Kentucky basketball mailbag: UK’s future frontcourt, Shaedon Sharpe’s status and more
Earlier this week, we asked for your questions about the Kentucky basketball team and the Wildcats’ recruiting efforts. Here’s part one of our UK basketball mailbag, which focuses mainly on this season’s team.
Part two — with a focus on Kentucky’s recruiting outlook — will be posted later this week.
Can you speculate on the “5” position for next year? Admittedly too early to know about development/draft potential of this current team’s bigs, but wondering if you have a feel about the options yet?
It’s never too early for speculation on NBA Draft position and future rosters.
As of now, it looks like at least one of Kentucky’s big man trio — Oscar Tshiebwe, Daimion Collins and Lance Ware — will be gone by next season.
The most likely departure is Tshiebwe, who turned 22 years old over the weekend and — as an international player — isn’t in a position to take full advantage of the NCAA’s name, image and likeness reforms. Despite his dominant play, Tshiebwe isn’t on any reputable NBA Draft boards. He was completely absent from ESPN’s Top 100 update Tuesday morning. His skill set just doesn’t line up with the current direction of the NBA, but scouts will need to pay attention if he keeps up this pace against better competition. And, even if he never projects as an NBA pick, he should be able to make some serious money professionally starting next season. There seemed to be a sense around the program going into the season that Tshiebwe would be off to the pros in 2022 regardless, and that remains the safest bet at this point.
Ware has played only 24 minutes in four games this season, partly due to injury, though he has shown flashes of what made him a Kentucky recruit. He plays hard, he has enough athleticism for the position, and he’s still relatively new to basketball, so it wouldn’t be unexpected to see some major jumps in his game. He should be back next season.
Collins is the wild card. He’s an amazing athlete capable of things only a handful of former Kentucky players have done, but he’s also a bit of a blank slate, basketball-wise. The consistent production hasn’t been there so far this season, and that was the expectation around Collins coming in — that he would often disappear and ultimately take awhile to get going.
ESPN’s NBA Draft rankings update had Collins at No. 28 overall, just barely inside first-round range. If he’s around that same spot at the end of the season, it would probably be wise to return to school. It’s often the case that projected draft picks who come back to college hurt their stock more than help it, but Collins seems unique in this regard. Sure, there’s a chance he never turns into a can’t-miss first-round selection, but he undoubtedly has the upside to one day be a top-10 pick if he can bring along his offensive skill set, add strength and play with consistency.
For the sake of example: the No. 28 pick in the 2022 draft will make about $3.6 million over his first two seasons in the league. The No. 10 pick in the 2023 draft will make about $8.2 million in that same span. If you’re willing to bet on yourself, that’s a lot of money to be made by staying and developing, especially when Collins would be in a position to make some major NIL money at Kentucky next season.
If Collins and Ware both return — and both can be 20-30-minute-type guys — that would drastically reduce UK’s need to add a major-impact big man this coming offseason, especially with bigger wings like Jacob Toppin, Bryce Hopkins and (especially) new recruit Chris Livingston on the projected roster. All of those players could play the “4” spot, if necessary.
Even if Collins and Ware do come back, expect Kentucky to keep a close eye on the transfer portal for possible instant-impact bigs. You can never have too much talent, especially in the post. And if two of the Cats’ current trio leave, UK will have to add at least one player from that pool.
There are no realistic recruiting options left in the 2022 class. Reclassification is always something to consider, however, and it’s worth noting that the No. 1 center in the 2023 class — 6-foot-10 big man Baye Fall — turns 18 years old later this month.
Fall, who moved from his native Senegal to Colorado a few years ago, was a first-team sophomore all-American last season, averaging 22.1 points, 10.0 rebounds and 3.2 blocked shots per game. He’s the No. 2 overall recruit in the ESPN rankings for 2023, and he’s expected to visit Kentucky this winter.
Which player has stepped up as the vocal leader of this team?
This is admittedly speculative — since I’m not on the court and don’t know what is said during games — but it sure seems like the answer to this question is 1) Sahvir Wheeler and 1A) TyTy Washington.
John Calipari, who is usually coaching incredibly young teams, hammers home the importance of on-court communication every season, especially at this stage of the schedule. It’s evident just from watching the games that Wheeler and Washington are talking while the ball is in play. It’s even more evident that those players, especially Wheeler, can have a commanding presence in team huddles during dead-ball situations, before free throws, etc.
Calipari said as much after the Cats’ second exhibition game last month.
“He was coaching in every huddle,” Cal said of Wheeler. “He was talking to guys, getting on guys, he was encouraging guys. TyTy was doing the same.”
