Bamba at the Global Games

[vismatt]

Bamba Fall is playing for the African team in this weeks Global Games. You can follow the action at the following website:

http://www.globalgamesbasketball.com/

He had a nice 2nd game with 15 points and 6 rebounds against a team consisting of mostly JUCO players. It is a little scary that he was 0-7 from the free throw line in his first game (but he rebounded to go 7-12 in the 2nd game).

[Stallion]

it should be noted that in his first game playing against a group with some quality Division 1A recruits his team got slaughtered 116-70 and Falls was 2-5 FG and 0-7 FT with 4 points. In the secong game I didn't recognize a single name-were they Division 1A prospects at all-were they the sacrificial lambs to make Bamba look good because seriously who were these guys-it looks like a bunch of unheralded CC and HS kids? I looked the top scorers up and it looks like a team made up of half the team from Grayson County CC and Collin County CC and a few unknown high school kids and a couple of players from UTA and Southwestern and they still beat Bamba's team by 20.
In the first game Select had guys like Henry Dugat(BU-No. 7 in Texas), Kevin Rodgers(BU-No. 6 in Texas), Jeremy Barr(USC-No. 19 in Texas), Fendi Onobun (Ariz. No 15 in Texas), Booker Woodfox( ULL- No. 48 in Texas). One kid from out of state was 6-8, 205 Marcus Williams from Seattle(Ariz-National No. 76). who dominated inside with 26 points on 11-18 shooting

[Hoop Fan]

dont assume Marcus Williams plays inside and dominated Fall just because he is 6'8. The fact is Williams is a perimeter player, who is deadly from 3 point range. I have seen him play, not against Fall, but I highly doubt he was posting up in the interior getting most of those points.

The 0-7 free throw shooting is dang bad. Not sure how you go 0-7, ever. Despite that, Bamba's value to SMU is going to be shot blocking and keeping guys from easy post up buckets. Not sure how the big men on Texas Select fared against him, but Marcus Williams isnt one of them. The stats dont show blocked shots. Plus its obvious from the shooting percentages of Dugat, Williams and Woodfox in that game that Africa has no perimeter defense/resistence whatsoever. They probably dont have any decent guard play at all. If I had to guess, I would think they have a hard time even getting the ball up the floor against American guards and they certainly cant stop penetration from guys like Dugat.

[Stallion]

all the big men shot well for Select-Barr was 3-4, Onobun was 3-6, Rodgers was 4-4 in addition to Williams. Those are the big men I recognize. Fall had 3 rebounds. Barr lead Select with 8 rebounds, Onobun had 6, Williams 5, Rodgers 5. ...And opponents will do nothing but post-up on Bamba. Ask the Praying-Mantis.

[Hoop Fan]

The stats are not very encouraging, but the fact is with 3 guys going to Arizona, 3 to Georgia Tech, 2 to Georgia, plus Dugat and Rogers, that team is stacked with talent all Bambas age. Africa doesnt have near the experience or talent as a team to withstand that. It may tell you something conclusive about Bamba, but it very well may not playing on a team like that. What if the guards on Select were penetrating, drawing the bigs off their man and then dishing to Barr for easy baskets? Is that all Bambas fault? Still 3-4 is not a dominating performance by Barr, hell Bamba went 2-5 and created enough fouls on the opposition to get to the line 7 times too. Write the guy off if you want, but playing with the African team has its issues.

[jtstang]

I don't care who this guy is facing in the global games, or how he fares there. Look, the bottom line is this guy is a tall stick. The question is can he make up for stick with tall? Only time and experience in college will tell. Beter keep our fingers crossed.

[Stallion]

yeah I never said he wouldn't make it-I never even said SMU shouldn't have signed him. What I said is that he is at least a 2-3 year project and anyone saying otherwise is dreaming. I also questioned why SMU didn't attempt to sign a JC/CC Transfer with a nice outside nucleus including two National Top 50 type players at guard as well as others. Most teams would have looked for at least some immediate help and SMU will pay the price nexct year. By the time Falls is contributing that nucleus will be gone. Its a never ending cycle at SMU while our opponents like Tulsa, TCU, UTEP et al all seem to understand that you need to go get some immediate help in this type of situation. It has often been the difference in championship and NCAA runs by each of those schools. The players on that Select Team are a nice group but some on this board have claimed Fall is a Top 100 type which is about the same level of competition.

[friarwolf]

I watched Bamba last year with Team Texas. He was the last guy off the bench. He is skinny and doesn't appear to have the kind of body that can put on weight - a Manute Bol type. That would be ok if he had hands - putting footwork aside. He doesn't have footwork, either. He was consistently posted up and easily moved around by players 7 inches shorter. Let's hope someone spends hours throwing a tennis ball at him and making him catch them with either hand..................

