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Poor NIL is the biggest reason for our disappointing season

JWill and AWill were desperation moves after Spencer/Mulcahy bailed late, well after the undergrad portal had closed. JWill was a huge risk, since we didn't even know if he'd be eligible for 2023-24 without a waiver, had the betting issue looming over his head, and was coming off a torn achilles tendon - but there were slim pickens in the portal at that point, and we had a massive hole blown through our roster after we'd thought it was largely set.
omg i totally forgot about AWill..another wasted spot...and you are right...Pike taking too many risks another red flag with EO, J Will and Fernandes all with injuries
 
serenity now...there you said it...ACCEPTANCE
The Ogbole injury broke me. He was also my favorite player. I don't mind losing, but I hate how we are losing. I was OK losing last year, but competing defensively. This team bring back Rosario vibes where I stopped going to games because I was repulsed with the effort i saw. Watching Ace vs MSU gave me flashbacks.
 
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None of us are privy to the NIL marketplace.

I think we would have been able to get a 2 guard and a wing off the portal with the spot being open for a guy being a focal part of the offense playing in the B1G for a reduced rate.

Obviously I don't know that.

Our situation coming in to the season had to have eliminated a LOT of potential transfer targets.

If I were a 22 year old playing for a mid major and saw the tape on Ace Bailey and the shots he took I would stay way clear of RU.

You're talking about mid-major players? We got two seemingly-strong mid-major players in the portal last year in Acuff (21.7 pts, 3.6 rb) and Derkack (17.0 pts, 6.0 rb). Do you feel that our player evaluations would be better with mid-major pickups without Bailey/Harper on the roster.... enough so that two such pickups would be a net improvement on having Bailey/Harper? That's a huge assumption - and more wishful thinking than anything else.

Bailey/Harper needed a stable core around them... and we didn't have that. If we'd somehow been able to retain Omoruyi, Mag, Simpson, Woolfolk, and Griffiths.... I feel we'd probably have been in a better place. It's not about shiny new/different/imaginary portal players... it's about Bailey/Harper slotting into an already-built-and-stable system with veterans around them to help them get acclimated.
 
You don't know shit. Here's a proposal --every time you, KYK and Lou post on this board with a complaint, you donate $100 to NIL. That should raise nearly $1mil at the rate you three complain.
Wow unbelievable kudos to you BAC does nothing but waste his life on this website. He bashes players and coaches but still finds the time for 10 paragraphs after every game. He has never donated squat to basketball but is tolerated because he is tight with all of the CE buddies.
 
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The roster would look completely different.
We would play better defense.
We wouldn't have played Kennessaw State.

Ace NET NET is not moving the needle forward in terms of winning basketball games.
He is not making others better on offense (in fact he is making them worse).

Very good chance we wouldn't have Derkack and Davis
This is interesting. I've seen you very down on Ace's defense, and for the most part I've agreed, although I think it is much better now than it was early on. I just noticed Ace's defensive efficiency # actually leads the team now. Pretty shocking.

For his offense. His 16 assists on the year is atrocious. The biggest benefit to his shot making is that it should draw attention away from others. He is shootng 40% from three though, and his turnover rate is lower than Dylan, JWill, and Derkack - but they all turn it over too much.
 
You're talking about mid-major players? We got two seemingly-strong mid-major players in the portal last year in Acuff (21.7 pts, 3.6 rb) and Derkack (17.0 pts, 6.0 rb). Do you feel that our player evaluations would be better with mid-major pickups without Bailey/Harper on the roster.... enough so that two such pickups would be a net improvement on having Bailey/Harper? That's a huge assumption - and more wishful thinking than anything else.

Bailey/Harper needed a stable core around them... and we didn't have that. If we'd somehow been able to retain Omoruyi, Mag, Simpson, Woolfolk, and Griffiths.... I feel we'd probably have been in a better place. It's not about shiny new/different/imaginary portal players... it's about Bailey/Harper slotting into an already-built-and-stable system with veterans around them to help them get acclimated.
You're talking about mid-major players? YES
Do you feel that our player evaluations would be better with mid-major pickups without Bailey/Harper on the roster? OF COURSE 😀

Bailey/Harper needed a stable core around them...aren't they the core?

