Christion Thompson

[the_one_mike]

My cohorts of KeaneyBlue... it's now officially never to early to start talking about next year. I'm excited. And I think this is topic #1 that isn't getting enough love on this forum: CT25.

Of all the posts I I have read on other threads here predicting and projecting next year's starting lineup, I'd say maybe 25% make mention of Christion as a starter next year. I'm here to tell y'all... take that shit to the bank -- he starts every game he's healthy for the rest of his Rhode Island career. And based on the lack of love here, I think some of you are going to be pleasantly surprised what we had under our noses this whole time...

His career shooting numbers show far worse than he actually is -- I liken this to Fatts' numbers from this year. He had a stretch through conference play where he looked rushed, out of place and his shot wasn't falling. His percentages are pretty bad because of that but I think any one of us would be hard pressed to argue that he isn't lethal from the floor.

Christion, to me, is no different. As a freshmen he averaged over 18 minutes a game, contributing to an offense that had lost EC and never recovered mentally or emotionally the entire year. His numbers may be less than stellar but you cannot put a number on intangibles. He brought a calming and fundamental presence to the floor that we needed at the time...

Because of the log jam at guard we haven't seen many stretches with both him and Dowtin on the floor and BOY am I excited to see that. Fatts, Dowtin, and CT all have "it" -- we all know what "it" is but you just can't quite define it. The basketball sixth sense. Being in the right place at the right time and ready to execute while you're at it.

Coming back as a 4th year junior with two seasons to play, I see his role being nearly identical to that of Stan Robinson this year. Energy, leadership, defense... but much more comfortable with the ball in his hands and the ability to create for others. Replicating Stan's ability to play passing lanes won't happen, but offensively CT, in my opinion, will end up being a big time upgrade. As a team we defend extremely well so in the end, I think this ends up a net positive for the starting lineup. *Insert prove me wrong meme here*

Christion got hurt last year and Danny had him strategically have a surgery this season to get a medical redshirt. I'm obviously not in Danny's head, but I'm fairly certain he saw having CT for two more seasons after this the same way I do... it was always the plan to make him a starter. Just another layer in the reasoning why I don't see Danny going anywhere. He knows what he has. What he has next year very well may be better than this year... More balance, more depth, more flexibility... and most importantly, less weaknesses. On paper, at least.

I was way more worried coming into this year, personnel wise, than I am for next year. For the exact reason we all witnessed today... no size. Christion also adds that at 6'5 with a nose for a lose ball...

Let's go Rhody. Get ready for a pleasant surprise next November.

[Seawrightspostgame]

The man.

[UCH21377]

Christion is an excellent and disruptive defender when healthy. Potential is there on the offensive end too. Agree with you Mike but after almost two years off there will be rust.

[the_one_mike]

Christion is an excellent and disruptive defender when healthy. Potential is there on the offensive end too. Agree with you Mike but after almost two years off there will be rust.

Oh, without a doubt there will be rust. I don't see it lasting very long, though. He's been there every step of the way with this team this year, just not wearing a uniform. He doesn't even wear street clothes, he wears warmups knowing damn well he wasn't playing a minute this year. He's a gamer.

I wouldn't even say there's potential on offense either... From what I saw in the past, I truly believe he's going to come out ready from the jump next year on both sides of the ball. He has great form shooting the ball and always seems to "miss close."

[section(105)]

......All of the above is fine, his playing up this level will be a huge impact to the depth of the rotation......we shall see.....

[CTRamfan]

We have not seen CT meet his potential yet. He was injured most of last year. I expect we will be talking about him the next two years with raise.

[reef]

Looking forward to CT coming back. I like his game able to hit that 3 and good defender with decent size

[BleedBlue87]

I hope he comes back as a stone cold killer. Just raining 3s right in people's faces.

[Roz]

He will challenge fatts for most steals

[Rhody15]

I don’t know how anyone can say next year could very well be better than we had this year....that’s a pretty big reach in my opinion.

[bigappleram]

That is a real big reach. Also think there is some selective memory about CT. Loved his defense, and he's got the athleticism...but he never showed a polished offensive game nor that he could do all the little things that Stan did, who some have compared him to. That and he will have played sparingly over 2 years so he will have a lot of rust. One thing about Stan people can't forget, he was a 4 star Top 60 recruit that went to Indiana. CT was nowhere near that.

[Rhody83]

I hope CT turns it around. I also think there is selective memory. His defense the first two years was fouling. He has 118 fouls in 793 career minutes. That is 6.0 fouls/40 mins or 4.5 fouls/30 mins. He has 3.5 fouls for every steal. Stan had 1.5 fouls for every steal.

His shooting isn’t good either - 35% FG, 30% 3PT & 61% FT.
His stats were better his Fr year than his Soph year.

[hrstrat57]

Robinson and iverson huge scores for Hurley and responsible for a large part of our success.

