Johnell Davis is NOT Visiting This Weekend
Earlier, I posted an update from 247's Travis Branham that said Davis was not expected to join May at Michigan. Then, there was some optimism because reports started coming in that Johnell would be visiting this weekend. However, Sam Webb shot those reports down shortly after (video below). The original "Davis will visit" tweet from FAU reporter JJ Metz was deleted (as were follow-up "Davis will visit" tweets from Davis Moseley and Josh Henschke).
April 17th, 2024 at 10:41 PM ^
Well that’s a buzz kill.
April 18th, 2024 at 12:22 PM ^
Get that buzz back with a toot of cocaine!
April 17th, 2024 at 10:47 PM ^
Was it something I said?
April 17th, 2024 at 11:14 PM ^
Nah. You're A Fun Guy. Couldn't have been your fault.
April 17th, 2024 at 11:32 PM ^
Are we sure this isn't a The Last of Us situation here?
A fungi.
Why did the mushroom go to the party?
Because he was a....
And then why did he leave?
B/c there wasn't much room. 😅
Often, I'm afraid.
April 17th, 2024 at 10:53 PM ^
Did he not like the Spring game format?
Damn it, blue team!
Underrated comment
April 18th, 2024 at 12:53 AM ^
It doesn't appear to be an admissions issue, it appears to be more like a money issue. While Dusty is admirably trying to scratch build an NIL program, Davis (as potentially the most coveted guard in the portal) is going to fetch a number that's beyond what the team can invest in one player AND still try to fill a largely empty roster.
“Every single recruiting call, every Zoom, one of the three main factors always ends up being NIL,” he said in his latest interview... “It’s more of a crowdsourcing just to try to raise the level of awareness and the impact that every dollar counts, every opportunity counts,” May said.
There were some reports (rumors?) that he hasn't graduated yet after 5 years. If he can't grad transfer then it's an admissions issue. Who knows though.
I keep seeing people say 5 years. From what I can tell, he started college at FAU in 2020. This would be his last semester of his 4th year. Maybe the issue is that he's not on track to graduate (???).
Either way it doesn't matter. NCAA says that you need to be 80% of the way to your degree after your 4th year, but M won't give more than 60 transfer credits (and that's assuming he has 60 credits that would transfer--no small issue with M's credit policy), meaning that he'd be at only 50% here and thus ineligible for athletics. Even if the COVID year didn't count for the academic progress requirements (40% after 2nd year, 60% after 3rd year, 80% after 4th year), i.e. he had been in school four years but only needed to be at 60%, he'd still be ineligible, as he couldn't be any higher than 50% when he comes here (unless I guess he busts his ass all summer to make it to 60% by the fall?).
April 18th, 2024 at 11:58 AM ^
That's the ironic Catch 22 of the UM Admissions vs. NCAA. It doesn't matter if you had enough credit hours at your previous school. How you "lose credit" for all the work you did seems silly. I expect a better NIL in place within 2-3 years, hopefully sooner. I'm not sure any real progress will be made on admissions since they are managed by the College Dept (College of LS&A, etc.) and don't answer to the Prez very much (accept in cases of misconduct). It would take some hands-on and prescriptive "legislation" by the BoR to force any real change.
You can neg me all you want idc anymore.
Michigan isn't serious about winning at bb. Its frustrating as a fan when you know and more importantly the players know that Michigan makes top 5 money but refuses to share it.
There's a reason Harbaugh was screaming for the players to be paid by someone other that schools because he had been told Michigan is not helping him with $$$ period.
To act like Michigan can't afford Davis because they need to fill out their roster makes absolutely no sense considering everyone gets paid, everyone on the roster, not just portal players.
Its real simple where top 5 NIL programs may use 10 mill to fill out their roster Michigan is telling players just get here and we'll help you find NIL partners, wtf? So I doubt Michigan is paying 1 penny rather they beg fans and businesses which was a huge factor in why we went 8-24.
NIL money doesn't come directly from the school, so not sure you have a point about "Michigan makes top 5 money but refuses to share it." However, the school/AD/program needs to do a better job of facilitating and getting the deals lined up for the players sooner to give May a better chance of landing kids like this.
The NIL thing is frustrating. (obligatory: "Fire Warde!") It shouldn't be hard to figure out. I haven't done an official audit, but when our teams are good (Fischer/Fab5/Beilein/early Howard) we sell merch, the schools profile goes up and there is money.
First round NBA picks get $2 to $10M a year. The NBA rookie minimum is $1.1M.
Guys who are not NBA draftable and/or are borderline are probably worth half that and guys further down are worth half that again or less. So an optimal stacked roster would look something like this:
- $1M
- $1M
- $1M
- $1M
- $1M
- $1M
- $750k
- $750k
- $750k
- $500k
- $500k
- $500k
- $250k
- $250k
- $250k
Total: $10.5M
I'm probably overpaying (with my imaginary money), but for the guys on the cusp you could make it worthwhile to stay an extra year and try to become a lottery pick or at least first round pick. Got to imagine that additional ticket sales and concessions would cover that. Can Chrisler Arena pay NIL? Set it up as a separate legal entity.
Ticket sales from basketball wouldn't cover $10.5 mil. Michigan makes about 90% of its ticket sales revenue (usually around $50-60 mil total) from football. So, we're already talking about operating at cost or at a deficit just to build a college basketball team at a football school.
