Last season Patrick Patterson was looked at as the seasoned veteran, the old guy that the young players looked up to.  When the team was in a bind Patterson was called upon to make a big play or give a little confidence to players like DeMarcus Cousins and John Wall, who are talented but would continually put their heads down after a negative outcome.

The Wildcats coming into this season are lacking that type of leadership.  They don’t have that one go to guy that is going to keep every players head up when things get tough.  They need someone to essentially fill Patterson’s shoes.  It’s not an easy job but it is a very important one.  Darius Miller is the perfect person to take on the task.

He played on the USA U-19 team which gave him a lot of experience.  He doesn’t seem to be very vocal which could lead to some problems but that is an easy problem to fix.  If you pay attention to high pressure situations they don’t really seem to bother Darius.  The big problem with Darius Miller is that he was very inconsistent last year.

He was supposed to provide the outside jump shooting Kentucky desperately needed but time and time again he would have one good shooting night and then two off nights.  Consistency is key to any athlete and without that they are just not any help to their team.  With this being his junior year he has played in enough games to understand how to lead a team.

He won’t need to go out and score 20 points a game but he will definitely have to improve on the 6 ppg. average that he has for his career.  Also, for his career he shoots close to 33% from beyond the three-point line.  It’s not a terrible average but he needs to get to the rim a little bit more and not rely just on his outside jumper.

If Miller becomes a reliable captain for UK then the sky is the limit.  When looking at their roster all they are missing is the leadership.  They have a ton of talent provided by the incoming freshman and the bench will be solid.  It doesn’t have to be Miller who steps into the role but Calipari certainly would like it to be him.

Josh Harrellson was just one of the players last year for UK that no one could really understand the way he was handled by Billy Gillispie. Darius Miller, Kevin Galloway, and DeAndre Liggins, among others, joined the crowd as well.

Stories about those players’ interactions with Billy Gillispie are pretty much common knowledge at this point, so much so that a book probably could be written about them. It’s hard for me to come up with a better word to describe Gillispie’s coaching approach than “irrational”. “Irrational” should not be a word descriptive of a basketball coach.

Well, there’s no book yet, but Jerry Tipton has written an article about Josh Harrellson that confirms a couple of the stories. Harrellson does a good job of politically expressing his thoughts on Gillispie, but in his quotes, you can sense that Harrellson failed to understand much of what Gillispie did:

Harrellson’s most memorable struggle surely came at Vanderbilt last season.

Then UK Coach Billy Gillispie ordered Harrellson to listen to the halftime instruction from a bathroom stall.

“The bathroom was connected,” Harrellson said in trying to downplay the significance of incident. “I still listened to the game plan. I still watched what he (Gillispie) was doing.”

Harrellson acknowledged feeling humiliated “a little bit,” but added that the banishment inflicted no lasting damage.

“I didn’t take it any way,” he said. “I just knew he (Gillispie) was frustrated because of what was going on. Nobody playing hard or good at the time.”

Gillispie, an unabashed Bob Knight fan, might have been mimicking his coaching career. He certainly made a Knight-like move after the 77-64 loss at Vanderbilt by ordering Harrellson to ride back to Lexington in an equipment truck and not with his teammates.

“That’s because I had a class at eight in the morning, supposedly,” Harrellson said. “Because the equipment truck was faster. Something like that.”

When asked if that explanation should be believed, Harrellson said, “Nope.”

I think it’s fair to say that Harrellson deserves to have some positive in his basketball career after a season rife with negative. John Calipari has been quick to praise Harrellson, so his role could be much more significant than expected. It’s a compliment in and of itself that he managed to survive the roster purging that happened when Cal took over.

Above all, Josh is a kid who loves basketball, loves playing at UK, and loves his teammates. Whether he’s a starter or the 13th man, he’s the kind of presence you want on your team.

At least when the UK football team gets in a fight, they do it with another school. Besides, I have a feeling that if a fight broke out between UK basketball and football teams, most bystanders would take up for the side with John Wall and Patrick Patterson.

