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Thanks for the question Coco, but can they be discussed on the offsite because I do not want others checking in to get any info.

Great questions DRoss. They have been discussed some but ill try to put it all together.

1. Each season might require different tactics based on the personnel we have in the pipeline. Currently we are very limited on our selection because of very similar skillset for all of our players. There is nothing to hide for this season and most likely best season. We will be primarily a LI team with some base offenses mixed in, including base, PTB, and isos. I want to work on training so that we have more player styles that can allow us different play styles, such as mixing inside and outside offenses. These offenses will become more clear at the beginning of each season where we, as a community, can decide what tactics we want to work with each season. This, of course, is dependent upon having a diverse pipeline which I will work to create.

2. I do want to plan when players are 18 or 19, however I will not make every player go the same way. I believe your player style stems from the types of skills he has when drafted. If I have a guard with good inside skills and outside I would advise for a hybrid guard. If I have a guard with good passing to start but very low shooting I will advise a LI pass first guard. Have good shooting but lower other skills I would suggest a pure SG. All is based on their starting skills so we have a diverse pipeline to use.

1. I probably won't. I don't think there has been a single manager who has intentionally tried to piece together a roster that suits more than one tactic without skimping on its effectiveness. You pick your best players for the main offense you want to run, and if those players happen to work well in a different tactic, than that's fantastic. More than one tactic has been played seemingly every season, but the chosen roster is best at only one tactic.

I REALLY hate all this talk about "we must be prepared because GDP...." and stuff of that nature(certainly not aimed at you. I have no idea if you were talking about GDP or not with this question). BB is a game with a ton of active variables, so altering how we run things because of an additional, new variable is not practical at all, until it is proven that GDP can size-ably alter the game. It would be like finding out this season a change has been made to make ID more effective, making LI/LP less effective, and then picking a roster for Motion/RnG, even though the LI/LP roster is better. You don't know exactly how much more effective ID is, and how much efficiency LI/LP lost. Same concept here.

2. I would absolutely like to plan a player from 18/19 to have a specialized role for the U21, and possibly NT. Like you said, the owners cooperation is critical. If they are not 100% convinced with the plan that I lay out for them, than they don't have to follow it, and it will not be held against them. If I was given 5 guards of similar talents and potential I would look over which one would have the easiest path to the specialized build(among other things like owner nationality, offsite participation, overall participation, and willingness). Having five guards of similar build at age 21 is useless. You don't want to ever have more than two players on the team, at any position, that have a similar build, because team effectiveness goes down (you wouldn't run a team with 5 PGs, 5 SGs, 5 PFs etc.). So if that happens, three managers who have trained their player very well are S.O.L.

Player skill diversity is critical. It gives you so many more options, and makes it so much easier to run a team.

Here is a question for all candidates:

If you weren't running in this election, who would you be voting for and why?

Isaiah. And for the record I hate these questions because they always make you feel like a jerk.

While he jokes a lot, and holds pride in being 2nd in 2nd place finishes in elections(behind your truly- suck it!), he would be a very great manager. While E.B.W. is seemingly the "hot" candidate, and has been more active and made more friends the last couple seasons, that doesn't mean he'd automatically be a great manager. Both Isaiah and I have, at one point or another, been the "hot" candidate but lost to the more experienced manager. And I don't know with 100% about Isaiah, but I'm sorta glad when Magiker beat me out, because there are some crazy things he did with the team that worked that I wouldn't have even considered, and that was mainly due to the experience he's had. He had been at the upper levels of BB longer, and had a better grasp about teams, and what this player will do if he's faced with a player just as good as him. Isaiah has done his due with being just as active with the NT on the offsite than on BB. You cannot expect managers like us to scout, gameplan, mentor, run our BB teams, and deal with real life for 10+ seasons. It's just not plausible, but I have no doubt in my mind he can run the hell out of this team for the next 7 months. He wouldn't be running if he didn't think he could devote the required time. I know that's why I'm seriously running this season. My schedule finally allowed it. If not I would be running, and Isaiah would just be jockeying for enough votes to get 2nd place so he could beat my record



Last edited by oriolekid at 12/30/2013 12:20:53 AM

Personally I would probably vote for oriolekid. I would vote for him, for the simple fact that I think he and I have more similar approaches than Isaiah and I have. I respect his opinions a ton, I just relate more with oriolekid's opinions I suppose. At the same time If I wasn't running I know a few of the other active U21 NT offsite users would then most likely run and I would feel more comfortable voting for A Warrior or Hunterz even over Isaiah and oriolekid.

