The Darryn Peterson situation at Kansas is one of a kind. There’s no obvious precedent for this in men’s college basketball — a star freshman likely to go No. 1 in the upcoming NBA Draft who plays like it, except when he’s missing games or sitting late in them because of a variety of maladies.
It’s strange enough, and infuriating enough for Kansas fans, to be a conspiracy theory incubator. And conspiracy theories don’t need much to grow.
If Peterson had cramps in that second half against BYU, why wasn’t anyone tending to him? Was that his agent talking to him on the bench? Why did a Kansas deputy AD approach him? Did you see the video posted of the text from press row suggesting a conflict between Peterson and Bill Self, which Kansas shot down as speculation? Why does Self sound flustered with the situation after games, then flustered with the people talking about the situation in between games?
After watching Peterson score 10 points in 24 laboring minutes in a 74-56 loss on Saturday at Iowa State, I must ask aloud what I’ve been asking myself for a few weeks: Why would anyone do the things Peterson has been doing if the injuries and illnesses weren’t real?
The best answer I can come up with is that he’s mad at Kansas for some reason — the millions to play one season weren’t enough, the dorm food is substandard, the football team is lousy, who knows? So he wants to do just enough to tease the Jayhawks and their fans about what could have been, then plans to sit for one reason or another, as a team with Final Four potential exits well earlier than that in March.
That’s quite dumb. But it’s no more dumb than the popular theory going, which is that some combination of Peterson’s agent and family is forcing him into load management as a pre-draft strategy. Please tell me how that helps his agent, Darren Matsubara of Wasserman Group. Please tell me how that helps Peterson and his family.
The last thing anyone should want to do in such a scenario is exaggerate the reality of a health situation.
This should be the No. 1 pick, folks. This is the best player in perhaps the best freshman class since 1981. If Peterson had played every game to this point, with no issues, with no questions, with no stretches of limited explosiveness as those who have watched him closely for years — such as The Athletic’s Sam Vecenie — detected at times this season, I don’t think there would be any doubt.
Instead, there is doubt. Doubt about his long-term health. Doubt about his commitment to his team. Doubt about whether his agent has any idea what he’s doing.
Vecenie spoke with five NBA scouts and executives about Peterson a few weeks ago, and the prevailing sentiment was that his stock remained high, pending the full medical results that will be available at the combine.
However, one source told Vecenie, “I’d love to see Peterson play. In the end, if he ends up not playing enough, it might result in the team at No. 1 feeling more comfortable with one of the other two guys (BYU’s AJ Dybantsa and Duke’s Cameron Boozer) at the top from a safety perspective.”
Play and help yourself. Sit and invite more questions.
Injuries to the hamstring, quad and ankle, cramps and flu-like symptoms have been cited at various times as reasons for Peterson missing 11 games and being severely limited in the second halves of others. That didn’t stop him from shredding Dybantsa’s Cougars in the first half on Jan. 31, 18 points and some plays that only NBA stars make, before sitting in the second. That didn’t stop him from playing an entire road game two days later and ripping Texas Tech’s heart out with two 3-pointers in the final 80 seconds to win.
On Saturday, he played 13 minutes in the first half and 11 in the second, leaving the game for good with 7 minutes, 1 second left and Kansas down 18. He did not look like his best self. He could have been pulled much earlier, with Kansas down 24 in a second half that was mostly garbage time, but he wasn’t. Those things don’t feed the narratives.
Some of Self’s comments have, though. He said after the BYU game that he had “no idea” why Peterson came out, then mentioned the cramps. He told reporters earlier this season that “they want him at 100 percent” in reference to Peterson’s camp and added: “I’m not inside his head.”
An illness kept Peterson out of Monday’s home win over No. 1 Arizona — no, Kansas is not better without him, please don’t add to the pile of bad theories.
Added Self: “We thought he’d go. I thought adrenaline would kick in, and he would go. He was at shootaround today. I mean, he was out there. But you could just tell he didn’t feel great.”
Intended or not, this comes off as frustration, which makes it easy for fans to seek a culprit. Self finally went after that rapidly growing mindset on Thursday. He even admitted to checking social media to gauge the fans’ temperature, and he vowed that all the ailments were legitimate.
“The narrative is BS in many ways,” Self told reporters. “Load management, this kid hadn’t talked about that one time or anything. Load management, geez, that’s when you play four games in seven days. That’s not when you play one half a week or anything like that. So those aren’t true.”
Here’s a theory. It might be a little wild, but give it a chance: Peterson has had a lot of bad health luck this season; he’s been fearful of a more serious injury and careful to avoid it; he really wants to play, and Kansas has been mostly truthful in discussing him. What do you think? Too far out there?