I think the general consensus among the talking heads including Matt Jones is that Pope is in over his head, but they aren't going to verbalize it at this point in the season because Pope could turn it around and they don't want to publicly undermine him.
I'm all in on Pope and it shows in my responses, but I'm not so far out of touch that I can't admit he simply isn't measuring up as a second year coach for Kentucky at the moment.
His downfall is going to be to stick with his current approach in the hopes that he can coach the players up. Its not too late in the season for a turnaround but the damage is done. There is no 2,3, or 4 seed for this team. It feels like a 5 seed would be a dramatic turnaround for a team that people are questioning will even make the tournament at this point. 6,7,8 seeds are kinda last 4 in territory for a blue blood program. Barnhart is on record during the Tubby years saying 8 seeds aren't the standard for Kentucky.
My suggestion to him (Pope) would be to recognize there are players he can't put in a game unless the circumstances require it (fouls, injury, sickness) and the reality is he doesn't even have 6 guys he can trust to play intelligently at the moment.
Get a 7 man rotation and put the rest of the season on their shoulders. Don't worry about the fallout or what happens at the end of the season, you have to prove your coaching chops now.
Close out the season strong, make some noise in the SEC tournament, and win two tourney games. I think at this point that is best case scenario