Did we get Acuff before or after he got hurt? i think after, but am not 100% here
 
This is interesting. I've seen you very down on Ace's defense, and for the most part I've agreed, although I think it is much better now than it was early on. I just noticed Ace's defensive efficiency # actually leads the team now. Pretty shocking.

For his offense. His 16 assists on the year is atrocious. The biggest benefit to his shot making is that it should draw attention away from others. He is shootng 40% from three though, and his turnover rate is lower than Dylan, JWill, and Derkack - but they all turn it over too much.
I think defensive efficiency looks at drebs, blocks and steals.
 
Quiet? I thought we had a good football season. We beat the vegas o/u. Little bad stretch but finished strong. My donating $5-10K aint moving the needle. GS and pike should spend zero time on folks like me, in the 5-10K camp and 100% of their time on folks capable of writing high 6-figure to 7-figure checks. GS has, will pike follow suit?
Disagree and show your work. I'm in a donor group that has some of the heavy hitters in it. It's the same heavy hitters that have been around since the Ash years, one being on the BOG. And you could not be more wrong. There are plenty of people in between the $5-10K (very low 6 figure donors) that make a huge difference. And I doubt the Knights of the Raritan leaders would agree with your premise.

And you proved my point on GS. He got a huge pass playing the injury card. Guess what. Dylan Harper has been injured for playing hurt/sick for many games. Guess what, Acuff has been recovering from a broken foot. That's 40% of the team. Greg had fewer than 40% of the team injured this season, and if you think going 7-5, losing to UCLA and Nebraska and getting throttled 42-7 by a crappy Wisconsin is "good" when the pre-season looked so rosy, you are being disingenuous on basketball and want to have it one way for football and the other for basketball. You have been on record as having a hard on for Pikiell for at least 2-3 years.

That above on football does not mean I was disappointed in the season or Greg should be fired. Just saying, wondering where the criticism is when his team does not perform.
 
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Disagree and show your work. I'm in a donor group that has some of the heavy hitters in it. It's the same heavy hitters that have been around since the Ash years, one being on the BOG. And you could not be more wrong. There are plenty of people in between the $5-10K (very low 6 figure donors) that make a huge difference. And I doubt the Knights of the Raritan leaders would agree with your premise.

And you proved my point on GS. He got a huge pass playing the injury card. Guess what. Dylan Harper has been injured for playing hurt/sick for many games. Guess what, Acuff has been recovering from a broken foot. That's 40% of the team. Greg had fewer than 40% of the team injured this season, and if you think going 7-5, losing to UCLA and Nebraska and getting throttled 42-7 by a crappy Wisconsin is "good" when the pre-season looked so rosy, you are being disingenuous on basketball and want to have it one way for football and the other for basketball. You have been on record as having a hard on for Pikiell for at least 2-3 years.

That above on football does not mean I was disappointed in the season or Greg should be fired. Just saying, wondering where the criticism is when his team does not perform.
Dylan and a rotation player are 40% of the team? News to me. Dylan is fine. He has a cold and a rolled ankle. There aint a team in America that doesn't have players roll their ankles.

Greg's did a much better job in 2024 than pike is doing in 2024-2025. Again, if 40% of Greg's starters were first round picks and he only could get to 7-5, I'd be leading the pack raising hell.

Greg finished 10th of 18 teams with the 17th most talented roster in the B1G per 247 team talent composite. He's realized his job as ceo is fundraising first and coaching 2nd at this point and we've now seen 2 straight solid recruiting classes come from it to bridge that talent gap.
 
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Dylan and a rotation player are 40% of the team? News to me. Dylan is fine. He has a cold and a rolled ankle. There aint a team in America that doesn't have players roll their ankles.
Your favorite river: DeNial.
It's not worth going back and forth with you. I know plenty of people like you. Young, no experience, but think you know and understand so many things, when you don't. And show know respect for people who are older and wiser than you.
 
