2022 4* C Sage Tolentino Commits to Cincinnati

[johnjacob 44]

1 hour ago, e808 said:

This reminds me of the other highly touted kid that was committed to Auburn for a while and then the Person scandal hit and he ended up at Kentucky. If my memory serves me right he didnt do much at Kentucky. Auburn was just fine without him. I believe his name was EJ Montgomery. Correct me if I am wrong.

And don't forget the local PF/C that spurned AU for UNC. I bet he did not enjoy  that 17 point beat down Coach P's team put on his team. 

Edited June 23, 2021 by johnjacob

[Dual-Threat Rigby 8,649]

6 hours ago, johnjacob said:

I see your point, but this is not Gusball recruiting or that two bball coaches we had before Coach BP, who just made excuses for why they could not attract topnotch talent--- this is PEARLBALL. AU is a hot place to be right now with Bball players. 

Guys who recruit better than Pearl don’t just lose out on kids they’ve pushed hard for for 2 years and it results in a collective dismissal. Sage would’ve been the second highest center Auburn has gotten (Austin Wiley was rated as a PF) by 247 ever…that’s not nothing 

Not to mention, they’re at risk of losing 3 guys in a worst case scenario (not counting transfers), and all 3 of those are front court guys, and you have no commits now, so there’s a good bit of ground that one would have to make up 

[tgrogan21 6,198]

Some of you guys are sounding very bammerish when they talk about losing out on recruits. You don't lose a guy you've recruited for multiple years, a 4*, and one who is constantly getting praised and seems to be on the rise and say, "no big loss". This sucks and I'm hoping that he will visit again and Pearl can possibly recruit him back to AU.

 

[johnjacob 44]

On 6/23/2021 at 2:47 AM, Dual-Threat Rigby said:

Guys who recruit better than Pearl don’t just lose out on kids they’ve pushed hard for for 2 years and it results in a collective dismissal. Sage would’ve been the second highest center Auburn has gotten (Austin Wiley was rated as a PF) by 247 ever…that’s not nothing 

Not to mention, they’re at risk of losing 3 guys in a worst case scenario (not counting transfers), and all 3 of those are front court guys, and you have no commits now, so there’s a good bit of ground that one would have to make up 

Please tell us, who recruits better than Pearl that does not cheat. Pearl built AU basketball into a Final Four team. Roy Willimans could not have done that without cheating, which he had to do at UNC. Calipari (a nice guy, but a super cheater) could not do it. Sage is a decent big man, but once again he is ONLY the 15th highest rated center in his class and ya'll act like the current players can't improve. Cardwell will improve, Stretch will improve. AU will be OK with or without Sage. I am not going to start declaring the sky is falling, because he could not stick to his word when some other schools showed him some attention. 

Edited June 24, 2021 by johnjacob

[e808 3,025]

5 minutes ago, johnjacob said:

Please tell us, who recruits better than Pearl that does not cheat. Pearl built AU basketball into a Final Four team. Roy Willimans could not have done that without cheating, which he had to do at UNC. Calipari (a nice guy, but a super cheater) could not do it. Sage is a decent big man, but once again he is ONLY the 15th highest rated center in his class and ya'll act like the current players can't improve. Cardwell will improve, Stretch will improve. AU will be OK with or without Sage. I am not going to starting declaring the sky is falling, because he could not stick to his word when some other schools showed him some attention. 

Well said. Like I mentioned earlier the young man made a decision very early in the process. I believe he has the attention of the school that he really wanted to attend. Its great to have a big but as we can see u need good guards and long athletic wings. AU will be just fine. 24/7 has him as a 4* but rivals has him as a 3*.

[steeleagle 2,945]

38 minutes ago, e808 said:

Well said. Like I mentioned earlier the young man made a decision very early in the process. I believe he has the attention of the school that he really wanted to attend. Its great to have a big but as we can see u need good guards and long athletic wings. AU will be just fine. 24/7 has him as a 4* but rivals has him as a 3*.

I don't think when we question losing a good recruit and a big, then it doesnt mean that we think we will not be ok in recruiting. We trust Pearl's recruiting...

But if we needed good guards and long athletic wings, then why was Pearl going after Sage? And trust me, regardless if he was a 3* or 4* going into his SR year, it never hurts to have a rim protector in the middle. 

Nobody's lamenting the loss as much as we did guys like Green, etc..who were bonified studs.

But when Pearl wanted him, offered and received a commitment from him, then evidently he was always perceived as a want.

[gravejd 3,269]

8 hours ago, tgrogan21 said:

Some of you guys are sounding very bammerish when they talk about losing out on recruits. You don't lose a guy you've recruited for multiple years, a 4*, and one who is constantly getting praised and seems to be on the rise and say, "no big loss". This sucks and I'm hoping that he will visit again and Pearl can possibly recruit him back to AU.

 

Dude you are getting way too upset over one guy who was still a year out from actually signing with us. Yes i think he is a good prospect and yes i would be glad if he decided to re-commit and come to AU. But do you understand the kind of prospects AU has missed on lately??