[Rhody Guy]

Although people are definitely altering facts in their memories with CT I also think people are under selling the injuries. He was never healthy last year and initially hurt the knee halfway through his freshman year if I remember correctly.

[SGreenwell]

Although people are definitely altering facts in their memories with CT I also think people are under selling the injuries. He was never healthy last year and initially hurt the knee halfway through his freshman year if I remember correctly.

I agree with this, but I would caution that health is also a skill, in a way. Unless it's a truly minor injury, I always think it's tough to project how a player will come back.

[the_one_mike]

All I'm going to say in response to my supposed selective memory is that these are very similar responses I got when I argued Jeff should be starting over Jarvis last year. I think I'll let things play out again and time will tell, but I'm pretty confident in this call. That's why I started the thread.

[the_one_mike]

That is a real big reach. Also think there is some selective memory about CT. Loved his defense, and he's got the athleticism...but he never showed a polished offensive game nor that he could do all the little things that Stan did, who some have compared him to. That and he will have played sparingly over 2 years so he will have a lot of rust. One thing about Stan people can't forget, he was a 4 star Top 60 recruit that went to Indiana. CT was nowhere near that.

I think that arguing that a player can't be impactful because they weren't a 4 star top 60 recruit is far more of a stretch than anything I posted, truth be told.

Of course he will be rusty. Whatever that even means, of course. He will come to play, I promise that -- it might take a game or so to get back into the flow of things but to presume he won't start because he's not in the flow of the game would be a fallacy. Again, a very similar argument to why people assumed Berry would not start on opening night this year while I had him penciled the whole offseason.

[the_one_mike]

Although people are definitely altering facts in their memories with CT I also think people are under selling the injuries. He was never healthy last year and initially hurt the knee halfway through his freshman year if I remember correctly.

His freshmen season the team was completely disjointed after losing EC. His sophomore season he battled injury. His numbers most certainly do not reflect his offensive ability... like I said above, time will tell but I'm pretty confident in this call.

I hope CT turns it around. I also think there is selective memory. His defense the first two years was fouling. He has 118 fouls in 793 career minutes. That is 6.0 fouls/40 mins or 4.5 fouls/30 mins. He has 3.5 fouls for every steal. Stan had 1.5 fouls for every steal.

His shooting isn’t good either - 35% FG, 30% 3PT & 61% FT.
His stats were better his Fr year than his Soph year.

Again, I will compare this directly to Fatts. Basically anyone here would have a hard time arguing Fatts isn't a good shooter -- but his shooting numbers outside of FT% are extremely similar to CT25... actually worse, really (Fatts 42% overall, CT 44% overall; Fatts 30% 3P, CT 30% 3P; Fatts 82% FT, CT 61% FT). Christion has a nice stroke at the line in my opinion, I see that number improving pretty dramatically up to somewhere in the 70s-80s percentage wise next year. Fatts likely jumps to the 90s.

Fatts dealt with far less defensive mismatches than Christion in his first two seasons; at 6'5" CT25 often played the 3 and had to play against the 4 when we went small. Next year we will have a stable of capable bigs to avoid that becoming a recurring situation... yet Fatts still committed 70 fouls in 609 minutes this season which computes for 4.6 fouls per 40. That's not a significant difference to me.

Now if you break their offensive and defensive stats per 40 down a bit more, it gets even closer...
Turnovers per 40: Fatts 1.8, CT 1.6
Steals per 40: Fatts 1.8, CT 1.7 (this spiked to 2.4 from 1.4 while playing hurt as a Sophomore, mind you, as Danny coached him to focus on defense after the emergence of El Jefe at the 1)
Assists per 40: Fatts 3.5, CT 2.2 (played limited time at the 1 his sophomore season after Jeff came in, as I mentioned in the OP -- this dropped from 2.4 to 1.8 as he handled the ball less)
Rebounds per 40: Fatts 3.7, CT 6.1 (very similar to Stan on the boards, he has a nose for the ball and knows where to be)

If you look at their offensive and defensive ratings per 100 possessions:
DRTG: Fatts 101.6, CT 98.1
ORTG: Fatts 102.3, CT 103.0
Technically CT achieved better ratings playing on (allegedly) weaker teams while hurt. (I say allegedly because I believe we were better last year than this recently past season, so this point can be argued)

NOW, all that said, let me clarify -- I do not compare CT and Fatts in any way other than to illustrate some statistical facts and prove I'm not relying on my "selective memory" as stated by a few posters above. If anything, based off these numbers, maybe some of you guys are the ones with a selective memory...

This is merely to draw the parallel of how each player is perceived; CT is a lunchpail kind of guy. Less flash and doesn't really slash at the bucket much so he's made less noise on the path to putting up extremely similar numbers to our fanbase's pie in the sky Fatts Russell. I love them both (Fatts is my favorite URI player I've ever watched.... already), but CT deserves more love than he gets from our fans.