Per KSR there is a job posting for a UK BB gm. Can anyone confirm? That might be good news if true.
GM job posted?
- Thread starter mdluk1
- Start date
This will be a very important hire. They really need to get this right and hire an imminently qualified individual. Hopefully, this happens,
A friend of mine looked it up and said he didn’t see one posted anywhere on UK’s website.
Pope just proved that he has no idea how to evaluate top end talent, how to properly negotiate a deal, how to get the best players and how to properly build a roster that fits his style AND can defend.
He doesn't understand what players are worth, so a GM is the best way to fix that.
Mitch will see the ad and hire himself.
Hopefully you are right. I wasn't listening this morning so I didn't hear the statement. Would love to be wrong.
If true, a GM can prevent overpaying bench pieces, know market worth, negotiate contracts, and take Pope out of the "closer" role with recruits. Will not help at all with the current high school crop, but if done now, can be beneficial with this portal cycle and future high school classes.
Generally speaking they won’t even post it until they know who they are hiring. The posting will only be to satisfy legal requirements.
I have a great background in running a business having run my maintenance company that handled over 1000 properties without an issue.
I would love to be the GM for this job. here is what I would do day one;
1. Hire the best there is in evaluating basketball talent. Anyone who looks, talks or acts like Jay Biles, Seth Greenbum, or that fool who talks in riddles, "cut like a NASCAR" would be excluded from consideration.
2. Establish a work environment that is equivalent to what is standard in a working environment. You don't play, you don't get paid. You want to take out an insurance policy to guard against an injury, I would highly recommend this. You get hurt while playing for UK, you get paid.
3. Move seating in Rupp to allow for more on floor experience for those who want to raise a little noise.
4. I would bring back the old Rupp experience where you walk around in the shops before a game.
5. Bonus money paid out would be for the coaching staff after we make the S16. Making the S16 should be where you expect to be every year. Include NIL bonus money for players after reaching the FF.
6. Bring back the old UK logo.
7. I would bring back ticket scalping in front of Rupp. Much better pricing then these ticket scalpers called Ticketmaster, Seat Geek and so on.
8. The coach would have to set aside an hour a week to interact with Rafters posters.
9. Until Matt Jones and Marc Maggot have a WWE event between the two in front of Rupp one day, both would be banned from all games.
10. Matt Jones would need to publicly denounce Duke. As it is now, I feel we may have a double agent around.
I would kill it guys!
I would love to be the GM for this job. here is what I would do day one;
1. Hire the best there is in evaluating basketball talent. Anyone who looks, talks or acts like Jay Biles, Seth Greenbum, or that fool who talks in riddles, "cut like a NASCAR" would be excluded from consideration.
2. Establish a work environment that is equivalent to what is standard in a working environment. You don't play, you don't get paid. You want to take out an insurance policy to guard against an injury, I would highly recommend this. You get hurt while playing for UK, you get paid.
3. Move seating in Rupp to allow for more on floor experience for those who want to raise a little noise.
4. I would bring back the old Rupp experience where you walk around in the shops before a game.
5. Bonus money paid out would be for the coaching staff after we make the S16. Making the S16 should be where you expect to be every year. Include NIL bonus money for players after reaching the FF.
6. Bring back the old UK logo.
7. I would bring back ticket scalping in front of Rupp. Much better pricing then these ticket scalpers called Ticketmaster, Seat Geek and so on.
8. The coach would have to set aside an hour a week to interact with Rafters posters.
9. Until Matt Jones and Marc Maggot have a WWE event between the two in front of Rupp one day, both would be banned from all games.
10. Matt Jones would need to publicly denounce Duke. As it is now, I feel we may have a double agent around.
I would kill it guys!
To me that is a major red flag if a head coach can't evaluate talent. How can one not evaluate talent and then coach that talent?
He would exclusively get nice guys and help his buddy Drew out. SMH
i feel like when things like this happen whether it be a position we know is open or will be open soon we get an idea from reporters and then the position is listed.
like they are probably figuring everything out right now and once they do that they will post the position so the person can "apply"
like they are probably figuring everything out right now and once they do that they will post the position so the person can "apply"
1. Will Pope listen to the GM?
2. How much? To the extent that the GM picks the roster or at least has primary control?
3. Is Pope picking the GM? Having a strong say?
I can easily imagine a scenario where this doesn’t help things much. If Pope has a large influence and/or selects a buddy, it takes away a lot of the value because Pope has shown to have poor judgment in roster construction. This really only works if the GM has a high level of autonomy. Not sure why Pope would give up his role there.
Like I said in another post. This is Pope's career at stake. He’s smart enough to know that he's not doing a good job and it’s not just because there are injuries. He better get someone in that knows what they're doing and he needs to trust that person, if not, his UK coaching career will be short lived
They should hire a former Nike Grassroots person IMHO. Someone who has connections all over the country, inroads with recruiting, connections at Nike and who understands the market.
