I’m not saying Pope is a bad coach, but if we don’t start getting better players and soon, he needs to clean house and get some recruiters on staff. Our assistant coaches have to be the most overrated “recruiting aces” I’ve ever seen. They have every resource at their disposal.
How can this coaching staff be so poor at recruiting?
- Thread starter Pensacola_Cat
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The players we have are good enough. Have to start playing better. JQ will help.
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He’s never recruited at this level before. He simply has no connections that would give him a leg up when competing with other schools and coaches.
Who knows. Might just be a strange dude that doesn’t appeal to kids. Guy is very smart, but maybe too smart, probably comes across as a dork. And he’s a mormon, I’ve never met one who wasn’t a little odd, frankly. You’d think guys like Hart would be able to recruit, but he just lost a player where he was close to their father.
And I wouldn’t count on Pope changing coaches. He seems like a guy loyal to a fault, either he works with the coaches we have or Pope simply doesn’t work. I wouldn’t expect to see him fire anyone. I’d be shocked at the very least.
Maybe he can pull in Stokes and/or Collins. Could help set him up with more players if they go to the league. Same with JQ.
Who knows. Might just be a strange dude that doesn’t appeal to kids. Guy is very smart, but maybe too smart, probably comes across as a dork. And he’s a mormon, I’ve never met one who wasn’t a little odd, frankly. You’d think guys like Hart would be able to recruit, but he just lost a player where he was close to their father.
And I wouldn’t count on Pope changing coaches. He seems like a guy loyal to a fault, either he works with the coaches we have or Pope simply doesn’t work. I wouldn’t expect to see him fire anyone. I’d be shocked at the very least.
Maybe he can pull in Stokes and/or Collins. Could help set him up with more players if they go to the league. Same with JQ.
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We loaded up on the type of recruits that usually win but the eggs haven’t hatched yet. Give it time.
Why do we have to post the same thing over and over again.
Maybe because Pope had a max NIL amount he was willing to pay for his main targets and other teams simply out-bid him for those guys? I don’t think it’s a huge mystery that Pope missed on a few of his bigger targets, but he has to build a roster and if those guys were being guaranteed more than he thought they were worth, I’m fine with that. That’s part of the balance of “recruiting” in this NIL era and I trust Pope and staff do a better job next year.
Also, injuries are really hurting us this year. Can’t plan for that.
Also, injuries are really hurting us this year. Can’t plan for that.
i think matt jones aluded to barnhart having a role in our recruiting woes, if so GET HIM OUT
Again, you need to be careful on that front. Matt is not wrong about what he’s saying but there’s a part of that story he doesn’t highlight. He’s mad at Mitch for doing what he wanted to do. You’re only good to Matt as long as you’re his “friend”. He will protect them until he has no leverage and then he turns about face. Snake in the grass. I’m absolutely good with Mitch going and bringing a new AD, but I wouldn’t be putting your eggs in the “genuine fan” Matt Jones who calls it “right down the middle.” If you’ve listened the radio show enough, the man has already told on himself.
i dont know their relationship well, but from the postgame show matt sounded like he was speaking from the place of a fan, he even mentioned how barnhart is our best AD ever, but said he thinks its time to move on, and if its for the betterment if both sports, why not make that move
That’s the problem. That man is a walking conflict of interest. Go re-listen to the KSR radio shows for the several months prior to the JMI deal with NIL. Listen how Matt speaks of Mitch and Pope. Rosy and defensive of Mitch. Then, listen to the special episode he did when the JMI deal was announced and pay very close attention. Man straight tells on himself. Then, listen how he talks of Mitch immediately after and also watch how critical he becomes of Pope.
Interesting thing about Matt —- he admitted when Pope came on board that he “protected” Cal when he was here and would be willing to do the same for Pope. Thing is, Matt “protected” Cal while he was friendly with him and was anti-Mitch during that time. Then, when Cal and Matt grew apart (due to Matt’s criticism in the pandemic), Matt started becoming more anti-Cal and over time suddenly started taking up for Mitch more. That ended when the NIL deal happened with JMI. People on this site like to shoot the messenger so I’ll invite everyone to go back and re-listen yourself. Matt has a customer facing “voice of the voiceless” fan spokesman hat he likes to wear —- in reality, he often admits how little he began to care about the games and that it became a job. And he wants as much influence over the business aspects of the school as possible. When he doesn’t get it, there is hell to pay.
I'd like to see us add a GM at some point. Coaches focus on coaching and scouting good talent while the GM worries about budgets, wheeling and dealing, helping find good talent, and closing deals. I know the coaches are interested in going that work, but it's clearly not been the greatest system so far, so...
