Stop the Witch Hunts, Let People Enjoy A Good Offseason

[Eagles_Ball_69]

Coach K had NIL and the portal in the 80s?

This is the one thing that seriously confuses me about their opinions. They just fail to acknowledge it happens much quicker in today’s landscape. Or at least CAN happen much quicker if you’re one of the best.

 

[Eagles_Ball_69]

That is not the magic wand that erases all reality that you believe it to be. Coach K took over a program on a successful 3 year run with a quality roster with 3 returning starters from an Elite Eight team including Gene Banks not a roster that consisted of only incoming freshman Travis Perry in mid April.

It certainly can be a magic wand if you’re really good at building rosters and coaching them. Others seem to have done it.

 

[Im The Village Idiot]

His sample size isn’t small. It also isn’t awful. It also isn’t good. It’s kinda like Pope in general. Just okay. Pretty meh. Cool for places that don’t aim to be elite.

His sample size at Kentucky is tiny. That’s why we are where we are. Most fans are not decided on him for good reason. I absolutely understand there are people on the fringes who absolutely know he’s trash and people who absolutely know he’s the next goat. Most of us are still deciding and we aren’t imbeciles for it.

 

[Eagles_Ball_69]

His sample size at Kentucky is tiny. That’s why we are where we are. Most fans are not decided on him for good reason. I absolutely understand there are people on the fringes who absolutely know he’s trash and people who absolutely know he’s the next goat. Most of us are still deciding and we aren’t imbeciles for it.

He’s neither trash nor the goat. Those extremes. He’s just not good enough and probably won’t be. Prior evidence suggests it. No matter how you try to explain it away. We just have to hope I’m wrong about the not good enough part.

 

[Im The Village Idiot]

He’s neither trash nor the goat. Those extremes. He’s just not good enough and probably won’t be. Prior evidence suggests it. No matter how you try to explain it away. We just have to hope I’m wrong about the not good enough part.

I don’t believe we yet know if he is good enough or not. And I believe his early career is insufficient in drawing that conclusion one way or the other. He either showed promise or was a failure in his early career depending on how you want to look at it. If you want to boil it down to what he didn’t do i.e. conference championships, NCAA tournament wins and winning percentage, then you’ll say he wasn’t good enough. Others will look at why the record was what it was, why there wasn’t conference titles and why there wasn’t NCAA tournament wins and see the progression of a program builder. I simply will not agree with anyone who doesn’t see that Pope showed promise in his early career. Does that mean he’s good enough for Kentucky? I don’t know. I’m probably about 45% confident at the moment — not exactly glowing or decisive, but it’s honest.

 

[paulcalhoun_rivals397471]

It certainly can be a magic wand if you’re really good at building rosters and coaching them. Others seem to have done it.

Others did it before NIL and the transfer portal and others have failed to do it with them. Their impact is questionable at this point especially if key players suffer significant injury.

 

[JayEzzy]

While the edition of Mitchell is icing on the cake so to speak, we would still have a good team without him (just in case "without him" happens) and like others have said, we must take a wait and see approach. This imo, is Pope's make or break year. He has the pieces, and the backing so... he needs to get it done.

Fringe top 20 team, which suggests we have a chance of making the second weekend. Is that what you call good at UK with $25m to spend?

 

[JayEzzy]

Pope's already had 2 years here and like 9 elsewhere.

He has never won **** and isn't going to miraculously start now.

We have some good players but not a good team. We filled holes with what we could get and got lucky on some late circumstances and still having money available. There is a reason we still aren't projected as a top 10 pre season team at this point.

This team will be another horrible defensive team and will be out matched physically often. Their hope is to run up the score and pray the other team isn't making as many shots.

Pope will fail, and the hopefully this AD can go and land a real coach.

Bingo. He has ALWAYS been a ten loss coach. Maybe he bucks a career long trend this year, but it would be a stupid bet.

 

[Mdnerd]

Its like being the smartest kid with down syndrome using Cals last 2 years to act like pope has done a good job. We have done slightly better n ncaa tourney but still not close to winning anything that matters.

But yes you are correct, not a regression. But still a continued embarrassment for the Uk brand.

Have to take at least Cal's last 3. We should never forget the loss to St. Peters.