Speaker 1: Well, Oklahoma against a little revenge for getting swept by
Speaker 1: the Wildcats in Lexington, as the Sooners eleven eight Kentucky
Speaker 1: by the final score of five to one here at
Speaker 1: the SEC Tournament.
Speaker 2: That's how the game ended.
Speaker 3: Darren Hedrick called it on the UK netwhere Kentucky falling
Speaker 3: to Oklahoma.
Speaker 2: Five to one.
Speaker 3: Wildcats flatter it seemed today then last week's club soda.
Speaker 3: They lose to an Oklahoma team they swept last weekend,
Speaker 3: So now their fate is in the hands of the
Speaker 3: selections committee. Wildcats with just twenty nine wins on the
Speaker 3: year and yeah, thirteen of them in SEC play. But Kentucky,
Speaker 3: which put runners on base in each of the first
Speaker 3: re innings in scoring position, but they were one for
Speaker 3: seven with runners in scoring position, scored one run thanks
Speaker 3: to an Oklahoma error. Five to one was the final,
Speaker 3: So now their fate is a real mystery. Nick Menzione
Speaker 3: appeared on the SEC Network yesterday with Paul Finebaum and
Speaker 3: broke down some numbers, which I find fascinating, especially with
Speaker 3: baseball such a numbers game. But I remember talking to
Speaker 3: Gary Henderson a few years ago about one of those
Speaker 3: years where Kentucky was so close. You know, in certain situations,
Speaker 3: might have been here, they were ranked number one in
Speaker 3: the country a couple of times, but just to win
Speaker 3: here or there, and wins come down oftentimes to one inning,
Speaker 3: which can come down to one pitch or one play,
Speaker 3: just so many moments. And you can say this about
Speaker 3: a lot of different sports, but we're talking about baseball here,
Speaker 3: and it just seems like baseball is easier to crunch
Speaker 3: numbers of this sort. And Minjeo, and being an analytics guy,
Speaker 3: has gone through and he's done the math. He's done
Speaker 3: it simple arithmetic, really, and he broke down some of
Speaker 3: these numbers for Fine Baumb when he was describing what
Speaker 3: the regular season was like for Kentucky, which came so
Speaker 3: close so many times to winning a series. And that's
Speaker 3: what's about, of course, in the regular season in the SEC,
Speaker 3: we talk about it all the time on TV side,
Speaker 3: Darren talks about it on radio side. Win the series
Speaker 3: at home that you have and maybe get one win
Speaker 3: on the road and you're in great shape and pull
Speaker 3: off a surprise on the road, two or even three
Speaker 3: wins on the road in one weekend. Now you're contending
Speaker 3: for an SEC championship, which Kentucky won last year. That's
Speaker 3: how the Wildcats did it. For the most part. They
Speaker 3: took care of business at home and got some big
Speaker 3: wins on the road because they were able to take
Speaker 3: advantage when the moment was right there for the taking.
Speaker 3: And they've come up just short this year in so
Speaker 3: many ways. And here's how MinJe O described it mathematically
Speaker 3: to Paul Feinbaum on the SEC Network.
Speaker 1: This is crazy, but in an average SEC game, the
Speaker 1: average SEC team throws one hundred and fifty four pitches
Speaker 1: in a game.
Speaker 4: Now, so you times out by.
Speaker 1: Two, there's about three hundred and eight moments in every
Speaker 1: single game. Well, for us, when you look at it
Speaker 1: and you break it down that way, we've had nine thousand,
Speaker 1: six hundred and sixty eight moments in our thirty game season.
Speaker 1: We are five plays away from winning four more SEC
Speaker 1: series and winning eight, which only Texas did, and we
Speaker 1: are nine plays away out of that nine, six hundred
Speaker 1: and sixty eight from being back to back SEC champions
Speaker 1: nine plays.
Speaker 3: I knew they were close to being much much better
Speaker 3: in terms of their record. I didn't realize. I guess
Speaker 3: if I had sat down and pulled out a pencil
Speaker 3: and figured it out. Yeah, I knew they could have
Speaker 3: won more series, but they were that close. And the
Speaker 3: reason is to an SC title again because as good
Speaker 3: as Texas was, as good as a Florida was good
Speaker 3: as a lot of teams were, nobody ran off and
Speaker 3: hid with the SEC title.