It doesn’t sound like there was too much damage done. Darius Miller’s teammate on the USA U-19 Team, Tyshawn Taylor, suffered a dislocated thumb, but he should recover within a month. This is also further proof that there is NOT very much to do in Lawrence, Kansas.

LAWRENCE JOURNAL-WORLD – Kansas University sophomore basketball guard Tyshawn Taylor was involved — and injured — in an incident that broke out in front of Burge Union on the KU campus shortly after 6:30 p.m. Tuesday, a source confirmed Tuesday night.

A nursing supervisor confirmed that Taylor was treated and released Tuesday night at Lawrence Memorial Hospital.

A source close to the situation said Taylor suffered a dislocated left thumb and would be out of action three to four weeks. The basketball season begins with the Oct. 16 Late Night in the Phog.

A source said several people witnessed a skirmish between members of the KU football team and basketball team. The identities of the other players involved were not known as of Tuesday night.

It is believed no players except Taylor sustained injuries that would require any missed playing time.

KU associate athletic director Jim Marchiony was asked about the matter on Tuesday night.

“We’re aware of reports of an incident, and we are gathering facts as we speak,” Marchiony said.

KU coach Bill Self was on a recruiting trip and unavailable for comment.

Police were called to Jayhawker Towers about 10:25 p.m. Tuesday to disperse a crowd of about 20 individuals gathering in the parking lot of the Towers. The Journal-World police scanner indicated it was in response to the incident that happened earlier in the day.

“I don’t know much. All I know is a fight happened (in front of union),” a KU student said before entering a Towers apartment.

A source said one group of players was entering the union as another group of players was exiting, arguing ensued, and punches were thrown. Police had no comment on the matter Tuesday night.

As of Tuesday night, KU public safety officials had not returned calls for comment.

One of my strongest beliefs in the world of sports is that the best athletes in the world play basketball. Football has some phenomenal athletes at the skill positions, soccer could make an argument, and baseball has a stray Carl Crawford or Grady Sizemore running around, but when it comes down to it, I’ll take the average basketball player over the average player in any other sport.

As an example, one of the things in sports that I would like to see most is a season of LeBron James playing wide receiver in the NFL. If there were some sort of fund that would go toward paying a year’s salary for LeBron, I would be all over that. His combination of size, speed, strength, and explosiveness would be absolutely unstoppable.

With that in mind, and in honor of the upcoming football season and the current series of positional previews the Pinkie is unveiling, I started applying LeBron principle to UK’s current basketball roster. With John Calipari at the helm, UK is going to have rosters with near NBA level athleticism. His first roster is already showing that even though only half of it is made up by players recruited by him.

Really the only spots on the field that basketball players are unable to fill are the line positions, so what I’m going to do is fill 6 offensive positions (QB, RB, FB, 2 WR’s, TE) and 6 defensive positions (FS, SS, 2 CB’s, 2 LB’s) with the same group of players.  There are some fits that aren’t ideal, but the point is that this is fun to think about.

Offense

Just as in our positional previews, it all starts at quarterback. This is probably the most difficult position to project, because to correctly do so, I would need an idea of arm strength and accuracy. I thought about going with Daniel Orton, because of how I’ve seen him launch full court outlet passes, but instead I’m going to pick John Wall to play QB.

Wall is the kind of athlete who could probably play any of the skill positions, but when I think about his court awareness, speed, and agility, I think he would make a pretty good QB. I’ve seen countless highlights where he finds an open man that didn’t even realize he was open. He would pick holes in defenses, and when he couldn’t, he would probably just scramble for a first down.

At running back, I’m going to have to go with Eric Bledsoe, who at 6 feet tall and just over 200 pounds, is closest to the prototypical size for a back. He’s got the kind of strength, speed, quickness, and shiftiness that would make him very difficult to bring down. Besides, his point guard skills would allow him to see the field well and find spaces underneath to give John Wall a great checkdown target.

