Geno/Malik

I think it's safe to say that this board is in favor of Geno losing some minutes and Malik gaining more.  I tried to figure out our teams +/- of our team with each at the point but really couldn't do it with the play by play I saw.  In my opinion it was probably +5 with Boothe and about -10 with Geno, give or take a little.  That's a huge swing of points though that this team is losing bc the wrong guy is out there.  I haven't been overly impressed with Malik yet this year but its apparent he understands the game and he definetely sees his role as a point guard.  I know people wanted Justin to get the ball at the high post in the 2nd half, and Malik was the only guy able to dish it to him at all over there, while the rest just passed it around the peremiter.  Norm knew we had to get the ball to Justin, but our guys just aren't good enough at doing it.  I would bet that most of Justin's points came with Malik in rather then Geno unless Justin worked his ass off to get the basket on his own.  The problem I see for Norm here is Geno is his guy for better or worse and as much as we all want him benched, I honestly think Norm does too.  Lately his minutes have been going down, but the thing is he's our senior, we need him.  Norm loves Geno and rightfully so as the kid has busted his ass for 4 years and I think Norm just keeps hoping the kid will play the way he wants him to but deep down he's starting to realize that he is our biggest problem right now.  I don't know if Norm has it in him or any coach in the country to sit a guy like Geno down and tell him he's losing a majority of his minutes to a freshman, thats gotta be tough.  I don't even think it's fair to judge Malik at this point either because he rarely gets to play with the A squad and is usually out there with 3 to 4 other freshmen.  A line up of Malik, Larry, Mase, Justin, Center of choice would be so hard to defend but we haven't seen it and probably won't anytime soon.  Since cuse this has been real upsetting for me because I just can't picture it all changing and unless Geno picks up his game we're going to end up flushed down the toilet and worst of all pissing off our young guys who realize that he's holding them back from being a better team.  Worst part of this whole Geno sucking streak is apparently his shot is gone, kid hasn't hit his 3 consistently in ages and that was something he really had going for him.  So as we continue this season I hope that either Norm mans up and gives Malik the big time minutes hes deserving right now or Geno shows us how hes our senior, how hes our POINT GUARD and that he's going to try and lead these young dudes to show them what St John's Basketball is about.

Wow great post scooby !  I agree 100% with what you had to say.

this is my only problem with him.i can respect geno being the senior and a leader which i think he is. but at the same time when u watched the all of the outer conference games he was trying to hard to be a scorer. it was like he was thinking ok no mason  ive been passing all my life its time i show people what i can really do. and he just dosent have it. it was looking like he didnt want to past just blaze the ball and by default he had to pass dj the ball because he was the only wing out there. senior or not norm needs to correct that. the way they played syracuse just proves they shouldnt have lost those other games. its ridiculous. ok so larry is in the dog house. norm feels he isnt playing defense, he cant run the point, and his shot is off thats cool ( even though if im not mistaken avery patterson was the same way more of a nut but he got way more playing time).
i alays tell this to my boys who are also coaches and they be laughing but im serious heres a little theroy of mine. its pro justin but bear with me.
ok like ive posted b4 geno has been passing all his life after he transferred to lincoln. it went bassy, hill, lamont,masonjr,even spears. now uve been doing this for 4 years. his junior year in college he finally recieved a jump shot. a good one at that. so when hill and lamont graduated he was probaly thinking damn i still have to pass to masejr., qcalhon and larry.( u see no 1 on the team liked avery they said he was a a rear of a donkey so they knew he was transferrring). but then news came of a top 50 recruit big man signing to st. johns named just balze. and on top of that another great player was getting healthy named robby T. so eugene was like damn thats 2 more i have to pass to. but something happened. qcalhon because of family issues and the fact he didnt know what was going to happen to him decided im going to transfer. geno had a smile on his face now. st. johns second scoring threat is gone. ok i can work with this he probaly thought.
then on top of that thomas isnt going to be ready till december. so now its the time for geno to do his thing. now all posters and newspapers and college magazines is talking about this 7 man freshman class which is top 30 and being highlighted by this beast of a freshman named just blaze. geno isnt happy and has every right to. so practice starts geno is hitting his 3 ball and passing the ball to justin. everything is looking good hmmmm maybe this can work. but what happens next mase gets injured. now with all these things going on in his head a new geno emerges. one that hasnt been seen since canarsie. one that shoots from deep and dosent pass in the post. and its not like he cant hes been giving it to lamont and spears. this geno has to understand that the old geno is important to have right now. u have players that can score and jump. but if he really wants to score he just has to be smart about his shot selection. his number one goal should be getting the scorers get the ball 1st. an then when things break down or im open take the jump shot. but this isnt happening right now

KOB,

I'm 100% with you man.  I never expected this shit from him, and I really think its the reason our team has sucked.  Going into the year i expected huge assist numbers, stellar D, and knocking down the open 3.  Now he forces up crappy 3's, rarely makes a nice pass, and gets blown by every other trip down the floor.  He has to cut it out with driving and throwing up a ridiculous shot that he'll never make and stop trying to be a 1 man team.  We know this, and I think Norm knows it, will Geno know it?? I mean he's losing minutes rapidly to a freshman who really isn't ready to lead this team but we have no choice.  I've been wondering if Geno really is just a 2 in a 1 body and by default picked up his assists bc he knew he wasn't good enough to score on his own.  Somehow this offseason he's gotten this theory that he can drop 20 a game.  I'm giving him this weekend to prove to me he can play wiht this group bc right now hes really pissing me off.  Hopefully Norm has him on an even shorter leash then he's been and yanks his ass immediately after a screw up that no 4 year player should be making.

