Michael Roll: 1st Team All Conference
by Achilles on Mar 8, 2010 6:57 PM PST
in Basketball
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PrintMichael Roll been selected as first team all Pac 10.
Tyler Honeycutt and Reeves Nelson were selected to the all freshman team.
The Roll selection makes me oddly happy. If ever a guy spent his entire career just trying hard and trying to do what the coaches asked of him, it's Roll. That he will forever be known as an all conference first teamer is a fitting tribute to his tenacity and to the value of doing the little things well.
One of the great "what ifs" of the Howland era is "What if Mike Roll had played with Kevin Love?" Remember, Roll got hurt during Love's only season in Westwood and he and Love never really played together. It's unfortunate, because Mike was/is very good on the entry pass and the constant double-teaming of Love in the post would have created many open shots for Michael.
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Great news.
Voting was done by the coaches, so it’s definitely a set of voters that are familiar with his work. Terrific validation for Roll. I find it interesting that 7 out of the 10 first-teamers are guards, with another G/F as well.
a nice recognition for Roll
Congrats to him.
by RealisticBruinFan on Mar 8, 2010 1:42 PM PST reply actions
Very well deserved
He wasn’t the most gifted athlete on the floor most nights, but he might have been the hardest working athlete out there.
You know Coach is proud of this guy.
greg in denver - UCLA guy for life
get the player to give 110% of his maximum effort each and every game
That’s all you can ask of him.
That’s Mike Roll.
Well done.
The voters really understand
what a complete package MR is and what has meant to this program over the years.
As much as I want to see this season end, I will be sad when he walks off the court for the last time.
For the last few weeks, my fantasy has been that he serve as a “graduate assistant” for a while — at least until we reestablish the Warrior culture of which he was so much a part.
sjh
Not just you
I get the sense that MR could be a really good coach some day, coaching up a new generation of “Ben Ball warriors.”
I get the sense that he could be a very good coach
and I know for a fact that he’s strongly considering getting into coaching at some point. If he does, I hope he finds his way back to Pauley.
For everything UCLA baseball, visit my UCLA baseball twitter.
by Ryan Rosenblatt on Mar 8, 2010 1:50 PM PST up reply actions
He can't be a grad assistant when he graduates?
Ben needs to get on this recruitment right away. Mike is the kind of guy that rarely makes an unintelligent play. We are going to miss this guy next year, big time.
I also have the inkling that he might become one
when his playing career ends. Some people said he would be good for the European leagues but I still think perhaps, with his shooting touch, that some NBA teams can use him coming off the bench.
The name escapes me now but I am sure you all know who I am alluding to here. Remember that Chicago Bulls guard, back in the Jordan era, who is now, the last I heard, the general manger of the team even. He was good in getting himself open for long jumpers.
I said it before. Roll always gave Pauley his all, warts and all. His game progressed with each season. It literally transformed right before our eyes. He wasn’t MacDonald’s first team all America when he came. Yet his work ethics, that sheer determination against the odds, especially this season, to not just prevail but help the team win it anyway he can surpasses many more heralded than him.
Congrats, Mike
In a rough, rough season, I could always smile when I saw MR because I knew that he was representing the four letters on his chest well, good game or bad game.
For everything UCLA baseball, visit my UCLA baseball twitter.
Congrats to Roll
He has always been a classic Ben Ball warrior leaving everything on the court. Just as importantly he represented those four letters with the kind of class and grace we expect from Coach Wooden’s program. I am excited for him and can’t wait to see what adventure he decides to embark on next. Given the kind of hard worker he is and the dedication he has shown, I have no doubt he is going to have a great future. Proud of him.
Roll's absence in 2008
When I think back to what could have been in 2008, I most often think “What if Afflalo had stayed another year?” In that scenario, I think of us beign able to match up with Memphis by having Afflalo guard CDR and Westbrook on Rose. Shipp’s late season struggles would have relegated him to a role as first wing off the bench.
But another very good question is “What if Roll hadn’t blown out his plantar fascitis?” Just having a backup guard on that team would have been a major plus. And when Shipp struggled, we could insert a shooter to take pressure off Love, Collison and Westbrook. Memphis would have had at least one more player to guard (thus still able to double Love but not Collison).
Roll was a solid contributor and a hard worker. This is quite an honor (even in a down year of the Pac-10). Imagine how bad we would have been this year without him.
Scratch that
You probably don’t want to think about how bad we would have been this year without him.
No kidding
Roll was the only player that showed any form of leadership skills both on and off the court. W/O him, might as well not play the season.
Congrats Mike
N, did you really have to bring up that excruciating “what if”? If there ever was a more perfect compliment for the DC/RW/KL team it was MR. Very glad he was around this year though so as to make this season somewhat bearable.
That was me ...
not Nestor.
But I agree with you. Roll would have really complimented that team.
The other part of that “what if” is that James Keefe gave up his red shirt year when Roll got hurt. Who knows what would have happened if he had sat out the year? Maybe he would have gotten completely healthy and had a better career. And remember, if Roll doesn’t get hurt that season, Keefe would be coming back next season.
Here's another question ...
