now are pre
• 37:58
  season ranked higher than us going into the A10 and and
• 38:02
  dancing come March. But you know, you really, it
• 38:04
  really is going to be a tough, tough challenge for the coaching
• 38:07
  staff to figure out how what's the right line up?
• 38:11
  How do you develop these guys and how do you get yourself in
• 38:13
  position for a? Yeah, it's.
• 38:14
  Interesting. I mean we need to wrap up here.
• 38:16
  This is getting long. But like, I don't, I understand
• 38:19
  what Mooney is saying when he says that's one of his
• 38:21
  challenges or concerns. But like, at some point it's
• 38:25
  your best eight players are going to play and these guys
• 38:28
  need to fight for those eight, maybe 9 spots.
• 38:32
  And like, the challenge for Mooney is at some point he's
• 38:35
  going to have to have some hard conversations with players who
• 38:37
  aren't making that rotation. But he still believes in the
• 38:41
  long term. And that's never going to be
• 38:43
  easy. But like, the depth is awesome
• 38:47
  because it, if we're going to be really good this year and let's
• 38:52
  say top half of the A10, I'll call that, you know, good, maybe
• 38:55
  not really good. Like we're going to need the
• 38:57
  depth to result in our top 8 being better than they would
• 39:01
  have been if we didn't have the depth, Meaning the the the 10th
• 39:05
  player challenging the eighth player is going to make that
• 39:07
  eighth player better. And we're going to be able to
• 39:11
  take recruits that we know none of them made the A10 top three
• 39:15
  teams. So we've got walls who you know
• 39:18
  who came back, but no, no transfers made that.
• 39:21
  So there's a lack of respect of our transfers.
• 39:25
  There, there's a lack of respect.
• 39:26
  Either that or a red shirt freshman, which obviously you
• 39:29
  know, no one's talking about outside of, you know, the
• 39:31
  University of Richmond and us. We're going to need somebody to
• 39:35
  really show that they deserve to be mentioned in these teams and
• 39:40
  that's going to be come from this depth making, making the
• 39:44
  competition for these positions fierce.
• 39:46
  We're going to be a lot better than we were last year.
• 39:48
  I mean, that's not a hot take because we were bad last year,
• 39:50
  but we, we have the ingredients, the ingredients to dance this
• 39:56
  year. We just, it's like, how do you,
• 39:58
  how do you prepare those ingredients so that, that the
• 40:00
  recipe comes together? That's the coaching staff
• 40:03
  challenge. OK.
• 40:04
  Well, we're going to wrap it up here.
• 40:06
  We're going to put Porter back in the elevator and we'll see if
• 40:10
  he can get out before our next episode.
• 40:12
  So this is Tom. And this is Porter.
• 40:15
  And we are sounding off. See you next time.
• 40:17
  Bye. We will.
• 40:18
  Try to be funny and entertain, maybe you'll learn something or
• 40:26
  just complain. Spider sound off and spider
• 40:29
  sound.