Green, Kuminga (sp?), Scoot, Kessler (once ).......have all been considered AU locks or damn close. That is some major talent right there. And you know what? AU is set up to have a very exciting team next season. Did it suck to miss on those guys...yes it did. Losing Green was actually a big deal cause it was so late and we could not find a replacement. 

Losing Sage a year out from signing day is not a big deal because he can be replaced. It sucks but nothing to get all upset about. AU will be fine

[tgrogan21 6,198]

1 hour ago, gravejd said:

Dude you are getting way too upset over one guy who was still a year out from actually signing with us. Yes i think he is a good prospect and yes i would be glad if he decided to re-commit and come to AU. But do you understand the kind of prospects AU has missed on lately??

Green, Kuminga (sp?), Scoot, Kessler (once ).......have all been considered AU locks or damn close. That is some major talent right there. And you know what? AU is set up to have a very exciting team next season. Did it suck to miss on those guys...yes it did. Losing Green was actually a big deal cause it was so late and we could not find a replacement. 

Losing Sage a year out from signing day is not a big deal because he can be replaced. It sucks but nothing to get all upset about. AU will be fine

Again, sounding very bammerish. That's the type of stuff they say when they miss out on recruits. "We didn't want them" "They're not good enough" "We have way more better recruits lined up."

Will Auburn be fine in the long run? Obviously. But to sit there and to say that having a guy who was committed for as long as Sage was, in basketball no less, who just decides to re-open his commitment isn't a big deal is very stupid. Players decommitting doesn't happen very often in basketball and just like @Dual-Threat Rigbyhas been saying, we're potentially losing a lot of our front court. Having a highly rated big man committed is a big thing. We currently have no one committed. I trust Pearl and I know we'll be fine but I'm not gonna be like a lot of you guys and keep down playing this as some walk-on or 1* nobody.

[augolf1716 21,101]

Better to do it now then closer to signing day

[Dual-Threat Rigby 8,649]

5 hours ago, johnjacob said:

Please tell us, who recruits better than Pearl that does not cheat.

Oh brother 

[Dual-Threat Rigby 8,649]

5 stars are committing to Auburn, AL entirely by the book and no “illegal” influences are at play 

5 stars are committing to the top 4 school with arguably the best sports color ever in arguably the best basketball conference sponsored by the best player ever and Roy Williams, arguably their best head coach ever (fairly contentious I get it) HAS to cheat. 
 

6.5x as many first rounders as we have, 22 more 1st rounders than we have total draft picks…and Roy HAS to cheat. But Bruce doesn’t.

[Dual-Threat Rigby 8,649]

They produced MICHAEL JORDAN man. Cmon now. 

[johnjacob 44]

3 minutes ago, Dual-Threat Rigby said:

5 stars are committing to Auburn, AL entirely by the book and no “illegal” influences are at play 

5 stars are committing to the top 4 school with arguably the best sports color ever in arguably the best basketball conference sponsored by the best player ever and Roy Williams, arguably their best head coach ever (fairly contentious I get it) HAS to cheat. 
 

6.5x as many first rounders as we have, 22 more 1st rounders than we have total draft picks…and Roy HAS to cheat. But Bruce doesn’t.

Someone has forgotten the "fake classes at UNC" scandal. That is called cheating. Or what he did at Kansas. https://billingsgazette.com/sports/kansas-admits-ncaa-violations-under-roy-williams/article_a485bfe9-8bfd-560f-943d-14f0393f457b.html

So are you sure you want to defend Roy Williams now? LOL

[Dual-Threat Rigby 8,649]

1 minute ago, johnjacob said:

Someone has forgotten the "fake classes at UNC" scandal. That is called cheating. Or what he did at Kansas. https://billingsgazette.com/sports/kansas-admits-ncaa-violations-under-roy-williams/article_a485bfe9-8bfd-560f-943d-14f0393f457b.html

So are you sure you want to defend Roy Williams now? LOL

You missed 90% of my point

I didn’t reject the notion that Roy does cheat, insinuating he has to cheat to get talent to UNC when Bruce doesn’t to get guys to Auburn was my point. We have instances of violations here too, that are considered acts of Bruce Pearl cheating by people outside of Auburn. People, many not all, consider Bruce Pearl a cheater and have for a while. 

I don’t personally care about cheating, but there’s two fallacies with what you’re presenting to me 

[johnjacob 44]

The truth is Pearl's offense does better when it can spread out a defense by forcing them to defend all 5 players on the perimeter due to solid 3 pt shooting which then opens up lanes to the basket for drives and one on one post up like Chuma tearing UNC a new one in 2019. Sage will be a good college bball player, but he was not going to come in a dominate as a freshman. He would have to be developed like Cardwell and Stretch are being developed now. Stretch has looked much better offensively in practices this summer. It would have been great to have a third C of Sage's size and potential on the roster, but he chose to go elsewhere so here is to coach P getting the player that really wants to be at AU and have success. 

