GoldenYears;841955304 said:
I guess there must just be a lot of really dumb basketball players who don't read US News & World Report
Seriously though, anyone who doesn't understand why really talented basketball players pick a school like Kentucky over a school like Cal doesn't understand what really talented basketball players value the most. If you can play basketball, you could play for Siberia State and the NBA will find you and draft you, but most kids are thinking about what gives them the best chance to make the league. Academic rankings of university are way down there on the list of factors they are considering unless they feel like it's not a sure thing that they are NBA material and they need that degree to fall back on.
the part you might be missing golden years is that marcus lee is not a dumbass high school all american basketball player, many have hs gpas in the low to mid 2.00s
coach calipari's top incoming "student athlete" is national top 5 rated 6'10" nerlens noel who needed to pass 2 summer school classes to meet ncaa admittance standards (not kentucky standards which are apparently non-existent) because of his hs gpa of 2.1, no that is not a typo, 2.1 hs gpa
lee has an impressive 3.2 hs gpa and considered duke
odds:
lee getting injured in college thereby derailing his basketball career and causing him to need to rely upon his college diploma-5 to 10%
lee becoming financially wealthy with a cal degree-70-80%
lee becoming an asst manager at subway with a kentucky degree-70-80%
lee getting recruited over by a lottery type player like nerlens noel during the next 2-3 years at kentucky (calipari is a relentless recruiter/salesman)-30%-40%
lee starting for the bears from day one/playing at least 30-35 minutes per game-95%
lee's mom and brother bryan and family and lifelong coaches being able to afford to see more than 4 of his games in person a year (see my earlier post on travel costs to lexington)-10%
lee's mom and brother bryan and family being able to attend all of his home games at haas and other bay area games (stanford, etc.)-100%
lee's odds of playing with mcdonald all americans (that he has never played with) at kentucky that will freely pass him the ball-50%
lee's odds of his friends bird and matthews passing him the ball-90%
lee's odds of enjoying half the year of absolutely humid and suffocating hellish hot weather (mid march thru mid september) in lexington-25%
do you disagree?
family matters
dominoes baby#