Mark Pope Discusses Balance Between Analyzing Data and Trusting Your Gut
When Mark Pope was hired at Kentucky, it was understood that he would bring a balanced approach with analytics. It was an important part of his tenure at BYU. However, how exactly he interprets and uses the data may still be a mystery to some fans. Pope discussed with reporters on Thursday exactly how he balances analyzing data with trusting his gut feeling.
“It’s one of the fun things about digging into the numbers,” Pope said. “The numbers can tell you whatever you want them to tell you. It’s not like you can jump into the numbers and the numbers tell you exactly what to do. You have to interpret the numbers. That’s almost more artistic than just going with your gut or maybe it’s exactly the same thing.”
Pope talked about balancing several aspects of the game, from instinct, gut, experience, what you see with your eyes, and what you’re feeling with your players. It’s not something that can be explained by a data set.
“It’s hard for data to account for that because people are really dynamic, and incorporating the data,” Pope said. “When you do all that, at the end of the day, you probably end up going with your gut too, but your gut is helping you interpret the data a little bit.”
Dealing with Dynamic Personalities
Mark Pope has had a tough job since being hired at Kentucky, recruiting 12 new players while building team chemistry. It’s not something that any coaches are used to doing.
With this Kentucky roster, he’s had to place an emphasis on learning the personnel around him. That’s not something that can be done with just data alone.
“I don’t know if this game is ever going to get down to just straight science,” Pope said. “Science would be great if you were working with robotic figures out there, but you’re not. You’re dealing with emotional, dynamic, changing circumstances all the time and limited data sets all the time. There are dynamic personalities on the other side that are changing from moment to moment. It’s all of that put together.”