Speaker 2: Vandy has done in the past.
Speaker 3: Other teams have done it, but there was so much
Speaker 3: parody this year, and there's always going to be now.
Speaker 3: I think that nobody ran away with it. And look,
Speaker 3: Kentucky won one game over Texas right in Lexingon, could
Speaker 3: have won, two, might have won, three, might have swept.
Speaker 3: The Longhorns. Had enough moments, had enough opportunities, and if
Speaker 3: Kentucky had, Texas wouldn't have won the SEC championship. That's
Speaker 3: where things turn in the Southeastern Conference. It is so
Speaker 3: hard to win. But that's what made last year so special.
Speaker 3: And as men Geones said, he believes this team is
Speaker 3: a really good team, and he has said it all year.
Speaker 3: He hasn't complained, he hasn't you know, talked about injuries.
Speaker 3: He's talked about how well they've played at times, how
Speaker 3: they've come up short, but he still has never stopped
Speaker 3: being proud of this ball club.
Speaker 1: I'm really proud of this team, and we really believe
Speaker 1: we're one of the best teams in the country because
Speaker 1: we're battle tested and we've been through it. And I
Speaker 1: would say there's thirteen or fourteen teams in our league
Speaker 1: that believe that.
Speaker 2: And that's why.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you're gonna have one team win this tournament, obviously,
Speaker 3: but the other teams in the tournament that that get
Speaker 3: bids to the NCAA, they'll know going in in Kentucky
Speaker 3: included that, Hey, you know, we might have lost in Hoover,
Speaker 3: but we're still good enough to win in Omaha.
Speaker 2: And you may well see that. You may see a.
Speaker 3: Team that didn't win the SEC title. Now Tennessee did
Speaker 3: it last year, but you may see a team from
Speaker 3: the SEC they got knocked out in Hoover and jump
Speaker 3: up and win in Omaha. Because you're not playing day
Speaker 3: after day after day. You get a little bit of
Speaker 3: respite in Omaha. But you got to win that first one.
Speaker 3: That's the key. That's one of the keys, the other key,
Speaker 3: just as it is in the SEC tournament. And men
Speaker 3: Jones said this prior to today's game to find Bomb,
Speaker 3: but he has said it all year again when fine
Speaker 3: Baum asked him in terms of pulling Kentucky through these
Speaker 3: close games that the Wildcats they won some, they've lost
Speaker 3: too many. But fine Baum said, if you could wave
Speaker 3: a magic wand what might that turnaround be?
Speaker 1: I believe it comes down to one thing. If you
Speaker 1: said manage, put it into one word, I would say,
Speaker 1: it comes down execution. That's it, plain and simple for
Speaker 1: our players to execute what we are trained to do
Speaker 1: and what we're capable of doing. If we do that
Speaker 1: one thing and we execute at a high level, with
Speaker 1: tremendous focus, tremendous energy and persistence, we'll like the result.
Speaker 2: So ask yourself, did they execute today? Yes? Or no?
Speaker 3: And can they keep executing once they get into the
Speaker 3: NCAA tournament if they get a bid. But after losing today,
Speaker 3: twenty nine and twenty four, and I've seen Kentucky teams
Speaker 3: with better records not get a bid. But the SEC
Speaker 3: wasn't nearly as tough. You get a lot more credit
Speaker 3: these days for winning an SEC game, winning an SEC series,
Speaker 3: And the Wildcats did win four and it might come
Speaker 3: down to that series win at Tennessee when Kentucky really
Speaker 3: he was at its best. So now they've got to
Speaker 3: sit and wait until next Monday at noon. That's when
Speaker 3: the selection show is. That's when the Wildcats will learn
Speaker 3: their fate. So five won the final the loss to Oklahoma.
Speaker 3: One other note in the SEC this was a pretty
Speaker 3: big headline not related to baseball, and that was finally
Speaker 3: the rumors are over and its official. Florida has landed.
Speaker 3: Boogie flanned through the portal.
Speaker 2: You'd heard about this.
Speaker 3: Had he pulled his name from the NBA consideration, he
Speaker 3: would end up at Florida. That's exactly what happened on Sunday.