A few questions for y'all,

1) This one's mainly for accountability sake but if you do not win the election, how will you continue to be involved with the U21 team?

2) Some of the candidates have mentioned getting more individuals involved in the USA offsite as a priority goal as manager, so do you think that's a priority and if so, how do you plan to do that?

3) Everyone has discussed diversifying the pipeline and the players developed. It's a great thing that everyone wants to do though i'm sure that's always been the case with past managers too so what would you implement that is different than what's already being done to actually make that happen?

4) This is to mainly everyone except E.B.W. as I don't believe this applies to him. I know that many of you have extensive experience on the offsite and assisting with the national teams, which is great, but am simply curious as to why you haven't been engaged with the U21 squad this past season until this election time came? Feel free to correct me if i'm wrong.

1) Regardless of whether I win the election or not I will still be on the offsite every week helping with game planning. This is both because I have Edju Palmer, who will be on the team, but also because I like our core planning group on there and love the discussions that take place.

2) Once the elections are over and I get some time on my hands, I plan on grabbing a few other people and posting offsite information again in all the league forums like we did awhile back. I this could easily attract at least an additional 10-15 people to the offsite.

3) The key is to get closer connected to the managers who are training them and keep in touch with them every week or two just to keep up with their planning and seeing what is going on. I feel like many times people train just whatever they want even if it is not beneficial to the U21 NT. this could probably be easily prevented by simply getting a closer relationship with the managers of the future players on the U21 NT. I plan on bbmailing a lot of them here and there so I can give advice and see if they would be more willing to create different players. If the U21 NT coach has a good relationship with the managers, the managers will want to help out the U21 NT more I believe.

4) it appears I am exempt from this question.

Last edited by E.B.W. at 12/30/2013 1:43:04 AM

This would be a tough decision based on the fact that we have two equal competitors with different strengths an weaknesses. If I had to choose though, it would have to be for Oriolekid. Reason being is that, while E.B.W is a great candidate and would do a great job, Oriolekid is a lot like myself in the fact that he has always run and came up just short. Manat elections he and I have run great campaigns only to get 2nd behind someone with more expierence. Just like E.B.W., I contributed a lot to season 18 for the U21 and was always discussing things in the game threads. I came out of that with expectations to have the edge on others, only to lose the election. I have also ran for U21 other times, only to be beat by managers who have been around longer. So while E.B.W would still be a great pick, I don't feel right picking him over Oriolekid.

1. I have lost more elections than I can count. I'm not going anywhere because I LOVE this game.

2. It's not a priority per se, since it's one of those things that will always be important, no matter how many new people you get to signup, so labeling it a priority is misleading, but it's important. it is mutually beneficial to all parties involved. If elected I'll post in every league forum(well d1-4 at least) telling them about the offsite and list some of those benefits. You can't force people to join, no matter how insanely talented their 18 yo is. And those managers would be getting a PM from me anyway. That's really all you can do.

3. This is a priority. My number 1 priority in fact. I will utilize my scouts heavily and after most of the 18 yos with the potential fir the u21 are discovered I will personally mentor those that I identify as candidates for a specialty build. These won't always be our top prospects upon first glance, and are often overlooked, but they are critically important.
That has never been done before.

4. It's just not practical to expect someone to be as active as E.B.W. has been the last 2 seasons for 10+ seasons. Not even some past managers are as active now as they once were. There was an election many seasons ago(18?) where I lost when I feel I was the most active candidate, but Magiker was the better manager. By far. Big difference between best candidate and best manager.

3) The key is to get closer connected to the managers who are training them and keep in touch with them every week or two just to keep up with their planning and seeing what is going on. I feel like many times people train just whatever they want even if it is not beneficial to the U21 NT. this could probably be easily prevented by simply getting a closer relationship with the managers of the future players on the U21 NT. I plan on bbmailing a lot of them here and there so I can give advice and see if they would be more willing to create different players. If the U21 NT coach has a good relationship with the managers, the managers will want to help out the U21 NT more I believe.

Follow-up questions,

1) How will you, if elected, as the U21 NT coach manage to do scouting, researching opponents and game planning along with handling so much correspondence with the managers of the 18, 19, 20 and 21 year olds who have a potential for U21?

2) How will you begin to identify which players you should even contact to be "created differently" or is that dependent on managers?