The biggest no brainer for me in putting this imaginary team together is Patrick Patterson at tight end. All last football season, as I watched UK struggle at tight end after Jacob Tamme’s departure, the idea of having Patterson kept going through my head.

How many times have you seen Patterson get pounded by double and triple teams and still manage to dig out space? How many times have you seen a UK player lob in a half hearted entry pass and see Patterson somehow come up with the ball? Patterson has the strength, size, and hands to make a tremendous Antonio Gates type tight end.

At wide receiver, I’m going to have to go with DeAndre Liggins and Darius Miller. With their size, they would create mismatches all over the place for smaller corners. They make take a few nasty hits with their length, but I think they would have the agility to run precise routes and the leaping ability to make the difficult catch.

At fullback, I say the best fit is Daniel Orton. He may be about a foot taller than the typical fullback, but he has the power to blow some people up.

Defense

The captain on the defensive side of the ball is Patrick Patterson at linebacker. His intensity and power would give the basketball version of the Whomp Squad ideal leadership. The other linebacker would be big Daniel Orton. The two players would give the ‘Cats the tallest linebacking corps in the history of football, and the summer they spent together with Hell’s Trainer Frank Matriscano gave them the strength and stamina to man the trenches for 60 minutes.

At the two corner positions, I’m going with John Wall and DeAndre Liggins. Wall would bring the kind of athleticism and ball skills that every NFL scout looks for in a DB, plus his height would allow him match up with any big wide receiver. DeAndre Liggins isn’t exactly what I would draw up when I think of a corner, but I don’t think his competitive streak would allow him to back down from anyone.

At free safety, I’m going with the wily Darius Miller. I think Darius would be an absolute ball hawk and he might fool some players into thinking he was soft with his wiry build. He would play a great center field and make the big pick.

At strong safety, the choice is clearly Eric Bledsoe. I’ve seen Bledsoe compared multiple times to a safety because of his strength and tenacity, and I think he would deliver a pretty nasty lick or two to a receiver venturing in the middle of the field.

OK, I enjoyed that. Why don’t you guys join in? Post in the comments if you think I put anybody at the wrong spot, if I left anybody out. Also, which football players do you think would make the best basketball players?

This is from a different angle that part 1 and part 2 so you can get a closer view of John Wall’s ridiculous athleticism. Wall is going to be a terror on the offensive glass with the way he attacks the ball from the wing.

Darius Miller also throws in a couple nice highlights.

Lately, one topic that has been on mind a bunch is how John Calipari is going to distribute playing time. I posted an article last week about what I thought UK’s rotation would look like, so check that out if you haven’t already.

All the talent that John Calipari has brought in his first months will give John Calipari something UK never had last year: flexibility. John Calipari is going to be able to bend and stretch his rotation to play about any kind of lineup you could ever want to play and do it with some serious, high level talent. Without further ado, let’s take a look at some lineups that we could see next year and some of the strengths and weaknesses of each:

The Starters

John Wall
Eric Bledsoe
Darius Miller
Patrick Patterson
DeMarcus Cousins

Wall, Miller, and Patterson are all but set to start in my mind, but I think this group of five is the most likely to take the floor against Morehead State in mid-November. It’s a bit non-traditional in that there are two point guards on the floor, but John Wall’s size and athleticism and Bledsoe’s build and athleticism allow each to guard a 1 or 2 if necessary.

The obvious strengths here are ball handling and passing. With how sketch the ball handling in the backcourt was for so much of last season, the upgrade is tremendous. Miller was arguably the best ball handler by the end of last year and he’s the tertiary ball handler in this lineup. Also, DeMarcus Cousins is very good on the dribble and as a passer for a big man, so it’s hard to see this group making many turnovers.

These five could also be a terror in a full court press. Wall and Bledsoe are about as quick as they come and Darius Miller’s length and athleticism would present some serious problems.