[johnjacob 44]

15 hours ago, Dual-Threat Rigby said:

Guys who recruit better than Pearl don’t just lose out on kids they’ve pushed hard for for 2 years and it results in a collective dismissal. Sage would’ve been the second highest center Auburn has gotten (Austin Wiley was rated as a PF) by 247 ever…that’s not nothing 

Not to mention, they’re at risk of losing 3 guys in a worst case scenario (not counting transfers), and all 3 of those are front court guys, and you have no commits now, so there’s a good bit of ground that one would have to make up 

I am biased against Roy, because I don't like him personally. Calipari is as much if not more of scheister salesman as Roy, but Calipari does not come off near as full of himself as Roy, who NEVER coached anywhere, but at Blue Blood schools, where advantages where built in. 

[gravejd 3,269]

1 hour ago, tgrogan21 said:

Again, sounding very bammerish. That's the type of stuff they say when they miss out on recruits. "We didn't want them" "They're not good enough" "We have way more better recruits lined up."

Will Auburn be fine in the long run? Obviously. But to sit there and to say that having a guy who was committed for as long as Sage was, in basketball no less, who just decides to re-open his commitment isn't a big deal is very stupid. Players decommitting doesn't happen very often in basketball and just like @Dual-Threat Rigbyhas been saying, we're potentially losing a lot of our front court. Having a highly rated big man committed is a big thing. We currently have no one committed. I trust Pearl and I know we'll be fine but I'm not gonna be like a lot of you guys and keep down playing this as some walk-on or 1* nobody.

If not fretting over losing talented commits because I’m confident the coaches will sign other talented guys makes me “bammerish” then I cannot wait to be bammerish about football recruiting as well. 

[Rednilla 5,383]

17 hours ago, gravejd said:

If not fretting over losing talented commits because I’m confident the coaches will sign other talented guys makes me “bammerish” then I cannot wait to be bammerish about football recruiting as well. 

Truthfully, he's not wrong in his description...but the thing is that, like you said, we're getting to the point that we can genuinely trust that our coach knows what's up and is either prepared for this already or can readily adapt.

But at the same time, losing a 7 footer who can hit from all over the floor and is shooting up the boards hurts any way you look at it. We'll be okay, to be sure, but it's not so easy to replace guys like this, so being concerned is not unwarranted.

[johnjacob 44]

18 hours ago, Dual-Threat Rigby said:

You missed 90% of my point

I didn’t reject the notion that Roy does cheat, insinuating he has to cheat to get talent to UNC when Bruce doesn’t to get guys to Auburn was my point. We have instances of violations here too, that are considered acts of Bruce Pearl cheating by people outside of Auburn. People, many not all, consider Bruce Pearl a cheater and have for a while. 

I don’t personally care about cheating, but there’s two fallacies with what you’re presenting to me 

Show me a PROVEN example of Bruce cheating that helped AU. The Chuck stuff was paying players to LEAVE AU not sign with AU. And every 5 star that has signed with Bruce at AU has been from a family that is upper middle class or wealthy. Cooper's family is rich. Okoro's family is well off and upper middle class. Same with Smith's and Kessler's. So they are all from families not desperate for money and most likely of sound moral standing. 

Edited June 24, 2021 by johnjacob

[Dual-Threat Rigby 8,649]

The guy started making excuses and conditionals mid post, what’s the point of me continuing to argue lol

[cole256 17,042]

Man....

[AUBwins 10,070]

On 6/24/2021 at 11:50 AM, Rednilla said:

Truthfully, he's not wrong in his description...but the thing is that, like you said, we're getting to the point that we can genuinely trust that our coach knows what's up and is either prepared for this already or can readily adapt.

But at the same time, losing a 7 footer who can hit from all over the floor and is shooting up the boards hurts any way you look at it. We'll be okay, to be sure, but it's not so easy to replace guys like this, so being concerned is not unwarranted.

I wanted to keep him too because I was darn proud that we were on this guy before his rise.  

[AUGoo 2,659]

On 6/23/2021 at 11:39 AM, e808 said:

Well said. Like I mentioned earlier the young man made a decision very early in the process. I believe he has the attention of the school that he really wanted to attend. 

What School is that?

[fishepa 1,901]

Every time I see a thread bumped in the bball forum I cringe opening it because someone has decommitted.

[abw0004 10,109]

On 6/23/2021 at 5:44 PM, Dual-Threat Rigby said:

5 stars are committing to Auburn, AL entirely by the book and no “illegal” influences are at play 

5 stars are committing to the top 4 school with arguably the best sports color ever in arguably the best basketball conference sponsored by the best player ever and Roy Williams, arguably their best head coach ever (fairly contentious I get it) HAS to cheat. 
 

6.5x as many first rounders as we have, 22 more 1st rounders than we have total draft picks…and Roy HAS to cheat. But Bruce doesn’t.

I love Bruce but let's get out from under the FBI investigation for cheating before we say we never cheat.    It also didn't look good aesthetics-wise that while still under investigation a few years ago Bruce hired Ira Bowman who was under investigation for cheating at Penn State as well.