[Hoop Fan]

Hey, I agree, a mature Juco is what we needed for next year. For some reason, that seems to never happen at SMU. That aside, I think we will have another "nucleus" when Fall does mature fully. Willingham has 3 years of eligibility left. So does Derrick Roberts. Granted, Hopkins will be gone and this is the last chance to get somewhere with our only top 30 national recruit in forever. But there will be an ongoing nucleus. Tubbs will get more guys of Willinghams caliber, no reason to think he won't.

As for next year, I have seen Fall and think he can be immediately MORE effective in the defensive post than Simpson and Castro were even as seniors.

[vismatt]

I'm not sure where they found the players for the Texas team, but I think it was probably a team thrown together at the last minute to fill out the schedule because it does not appear that they have near as many teams playing in the tournament this year.

From looking at the scores, it appears that the African team does not have much talent, but it is encouraging that Bamba has stepped up for them, and put up decent numbers in his last 2 games. They just lost by 41 points to the Ukraine team, but Bamba had 16 of the African team's 48 total points, and 6 rebounds.

I talked to one of the coaches of the Global Games Select Team on Sunday, and he said that Bamba is way too skinny, and they told their kids to push him around down low. Hopefully he can put some weight on, and avoid getting pushed around too much, but we'll have to wait and see. With his size he may be able to block some shots as a help defender, and patrol the middle of the zone, but I think he will probably get backed down by stronger players when we are in a man defense.

[Hoop Fan]

I watched Bamba last year with Team Texas. He was the last guy off the bench. He is skinny and doesn't appear to have the kind of body that can put on weight - a Manute Bol type. That would be ok if he had hands - putting footwork aside. He doesn't have footwork, either. He was consistently posted up and easily moved around by players 7 inches shorter. Let's hope someone spends hours throwing a tennis ball at him and making him catch them with either hand..................

if the guy has nothing going for him and cant make a play, it makes me wonder why he was on the elite Team Texas roster to begin with. Grandstaff is all about ability. Why did he ever start games for Oak Hill this year? I'm not saying he has any kind of offensive post moves right now, but he does move his feet pretty well on defense. Derrick Caracter didnt post him up easily in their Espn game.

[SMUFan]

yeah I never said he wouldn't make it-I never even said SMU shouldn't have signed him. What I said is that he is at least a 2-3 year project and anyone saying otherwise is dreaming.

How do you balance your time between your career, football talent evaluator AND basketball talent evaluator?

I also questioned why SMU didn't attempt to sign a JC/CC Transfer with a nice outside nucleus including two National Top 50 type players at guard as well as others. Most teams would have looked for at least some immediate help and SMU will pay the price nexct year.

Did Coach Tubbs and his staff not look? How do you know? I'm not challenging you on this -- maybe they didn't (although they did sign Epps out of .... a junior college). Or maybe they tried for a guy and didn't get him. After all, it was only Coach Tubbs' first year. Don't lose faith in his recruiting abilities just yet.

[Pony_Fan]

What is the point of this? It shows no fan interest. Why did they move it from Moody?

Is this still a Donnie Nelson project?

[mavsrage311]

let me try to clarify some things....

Donnie is still running the global games. He was overseeing the "all-star" festivities today

On Bamba...I can see why we recruited him. Afterall, 7 footers dont grow on trees, no matter how thick or thin they are. The best part of his game right now is his weakside shotblocking...defending in the post, he does get pushed around. There were also times when i thought he couldve dunked over some people, but instead he tried to finesse his shot up...he's got a lto of work to do, but he can contribute down the line.
I also saw fellow smu recruit brian morris (just there to watch bamba), nice guy...look for him to do a lot of posting up next year(dudes got a huge butt), that can be a nice weapon for him

The mysterious "JUCO" team came into existence because Mexico had to drop out fo the global games...Team Texas is made up of mainly collegiate Juco/D2 players. They even had a guy still playing for Frisco High. Team was put together by CCCC's coach, i think Coach Sedona. Their best player, and the reason i went to see the team play, as he's a friend of mine, Jason Bray, played for La. Tech last year and is transferring to Oklahoma Baptist to get some more PT...great kid, even better shooter. Unbelievably, Jason brought back Team Texas to beat the Global Games select team (made up of the zona, GT, etc. recruits, even Tayshaun Prince's cousin), so congrats to Jason with his game high 23 points...wish some of you couldve seen the game, one of the most unbelievable I have ever seen

[EastStang]

I agree that Fall is a 2 year project at least. He might get some fill-in minutes this year. You don't see many red-shirts in basketball anymore due to youthful eligibility for the NBA. If we thought Fall would stay for 5 years, I'd red-shirt him this year and let him bulk up.