The only clear weakness you can point to is shooting. Miller is the best option from the perimeter and he was not consistent until the end of last season. I’ve said it before, but expect this kind of lineup to see zones over and over and over until Wall or Bledsoe shows an outside shot.

The Traditional

John Wall
Darnell Dodson
Darius Miller
Patrick Patterson
DeMarcus Cousins

This lineup features the traditional mold of two wing players with one point and presumably would not struggle as much against a zone (assuming Dodson can stroke it like he reportedly can). It could potentially be exposed by an opponent with two penetrating guards since Dodson and Miller could struggle against a smaller player.

If the starting lineup I offered earlier turns out to struggle due to lack of shooting in some games, this kind of lineup (with Wall and Bledsoe interchanging and Patterson, Cousins, and Daniel Orton splitting time) could be the one that becomes the default.

The Dribble-Drive Special

John Wall
Eric Bledsoe
Darnell Dodson
Darius Miller
Patrick Patterson

Darius Miller showed in New Zealand that he can play some post defense on a 4 man and John Calipari’s 4′s are typically called on to play more like 3′s. I think this is a lineup you will definitely see next year, especially with how many SEC teams play smaller, three guard lineups.

The rare team that has a traditional post up 4 man would be difficult to deal with for this lineup, but I think this group would play well together.

The Humvee

John Wall
Darius Miller
Patrick Patterson
DeMarcus Cousins
Daniel Orton

The dribble drive isn’t made for this kind of lineup, but if John Calipari wants to absolutely clean the glass, he could go with this group. Patterson will be called on to develop his ball skills and I’m sure Calipari will want him to be able to play like a 3 by the end of the year, so it’s not stretch to think he may be put in that spot. Besides, can you imagine Patterson posting up a small forward?

The weaknesses here are shooting and defensive matchups. Patterson would likely have some trouble playing his guy straight up on the dribble and Miller may struggle with a 2.

The Freshmen

John Wall
Eric Bledsoe
Jon Hood
DeMarcus Cousins
Daniel Orton

OK, you probably won’t see this lineup often, if ever, but I just wanted to remind you how good the freshman class is.

Veteran Presence

John Wall
Darius Miller
Ramon Harris
Patrick Patterson
Perry Stevenson

I haven’t included Stevenson or Harris in a lineup yet and I think we can expect Harris and Stevenson to get some time (especially Harris).

The Victory Lap

DeAndre Liggins
Jon Hood
Ramon Harris
Perry Stevenson
Josh Harrellson

Hopefully we’ll be seeing this group a bunch with 20+ point leads, with a little Dwight Perry or Mark Krebs sprinkled in.

The Billy G

Michael Porter
Jon Hood
Ramon Harris
Perry Stevenson
Daniel Orton

Ladies and gentleman, your starting lineup for the 2009-2010 Kentucky Wildcats had Billy Gillispie kept his job. I don’t even know, what’s the name of the tournament that teams that miss the NIT play in?  The CBI or something?

I just threw up in my mouth looking at that.

Things escalated and the authorities were involved. We do know, or at least we think we do, that there is an ongoing investigation into the matter, which supposedly also involves some Tennessee athletes who were in town for the weekend.

I’ve hesitated to post about this up to now because of the simple fact that there is absolutely no hard news. I haven’t wanted to take part in rumor mongering, but not acknowledging the rumors that are floating around would almost be misleading.

However, I don’t think it’s appropriate to spell out all the individual rumors that are around. These rumors have truly taken on a lives of their own. No mainstream media has said a thing about what’s going on because everybody is trying to figure it out. Therefore, it has become the biggest story that isn’t officially a story since I’ve been keeping tabs on UK sports.

At this point, there’s really nothing to do but wait. There’s really nothing to be gained other than personal pride from spreading rumors about this situation. So, until there is hard news to report, you will not read anything else on the Pinkie about it…unless rumors about Layla Kiffin somehow being involved start popping up.

Until then, we’ve got plenty of other stuff to talk about:

-Darius Miller is finally back in the Bluegrass with a gold medal around his neck. I’m sure he has plenty to say about his experiences in New Zealand and tomorrow we will have two chances to hear about them.