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Can't take anyone serious who is bitching about our NIL situation while also saying they contribute zero. 5-10K doesn't matter? Are we serious right now? NIL battles are decided by thousands...not millions. Your donation could be the difference between getting the guy the coaches really want or having to settle for someone further down the line. Esp when you are talking with many fans giving smaller amounts.

Of course guys cutting big checks are preferred but it ALL matters. But hey you're all posting a ton of messages about how bad things are on a message board. You're doing your part. Can't ask for more outta you...
 
Your favorite river: DeNial.
It's not worth going back and forth with you. I know plenty of people like you. Young, no experience, but think you know and understand so many things, when you don't. And show know respect for people who are older and wiser than you.
Happy to meet up for lunch and discuss how much each of us know. You in north jersey?
 
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Happy to meet up for lunch and discuss how much each of us know. You in north jersey?
No, I'm not.
To be clear, I don't have any animus/anger towards you or bac, and I know your posts come from a place of wanting RU to succeed.
Constantly bellyaching about the same shit over and over again, as others have pointed out, serves little point, and it is probably counterproductive, but that's what these boards are here for. There's a fair amount of stuff on the non-basketball side I am privy to but will not share because it was explained to keep private.
 
@bethlehemfan is just a guy who has to take the opposite side of everything I say. Even going as far as to say the RAC is a liability for us recruiting and that the apc is a dump. He is not to be taken seriously
I did not say the apc is a dump. The rac is a dump. I also did not say it’s a liability. I said it is not a relative advantage. I also do not disagree with everything you say. I only disagree when I have a different opinion. We. Actually share similar views on lots of things. Just not basketball because you are a Smurf.
 
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I did not say the apc is a dump. The rac is a dump. I also did not say it’s a liability. I said it is not a relative advantage. I also do not disagree with everything you say. I only disagree when I have a different opinion. We. Actually share similar views on lots of things. Just not basketball because you are a Smurf.
Disagree with RAC not being an advantage, it’s a massive advantage when it’s “on.”

The RAC has always created moments that causes an opposing team to have mental breakdowns. If a recruit is lucky enough to witness it in person, it can absolutely impact a recruitment. As previously mentioned, it happened with Ace.

From a fan game day experience, yes the RAC is a dump, but a 16-17 year old recruit doesn’t care about lack of bathrooms for 58 year old Tim from Sparta, NJ.
 
You're talking about mid-major players? YES
Do you feel that our player evaluations would be better with mid-major pickups without Bailey/Harper on the roster? OF COURSE 😀

Bailey/Harper needed a stable core around them...aren't they the core?

Did we get Acuff before or after he got hurt? i think after, but am not 100% here

Why would our player evaluations be better without Bailey/Harper on the roster? Our evaluation of Martini put him as a high priority target.... why would we have thought any differently about him if we had two rando HS players instead of Bailey and Harper?

No, Bailey/Harper can't be the core... they are the minority of the guys on the court at any time. For freshmen to truly excel, they need to have stable veterans around to bring them along... not be surrounded by other newbies. "This is where you fit in the press" and "in this set you need to be over there", etc. Instead, everyone was new - the only guy on the roster who came in with a full season of experience was Jamichael Davis. Swapping Bailey/Harper and our 4 portal guys for 2 HS randos and 4 different portal guys wasn't going to change that.

Acuff got hurt after he came to Rutgers.
 
Can't take anyone serious who is bitching about our NIL situation while also saying they contribute zero. 5-10K doesn't matter? Are we serious right now? NIL battles are decided by thousands...not millions. Your donation could be the difference between getting the guy the coaches really want or having to settle for someone further down the line. Esp when you are talking with many fans giving smaller amounts.

Of course guys cutting big checks are preferred but it ALL matters. But hey you're all posting a ton of messages about how bad things are on a message board. You're doing your part. Can't ask for more outta you...