A thought came to my mind after the syracuse game, and I too have been critical of Norm recently, but does anyone else think maybe Geno is to blame for our anemic offense and not toally norm? It just seems that Malik runs things much more smoother and knows how to take control of the team when hes out there. Maybe we are realizing this now because we finally have an alternative at the pg position for the first time in 3 years!

A thought came to my mind after the syracuse game, and I too have been critical of Norm recently, but does anyone else think maybe Geno is to blame for our anemic offense and not toally norm? It just seems that Malik runs things much more smoother and knows how to take control of the team when hes out there. Maybe we are realizing this now because we finally have an alternative at the pg position for the first time in 3 years!

geno is part of the problem.  but that doesn't excuse norm for horrendous halftime adjustments, sub patterns, lack of defensive adjustments, not playing larry, not landing top recruits, etc, etc, etc....

A thought came to my mind after the syracuse game, and I too have been critical of Norm recently, but does anyone else think maybe Geno is to blame for our anemic offense and not toally norm? It just seems that Malik runs things much more smoother and knows how to take control of the team when hes out there. Maybe we are realizing this now because we finally have an alternative at the pg position for the first time in 3 years!

I have said a couple times that i think we have better lineups with geno on the bench but i didnt think Norm would sit his senior.  After the syracuse game when Boothe got some good burn im hoping Norm is seeing this and that Geno realizes if he doesnt start playing like a point guard than his minutes will be given elsewhere.

Quote from: bubman15 on January 04, 2008, 12:53:48 PM

A thought came to my mind after the syracuse game, and I too have been critical of Norm recently, but does anyone else think maybe Geno is to blame for our anemic offense and not toally norm? It just seems that Malik runs things much more smoother and knows how to take control of the team when hes out there. Maybe we are realizing this now because we finally have an alternative at the pg position for the first time in 3 years!

geno is part of the problem.  but that doesn't excuse norm for horrendous halftime adjustments, sub patterns, lack of defensive adjustments, not playing larry, not landing top recruits, etc, etc, etc....

no reason to bash all those things about norm in that post.  if geno was playing well, we'd be playing better and those things wouldnt look the way they do.

Quote from: bubman15 on January 04, 2008, 12:53:48 PM

A thought came to my mind after the syracuse game, and I too have been critical of Norm recently, but does anyone else think maybe Geno is to blame for our anemic offense and not toally norm? It just seems that Malik runs things much more smoother and knows how to take control of the team when hes out there. Maybe we are realizing this now because we finally have an alternative at the pg position for the first time in 3 years!

geno is part of the problem.  but that doesn't excuse norm for horrendous halftime adjustments, sub patterns, lack of defensive adjustments, not playing larry, not landing top recruits, etc, etc, etc....

You are 100% correct. . it all flows back to the coach...

A good coach would have recruited a point guard sometime in the past 4 years to play with or over Geno...     then all of these discussions would not be going on...

Norm almost had him in Doug Wiggins but he slipped away....

i prefer phil missere over geno and malik at point guard

i prefer phil missere over geno and malik at point guard

Do you even like St. Johns or do you just enjoy coming on the site and telling everyone how much the team sucks ?  I mean even occasionally even the biggest pessimists have something good to say about the team but you seem to get pleasure about talking about the teams imperfections.

Quote from: NYCbuckeye on January 04, 2008, 03:54:18 PM

i prefer phil missere over geno and malik at point guard

Do you even like St. Johns or do you just enjoy coming on the site and telling everyone how much the team sucks ?  I mean even occasionally even the biggest pessimists have something good to say about the team but you seem to get pleasure about talking about the teams imperfections.

Quote from: NYCbuckeye on January 04, 2008, 03:54:18 PM

i prefer phil missere over geno and malik at point guard

kjd.....my bad. with the talent we have, the team does NOT suck, coaching does. please understand behind the jokes, there is a point....if norm cannot see that malik is better (and does not give him more mins), he minus well put himself in at point....thats all im saying.

re: imperfections, thats expected with 8 freshman in this years class.

im surprisingly optimistic about this team if they can stay together for 2 more years...they will be stellar in 2009 with or without good coaching.


****you used the quotations wrong just fixed it for you jj

ps...kjd.....thanks for the bad karma rating. just my way of speaking and talking hoops.

buckeye is aloud to voice his displeasures kjd. Kjd I also understand where you are coming from too as it gets annoying hearing the same drivel over and over.

keep it to hoops guys

ps...kjd.....thanks for the bad karma rating. just my way of speaking and talking hoops.

look at that two people exalted you and neither was me

ps...kjd.....thanks for the bad karma rating. just my way of speaking and talking hoops.

Sorry didnt catch the sarcasm since you use it in every post lol  Got you your karma back !

i've been calling for malik since day 1.  guy can be a good starting pg for us.  and is a lockdown defender.

i'm not sure i'm calling for malik more than i'm disgusted with geno. I think Geno has more ability at this point still. Lets remember Malik makes geno look like a sniper from deep and geno does better penetrating however Malik is making better decisions.

i don't mean i'm touting him to being a great player now (although i do think he's a very good defender).  if lawrence was playing well i wouldn't care as much.  but since he's playing absolutely horrible, gotta see more malik.

Geno may have been Norms first recruit. I think coach has a different kind of loyalty towards Geno. When ever Norm talks about Geno to the "press" it's always about how Geno never misses practice,gives 110% etc.  Norm is having a difficult time getting past this.  We all went through this last year watching this point guard. Geno is Geno.