First, as Larry Vaught reports on his excellent Twitter account, Darius Miller will hold court at a press conference tomorrow to field questions about his time with the national team. Second, Miller and Ramon Harris will be available for questions from fans via live chat at 1 pm on UK’s official blog, Cat Scratches.

The Pinkie will have coverage of both tomorrow afternoon and evening, so be sure to check that out as well.

-We’ve been reporting on Jodie Meeks successes in Vegas summer league play, but ignoring the other two ‘Cats getting a chance to play:

Joe Crawford – Joe is on the Knicks roster and the Knicks have played only one game thus far. Crawford played 17 minutes in the team’s 90-86 loss to Memphis, scoring 10 points on 4-9 shooting to go along with 3 board.

Erik Daniels – The perennial D-League star is on the Memphis Grizzlies roster, but has yet to play in a game.

-Another story of interest to UK fans today was the news that former national champion Antoine Walker has run up $822,500 in gambling debt in Las Vegas.  Walker is still looking to continue his career in the NBA, but the three outstanding felony charges against him will not help his case. I hope that this is able to be resolved cleanly and without much trouble for either side, but this is not good.

One of the casinos where ‘toiney did his damage was Planet Hollywood, which happens to be where I will be staying when I head to Vegas in August. I’m definitely going to be playing some craps there and I think I will debut the Antoine Walker dice roll. I’m going to stand unnecessarily far away from the table and land both dice on the table about 32.5% of the time (that’s Antoine’s lifetime 3 point %).

-One more story that has been recent fodder for message boards is a potential new transfer to UK. I do not think there is any validity to this whatsoever, but John Calipari remove any reasonable doubt that he keeps track of what is being said online. Here is a series of tweets from the man himself:

If you believe things you are reading, you would think we have dozens of commitments already but we’re still evaluating talent.

It’s gratifying 2 know so many young men want 2 b part of what we’re building. We only pursue studnt-athletes who’ll contribute 2 our goals.

For anyone 2 say were taking transfers or have tons of commitments is disingenuous. Our style of play requires a deep and diverse roster.

The young men who wear the UK uniform are people who dream big dreams and understand that to go far, we must go together.

Calipari went out of his way to mention “transfers” and while he likely was referring to Elliot Williams, it’s still going to fuel speculation.

July recruiting in full swing – John Calipari and his staff were all over the place this week, evaluating many of UK’s top targets for the class of 2010 and beyond. Calipari has made his opinion of summer recruiting well known and he used Twitter to restate his views. Calipari takes part in summer recruiting only because he would lose ground to his competition if he did not.

Calipari says that eliminating the summer evaluation period would allow the power in recruiting to shift back to high school coaches instead of AAU coaches. The AAU system is responsible for so much of what is wrong with amateur sports. It is conducive to the culture of hangers on that so many athletes fall prey to. Additionally, freeing up coaches during the summer would allow coaches more time with their current players instead of future players and more time for family as well.

However, John Calipari takes full advantage of his opportunities to see top high school talent and to be seen by top high school talent. Perhaps the most intriguing development of the week was the fact that Calipari was seen rubbing shoulders with one LeBron James. Cal is not afraid to point to and take advantage of some of his high profile relationships to help himself in the recruiting game, and there’s really no better name to be associated with than LeBron.

UK is being mentioned by such a ridiculous volume of top names right now that it’s really not even worth it to run them down. Really, just look at any list of the top 50 in the country and you’ll have a pretty good idea who UK is after.

Jodie Meeks and the NBA – One piece of news that particularly excited me this week had to do with a player who won’t be on the roster next year. The man who made UK basketball remotely watchable in 2008-2009 signed a 3 year deal with the Milwaukee Bucks, 2 years of which are guaranteed.

This is really excellent news for a guy who was assured nothing after being passed over by every team that had a pick in the top 39 of the NBA Draft. Getting a deal like Jodie did as a second rounder is not too commonplace, so congrats to Meeks for getting this done.