$5-10K donations are great - but very few people have that sort of disposable income to throw toward Rutgers athletics. The vast majority of people don't even have $5K in their savings account, let alone are able to part with that much for nothing in return. The number of Rutgers fans who are able to contribute on that tier or above is very small.

Most fans are able to chip in tens of dollars not thousands of dollars.
 
omg i totally forgot about AWill..another wasted spot...and you are right...Pike taking too many risks another red flag with EO, J Will and Fernandes all with injuries

Wasn't about taking risks at that point, it was a mad dash to salvage a roster: 'any port in a storm'. There was no one left in the portal when Spencer/Mulcahy hit the road that wasn't deeply flawed. At that moment, the portal was mostly a bare cupboard, and all we had at guard was Simpson (6-3), Davis (6-1), and Fernandes (5-11).
 
$5-10K donations are great - but very few people have that sort of disposable income to throw toward Rutgers athletics. The vast majority of people don't even have $5K in their savings account, let alone are able to part with that much for nothing in return. The number of Rutgers fans who are able to contribute on that tier or above is very small.

Most fans are able to chip in tens of dollars not thousands of dollars.

of course...was responding to someone saying his $5-$10K donation wouldn't matter...

however you want to tell me that the 17+ thousand people that made the trip to MSG couldn't pony up $25 a month or $300 a year? i went to msg and that is an expensive afternoon for a family of five. so i don't think that subset of the population is living in poverty. and if they all did give well that is five plus million right there.

of course getting one guy to pony up multi millions is ideal but don't tell me that smaller donations don't matter as well...esp from people who are here pointing out every possible negative thing about the program while not doing anything of substance to actually help it.
 
of course...was responding to someone saying his $5-$10K donation wouldn't matter...

however you want to tell me that the 17+ thousand people that made the trip to MSG couldn't pony up $25 a month or $300 a year? i went to msg and that is an expensive afternoon for a family of five. so i don't think that subset of the population is living in poverty. and if they all did give well that is five plus million right there.

of course getting one guy to pony up multi millions is ideal but don't tell me that smaller donations don't matter as well...esp from people who are here pointing out every possible negative thing about the program while not doing anything of substance to actually help it.
Stop spending peoples money

Things add up when you start attending alot of hoops and football games
 
Where is PIKE going out on a limb and meeting donors face to face (esp ones with money)? Schiano goes out and builds relationships. Pike hasn’t. It was absolutely criminal that with all the time he knew Harper and Ace were coming that he couldn’t get enough money for a competent surrounding cast.

How the F do you know that? Seems like you just made it up.
 
of course...was responding to someone saying his $5-$10K donation wouldn't matter...

however you want to tell me that the 17+ thousand people that made the trip to MSG couldn't pony up $25 a month or $300 a year? i went to msg and that is an expensive afternoon for a family of five. so i don't think that subset of the population is living in poverty. and if they all did give well that is five plus million right there.

of course getting one guy to pony up multi millions is ideal but don't tell me that smaller donations don't matter as well...esp from people who are here pointing out every possible negative thing about the program while not doing anything of substance to actually help it.

People spent money to get something in return - a trip to MSG and a basketball game. How many of those 17K would have attended if it cost an extra $300 per ticket for no additional return? Many fans are already dropping several hundred dollars a year on season tickets/parking/etc - to ask them for another $300 that they get zero additional benefit from is not going to get many takers.

It's basically asking people to give money to charity... but it doesn't have any charitable benefit and it's not even tax deductible (like the same donation to the University itself would be)

Also, the "living in poverty" is a misunderstanding of just how little "extra" cash most people have. 80% of the country has less than $5K in savings. For those that do have that much, what percent do you think are willing to part with $300 (per year!) for nothing in return.

If someone has enough disposable income to toss $5-10K toward their favorite college team, that's great - but most people probably aren't financially comfortable enough to even toss $50 in that particular bucket.

Also the "not doing anything of substance" - every ticket someone buys for a game and every time they pay for parking, they're doing something of substance for the team. It's the team's job to give enough entertainment value back to the fans that makes people want to spend their $$$ on watching the team play.
 
