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Every week, PowerMizzou.com publisher Gabe DeArmond answers questions from Tiger fans in the mailbag. This format allows for a more expansive answer than a message board post. Keep your eye out each week to submit your question for the mailbag or send them to powermizzou@gmail.com. On to this week's inquiries.
MUValjean asks: #9 in your monday thoughts you run through who Mizzou is targeting and what it could look like. It would be great if we could land/bring back all of those guys, and pretty impressive is we got a few. But what does the program look like if we strike out on the transfers and Kobe and Mosley don't come back?
GD: It looks different. Missouri has contacted at least 30 transfers. And those are just the guys we know about. Everyone is projecting rosters and I know that's fun to do, but the truth is, we have no idea right now. It's why I laugh at all these top 25 lists. We don't even know who is on the teams. How are we gonna know who will be good. Like your question stated, there's a world where Kobe Brown and Isiaih Mosley are back and Missouri adds two or three high-level transfers and you're set. There's also a world in which neither of those guys are back, a couple current players leave unexpectedly, the top transfer targets go somewhere else and things look a whole lot different. There's a big gap in what our expectations will be. The truth, as it always is, is probably somewhere in the middle of those two scenarios. But what Missouri fans should feel good about is that Dennis Gates has shown an ability to build a roster. And he's done in far worse circumstances than this. The upcoming season will be Gates' fifth as a head coach. It will be the first in which he's been at a high major school with a full offseason to recruit. So I'd say it's pretty easy to argue we haven't really seen anything close to the ceiling of what Gates can do putting together a team.
mglassma asks: Do you think Diarra leaving was a mutual decision or was he a guy that you think Gates wanted to keep? Also what type of leap do you expect to see from Shaw as a sophomore? Lastly, over/ under 2.5 on how many total offensive and defensive lineman we add in the 2nd wave of the football portal?
GD: I want to be clear that I don't have any inside information here. My opinion is that Mohamed Diarra probably didn't see a lot more playing time next year than he got this year. There were flashes, but I got to the end of the year not sure whether Diarra was a player that was good enough to become a starter at this level. Maybe he saw the same thing. Maybe he wanted to go somewhere that he thought he could play a little bit more. Maybe he's just a little out of his element and homesick. I don't really know. But my best guess is that Diarra had reasons he wanted to leave and Gates probably didn't fight super hard to keep him here.
As far as Aidan Shaw, the main focus of the offseason needs to be lifting a whole bunch of weights and putting up a whole bunch of shots. There were nights he really contributed this season. Overall, his freshman year was about what I'd have expected coming in. Now we need to see that role increase this year. I think you'd like to see a situation where he's regularly the first frontcourt player off the bench and he's giving you 20 minutes a game. Then in his junior year, he's a starter and someone you can really build things around.
I'd go with the over at 2.5. I think Missouri will add a defensive end and two offensive linemen going forward.
