I keep seeing snide comments about a group of people on here being "Pope pumpers". Why is this so hard for so many of you to understand? Is this a learning disability, or some other mental issue?
Nobody here, not me, not Monday, not Cowtown, not Cowboy and not Village, are Pope pumpers. Do we want Pope to succeed? Yes, but not because we are Pope groupies, it's because he's the current coach in place and him losing, means our program takes another step back.
Yes, we WANT Pope to win, but every one of us has said, he gets a 3rd year to prove himself. All I can hope for, is next years team doesn't suffer catastrophic injuries like the first 2 did. I want no excuses. Next year is put up, or shut up and leave.
Firing Pope now, would be an awful look for UK. The injuries and last years sweet 16 would be used against us and it would be very loud. Not to mention, Pope is one of ours, firing him in this circumstance, is a terrible way to treat one of your own.
This is on Mitch, he is the one that put us in this position. He is the one that should be answering for this.
The issue I foresee is, what will the new AD do if Pope loses 10 games, comes in 4th in the SEC and makes the sweet 16. Does the new AD let him go? Maybe it depends on how many of those 10 losses are blowouts and how badly we got beat in the SS.
I think it's important to get an AD hired now and for that AD to make it clear to Pope what the expectations are for 26/27 and if those aren't met, he will be removed.
I'm hoping this season's failures happened because the locker room issues and the injuries more than Pope's inabilities. I really do think he lost this team early and never could get it back on track.