Calipari's Dog House

I played basketball for three years in high school and I understand what “being in the dog house” with the coach means. Usually for us on the team it meant getting less minutes and getting some bench time weather the team needed us or not, or maybe it would mean getting the cold shoulder and not getting the attention or the praise one was used to. Whatever it was it was made to motivate and teach.

With that being said I have never seen a dog house like John Calipari’s.

Whatever he does to these kids they always respond so well. See DeAndre Liggins, he never even played the first half of last year’s season because he was in the dog house. You remember the old Liggins, well actually you probably can’t because I literally only remember one play off the top of my head and that was his no look pass to Patterson against Tennessee two years ago. There was no flame, no fire and no desire like Liggins shows now. He still may not score in droves but he really disrupts the offense.

He was in the dog house, just like it is to be believed that Terrence Jones in currently in the head coaches dog house right now. Jones didn’t even start against Auburn. It came as odd to me when some was reporting it was because of the flu like symptoms he had the day before and didn’t practice and others were saying it was because he was in the “dog house” for not performing well enough. Even after his great performance off the bench Tuesday and his huge night from behind the line, Calipari said of Jones: “But to be honest with you, I’m sitting on the bench saying, ‘We’re not winning with him shooting 3s.’ He may shoot one, two or three, but that’s not why we win. We’ll win because he’ll rebound and score around the goals, he’ll score on drives, stick backs.”

I think we can all agree that Terrence Jones strength isn’t his post presence and it seems like he may not have one go to move in the paint like Patrick Patterson or DeMarcus Cousins, but it’s something he just has to work on if he wants to be good on the next level, and I think Calipari sees that.

If anything, whatever Calipari does to motivate these players in his dog house, usually works as we have seen in many cases, and it doesn’t hurt that Jones has a tremendous good attitude in working with his head coach. I noticed on Twitter once that Jones said he hopes Calipari isn’t hoarse (because he was sick) at the game because he wanted his coach yelling at him, pushing him to get better and even Calipari has said himself he believes Jones could be the best player in the country and he’s going to push him to do so.

This SEC stretch is going to be huge for Jones and I think we see a big difference in his play over the next couple of weeks, I’m going out on a guess here, but if Calipari can control Cousins, turn DeAndre Liggins into one of the best defenders and hustle players in America, then I think he can turn Terrence Jones into the best player in America and help develop him in the low post.

Whatever is in the Calipari doghouse…It seems to work.

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