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Pope/Payne

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JHR1932

Junior
Nov 27, 2025
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I’ve thought this since the Gonzaga game.

im not saying we are even close to what Payne did at Louisville at all but there are real Similarities that he is our Kenny Payne experiment.

sideline demeanor complete deer in headlights, in game coaching decisions, post game word salad, the Lack of any communication is very alarming, completely unrelatable with the modern day player,but I see real similarities here.
Hopefully the one we will see come true is his *** being fired after this year, I BELIEVE we have a losing record next year.

Fire away Pope pumpers but remember again I have said on numerous occasions I was a fan of his hire, boy was I wrong
 
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UKGrad24

UKGrad24

All-American
Apr 2, 2024
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He’s not as bad as Payne but that’s Lousville. Pope by comparison for UK standards is our Kenny Payne yes. Lousville is not a premier brand Kentucky is. Lousville is not a national brand Kentucky is. For what we do, vs. what they do, you might as well call this our version of a Payne hire.
 
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UKGrad24

UKGrad24

All-American
Apr 2, 2024
2,951
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TheApostleSaulSmith said:
Pope situation is worse. Payne was a historically bad coach so easy to fire. Pope is middle of the pack, worst place to be.
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Not just that but at least Payne was questionable. Mark Pope was KNOWN to be a low-mid level coach. Massive sample size of a bad coach. Had you told UK fanbase in 2001 that we’d be hiring a coach with that record, it wouldn’t have even been something we’d be able to process. Barnhart has had a campaign since early in his tenures to lower standards here across the board in men’s basketball. Pope was perfect gaslight material. Easy to see.
 
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deplion

deplion

All-Conference
Nov 6, 2007
232
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The similarities are strong.

Like Payne, Pope could probably be a highly effective assistant coach playing "good cop" to the alpha head coach's "bad cop".

Neither of them are remotely qualified to actually lead a major college basketball program though.
 
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darkshadesofblue

darkshadesofblue

All-Conference
Aug 18, 2015
3,625
4,132
103
UKGrad24 said:
He’s not as bad as Payne but that’s Lousville. Pope by comparison for UK standards is our Kenny Payne yes. Lousville is not a premier brand Kentucky is. Lousville is not a national brand Kentucky is. For what we do, vs. what they do, you might as well call this our version of a Payne hire.
Click to expand...
When all said and done, he may end up being the worst coach in our history besides Sutton. BCG was bad but at least he could recruit better and didn’t have a below .500 season. It looks almost certain like it’s heading that direction now
 
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J

JHR1932

Junior
Nov 27, 2025
142
239
42
UKGrad24 said:
He’s not as bad as Payne but that’s Lousville. Pope by comparison for UK standards is our Kenny Payne yes. Lousville is not a premier brand Kentucky is. Lousville is not a national brand Kentucky is. For what we do, vs. what they do, you might as well call this our version of a Payne hire.
Click to expand...
Correct
 
W

Woodrow24

Heisman
Dec 21, 2015
6,500
15,694
78
UKGrad24 said:
Not just that but at least Payne was questionable. Mark Pope was KNOWN to be a low-mid level coach. Massive sample size of a bad coach. Had you told UK fanbase in 2001 that we’d be hiring a coach with that record, it wouldn’t have even been something we’d be able to process. Barnhart has had a campaign since early in his tenures to lower standards here across the board in men’s basketball. Pope was perfect gaslight material. Easy to see.
Click to expand...
Mitch probably thought the UK brand would elevate what Pope could do as a basketball coach. Rick Pitino endorsed this hire, so I’d say that helped sway a lot of important people at UK. Honestly that’s one of the reasons why I changed my opinion about hiring him. That press conference really had me excited for the future of the program. Now I’m in disbelief it could be this bad. I didn’t think it was even possible for a coach to struggle recruiting here.
 
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OldScratchBlues

OldScratchBlues

Junior
Jan 12, 2026
178
282
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JHR1932 said:
I’ve thought this since the Gonzaga game.

im not saying we are even close to what Payne did at Louisville at all but there are real Similarities that he is our Kenny Payne experiment.

sideline demeanor complete deer in headlights, in game coaching decisions, post game word salad, the Lack of any communication is very alarming, completely unrelatable with the modern day player,but I see real similarities here.
Hopefully the one we will see come true is his *** being fired after this year, I BELIEVE we have a losing record next year.

Fire away Pope pumpers but remember again I have said on numerous occasions I was a fan of his hire, boy was I wrong
Click to expand...

Have called him Kenny Payne Lite since last year😂
 
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X

xmayor

Redshirt
Jul 1, 2025
38
40
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The worst part about Mark Pope is that we know we have to suffer through another year before the UK admin will do the right thing and go get a Coach recruits will want to play for.
 
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seccats04

seccats04

Heisman
Dec 6, 2004
14,447
23,207
113
I think BYU would've fired Pope maybe after this year. Look at how good the B12 has become and show me where Pope at BYU would rank. Look at how BYU has improved since he left and not to mention they stole two players from us this cycle. Pope is awful. UK is the only reason he hasn't totally sank.
 
KFuqua

KFuqua

All-Conference
Oct 24, 2001
2,181
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Mark Pope was hired late, had to put a team together from what was left out there. He took Kentucky to the sweet 16 in year one! Actually a pretty impressive job. Year 2 was absolutely painful, but you can't even compare Pope to Payne. I get that a lot of you have joined the hive mentality and spend your days trying to trash Pope, but you're really embarrassing yourselves. If year 3 isn't better, Pope will no longer be Kentucky's coach. It's that simple, but I'm going to hope that year 3 is great, even if it doesn't look that way right now.
 
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Woodrow24

Heisman
Dec 21, 2015
6,500
15,694
78
KFuqua said:
Mark Pope was hired late, had to put a team together from what was left out there. He took Kentucky to the sweet 16 in year one! Actually a pretty impressive job. Year 2 was absolutely painful, but you can't even compare Pope to Payne. I get that a lot of you have joined the hive mentality and spend your days trying to trash Pope, but you're really embarrassing yourselves. If year 3 isn't better, Pope will no longer be Kentucky's coach. It's that simple, but I'm going to hope that year 3 is great, even if it doesn't look that way right now.
Click to expand...
Something to watch for on here is when things get tough or bad with our team (like when rumors hit about recruiting) this board has threads started by people that aren’t usually on here and with names you usually won’t see on the board. Trolls just stirring the pot and it’s easy for any of us to fall for it and get baited into having bad attitudes because we care so much about the program.

Something to consider as well is Coach Pope is getting paid 5.25 million dollars a year, he doesn’t give a crap what people say about him on message boards. If he doesn’t care, then why should we? lol If I made that kind of money you all could call me stupid and say I’m terrible all you want to lol
 
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