Nobody is forcing you to read this thread.
That’s a good ideaI'd like to see us add a GM at some point. Coaches focus on coaching and scouting good talent while the GM worries about budgets, wheeling and dealing, helping find good talent, and closing deals. I know the coaches are interested in going that work, but it's clearly not been the greatest system so far, so...
Kept Fox but sent Antigua on his way. Makes absolutely no sense.
It’s almost like we don’t actually have a $22 million budget 
This is cope. Media is reporting a $20 million budget and that’s what we got. Whether we’re good or bad is obviously determined by the head coach.
So you’ll respond the same thing over and over again.
Truth hurts, doesn’t it? None of us like it BTW, but ignoring the 800# gorilla in the room ain’t fixing anything either!
How many times have you shut the door on mormon missionaries or just peep through the window to see who is knocking
So recruits don’t even let him in? He needs to start slipping cash
under the door to have a chance.I wish Nike pushed recruits our way like they do some of these other schools like Duke. You’d think that they would considering how big our fanbase isSo recruits don’t even let him in? He needs to start slipping cash
Throw the bank on Bruce Branch and Christian Collins. Get some shooters from the portal and lets go!
Buggest mistake this years was not bringing in shooters. Popes offense requires guys that can make shots.
Buggest mistake this years was not bringing in shooters. Popes offense requires guys that can make shots.
I had these 2 nice young men come once and I made the mistake of being kind and accepting a free Book of Mormon. It turned out the price was them returning weekly for 3 weeks to bug me. I finally had to firmly tell them I know where their church is and if I had questions I'd call them on church phone manner. That worked thankfully.
And I was watching the office and they heard it playing and clearly watched it too. Didn't seem like a show Mormons would watch lol
Agree on Branch and Collins but portal expectations have to be tempered with all the covid year players no longer available.
Pope's first portal class had six 5th year seniors.
I feel like he didn’t think he would be able to trust O. We might look at it different as fans than Pope was. In the end I think it would of been beneficial.
You keep saying that but those UConn teams had NBA guys on it. Florida had Walter Clayton. Auburn had their stud last year. The jimmys and joes will always matter. Otherwise creighton would be in the final 4 all the time.
I didn’t say anything one way or the other about NBA guys. I also believe you need NBA talent —- you probably just made a false assumption. Approximately 25.7% of starters on championship teams in the last ten years were an NBA draft pick. So, you probably only need one and the studies show that even a late first round pick is good enough to get the job done —- late first round picks are the most common of this type. We have one —- his name is Jayden Quaintance. None of us know if this team will be able to reach that level —- and I don’t either —- but I trust in the roster construction methodology, whether it pans out this season or not. Best we can do is be patient and wait to see the full product.
This isn’t our first conversation about the subject. I had previously made the point that this team has no studs on it and you eluded to not needing studs based on previous national champions. But I think all the recent champs had studs who could go get a bucket. I still think you need that. It may be semantics but I think “stud” is synonymous with NBA talent.
Of course no one said that, however I was told that the Kentucky name would recruit itself.
If you’re referring to the thread that was about HS rankings, it had literally nothing to do with NBA or non-NBA anything. You have no idea how many people don’t try to understand the point someone makes before arguing it. I’ve never believed you can win championships with zero talent and that thread says that very thing in it about 1,000 times. Statistically, on average championship teams feature one NBA player, but it doesn’t always need to be some superstar by any means. More often than not, a single late 1st round pick will do. You also have to consider —- when you’re thinking about this topic —- many of those draft picks aren’t high on mocks until they make that deep run. There have been plenty of players get major stock increases to become 1st rounders because of the March madness run. So, when you’re building a roster you do not always know who your NBA guys are. But they are a difference maker in championships.
Maybe it doesn't have a thing to do with Pope or his recruiting team. Maybe now that the money and exposure are now apples to apples across the college landscape, its harder to sell Lexington to an 18 year old than other cities
I really thought Brooks and Hart were going to be elite recruiters here but thus far that hasn’t been the case.
They will only be there for a few months anyway and always traveling so not as much as you think… I wouldn’t think it would be that hard to sell them on
Plenty of universities are in small towns and cities and have no problem recruiting. What a load of horse crap.
UK isn’t some anomaly over other schools like some of you people try to make them out to be. It’s just delusional. A coping mechanism as to why one specific coach is incapable of recruiting certain players.
Pope is recruiting fine. He isnt getting the 5 star kids Cal got, but then again, he isnt promising DJ Wagner that he will start over better players. Maybe his issue is honesty. If so, well done