Claiming Duke Is Somehow Underrated Is The Most Preposterous, Asinine, Incorrect Statement These Ears Have Ever Heard
I didn't want to write this blog, but figured let's argue on this here Friday. I'm already over the Duke/UNC promos I keep seeing and had this discussion with Marty on Bench Mob. Naturally, Marty being a Duke fan and all, claims they are underrated. I'm sorry, Duke, underrated? I figured it was shtick or at the minimum him just making an outrageous statement to do so. He wanted to argue the AP top 10 vs Duke. Fine, we can do that. Here's the current AP top-10:
Auburn, Gonzaga, UCLA, Purdue, Kentucky, Houston, Arizona, Baylor, Duke, Kansas
That's in order so Duke is ranked 9th. Call me crazy but that seems, oh, I don't know. Proper? I think they are better than Houston and Kansas out of that group. Bumps them up to 8. We can argue them vs UCLA, I'll side with Duke because I'm unbiased. I can call things as I see them. I'll take Paolo and Keels over Juzang and Jacquez. Ultimately what it comes down to when arguing them. Okay, so Duke is 7th.
I don't know how you can currently put Duke over any of the other teams. Spare me the 'they beat Kentucky' argument. Counterpoint: is Miami and Florida State better than Duke? They beat them. Same with Ohio State. No, of course not. We don't use one game scenarios here especially when that game happened months ago. Every metric has Kentucky, Gonzaga, Auburn, Arizona and Baylor above Duke. Same goes for Purdue, who I've talked about. Their defensive struggles terrify me, but that offense is as elite as elite gets. Especially when they just let Jaden Ivey cook. You know, their best player and an All-American.
I was stunned I had to argue it, but here we are. Listen to the full episode here.