I wanted the top post to be all about Michael and his accomplishment, so I didn’t put this in it. But here’s something Nestor and I were discussing via chat when the announcement was made:
All things considered, who turned out to be the better player as a senior, Michael Roll or Josh Shipp?
I really want this post to be about congratulating Michael, so I’m hesitant to turn it towards some potential Shipp bashing. But I think it’s a fair question to ask. Roll basically played behind Shipp. They both had their share of injuries in their careers. Howland consistently gave Shipp minutes at a time when some people thought that MR could take his spot. But he never could. Josh would just play (and some of the complaints we register about Dragovic — that Howland just plays him and never pulls him for a bad shot or for playing no defense — we registered about Shipp.
Now that Roll finally got the minutes, he was first team all conference. I can’t help but wonder what would have happened and how he would have developed if he had gotten the chance to beat our Josh Shipp earlier in his career.
And back to the original question: Who was the better player as a senior, Roll or Shipp?
I think Roll-Shipp comparsion comes out to just about even
I think Josh did bring better skillset on offense but Roll was always a better team player. I think MR merited a little more mins than JS last year, particularly during times when JS was not bearing down on D. Howland could have used number of opportunities to send a message to his team about his expectations with regards to defense. However, he never sent that message. I didn’t think much of it at the time because I always liked JS but in “retrospect” (hate that word these days), I think the bad trends from this year started last season.
Actually, I'd give Roll the nod...
…if we had 5 guys (plus bench guys cut from the same Coach Wooden-esque cloth) that would come out like Mike every game, always giving their all, I’d pay to see that. A team of Shipps? Not so much. Sure, Josh had more raw skills. But effort, intensity, and focus in basketball mean so much more to me as a spectator, simply because it’s a team game. JS wasn’t nearly as bad as ND in terms of disappearing on defense (though he definitely did at times) but he didn’t have the 24/7/365 effort that Mike did. Hence, to me, he gets the nod.
with all due respect to MR
I think we treat him very differently as a senior because
a) everyone else is so disappointing and
b) he has to put up with everyone else being disappointing
The latter point is valid – he deserves some respect for working hard under difficult circumstances. But I think we also are tempted to give him extra praise and respect because of the poor specimens with which he is being compared. If he was playing on a Final Four-caliber team, we might be saying that he is a streaky shooter that CBH is playing for his offense and hoping it overcomes being a step slow defensively.
None of this is intended as a knock on him – he has the heart of the true Ben Ball Battlers of years gone by, and (I believe) has willed himself to play to the very limits of his ability. I only mean to say that he stands out as a competitor on a team of under-achievers, but would be viewed as a ‘tries hard but has an obvious ceiling to his talent’ guy on a team of competitors. I think the context makes it difficult to compare him with JS, who looked occasionally nonchalant on a team led by a high-achieving DC and a talent-maximizing PAA.
I was talking about last season
And I do believe MR should have deserved more mins at the expense JS in the lineup because MR always played harder than JS on the defensive end. I feel as strongly about as I do about Rag’s pt vis a vis rest of the frosh in this year’s team. It was a misstep by Howland that foreshadowed the debacle of this season.
and I was replying to the question asked about senior vs senior...
but I am curious – do you think MR should have got more mins last year because he had a better defensive impact than JS, or because he was trying harder on defense than JS? Do you think he gave us a better chance to win as a player-for-player swap, or are you talking more about the overall team dynamic that CBH could have maintained by making that kind of move? Or both?
Hmm good questions
1) Do you think MR should have got more mins last year because he had a better defensive impact than JS, or because he was trying harder on defense than JS?
I think MR should have been given a little more mins last year because I do believe our defense gelled better with him in the line up (kind of like how with Lane in the lineup this season our interior zone D was better than with Nelson in it). MR always played team defense better and consistently tried harder than JS. JS was lot more athletic than MR.
2) Do you think he gave us a better chance to win as a player-for-player swap, or are you talking more about the overall team dynamic that CBH could have maintained by making that kind of move? Or both?
I think this depended game by game. I think in certain games JS was definitely in more rhythm and with him in gave us better chance to win. However, I think our team dynamic was often better with MR in the lineup. I say this as someone who has always been very fond of JS. Always appreciated what he did for UCLA.
Not JS problem, for Last Season it could have been MR and JK for ND and JH
You forget that it was not just ND and JA that were getting lit up this year in M2M, it was also MR. Yes MR tried harder than JS because MR always gives it 100% but MR is still not the defender JS was. You point out that JS took time off but do not forget JS was part of the monster defenses of previous years. If not for his defense in the Texas A & M game in 2008, we lose in the second round of the Tourney. I think he was still a better M2M defender than MR.
I am incredibly impressed with how MR grew this year, he lead this team in ASSISTS! I have the greatest respect for MR because he got as much out of his body as he could and was someone who never gave up. But his ability will only take him so far and he was never going to be a good M2M defender and I submit never as good as JS.
In retrospect, if you want to play ultimate fantasy for last year and you accept CBH’s proposition that the team needs more offense, you bench JH for MR but you keep JK as a starter over ND. I would never have thought this last year because I did not see MR as anything but a zone buster. MR is a liability on D but you can afford one liability and when you trade MR and JK for ND and JH, you still have one liability. Maybe JH quits\transfers but maybe he “has” to stay another year. Look, this is real fantasy and I would never have thought it but again I never saw MR able to score except from the outside until this year let alone pass this well.
