'Analytics is just the foundation': Keegan Brown explains role with Kentucky

[Matt Dillon]

The fan Q&A exercise continued with Kentucky head coach Mark Pope on Friday. This time the question that seemingly everyone wanted answered was addressed. Why does UK not have a general manager? Pope explained.

“In this ever-changing, dynamic college basketball environment, everybody is trying a different solution,” Pope said. “For us, instead of hiring a singular GM, we’ve gone with a more comprehensive general management team approach.”

“We have four members of the team. Keegan Brown is a data analysis and roster construction expert that’s worked in both college and in the NBA. Nick Robinson is our salary cap strategy and management specialist. Kevin Sergent is our compliance officer, and he deals with all of our contracts and legal language. And Kim Shelton is our JMI liaison, and she does all of our NIL contracts and dealing with corporate sponsorships. That’s our four-person general management team.”?

Kentucky’s data analysis and roster construction expert opened up on his role on Saturday via social media. The director of roster management provided some more transparency on his role in Lexington after spending the last two seasons working in the NBA G League as a video coordinator for the Milwaukee Bucks affiliate.

“To give more insight on my role, the analytics is just the foundation for me. Every day I’m talking to agents, building player projection models, running cap models with Nick, managing contracts start to finish, grinding film, and building the systems that power our front office,” Brown posted on X. “Blessed to be doing it at Kentucky.”

There is no official general manager at Kentucky, but Brown is back working with Pope and Robinson again after the trio spent time on the same staff at BYU. Pope heavily relies on this team to help build the roster. That team closed on a target on Saturday when Washington center transfer Frack Kepnang committed to Kentucky.

Kentucky hopes that Keegan Brown and the rest of this front office team will maximize the program’s roster-building efforts moving forward.

'Analytics is just the foundation': Keegan Brown explains role with Kentucky

[South jones]

Certainly hope this approach pays dividens going forward. It seems with 4 people plus the head coach and his assistants, there should be some real positive results

[thebluestripes]

While analytics certainly has its place, I feel relying on them too much can be more of a hindrance than anything.
It might explain why some of uk's players were being pulled out of the game last season when they werent tired.

[EKYCat]

Of all the gripes I've had about Pioe, his substitution patterns last year were my biggest complaint. They'd be going along fine and then at the first TV timeout he'd bring in 4 guys and they're down 12 in the blink of an eye.

[WeWant9]

I do not know if the sub patterns were based on analytics or trying to keep too many people happy with playing time. Either way, it didn't work out and there were games where UK just never got into any type of real flow. If Pope learned any lessons from last season, I hope the weird sub patterns is at the top and that is thrown away this summer. Develop a core of 7ish guys and roll with them.

[UKHoops01]

I do not know if the sub patterns were based on analytics or trying to keep too many people happy with playing time. Either way, it didn't work out and there were games where UK just never got into any type of real flow. If Pope learned any lessons from last season, I hope the weird sub patterns is at the top and that is thrown away this summer. Develop a core of 7ish guys and roll with them.

Depends on the roster.

Two of the best Kentucky teams in my lifetime went 9 or 10 team, and even had guys beyond that who saw some PT - the '96 and 2015 teams. The difference is that Pitino was a master at using his bench and Pope has shown that he really doesn't have a clue. Cal hated using his bench but that 2015 team was so deep it forced him to.

[WeWant9]

Depends on the roster.

Two of the best Kentucky teams in my lifetime went 9 or 10 team, and even had guys beyond that who saw some PT - the '96 and 2015 teams. The difference is that Pitino was a master at using his bench and Pope has shown that he really doesn't have a clue. Cal hated using his bench but that 2015 team was so deep it forced him to.

I think those teams are outliers and not the norm. I guess every few decades the planets align and you can have a deep, talented team that isn't selfish and is invested in the team concept. Probably even harder to accomplish now in the NIL era.

[EKYCat]

Pitino's system was designed for depth. To run and press like he did was going to require them to be able to play more than 7 guys. And Cal, in 2015, well that's one of the best rosters ever assembled.

[UKHoops01]

I think the problem with Pope is that he almost seems to stick to some sort of pregame plan with his substitutions and how he uses his bench. It's almost like he has a game plan that says at the 16 minute mark this player is going in for that player and the person he brought in is going to get four or five minutes of PT before he brings the starter back in. It's almost like he's not even watching the game. Doesn't matter how well the player is playing, he's got this pregame plan that he's going to stick to.

[EKYCat]

I remember last year at one point he said that if you look at the analytics Brandon Garrison was statistically the second most efficient offensive player on the team. Well, I watched him play. I didn't need to look at the analytics to tell me he wasn't getting it done.

[South jones]

I think the problem with Pope is that he almost seems to stick to some sort of pregame plan with his substitutions and how he uses his bench. It's almost like he has a game plan that says at the 16 minute mark this player is going in for that player and the person he brought in is going to get four or five minutes of PT before he brings the starter back in. It's almost like he's not even watching the game. Doesn't matter how well the player is playing, he's got this pregame plan that he's going to stick to.

I remember one game, it was close and in the 2nd half, Chandler hit 2 consecutive 3s, like bang bang. The other team called TO. Both teams came back out and Chandler was on the bench.
I just gave up, yeah, his substitution patterns was
Crazy