Update: ACC Now has a couple of good pieces up. Caulton Tudor says this might hurt UNC down the line which is a good point. As much as we all like to think UNC should have 13 five star players on the roster, you can’t and players like the Wears would have been solid contributors and pieces to the puzzle for UNC as juniors and seniors.
Secondly, Robbi Pickeral talked to Scout.com’s Dave Telep who said Roy should consider calling 2010 PF Kadeem Jack who is ranked 43rd overall in the final Scout.com rankings. Jack is 6-8, 190 lbs and has offers from Arizona, UConn, Florida, Arkansas and Miami. The word is Jack might go to prep school to develop more. Jack is still developing but according to his profile, he is explosive, runs the floor well and can rebound. On the negative side Jack needs to work on his offense.
Adam Gold offers his take and suggest bubble wrap for Zeller.
Finally, the UNC players had a little fun with the Wears’ transfers which I personally think did not cast them in the best light. Yeah, I know they are just kids but herein lies the danger with Twitter and tossing crap out you probably would say if you were just hanging out together. Deon Thompson shut it down by saying “yall need to chill on that ish man…” If you don’t know what “ish” is then toss a “t” into the mix and rearrange the letters.
Original post after the jump.
That will wake you up.
According to the Long Beach Press-Telegram, David and Travis Wear have asked for a release so they can transfer from UNC.
Freshman basketball forwards David and Travis Wear - McDonald’s All-Americas and Best in the West selections as seniors at Mater Dei High – will not be returning to the University of North Carolina, their father told the Press-Telegram tonight.
Dave Wear said he discussed the decision with Tar Heels’ coach Roy Williams earlier in the evening by telephone and that he hoped that his sons would be released from their scholarship agreements with the school “as early as Thursday”.
Wear wouldn’t offer any details as to why the players (who took their last spring semester finals today) were making the move other than to say “they decided they didn’t want to return to North Carolina.
Based on Twitter traffic from the players, this is a complete shock to them. Kendall Marshall asked “What da hell is goin on?!” Ed Davis and John Henson called it unreal. Henson then turned an eye to the future:
its all good though, because now roy got room to bring a couple more thoroughbreds to the stable.
Larry Drew tossed in a rather humorous quip: “#gotTwins?”
My reaction is I hate to see any player leave UNC. I was not as down on the Wears as many of you were and figured at the very least they give you 10 minutes per game to augment team depth. Now that leaves you with Tyler Zeller and John Henson at the two frontcourt slots. It also means you will see plenty of Will Graves at the four and possibly some Harrison Barnes. Adam Gold with 99.9 The Fan thinks it will not hurt as much as people think:
blessing in disguise. Only issue is the inevitable injury to Tyler Zeller.
smaller team won’t hurt them. Barnes, graves, Henson and zeller is enough. A lot of size will bother them, but who has it?
I would say that a physical team will hurt them but that was going to be the case anyway. Since the team will indeed be smaller and we know Zeller can run the floor there is only one thing to do here. Run, baby! Jacking up the tempo can negate any advantage physical teams might have and UNC has the horses to run with the three freshman along with the remaining team. The main question is whether Larry Drew and Kendall Marshall can cut down on the turnovers. If they can do that, UNC will be fine providing Zeller stays healthy. If not then it will get really dicey.
Two other salient points on this:
1. John Henson is correct. Roy Williams now has scholarship flexibility going forward. UNC was in the hole with the offer to Austin Rivers now they have on in the pocket for 2011. UNC still has a few more irons in the fire for 2011 which they have not moved much due to the lack of scholarships. Among the big men available in 2011 are Marshall Plumlee and Cody Zeller. Roy could also hold onto the scholarship and look to 2012 to build a solid class there.
