Three Thoughts From The Weekend: Hudson Card’s importance, Europe’s long-term value and more

GoldandBlack.com’s Three Thoughts from the Weekend column runs every Monday morning, with analysis of Purdue football, Boilermaker men’s basketball, recruiting or whatever else comes to mind. In this week’s edition, Hudson Card’s potential impact at Purdue, the Europe trip’s long-term value and more.

ON HUDSON CARD’S IMPACT AT PURDUE

You know, I hate to make this comparison because of all that comes with it, but you can draw a lot of parallels between the start of the Hudson Card Era at Purdue under Ryan Walters and all that the program had riding on Robert Marve early in Danny Hope’s tenure. Their talent levels are indisputable, their credentials prior to Purdue top-notch, their skill sets loosely similar and their experience levels pre-Boilermakers roughly the same.

Big difference: There’s no reason to think Card is at best out of control, at worst a social deviant.

I have long defended Danny Hope’s body of work at Purdue due to the indisputable fact that he never had stability — or even normalcy — at quarterback. A lot of that was injury, Marve very much included, but Purdue just needed a stabilizing force in those days, a leader. It was evident immediately Marve was never going to be that guy, though some bit of a light did come on at the end. Hope enabled Marve’s behavioral issues and entitlement, so it wasn’t one thing, but as it turned out, his was wasted talent.

Again, I hate drawing this comparison because what Marve was and wasn’t has nothing to do with Card, but the circumstances are alike. Marve was Hope’s guy; Card is Walters’ guy.

All the same dynamics apply now.

Purdue needs Card to be really, really good, but also healthy and stable, to lock that position down long term. If Card is ever not Purdue’s starter while he’s on the roster and healthy, that probably wouldn’t be great news, barring some kid coming in behind him and turning into Pat Mahomes. The thought of Card starting 30-some games at Purdue could be a load-bearing wall for what Walters and his staff are trying to build here.

Beyond that, talent is just part of the equation. Quarterbacks, unlike most other positions in sports, have that unique responsibility to be someone 10 other guys in a huddle respond to. That brings to bear such elements as energy, leadership, respect commanded, etc. Another Austin native who played QB at Purdue had all that and then some. Another bad comparison because Drew Brees was one of a kind, but his intangibles were arguably more the crux of his greatness than his talent.

Hudson Card doesn’t really have to prove himself as a talent at Purdue, but his responsibility at Purdue right away will be to make those around him better, to make his offense, his whole team, really, something more than it would be otherwise.

That’s the nature of being the quarterback, especially in a situation like this one.

ON THE EUROPE TRIP, LOOKING WAY AHEAD

I’ve beaten to death the fact that as valuable as these overseas exhibition trips can be, the timing for Purdue’s (twice-postponed) trip isn’t exactly ideal, since the Boilermakers are so well established. So maybe the real value here lies later, maybe next season after Zach Edey is gone.

Purdue did play one game last season without Edey. New Orleans wasn’t up to taking advantage, though. Matt Painter, at al, would prefer to have the reigning player-of-the-year every time out this season, but this Europe trip, Purdue has to play without him, meaning this will be the first taste guys like Braden Smith, Fletcher Loyer, Trey Kaufman-Renn, etc., get to be alphas, experience that could translate to when their time does come in a few months. The experience that Camden Heide and Myles Colvin get now not just helps them coalesce with older teammates now but also juices their development when their whole careers lie in front of them.

Not to say that empowering the rest of the roster to bear more burden now can’t be a developmental positive or expose some potential concerns Edey might just cover up — and better to find out now than January — but Purdue’s one of the best teams in college basketball and that’s beyond dispute. What happens in Europe isn’t going to change much of anything in the short term.

The long term, though, maybe that’s the bigger picture here.

Never get too far ahead of yourself in college basketball these days, but a lot of the lineups Purdue will use overseas will be comprised of players who should be back in 2024.

ON THE COLLEGE BASKETBALL RECRUITING CALENDAR

I don’t know if you guys care about the NCAA basketball recruiting calendar or not. I wouldn’t if I were you. But I need stuff to write about and there’s a lot going on right now in the sport I primarily cover, so I will try to make you care, I guess.

One of the under-rated absurdities of the fallout from the game’s FBI scandal was that a bunch of coaches behaved badly, then nothing got taken away. They added stuff. They put coaches on the road more often, occupying more hotel rooms (presumably not bugged) and away from their teams more often at the height of this era of student-athlete well-being. Part of that is coaches being, you know, around.

The recruiting scandal brought about the Rice Commission and its recommendations to move the recruiting game back toward high school coaches — in history, there has never once been a crooked high school coach, only Ted Lassos — and thus came about more events.

The June evaluation periods have been a hit among coaches (those I know, at least) but they also make one evaluation period blur into the next and into the next and so on. Coaches are on the road every week/weekend for like a month after being gone two weekends and dealing with transfers in April. It’s too much. The NCAA has put its own fingerprints on this, too, with these Academy events, a wholesome sort of alternative to the summer meat market, but also a clear indicator that the NCAA knows it needs to get in front of the best players, because there’s more competition for them than ever.

Coaches, meanwhile, have long been creatures of compulsion and a silly — but understandable — sense of obligation to be anywhere the door is open. They’re there to do the job a cardboard cutout could do more often than not, but that’s the job nonetheless.

I’m going to keep screaming this from the highest of hilltops.

I know this doesn’t jibe with anything being proposed, but why not just do away with evaluation periods altogether, give coaches X number of days to travel between April 1 and July 31, certify events all that time frame and let coaches decide when they want to go out? Thats how it works during the high school seasons? Why not the spring and summer? Heaven forbid a coach, or a player, get a weekend at home that time of year.

Those who have to deal with the portal in April, they can stay on their campuses and not lose anything. Those who want to take an extended vacation can plan accordingly.

For many years, sleepy assistant coaches have driven through the night on I-85 and I-20 between Atlanta and Augusta and various other places, dodging armadillos in the dark after attending an evening game in one city and needing to get to a morning game in another the next day. Head coaches are all jumping around the country in their schools’ private planes, flying in and out of these airfields one after the other, all in a condensed time frame. It’s always felt to me like every evaluation period in which no coaches are hurt or even killed is a win.

I don’t know why they can’t just get away from this condensed-calendar stuff.

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