Now, a team competing for titles would naturally generate higher ticket sales, but I'm not so sure it would be enough of an increase to justify the NIL budget.
April 18th, 2024 at 11:30 AM ^
The new court injunctions are compelling.
They say that NIL can come from the school.
So Michigan can take some of that donor money to pay salaries and their donors can get their write offs as opposed to Collectives paying kids and no donor write offs.
Problem is Michigan regents would rather fund a woman's hockey team.
"Michigan isn't serious about winning at bb."
Michigan academic departments don't care about sports, and there is nothing the AD can do about that
This looms as a really big issue, in year one. And may bring Dusty--and those watching with some optimism--up against the cold hard realities of Michigan's case. Which sometimes looked insurmountable for Juwan. Because whether Dusty's been promised augmented resources or not, he's filling an entire roster, from a pot that just doesn't match up to that of, say, a Kansas. Connecticut taking a player who lots of people were down on here, like Tarris, may speak more to the depth of that team, and its resources, than to Reed's proficiency, or that of his former coaches, who really needed him to excel this year to have a hope, not just be a promising part of a future youth movement.
Hope that Dusty doesn't get discouraged too quickly. But this reminds me a little of NIL, when it first emerged. Lots of enthusiasm from everyone, but not much indication that problems have been solved. We're already seeing that players are not just racing to be here or play for Dusty. The portal makes things interesting--as when a magician waves their hand in your face to confuse you. But none of this, none of it, has made the game more equal. Yes, there will be new winners and losers--we're already seeing that M isn't one of the former, at least not in hoop. But parity? It's dispiriting. There was a reason why Beilein left.
April 18th, 2024 at 10:08 AM ^
This is why they just need to move onto direct pay for players and a salary cap. To pretend these are still amateurs is laughable at best and parity will never come while everyone is still pretending the emperor has new clothes on.
April 18th, 2024 at 11:56 AM ^
The they are employees - and you can't make them be students.
The available NIL resources are essentially acting as a hard salary cap. In addition being a coach, Dusty May has to be the general manager and assemble a roster with a hard number constraint for total NIL. I'm not sure I can fully appreciate how difficult the job is under the current rules.
Good analogy. But what if Dusty doesn't even know the cap? Or it's shifting? Or he's waiting on word about this or that donor? Could be maddening.
Once the formal Michigan fan tithing program is in effect, we should be in a better position to get these guys.
Wow...this targeted advertising is ... a little too on the nose for me rn:
(yeah image upload not working on here huh)
Barely safe for work. :)
Damn … now I have to click on the link .
Dang, Davis Moseley has missed on several things lately. I guess I'm back to trusting no one.
so dave is mosely wrong now?
The only Mosely I trust is ... Special Agent Alonzo Mosely of the FBI.
EDIT 2: I noticed above that embedded giphys are working? That's interesting. Not sure I'd want to spend the time to create a giphy every time I want to post an image. But looks like they work. And now my semi-obscure reference from a 35 year old movie lives in tact.
https://i.postimg.cc/kgttNmXd/bamfstyle.png
EDIT: At which point I would have posted this amusing photo above, but am now forced to just link to an amusing photo.
Dear HUEL, please fix image embedding on MGoBlog. Signed, Meme Culture.
He is supremely optimistic but I don’t think he has the sources or inside knowledge of other Michigan writers. He basicallly got dunked on by Sam(who works for 247 also) in a matter of hours. He made it seem like Wolf would be committing right after his visit and that still has not happened yet.
Is it football season yet?
Gayle, come on over to the good guys!
its him, not us....
You can fire every coach and bring in a new one and Crisler will still be open! The product is what you ask for so now you will see how Dusty the arena itself will be this year. GO BLUE! We would've had a lot better roster however, lots of people wanted change.
April 18th, 2024 at 10:29 AM ^
I'm a little confused about what you're saying here. You're arguing that because Johnell Davis is likely not going to be on Michigan's team, you'd rather last year's roster to run it back? Other than a silly "Dusty" pun, I'm struggling to figure out the point here in this thread.
April 18th, 2024 at 12:56 PM ^
You're confused because it's a bizarre word salad. It's Dada-esque--the message board equivalent of Waiting For Godot. Looking for meaning is pointless when the very point is that it has no meaning. Or maybe the poster thinks Michigan should've kept Howard as coach. That can't be it though. So I'm going with the Dada reading.
April 18th, 2024 at 11:01 AM ^
FAU reporter JJ Metz is 11 years old. Maybe we shouldn't put much trust in a pre-teen?
April 18th, 2024 at 11:42 AM ^
Yeah, I had similar thoughts. I was going to include the fact that he's 11 or 12 years old in the main post, but I didn't want to be too harsh on a kid who is actually a credentialed media member. You have to respect the drive of someone that young to be involved in the media/insider business.
That said, it does feel like peak "Michigan insider szn" when Sam Webb is facing off with a pre-teen.
What in the world….how does this happen?
April 18th, 2024 at 12:07 PM ^
This is literally what happens when you get your information from a 12 year old FAU reporter who was the source for Davis visiting.
April 18th, 2024 at 12:58 PM ^
Precocious little scamp!
He's also the source of all the Goldin information, FWIW.