Calipari often talks about his teams needing a “coach on the floor,” and it looks like he already has two in Wheeler and Washington, the two Cats who will play the most point guard minutes.
It helps the situation that there’s so much more experience on this Kentucky squad compared to past rosters. It’s often difficult for freshmen to speak up, often even more difficult for others to listen to younger or just-as-inexperienced players. Calipari doesn’t have to worry about that this season. He has a proven high-major point guard in Wheeler, who clearly isn’t shy on the court. Washington has natural leadership abilities and a certain confidence to his game that most freshmen lack. Oscar Tshiebwe can lead by example, playing with an energy and attitude that is surely contagious. And guys like Kellan Grady and Davion Mintz — with a staggering 248 college games and 219 starts between them — can lead by presence alone, playing within themselves and not getting rattled in big moments. Keion Brooks has also shown team leadership qualities on and off the court.
That abundance of vocal leadership and collective lead-by-example approach means that Kentucky is bound to have a few guys on the floor at all times who possess such traits. In late-game, close-game situations, it’s likely that four or five of the previously mentioned players will be on the court. Calipari hasn’t had that very often at Kentucky, even with his best teams.
That’s yet another positive to having so much experience on this roster, and it’s one that could pay off big time in postseason games.
Now that we’re getting closer to Shaedon Sharpe being on campus, and we’ve seen the rotation a bit more, do you think he’ll play?
Quick background: Sharpe was the No. 1 recruit in the 2022 class before announcing he would enroll in classes at UK early and join the team at the semester break this winter, meaning he’ll technically be on the Kentucky roster starting in January.
The original plan was to have Sharpe come in as a practice player only to finish out this season, allowing him to get acclimated to the college game while going through UK’s strength and conditioning program to better position himself to make a huge impact on the 2022-23 season.
Obviously, speculation that Sharpe might play this season began as soon as it became clear he planned to enroll early. At the time, I thought there was roughly a zero percent chance of that happening. The whole point of this early enrollment was to get Sharpe better prepared for next season, and a big part of the reason he’s coming to UK is because his mentor, Dwayne Washington, had that same role in Shai Gilgeous-Alexander’s early basketball life, saw and appreciated the development he received at Kentucky, and reached out to Calipari to recruit Sharpe.
Knowing all that, it wouldn’t make much sense for UK to rush Sharpe onto the court this season, possibly interfering with the entire objective of him coming here in the first place.
Washington has said Sharpe will do whatever the UK coaching staff asks of him — and that could include playing this season — but he’s also stressed that he wants the 6-5 shooting guard to develop the right way before moving on to the NBA.
I’d fully expect Calipari to honor that approach. So, if Sharpe works out with the team for the first few weeks in January, and it’s clear he’s not yet ready to make a considerable impact against top competition, I don’t think he’ll play this season.
But there’s also the (very plausible) scenario that Sharpe shows up in Lexington and practices like a can’t-miss college basketball star. What then?
I still think — barring major injury — it’s most likely that Sharpe doesn’t play. Assuming Davion Mintz comes back healthy soon (and Calipari hinted that he could return for UK’s next game Tuesday), then Kentucky would have Sahvir Wheeler, TyTy Washington, Kellan Grady and Mintz as must-play players at the guard spots, with a rotation of bigger wings that Calipari clearly likes, Oscar Tshiebwe at center, plus Daimion Collins, a player the UK coach keeps saying that he has to get onto the court.
Yes, Sharpe has more overall talent and long-term upside than a lot of those players, but keep in mind that those players have all been practicing and playing together for months now. It just seems unlikely that Sharpe will be able to come into the program cold and displace someone like Mintz (which would probably be the most realistic path to playing time this season), and it’s more unlikely that Calipari would disrupt his roster dynamic — and possibly Sharpe’s long-term development — by pulling off such a move late in the season, especially if UK is winning.
So, if Sharpe plays this winter, it’s likely because 1) Another guard on the team has suffered a major injury or illness, or 2) One of those other guards just isn’t performing to expected standards. With Wheeler and Washington off to good starts and Grady and Mintz being proven commodities on the court, it seems unlikely Calipari would effectively bench any of those players for Sharpe down the stretch.
Maybe Collins or Jacob Toppin isn’t playing to expectations a couple months from now, Sharpe is starring in practice, and Calipari goes with a more guard-heavy approach heading into March, but that doesn’t seem likely either.
As long as the Cats are winning games, the original plan with Sharpe — practice now to star next season — seems like the best route.
Taking everything into account, sure, there’s a chance Sharpe plays this season, but I think it’s most likely that Kentucky fans won’t see him on the court until November 2022.