People spent money to get something in return - a trip to MSG and a basketball game. How many of those 17K would have attended if it cost an extra $300 per ticket for no additional return? Many fans are already dropping several hundred dollars a year on season tickets/parking/etc - to ask them for another $300 that they get zero additional benefit from is not going to get many takers.

It's basically asking people to give money to charity... but it doesn't have any charitable benefit and it's not even tax deductible (like the same donation to the University itself would be)

Also, the "living in poverty" is a misunderstanding of just how little "extra" cash most people have. 80% of the country has less than $5K in savings. For those that do have that much, what percent do you think are willing to part with $300 (per year!) for nothing in return.

If someone has enough disposable income to toss $5-10K toward their favorite college team, that's great - but most people probably aren't financially comfortable enough to even toss $50 in that particular bucket.

Also the "not doing anything of substance" - every ticket someone buys for a game and every time they pay for parking, they're doing something of substance for the team. It's the team's job to give enough entertainment value back to the fans that makes people want to spend their $$$ on watching the team play.
Agree re charity. Helping people truly in need seems better to me than paying a professional athlete.
 
Also the "not doing anything of substance" - every ticket someone buys for a game and every time they pay for parking, they're doing something of substance for the team. It's the team's job to give enough entertainment value back to the fans that makes people want to spend their $$$ on watching the team play.
well said
 
of course...was responding to someone saying his $5-$10K donation wouldn't matter...

however you want to tell me that the 17+ thousand people that made the trip to MSG couldn't pony up $25 a month or $300 a year? i went to msg and that is an expensive afternoon for a family of five. so i don't think that subset of the population is living in poverty. and if they all did give well that is five plus million right there.

of course getting one guy to pony up multi millions is ideal but don't tell me that smaller donations don't matter as well...esp from people who are here pointing out every possible negative thing about the program while not doing anything of substance to actually help it.
This

Hobbs should’ve organized a broad grass roots give what you can NIL campaign for this hoops season. I think the lawyer in him was concerned with advocating for pay for play….thats same lawyer in him was not concerned with having an extra-marital affair with a staff member.
 
I think an unhealthy Harper had an awfully lot to do with 4 or 5 of our losses.
No question. But teams have been running layup drills on us all season. Watch the 2nd half of our game at MSG for the latest example. Unfortunately I had to witness it in person (like many others on this board).
 
You're talking about mid-major players? We got two seemingly-strong mid-major players in the portal last year in Acuff (21.7 pts, 3.6 rb) and Derkack (17.0 pts, 6.0 rb). Do you feel that our player evaluations would be better with mid-major pickups without Bailey/Harper on the roster.... enough so that two such pickups would be a net improvement on having Bailey/Harper? That's a huge assumption - and more wishful thinking than anything else.

Bailey/Harper needed a stable core around them... and we didn't have that. If we'd somehow been able to retain Omoruyi, Mag, Simpson, Woolfolk, and Griffiths.... I feel we'd probably have been in a better place. It's not about shiny new/different/imaginary portal players... it's about Bailey/Harper slotting into an already-built-and-stable system with veterans around them to help them get acclimated.
If Merrimack is mid-major, dear god tell me what's low-major. Merrimack is in the middle of New England, and that's the only mid thing about it.

Sorry, but if he was the best player in the entire conference as a sophomore, that conference sure (fill in the blank)...
 
$5-10K donations are great - but very few people have that sort of disposable income to throw toward Rutgers athletics. The vast majority of people don't even have $5K in their savings account, let alone are able to part with that much for nothing in return. The number of Rutgers fans who are able to contribute on that tier or above is very small.

Most fans are able to chip in tens of dollars not thousands of dollars.
Yeah that's just not true when you consider the average cost of an app is like $100 a year.

The bottom line is most Rutgers fans want big time sports on a Walmart budget and constantly point to the big rich donor. Plenty of you are capable of giving more, myself included.
 
Yeah that's just not true when you consider the average cost of an app is like $100 a year.

