I’m not going to lie, seeing the Tweet announcing Marquette redshirt freshman Sheek Pearson was entering the transfer portal just hours before it closed shocked me.
I’m already halfway through another post about how flawless the offseason has been. This hit like a Mike Tyson body blow. So I wanted to expand a bit on why it hurt and what it means.
- The portal closed at midnight last night, so to see his name entered just under the buzzer when we thought all landmines had been evaded was jarring.
- One thing I had mentioned in March about using the transfer portal is that once you start bringing more people in, you should expect more people leaving.
- The timing is particularly suspect, though. We saw three players leave (Sean Jones to Toledo, Zaide Lowery to Dayton and Tre Norman TBD) but all were pretty much expected, as they had 3+ years in the program with little growth and no clear role available. Making it until 4/21 without any surprises was in and of itself surprising.
- If Sheek had entered his name a week or two back, we would have all been very disappointed, but it would have been part of business as usual. The fact he didn’t tells me this wasn’t a case of wanting to explore his value or options else where, this was a targeted poaching.
- What about Fru, you ask? It is true that Fru Sananda was brought in as the starting center (at a high cost) and would have been directly ahead of Sheek on the depth chart. This lack of playing time was definitely a factor in what opportunities Sheek would have with Marquette this upcoming season. But even though Fru was only officially announced yesterday, it was confirmed by Draft Express, Fru’s agent and Fru himself on April 13th.
- And I will add, it was not a super secret that Marquette was targeting bigs. And that’s with Shaka keeping the leaks on lockdown all of April. I mention this because there is no way it came as a surprise to Sheek that he wouldn’t be primary going into the season.
- Knowing what we know about Shaka, I’m 100% sure the role and expectation was appropriately communicated after the season. If he didn’t like it then, we would have seen a portal entry at that time.
- My gut says this is all about money. Again, keeping everything above in mind, my hypothesis is a team came to Sheek and dropped a bag that Marquette was not willing to match for an untested backup.
- Maybe I’m wrong and this is just a coping mechanism, but I’m pretty certain the evidence bears this out.
- What does this say about RGV if a player is willing to throw Marquette into chaos at the 11th hour? Money talks, and character is revealed.
So what now?
While Marquette theoretically doesn’t “need” another big with 3 on the roster (Fru, Caedin Hamilton, Josh Clark), I don’t think it will want to go into a potentially positive season relying on two bigs that have proven they can’t be relied on as rotation pieces and saw minimal minutes as Marquette turned its season around.
So I will go out an the world’s thickest limb and say Marquette will need to shop for another backup, one that is comfortable in limited minutes. Bigs get injured. Fouls happen. If you are once more relying on Caedin and Clark for 20+ minutes in more than an emergency situation, that is a recipe for disappointment.
The good news is it will be a little “easier” to do this than it was to find Fru because there are more backups than starter-level players available. You only need to find someone to fill 10 or so minutes a game, and basically keep the lights on.
The bad news is Closing Time is playing. There are fewer players available and you might have to pay more than their impact or role dictates, which could possibly cause further internal friction down the road. This is where the timing is so detrimental. If Marquette knows this a week ago, it would have been much more aggressive on some of the backup options in the portal.
Doing a quick sort on Evan Miya for available centers, I really like Luke Bamgboye of Texas Tech as a proven commodity, but have 0 sources or insight into who Marquette might target.
I also had a list of D2 bigs I was monitoring in late March, but even a good chunk of those have already found a home. Again, it’s getting late early.
One other route we might see is Marquette trying to reclassify a higher ranking big that is slated to be a high school senior next season, without redshirting them, like they did with Sheek. Of course, it’s a huge ask to expect a non-top-25 big to contribute immediately. So this one doesn’t feel as likely, IMO.
But what is done is done. Whether it’s a backup or an up-transfer or a reclass, Marquette needs to fill those projected Sheek minutes this year. And then start worrying about the following seasons post-Fru, too.
Marquette entered the new world a bit later than most, but has experienced the full gamut of emotions in a condensed time period. In the words of the great Ben Steele:
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