Jodie promptly played a very efficient first 27 professional minutes in the Vegas summer league, scoring 14 points on 6-9 shooting in an ugly 65-59 game between the Bucks and Dallas Mavericks. He and Joe Alexander led the Bucks in scoring, but Joe Alexander needed twice as many shots to get his points.  Juan Palacios played 10 minutes but only put up one shot and did not score or get a rebound. The Bucks have 4 more summer league games and we will keep you updated on Jodie’s and Palacios’ play. 

Patterson and Orton bust it in California – Patrick Patterson and Daniel Orton still have about 2 weeks left of their workouts with Hell’s Trainer, Frank Matrisciano.  Accounts from the families of Orton and Patterson have been 100% postive to this point.  The two were already close and they should come back even closer…and without an ounce of fat on their frames. Also, neither the troublesome ankle of Patterson or the balky knee of Orton have presented any problems, which is great news.

Darius Miller grabs the gold – Darius was a key member of Team USA that won its first U19 World Championship since 1991. Darius wasn’t the go-to scorer and he didn’t get to play as many minutes as I’m sure he will this season, but he made a bunch of big plays, including 2 steals early in the 4th quarter of the gold medal game to help seal an 88-80 victory.

This is such a great experience for Darius. It’s an experience that will help him mesh well with a UK team next year that will be similarly talented. Darius did exactly what you would expect of him. He found a role and filled it very well. When he needed to get a basket, he got it. When his team needed a big rebound, block, steal, or assist, he got it. Miller got great reviews from his coaches and you always hear players talk about what a great experience it is to play for their country. Very few get the opportunity, so you have to feel good for Darius.

The next step for Miller will be bring that confidence he has built back home and also to use that confidence to grow into a more assertive scorer, because he is going to be UK’s best option as a wing scorer. I know I can’t wait to watch him play.

Darnell Dodson – Dodson is the one member of UK’s six man recruiting class that has not yet arrived on campus. There has been some speculation that he is facing some academic obstacles, but Calipari has said that Dodson will be in Lexington for the next summer session. Also, he was included on UK’s officially released roster, which should alleviate concern. This video has also been making the rounds this week, which shows Dodson in an excellent 32 point performance in which Dodson seems to be a very diverse scorer with a solid stroke, which will be a welcome addition to the roster.

We will follow all of the Summer Leagues and keep you posted on T-Will, Jodie Meeks and the rest of the local guys competing.

Indiana 75, NJ/PHI 67
T. Williams (NJ/Phi) – 35mins, 2pts (1-8, 0-1 3′s), 9reb (8def, 1off), 2ast, 2st, 2to, 3bl
Dionte Christmas (NJ/Phi) – 16mins, 2pts, 2reb, 1to
Tyler Hansbrough (Ind) – 25mins, 17pts (6-13, 5-8 ft), 5reb, 1ast, 3st, 2to, 1bl

Oklahoma City 88, Orlando 77
D.J. White (OKC) – 32mins, 13pts, 9reb
B.J. Mullens (OKC) – 22mins, 11pts, 3reb
James Harden (OKC) – 21mins, 17pts, 4reb

Boston 87, Utah 56
Chris Lofton (Bos) – 15mins, 8pts (2-4 3′s)
Derrick Brown (Utah) – 15mins, 9pts, 3reb

Also, the United States 19U squad defeated Puerto Rico 82-61 early Tuesday to move to the quarterfinals of the FIBA 19U World Championships. Howard Thompkins (Georgia) led the way with 14 point and nine rebounds while Gordon Hayward (Butler) had 11 points, seven rebounds, and three steals.

Darius Miller finished with four points, three rebounds, a steal and block in 17 minutes.