The bottom line is most Rutgers fans want big time sports on a Walmart budget and constantly point to the big rich donor. Plenty of you are capable of giving more, myself included.

Average cost of an app? Not quite sure what that means.

I've dropped over $5K on attending games over the past 3 years - but I get something back for that money. I have no interest in contributing more $$$ to what amounts to little more than a Rutgers sports OnlyFans.

NIL was intended for players to be able to market themselves for sponsorship deals... not as a grift for fans to drop some cash in a slot and pull a lever hoping for lucky sevens to show up in the portal.
 
Average cost of an app? Not quite sure what that means.

I've dropped over $5K on attending games over the past 3 years - but I get something back for that money. I have no interest in contributing more $$$ to what amounts to little more than a Rutgers sports OnlyFans.

NIL was intended for players to be able to market themselves for sponsorship deals... not as a grift for fans to drop some cash in a slot and pull a lever hoping for lucky sevens to show up in the portal.
Agreed but it towards scholarships or facilities then like me. They need plenty of help in that area too.
 
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After every loss it’s the same BS. Pike this, Pike that, when accountability needs to start by looking in the mirror. We are the biggest reason Pikes roster is inadequate because we haven’t done enough to support a Championship Caliber program.

Poor NIL is the 800 lb gorilla that no one wants to acknowledge, because then we would need to take accountability. We’re either ponying up or not ponying up. By looking at our roster, we can reasonably conclude that not enough was done.

If we had Cliff and a few more quality kids, we’d be looking forward to dancing. But we didn’t have the support, so we recruited whomever we could.

Now I understand why Danny Hurley took the UConn job and turned down the Rutgers job. Because unlike at UConn, he would never get the support to win big at Rutgers. Two National Championships later, and he no doubt made the right decision.

Now it’s on us to provide the support so Rutgers can realize its greatest potential. It should have happened this year, because by some act of God, we wound up with two lottery picks. Thank you to whomever it was that provided that support.

The rest of us didn’t do enough, and sadly I fall into that group because already I do what I can for football. Going forward, this will change.

We need 1,000 people donating $2,000 for Basketball NIL. I’ve got to believe that we have 1,000 fans capable of doing so, especially after seeing yesterday’s game at MSG. This provides us with a $2M warchest, which can be used to get quality recruits. Recruiting lower division kids, and hoping their ability will scale to this level, simply is not a path to success. Football also has to choose this path, due to lack of NIL resources, so they have no other choice. Our experience shows, that not all transfers like this will be able to contribute. So we have to improve our odds of recruiting contributors by increasing our financial support.

If you’re a teacher, retiree, or someone struggling to get by, you are obviously not expected to give. Those of us who are well off, need to absorb this burden.

This does not absolve Pikes recruiting and development. But at the same time, I feel we haven’t provided Pike with the support to be successful and think he will be successful with the right support.

So it’s time to pony up, or live with the mediocre consequences. Transfer recruiting will probably kick into high gear in April. We need to give Pike the support he needs to land quality transfers, to turn this thing around.

Go RU!
No it is not. Like it or not, it is the coaching staff. Lack of talent evaluation, lack of offensive identity, lack of integration of roster, on and on. Just time to move on. Eight years is now too long, especially with a downward direction in last 3 years despite some talent on the roster.
 
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Did I miss the “We have more talent than Alabama, Kentucky and Duke” and “We need a basketball field house in order to compete” threads?

Did we skip right to “It’s the fans fault and low NIL. Stop expecting success” thread?
 
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No it is not. Like it or not, it is the coaching staff. Lack of talent evaluation, lack of offensive identity, lack of integration of roster, on and on. Just time to move on. Eight years is now too long, especially with a downward direction in last 3 years despite some talent on the roster.
It’s the lack of budget to get the needed talent.
This is why we shop the transfer bargain bin. To expect a bunch of lower division transfers to be able to consistently play at a big ten level was just unrealistic and unsurprisingly didn’t work out. People like you expect chicken salad to be made from chickenshit and it doesn’t work that way.

We need $$$ to recruit the needed talent.
 
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