Gigi Jackson, Kansas, Frank Martin discussed on CBS Sports Eye On College Basketball Podcast
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They've already had their hearing. So the Memphis, which is not FBI related, the James wiseman thing. Memphis is on a track to be resolved before Kansas. That's been the case the whole time. Arizona still has months to go. LSU still has months to go. The hope I think with Kansas was that this would be resolved by the time the season started, I guess there's still a window for that, but they have not gone and faced the jury here and had self sit down in Indianapolis. We wait and see when that happens. All right, that's the news peg. Let's go big picture here. Our annual PCM special that's going to be frankly the best one yet. All right, so mokin coincidentally enough, a program that obviously Kansas is quite connected to. Mocan, short for hello, Missouri, Kansas. They win peace jam. We'll get to that in a second. I do want to, I feel like there are actually multiple news pegs coming out of peach jam at them. Absolutely. What do we have to start with Gigi Jackson only? Now, it was expected. He was going to reclassify and then he was going to commit to South Carolina. So we can take this number of ways. I'm going to let the floor is yours, my man, but let me cue you up this way. One, Gigi Jackson, reclassifying. Is he still in your mind now the number one player in 22? And two, for South Carolina fans that are just about this, big picture, how impactful do you think he's going to be with the gamecocks this season? I say that because in talking to a few coaches, some of the feedback I got was interesting talent, but some coaches who saw them saw him aren't even convinced that he's going to be like a top 25 level player in college next season. But do you disagree with that assessment from some coaches who saw them in person? Well, there's two levels to this evaluation in my mind. There is how he projects at the college level and then how he projects at the NBA level because with this move he's now eligible for the 2023 NBA draft. So we'll start with college. You ask the question, is he the top ranked prospect in the class of 2022? The answer to that is no. Nick Smith, who's going to Arkansas, will maintain that spot. Frankly, I don't think he's number two either. I think that that goes to Derek lively, who's going to duke. The 2023 recruiting class, even with the amount of players that it lost, whether through overtime elite G league or reclassifying 2001 is still a much better group than the class of 2023 from top to bottom. The reason why that's important is because it speaks to the caliber of the subsequent draft. So GG Jackson, while he would have been remained the top ranked prospect in the high school senior class of 2023, as a college freshman, he's top 5, maybe top ten. But not number one. And he is an interesting talent. He is a guy who is certainly provides and listen, let's start with this. For Lamont Paris, home run, obviously. I believe this was the initial plan with Frank Martin. When Frank Martin was the head coach at South Carolina, it had been widely speculated that Gigi Jackson would commit there would end up reclassifying and ending up there as soon as potentially even earlier than he did now. So this, I believe, was the initial plan. There was some speculation that he always wanted to go to North Carolina. I think it was a little bit of a divided house in terms of his parents and where they wanted him. But when Frank Martin gets fired, it opens things back up because they had been very clear with that administration that Frank Martin was their guy. So Frank Martin gets fired anyway, and at that point, that's where North Carolina becomes the option. Obviously Lamont Paris comes in, they continue to work that. They flip the commitment and the fact that he becomes draft eligible a year earlier is significant because at North Carolina, the roster is much better. They don't have the immediate opportunity for GG to go in and make the splash. He can now theoretically make it South Carolina. The question is, and you alluded to this, what is he capable of doing year one for a first year head coach on a roster that is not considered to be in the top half of the SEC? For me, that is a fair question. I think offensively he's a guy that right now really wants to stretch his game to the perimeter. He calls himself, you know, he's a four who wants to be a three who's actually closer to a 5 in my mind. He's at his best around the rim where his physical tools can really shine, but he shows potential putting the ball on the floor and long-term as a shooter. That's going to be more important, I think, when you start to project them out to the NBA. But what he's not is a polished shot creator or someone you can build your half court offense around next year to the point many of the coaches you talk to were making. So and then from an NBA standard, you project them out and you say, okay, we think he's going to be able to shoot. We think he's going to be able to put the ball on the floor a couple of times. But is he as versatile defensively as we want him to be? And that's been the concern that I've heard the most from NBA scouts because those have been the people I've been talking to most. And they said, you know, they list them at 6 9. He may be 6, 8, and our world he's closer to a 5.