Consequently, I researched a little bit into how minutes were distributed for John Calipari’s last 4 teams as the head coach of the Tigers. What I found is that Calipari has been very consistent in the depth of his rotation and his starting lineup. I consider a player “in the rotation when he averages over 10 minutes per game and plays in a majority of the team’s games:

2008-2009:
-9 man rotation
-5 players started at least 27 of team’s 37 games
-Same 5 players averaged at least 25 mpg
-1 player averaged more than 30.2 minutes

2007-2008:
-9 man rotation
-5 players started at least 33 of team’s 40 games
-Same 5 players averaged at least 25 mpg
-No player played more than 29.5 mpg

2006-2007:
-8 man rotation
-5 players started at least 35 of team’s 37 games
-7 players played at least 20 mpg
-No player played more than 28 mpg

2005-2006
-9 man rotation
-6 players started at least 21 of team’s 37 games
-Each of those 6 played at least 21.1 mpg
-No player played more than 27.3 mpg

As you can see, Calipari has used a 9 man rotation in 3 of the past 4 seasons and has found a pretty consistent starting lineup by the end of each year. Calipari’s starters generally get the bulk of the minutes and the 3 or 4 players off the bench play around 15 minutes a game. Also, in 2008-2009 Calipari had 2 players play 30 minutes a game (Antonio Anderson and Robert Dozier), and that was the only time he had a player play that many minutes in the last 4 seasons.

I believe we can expect basically the same the same during the upcoming season. Let’s take a look at the 9 men who I believe will fit into this rotation. Players in bold are expected starters.

John Wall – G
Eric Bledsoe – G
Darius Miller – G/F
Patrick Patterson – F
DeMarcus Cousins – F/C
Daniel Orton – F/C
Ramon Harris – F
Darnell Dodson – G/F
DeAndre Liggins – G/F

The 3 players that I do not believe will factor into the rotation are Perry Stevenson, Josh Harrellson, and Jon Hood. I think each will get chances early in the year as Calipari learns his team, but I see the rotation shaking out like this.

Some will also argue against Ramon Harris factoring in the rotation, but Calipari has reportedly liked his defense. If you look at Calipari’s last 4 Memphis teams, it has been Antonio Anderson who has led the team in minutes the past 4 years. His defense got him minutes even though he average double figures just once. For this reason, I think you will see Ramon Harris on the court this year.

I also think DeAndre Liggins will be a part of the rotation because of his ability to play point guard in case Bledsoe and Wall are on the bench and the small forward position due to his size. I see him playing 15 minutes or so per game.

I also think that it is likely that 6 players on this years roster will play at least 20 minutes a game (5 starters plus Daniel Orton). You will notice that I include only 3 natural post players in the rotation. Patrick Patterson figures to play 30 minutes a game at either the 4 or 5 (maybe even the 3 from time to time), which leaves 50 minutes at those two positions. I think Orton and Cousins will get the vast majority of those minutes.

Also, people who have not been hearing reports about the pickup games in Lexington may be surprised to see Eric Bledsoe along John Wall in my forecasted backcourt. Bledsoe has been a revelation in these games, giving John Wall everything he wants and more. I think Bledsoe and Wall will be able to play very effectively together, although you have to imagine that a lineup with Wall and Bledsoe will see plenty of zone defense. That will put pressure on Darius Miller or whoever is playing the 3 to hit the outside shot. Even so, can you imagine a bigger upgrade in ballhandling in the backcourt from last season with these 2 playing together? Bring on the ball pressure!

Let’s take a look at how I see the minutes being divvied up at each position when UK plays a close game. Expect the 3 players not listed in the rotation to steal a minute or 2 here or there, but for simplicity’s sake I have excluded them.

PG – Wall (25), Bledsoe (10), Liggins (5)
SG – Bledsoe (13), Miller (10), Wall (5) Dodson (5), Liggins (7)
SF – Miller (15), Dodson (10), Liggins (7), Harris (8)
PF – Patterson (25), Cousins (5), Orton (5), Harris/Miller (5)
C – Cousins (17), Orton (17), Patterson (6)

Comment below if you disagree with any of this!