Coaches need guys they can connect with. That isn’t going away with college athletics. Kids pick coaches who will help make them the best man they can and want to be. A gm bringing in players and saying now “go coach them”. It doesn’t need to be that difficult. A guy who is on the bench. A recruiting coordinator, an associate head coach. That’s all you need. If you pay a coach top dollar and he doesn’t have to recruit? lol.
The type of position being discussed has always been dealt with by the asst coaches and coaches focused on recruiting. Fire mark Fox hire a guy who can recruit and someone who can help develop guards. The wise decision would be to hire someone who played as a guard in college who can manage things. Or two coaches one to recruit and develop the other to manage recruiting.
A GM? I mean do they fire the head coach or hire one? Or does the ad hire and “GM” is just suppped up associate head coach? They report to coach or AD? Inventing a position for a failing coach seems like a desperate move that will have all kinds of unintended consequences.
Then he will be the assistant to the regional GM himself as well.
It would be easy for me. I would hire a former NBA GM or AGM. Get someone who has handled these responsibilities and overseen programs and dollars much larger than even UK's NIL budget
There are coaches all over the country that have no personality, no developmental ability and do nothing but lose with lots of talent, but they keep getting talent. Scott Drew, Danny Sprinkle (Washington), Dana Altman (Oregon), Mike White, he sucks, but he gets talent and he’s at UGA, who doesn't care about basketball.
Look at that short little twerp that has little man syndrome at UCLA (Mick Cronin). He just ejected his own player and has the personality of a crocodile, but he gets star talent.
Then you have dudes like Eric Musselman that acts like an absolute clown, he gets talent.
Pope is doing a poor job because he tries to play too many players, he puts lineups on the floor that have no business being on the floor, he doesn't motivate his teams and he has dealt with a lot of injuries, but I will not agree with this premise that he doesn't develop his players, most of his players showed really good improvement throughout both yesrs he's been here.
Amari Williams doesn't get to the NBA without UK and Pope. Brea, Butler and Oweh all upped their stock and became better players here, Moreno is worlds better right now, Chandler is much further along and Kam Williams was really rounding into form before the injury. He develops players and he doesn't trash, or embarrass them.
His issues with recruiting are simple, he doesn't understand the value of top end players and he’s trying to find guys that have a certain personality, because he didn't want the wrong mindset, well, how is that working out right now?
Fact is, if Musselman, White, Cronin, Altman, Drew and Sprinkle can get players, Mark Pope and UK should too, but Pope isn’t relating to these players, that's where a GM comes in.
That and I really wish he kept Orlando Antigua. Mark is trying to do too much and it’s not working, he needs a GM and honestly, every day that goes by where he hasn't hired one, is another day he falls behind.
You could give Pope an NBA roster and he won't win with it. Well, he will win 65% of the time. We don't have a GM problem. We don't have a JMI problem. We don't have an assistant coaching problem. We have a coach that's just not qualified. The ancillary blame is just that.
You are lost my friend. You are crazy if you think pope couldn’t win with elite talent.
It helps the PROGRAM, regardless if Pope is here in a year or we have some one new coaching.
By all reports, we have the highest NIL payroll in the country this year. Yet we’re not even close to being the team with the best talent. Doesn’t that tell you that we might need someone else negotiating contracts and deciding how the NIL money gets divided up?
Seems obvious that we haven’t been using that money as efficiently as we should be. Maybe a GM would help change that.
Mitch will see it and say “we aren’t doing that here”. Similar to when he was told about every other SEC program using outside collectives and he said “we aren’t doing that here”.
Have to remember the Pope presser. He told everyone what this is about. “We’re finding our way back to our heart”. That’s what this is about.
Last edited:
That's not exactly true. Pope will win with good players, the problem is, he will also lose games he shouldn't lose with those same players.
But, let's be honest, these players are making millions of dollars, shouldn't they shoulder SOME of the blame for lack of motivation?
I greatly appreciate that and I feel the same about your posts.
I just feel like his personality is more of a fit for 10 year old girls soccer. That's not an insult, heck, I coached a U10 girls soccer team for a while, it's really hard, but that cheeseball personality, just doesn't light a fire under college basketball players.I hope it’s more complicated than that. If not,
It would be nice if Oweh had a little MKG in him, he’s supposed to be the leader, but you still need a tough, hard-nosed coach to lead the team, Pope isn’t that. You can't tell players that they’re beautiful and you "love the space they’re living in", then send them off to battle.
But also, dangit, when you have a lineup on the floor that is cooking, leave them in there, stop pulling players out.
Last edited: