Bobby Frasor Update

Ready to return.

According to Inside Carolina, Bobby Frasor has been cleared by the doctors to start playing basketball again and will soon be jumping into the regular pickup games.

“I just met with the doctor today and he said I’m good to go,” Frasor said at the Smith Center after a late afternoon weight room session. The 6-foot-3 rising senior has been formally cleared to return to the court, six months after suffering a torn left anterior cruciate ligament back on Dec. 27.

“Of course I’m not going to jump right into five-on-five,” said Frasor, who averaged 3.0 points and 2.2 assists in his shortened 2007-08 season. “I’ve been shooting and cutting before, but I’m probably going to just start playing one-on-one and two-on-two and gradually get back into the flow of things.”

His rehabilitation proceeded right on schedule and he’ll soon be joining the team’s offseason pick-up games. And with the start of practice more than three months away, he’ll be at full speed in time for preseason conditioning.

“I’m feeling as strong as I ever have,” Frasor said. “They always say [an injury] makes you stronger and I think I’ve worked a lot and put a lot of time into this. Hopefully things will go perfect next year and I can go out on a high note.”

As for whether this is is last season, they are still waiting to hear about a potential fifth season of eligibility.

“It still hasn’t been sent to the NCAA,” Frasor explained. “It has to go through the ACC first – they have all the letters. I wrote a letter, my parents wrote a letter, Coach Williams wrote a letter. They got all the statistics: missed 10 games [sophomore] year, 27 games my junior year. You throw all that together and see what the NCAA says.”

There’s no timetable for a verdict on the appeal. All Frasor can do is wait – and prepare for what may or may not be his final year in Chapel Hill.

“They don’t know – it could be one month, three months, six months, I could find out during the season,” he said. “That’s why it’s tough; I don’t know if I’m going to be graduating. I just wish they would tell me.

This is what drives me crazy about the NCAA. Why is this even going through the ACC? If the NCAA is the final word on such decisions let’s cut through the red tape and send it up the line to Indianapolis. I also do not understand why it takes so long to decide something of this nature. It is simple. The player has missed a season’s worth of games in two years, he meets all the other requirements except the games played the season he was out with the knee. Why someone cannot review his case and make a decision in a timely manner reeks of stupidity on the part of the NCAA. End rant mode.

Frasor’s presence on this team is huge. It was huge last season but with Quentin Thomas gone and Larry Drew being a freshman, Frasor will need to give 10-12 minutes a game as Ty Lawson’s backup. Frasor also has the highest basketball IQ on the team, he obviously has a coaches’ mind and having that kind of voice on the court in key situations is a major asset to a team that struggled with it’s defense at times. Winning a national title team is all about every player filling a role.  Much attention is paid to guys like Tyler Hansbrough, Lawson, Wayne Ellington and Danny Green for the prominent contributions they make.  The little things you get from Frasor, Marcus Ginyard, Deon Thompson, Will Graves and the incoming freshman do not make headlines but you cannot win a title without them.

Welcome back Bobby…

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