2. The Wears were Roy’s fifth and sixth recruits from the state of California. As C.Michael pointed out on email three of the six have now transferred back home after 1-2 seasons. The other three were Quentin Thomas, Deon Thompson and Larry Drew. Drew and Thomas both were possible transfers at some point in their careers. Deon Thompson is the only one who came and stayed four years without a peep of dissatisfaction. Being a three year starter probably had something to do with that. Roy’s penchant for going after CA kids goes back to his Kansas days when it was natural to recruit in almost any direction since Lawrence was in the middle of the freaking country. It is carried over to UNC which is fine but with a 50% transfer rate among native Californian recruits(which could have easily been 5 of 6) it might be time to evaluate whether or not using scholarships on anyone but elite players from the West coast is worth it. Three thousand miles is a long way from home for someone to be a role player or see limited time on the court. That is why people were shocked Thomas hung around all four years(and boy are we glad he did.) In the future I would not be shocked to see Roy only go after top flight players from the other side of the country(like Marvin Williams) Those types of players will play more and also leave early for the NBA negating a desire to transfer.
More on this when UNC makes it official.
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I thought Travis could develop and David had a shot. However, why didn’t they make this known earlier so Roy could actually recruit someone else for this season? That is the only part of this situation that ticks me off. Good riddance.
While I won’t go so far as to say good riddance, I agree, why didn’t they make this decision sooner to give Roy a chance to recruit their replacements this year?
This makes me really sad. I liked the Wears a lot. I was looking forward to seeing them develop in to impact players. I wish them all the luck. Hate to see them go.
Alex Stepheson didn’t make his announcement until May 17 two years ago, so maybe there is some sort of policy that transfers are not announced until after classes and exams are over.
^but didn’t his have to do with an illness in his family?
^Yes, and I am not comparing the two reasons for transferring, but his father’s illness was not something that came up suddenly. You will recall that he missed two games in January to go back to be with him, so you have to suspect that the notion of transferring at least started then, if not sooner. My only question is whether there is a standing policy at UNC under Roy for announcing when a player is transferring, or if this is just a coincidence.
well regardless, are we going after anyone for next season? Also, I’ve read rumors about Mcadoo coming early is that even possible?
2 reason I like this move
1. The wears were not ACC caliber, and couldnt handle the pressure of playing for UNC. They stole minutes from John all season.
2. Roy will have less players next year, which should do away with the crazy sub patterns, and force him to play Barnes, Henson, and Zeller 25-30 minutes. Zeller cant get hurt though.
i hate to hear this since i think they would develop into solid 4 year players. now, we’re hurting for big men next season, especially if tyler gets hurt again. any chance we bring in a big body for 2010-11?
were we still in the hole going after austin rivers even w ed’s departure? i guess it was a safe play that ed would have left following his jr year if he did come back one more year. p.s. did he officially hire an agent yet
“well regardless, are we going after anyone for next season? Also, I’ve read rumors about Mcadoo coming early is that even possible?”
First question: All the T100 players are accounted for, so I would hope that Roy didn’t add someone just to add another body. Doing that in the past is part of the reason UNC struggled this year (i.e. only one scholarship available for what would have been this year’s junior class). Terrence Jones apparently de-committed from UW the other day, but that would be a REAL long shot.
Second question: I’m pretty sure that is just a baseless rumor. That’s not something you do at the spur of the moment and I assume he would have had to re-arrange his schedule this year to make sure he got all of his coursework in. Additionally, he missed a good chunk of the season with a broken wrist, so it is probably in UNC’s best interest to have him play a full senior year, anyway.
Losing Larry would of hurt this team a lot more. Roy has hit homers with Marvin, Tyler, Wayne and Tywon, and laid some eggs with QT and the Wears, it happens.
Just think twice Roy before you go out west, Role players dont want to seat the bench 3000 miles away from home.
Just excited about next year,
People think McAdoo can pull an Andre Dawkins and come a year ahead of time forgetting that Dawkins should have finished HS in 2009 anyway. He ended up being a year behind because he changed high schools after his freshman year. The requirement is four years of HS English, as far as I know McAdoo has not finished four years of English nor could he between now and August.
As for a 2010 guy, Dave Telep thinks UNC should make a run at Kadeem Jack who is ranked 43rd overall by Scout.com He is actually thinking about prep school for development reasons.
I would be EXTREMELY skeptical of Jack. Scout is the only service that has him ranked in the Top 100. Rivals puts him outside the Top 150 and Gibbons doesn’t have him in the Top 200.
