A comparison.....

[SoonerfanTU]

Player A:
GP - 71
GS - 68
Min - 2,222
FG's - 204/499 (40.9%)
3FG's - 93/272 (34.2%)
FT's - 112/148 (75.7%)
Fouls - 133
Rebounds/game - 2.9
Assists/game - 3.3
TO's/game - 1.5
Steals/game - 1.2
Blocks/game - 0.6
Points/game - 8.6


Player B:
GP - 70
GS - 67
Min - 2,064
FG's - 194/435 (44.6%)
3FG's - 81/186 (43.5%)
FT's - 101/152 (66.4%)
Fouls - 168
Rebounds/game - 3.1
Assists/game - 4.4
TO's/game - 1.8
Steals/game - 1.2
Blocks/game - 0.1
Points/game - 8.1

 

[UHsurfer12]

What is this?

 

[Sam]

I am going to guess one of them is Tony Crocker, I am going with player A.
B I am not sure.

 

[Sooner23]

I'm gonna go out on a limb here and guess that this is a rehash of the Quannas White vs. Austin Johnson debate.

 

[Cheno]

I'm gonna go out on a limb here and guess that this is a rehash of the Quannas White vs. Austin Johnson debate.

I've rarely seen one of these that didn't involve Austin Johnson.

 

[coacht]

Neither is Crocker, he has started almost all of 3 seasons, so he he should be close to 100 starts.

 

[coacht]

I just looked it up and Crock has 95 starts in 102 games.

 

[Sooner23]

It's AJ's last junior-senior average and Quannas' junior-senior average. AJ is Player A and Quannas is Player B.

 

[Cheno]

It's AJ's last junior-senior average and Quannas' junior-senior average. AJ is Player A and Quannas is Player B.

Nice. Knew AJ had to be in there. I'm wondering the point.

 

[tomkar98]

Yeah, I'm not seeing the point...

 

[Edmond_Sooner]

cant put playing physical or toughness on a stat sheet and that is where i feel Quannas outplayed AJ if that is the comparison...

 

[SoonerfanTU]

The point is exactly what I've been saying for the last 2-3 seasons, and that is that they are nearly the same player, production-wise. If you take into account the overall talent differences of whom they had to play with, especially at the guard positions, it negates any small difference that you might see.

AJ averaged about an extra 2 minutes of playing time per game, and one extra shot per game. Q shot the ball a bit better, but could be a bit more selective about when he shot. Assist to turnovers are nearly the same. Rebounds were close. I think by looking at the fouls and blocks numbers, you can see that AJ was at least as good an all around defender as Q was, maybe better.

I've never argued that AJ was better than Q. I'd like to have seen AJ stay healthy, but as things were, I'd give Q a slight edge maybe, but I think at the end of the day, what they brought to the table in terms of overall game, was nearly identical as far as production. They went about it in different ways, but two full seasons worth of stats, and they are that close, that tells me something. I just wanted to take the time to do the comparison, b/c several months ago I said I would. And they ended up about how I thought.

 

[OULad]

B is better. He is more efficient on offense while still averaging similar defensive numbers.

 

[Cheno]

The point is exactly what I've been saying for the last 2-3 seasons, and that is that they are nearly the same player, production-wise.

Stats don't always tell the whole story though. Q brought a toughness and a leadership factor that I never saw out of AJ.

Q shot the ball a bit better, but could be a bit more selective about when he shot.

Why? AJ was very selective....it's not like he shot a lot or forced a lot of shots. Both teams had other guys that could score. Q top two threats were Ace & Hollis.....AJ's...Blake & WW.

AJ had a solid career. Both were solid players. AJ had much more natural abililty but I'd take Q because he provided that toughness and leadership that I like to see out of the PG position.
Neither of these guys were "stats guys". You can't compare stats alone when talking about guys that aren't stats guys and come up with an answer. With guys like this (PGs & role players specifically) it's more the intangibles.

 

[j2d2]

I dont see how anybody could question AJ's toughness. I doubt very seriously that ANY OU basketball player ever played with so many debilitating injuries that so continuously affected him. No one. Ever.

 

[Krugerfan52]

Something to take into the equation when comparing AJ and Quannis is that we never saw Quannis when he was a freshman/sophmore. We saw AJ struggle through those two years and so many people had poor opinion of him to start with. Add to it the fact that he had so little to work with his soph year and the fact that we were losing hurt the perception of the type of player as was.

If all we had ever seen of AJ was his junior/senior year I think people would have a much higher opinion of him and would think of him as every bit the player Quannis was in his 2 years at OU.

 

[cowboysooner]

There are lies, damn lies and then statistics.

Nothing against Austin, I liked him as a player. However, he wasn't Quannas White (year 2 anyway) by any stretch of the imagination. Quannas was and is the toughest kid to ever play at OU in my estimation. His senior year, he may have turned the ball over some, but never in critical situation. When it counted, he was money.

If he hadn't gotten hurt, I think we would have won the National championship.

Funny thing is, he couldn't have started for a class B high school in Oklahoma when he got to OU and was the worst looking D-1 point I had ever seen. I just couldn't see what Kelvin was looking at. By the time he left, he was my favorite player on the team.

 

[DenverSooner]

Cheno, you never saw a leadership factor in AJ? He was a bigtime leader his senior year. He took huge shots and was the reason OU won a few games. Given the fact that he played with perhaps the best player in the history of OU basketball (and certainly one of the top 2), that is a huge accomplishment. Obviously Blake Griffin was the biggest leader on the team and Taylor Griffin was also a leader but AJ did a great job his senior year.

AJ is a guy that battled injuries his entire career but still did a really nice job at OU. I really don't see why so many fans have a constant need to criticize AJ and/or deny him praise. There have been very few guys play at OU as much as AJ. I think he played more than Ryan Minor, more than Tim Heskett, more than Godbold and more than Hollis Price. Terrry Evans is probably the only guy to play more than AJ as a guard.

 

[DenverSooner]

There are lies, damn lies and then statistics.

Nothing against Austin, I liked him as a player. However, he wasn't Quannas White (year 2 anyway) by any stretch of the imagination. Quannas was and is the toughest kid to ever play at OU in my estimation. His senior year, he may have turned the ball over some, but never in critical situation. When it counted, he was money.

If he hadn't gotten hurt, I think we would have won the National championship.

Funny thing is, he couldn't have started for a class B high school in Oklahoma when he got to OU and was the worst looking D-1 point I had ever seen. I just couldn't see what Kelvin was looking at. By the time he left, he was my favorite player on the team.

Interesting comments given the fact that OU went to the final four in Quannas White's first year on the team (junior season). That season 2001/02 Quannas averaged 29.9 minutes per game and started in 33 of 36 games. One of those non-starts was probably senior night, although that is just speculation on my part.

 

[NickZepp]

Quannas is arguably the best pure point guard in OU history. Austin is just a really good player and a solid guard. I loved what he did for OU.