Again, it is just a fantasy but heck that is some of the fun of this.
Sorry I completely disagree on this
As I disagreed with your take on Dragovic. MR was athletically limited but always consistently brought more effort than JS. With MR in the lineup our team defense (not “team” not necessarily “individual athletcism”) improved. JS at times simply took off on possessions and was completely non chalant on D. It really had a bad impact on team morale and I know that based on lot more than what appeared in papers.
The core started rotting last year when Howland let JS get away with lackadaisical defensive efforts and giving him mins, even if he was taking time off on D. If you don’t want to be believe it, then you are more than welcome to live in a world of denial.
The serious reply On Effort v. Consequences
This was more ridiculous than serious. Like I said, I never would have thought of it last year. But going to the more serious.
I think the FIRST solution to the problem is consequences to those with more talent rather than simply rewarding those who put out the most effort. If effort were the only standard the starting team this year would be in order: BL, MR, JK, MAH, and MM.
For example, I didn’t include TH because he is more passive than others on the effort scale on offense. He has more ability than anyone else on the team but he is not yet living up to his potential on offense as he waits for the game to come to him too much. In the OR game he took as many shots as BL in more minutes and as a key part of the offense. He is my favorite player on the team but does not hustle as much as BL. Yet there is no way you play BL over him. My point is effort alone can never be the standard.
But back to the real solution, consequences. The solution was not to bench ND and never play him, even you agree to that. The solution was to yank ND when he jacked up one of his 26 footers with 30 seconds left on the clock. To drill in him that he has to think and make him pay for those huge mental errors. CBH said that himself late in the year. Why CBH did not do it, is a different story and one that should be called attention to.
A good small example of all our problems this year was the AZ game. As the start of the AZ game showed, ND was a good inside player because he is a tough matchup. ND went inside and scored 6 of our first 12 points and the lead went to 14-7. CBH game planned well despite being on the road and short handed and ND was part of it. Then JA entered the game and ND shot a bad three. And AZ came back to make it 14-13 during which time ND took another bad three. We only regained the momentum when JA went out and ND went back inside. Why did CBH let these two get away with destroying a game plan that was working? I don’t know but it happen too often.
ND needed to know there would be consequences for his stupidity. ND also could have paid more consequences for his off court stupidity. The scary thing to me is he is not the worst or second worse on this team in the effort category. However, as a senior returning starter it is arguably more important that CBH set the tone with ND. The scary conclusion is “If he lets ND get way with it, why won’t he let me?”
CBH better address this next year, along with having a PG. I think he will.
Happy to see that his efforts are being recognized
He provided consistency and maximum effort, when both were sorely lacking this year. Congrats! It must have been a frustrating year for him, too, with the pervasive lack of support, but I am glad to see him being recognized.
His Hard Work Paid Off
I met Roll at a summer league game and he was super cool and very gracious. I’m glad he was recognized for his hard work and effort.
Congrats Mike!
I did not see this coming, but having heard the news, I can’t think of any one more deserving.
The best thing you can do for your children is to love their mother. John Wooden
I am so proud of Michael for this and so glad he's been recognized.
I also want to add that I would have chosen him most improved as well. From being a roll player, to the one to count on on this team. A leader. But, oh well, I guess making 1st team all pac-10 pretty much acknowledges his amazing improvement. At Pauley, there’s a young woman who sat behind me last year, who would always yell, “give the ball to Michael” and “I love you Michael”. Can’t even begin to count all the times I yelled the same things this year! Yeah Michael…..“I love you Michael”!
Go Bruins!
One of the big reasons to be pessimistic about next year
Roll won’t be on the team. I think the guy has always been somewhat underrated by our fanbase, but he gave everything he was capable of giving, and most of the time, it was more than enough. We are going to miss MR and his steady play.
Congratulations to MR
Hard work on the court and off the court pays off.
The progress in your game is recognized by the coaches. Always had a nice catch and shot game. Now you have a more complete game.
Go Team Go!
by Bruin Dad and Grad on Mar 8, 2010 5:24 PM PST reply actions
I seem to remember Howland himself...
…saying that Mike would have made a difference on the Love team. It is true, he is really good at feeding the post and by the end of the year, Love was very good at kicking it back out if a good outside look presented itself for someone else. And that team could have used another good outside threat to loosen things up for our inside player.
Yes, I this it is true, Roll playing that year might have been the missing piece to a title.
Michael Roll is a True Bruin...
He brought honor to himself and to the program.
Who will be left after he goes?
MR is most deserving
I saw Mike and Keefe play many times in high school and I will always wonder what they could have become without the injuries. Mike played his tail off and while not the best athlete physically his effort and court sense were excellent. I have been a fan of UCLA since the days of Pete Turgovich from East Chicago, Indiana. As far as Mike is concerned, he could and would have played for Coach Wooden. Good luck Mike.
Congratulations, Mike Roll
This is something he deserves.
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