Hard to read how big an impact this will have, because the Wears aren’t a huge loss, except with all the injuries to the big men, someone needs to be in the lineup when injuries mount up. Hopefully that won’t happen again.
The impact this has to the rotation may be minimal – if Barnes starts, and Henson is at the 4, Graves would probably be the first sub at both positions like Strickland was at the 1 and 2 last year. The Wears probably saw their 10mpg average dropping to 0mpg. So the transfer, like Julius Mays leaving State, is the result of a more talented group taking minutes away, so that’s a good situation.
Now this year feels even more like one of the Doh years… The Wear twins looked out of place (talent wise) from day one, but its never a good sign when you lose 17 games and then have two players who you recruited just 12 months ago transfer.
Regarding Kadeem Jack – do we really want another post player who weights less then 200 pounds?
Maybe there’s a JUCO guy out there we don’t know about. If they do go after someone for this year I hope its a big body guy that likes to play physical down low.
The heels are looking like a pro team, with the roster TO next year,
out goes: deon/Marcus and number 2 (graduation), Ed goes pro, and Wears transfer
in comes: Barnes, Bullock, and Marshall.
3 starting spots open next year. Hopefully Bullock can scratch the starting spot, he swag is something this team desperately needs.
Maybe this is what the team needs after this year, but Henson tweet seems to insinuate that he doesnt think they will miss the Wears_ its all good though, because now roy got room to bring a couple more thoroughbreds to the stable.
Sounds like the Wears’ game wasnt respected by the team, and Henson is the new leader of these heels, so if he is cool, the team will be cool with it.
This a challenge to Roy. Let’s see if he can retool his entire system exclusively around guard play. This team can still be good if they play within their limitations. There are 9 good players on this team, the same number of players fielded by Duke throughout the year in 2009-10. In fact in our 2008-09 run we played with 8 players.
If this allows the Heels to play a more up-tempo run and gun type of offense it will please Roy and a majority of fans, including me. This can be a win-win situation for the Heels and for the Wear twins. Only time and a new season will tell but I am optomistic that the coming season will be a very good one. Go Heels!!
Hopefully UNC athletics will curb the use of twitter, it isnt a good look for players and the university. Things get taken out of context, and then posted on wral.com for all the ABC’ers to post 100 + comments bashing the heels. Less twitting more practicing.
I’ll be curious to watch over the coming days and months for the reasons behind the transfer. Beyond the “official” statements that will be polite but pretty uninfomative, I wonder if the Wears’ father is pulling the strings. Are they homesick? Are they chasing more playing time? What’s really going on? We’ll just have to wait and see. They seem like decent kids and I wish them well.
Agreed PRGuy, seems a little weird their dad asked for the “release to transfer”…aren’t they old enough/mature enough to ask the coach themselves?
Doesn’t seem likely they would leave due to playing time…they had to know coming in, who was returning, who was being recruited, etc…
I can buy into the “homesickness” thing a little bit, but they knew going in how afar they would be, I know it’s different when you’re away from home, so anything is possible…
Just seems there is more to the story…
I also wish them well.
This really came out of nowhere. I’d love to know why they are transferring. Carolina will still be good with Henson and Zeller, but I wish the Wear twins would still be around to give them both breathers during games. I hope the Heels aren’t cursed with injuries again.
Comments from Roy…didn’t see the transfer coming…
http://sports.espn.go.com/los-angeles/news/story?id=5167323
^well there goes the wait till May to announce it theory.
Not good in any way. It verifies and magnifies Roy’s recruiting failure of last year. Roy has had a great run, but is he Dean or are we seeing a decline along the lines of Denny Crum or Ray Meyer? I think the former, but his work is just getting tougher every day. Henson and Zeller are both foul prone, Zeller can’t stay healthy, Henson can’t shoot. An injury to either one could send us to the NIT or worse. Huge pressure on Barnes and Bullock to be spectacular.
we’re doomed, Roy can’t coach, Henson and Zeller will foul out every game. NIT again next year.
What a difference a year makes.
The Wears were not good basketball players, just watch the games last year, they hurt the team more then helped.
I need a post from william to set everyone straight. Roy missed with the Wears, and it helps both parties if they part ways before they dont have any eligibility left.
I still don’t understand the hand-wringing on missing the Wears. David Wear probably wouldn’t have played much after surgery, which just leaves Travis. So tell me what more could Roy have done with 10 players that he cannot do with 9 quality players?
Heck we won the NC with a 8 man rotation for most of the year!!
all in all i have to agree that their parting ways is good for the program. i would have whole heartedly disagreed before this season, b/c i could see them as solid, useful role playerse as juniors or seniors. but if the whole “favorites” and grading out in practice thing happens in a way that it happened this year and we saw both wears play in heavy rotation next year, i’d be eating my words. so, assuming they both grade well in practice, i guess it’s good to see them go. i hate seeing anyone go, makes me wonder what we’re doing wrong. not that they were stars. oh well, what i do like is that this means graves is THE big man reserve. thus we have no chance of seeing him start at the 2 or 3 giving more room to the trio to dex/bullock/barnes (in reverse order really).
more playing time for our top talent can’t hurt.
ap1,
Seriously?
You need a vacation.
“Roy has had a great run, but is he Dean or are we seeing a decline along the lines of Denny Crum or Ray Meyer”
Didn’t Dean Smith go to 3 Final Fours in 6 years prior to retiring… and leave Bill Guthridge with a team that went to another Final Four? If that is the definition of “decline”, then please, bring on the decline.
UNC could still make a run at Terrence Jones. Jones feels like he committed to UW too quickly.
)
I would love Terrence Jones on the team, but he never had any relationship of any sort with the coaching staff. So these expectations are unrealistic at this point.
No, seriously, THF. Roy is one for five on this year’s freshman class. That leaves a hole that is tough to fill. He can do it, but no way is it a one year project. Unless you do a Calipari, a massive gag on recruiting, particularly with a big class, causes serious trouble. Plus, I AM on vacation. Maybe that is the problem!
^ its basketball not football, one person can make a huge difference, and Roy got that one person. His name is Harrison Barnes.
Larry, Dex, John, and Tyler are instantly better when Harrison is on the floor with them. He has an NBA game, and wont have to change his game to the college competition. PJ Carlesomo made that point during the Nike Summit game.
Again the wears didnt fit UNC style, and now McDonald can get to see the court, who’s upside is higher than either the Wears.
1. You would announce now as classes are over and everyone is headed out. I walked through campus today and everyone was busy getting their pictures in front of the old well, loading up cars and just generally getting out of town. The graduation platform is already set-up in Kenan even. Why would you announce before end of classes then have to endure the questions, taunts and general pain of everyone wanting to know why or just being an ****** about it.
2. Gloom and Doom scenario, sorry AP1, it’s not like you can ignore the years Roy was at Kansas and the success he had their much less the two National Championships he has at UNC. Obviously last year was a big change and something Roy never experienced at Kansas either.
Best moments of this post – someone asking for william to post – he would bring the detail to be sure. As for me, I’d like to see Rath68 with a post, come back to us Rath, come back.
Go Heels!
What happened here was the last time Roy talked to the Wears, they probably asked Roy about playing time. They knew what the future held for them. When Roy told them what they already knew, it was time for a change for them. I really feel sorry for the kids. I dont think it was there fault that they got little PT. Hard to adjust or learn to play when you’re thrown in and EXPECTED to PREFORM RIGHT THEN or sit on the bench. You mark my words that we’ll be seeing them on sportscenter before there college days are over. Some team will be glad to watch them develope on there side. Plus when they transfer don’t they have to sit a year? If they stay until they graduate they’d be a year up on everybody…..
It sure would be nice if Lebo could talk them Wears into coming to ECU.
I realize it is between Kentucky and Washington, but didn’t Roy come out of no where to steal Harrison Barnes from Duke? I am sure previously playing with Barnes may help Terrence Jones in his decision making when it comes to UNC. They can play in the same frontcourt. However, Jones isn’t a true post player. He is a combo forward and will be looking to start whichever team he chooses.