Speaker 3: He pulled his name and now he's a Gator, and
Speaker 3: it makes sense. He's represented by Mike Miller, a former
Speaker 3: Florida Gator. Ask yourself this though, why does he leave
Speaker 3: Arkansas when you know that Caliperi, at least his past
Speaker 3: year was running everything.
Speaker 2: Through him before he got hurt.
Speaker 3: I firmly believe Arkansas was better after Flann got hurt
Speaker 3: and then came back, and everybody had gotten.
Speaker 2: Used to being involved in the offense.
Speaker 3: Prior to that, it was like give the ball to
Speaker 3: Boogie and get out of his way, and they struggled.
Speaker 3: He goes down Arkansas finds itself. Boogie comes back makes
Speaker 3: him better. But now with ironically enough, Denzel Aberdeen leaving
Speaker 3: for Kentucky, that might be why he sees an opening
Speaker 3: in Gainesville. Maybe he's the point guard. Well, he will
Speaker 3: be the starting point guard for Todd Golden down in Gainesville.
Speaker 3: And this gives Florida a really nice class out of
Speaker 3: the portal. Flann was rated the eighth best player in
Speaker 3: the portal. Had to be because he was coming back
Speaker 3: off that injury. But you know a guy who was
Speaker 3: five star coming out of high school and insanely talented
Speaker 3: and now joins the defending national champs. Now, of course
Speaker 3: they lose Walter Clayton Jr. Among others, but they get
Speaker 3: Xavion Lee out of the portal from Princeton.
Speaker 2: They get aj Brown from Ohio.
Speaker 3: You you might not heard those names, which you will
Speaker 3: when the Gators take on the Wildcats this year. And
Speaker 3: of course Boogie Flynn was going to be a Wildcat
Speaker 3: until Caliperi left, but now he is a Florida Gator.
Speaker 2: It's official. When we come back.
Speaker 3: There is controversy brewing with the proposed changes to the
Speaker 3: nil one SEC school in particular may not be cooperating
Speaker 3: a little bit later on the incredible story of Sunday Silence.
Speaker 3: In nineteen eighty nine, on this date he won the
Speaker 3: preak Mistakes, the second Jewel of Racing's Triple Crown, after
Speaker 3: twice literally defying death. We'll talk about that a little
Speaker 3: bit later on David Siske of Cats Illustrated Forrest Tucker WTVQ.
Speaker 3: That and more come out up right here on six
Speaker 3: thirty WLAP Welcome back to the Big Blue Insider. Coming
Speaker 3: up at the bottom of the hour, a great story
Speaker 3: about Sunday Silence. It was on this date in nineteen
Speaker 3: eighty nine that he won the second jeweler Racings Triple Crown.
Speaker 3: He won the Derby and then followed up with one
Speaker 3: of the greatest Preakness finishes of all times, right up
Speaker 3: there with the one we saw this year, different but
Speaker 3: right up there with it. So and it's a great
Speaker 3: story that began one county over in Bourbon County, on
Speaker 3: Stone Farm in Paris. And we'll hear from Arthur Hancock,
Speaker 3: who owns Sunday Silence, and we'll hear from him a
Speaker 3: conversation that he had ten or eleven years ago with
Speaker 3: a blood horse. But all the backstory about Sunday Silence.
Speaker 3: It's an incredible story and he's one of my all
Speaker 3: time favorite horses. So if you'll indulge me, that's coming
Speaker 3: up at the bottom of the hour. I wanted to
Speaker 3: point out if you haven't seen this yet, you know,
Speaker 3: if you're a college sports fan, and if you're listening
Speaker 3: to the show, thank you, and I'm sure you are,
Speaker 3: that the House Settlement ruling is imminent. Right, that's supposed
Speaker 3: to bring some guard rails, some enforcement to NIL, which
Speaker 3: is right now the scourge of college athletics. But the
Speaker 3: state of Tennessee has plopped itself squarely.
Speaker 2: In the way. And here's how.
Speaker 3: Back on the first of May, Governor Bill Lee quietly
Speaker 3: signed a six page state bill, Tennessee Senate Bill number
Speaker 3: five thirty six. According to Yahoo's Sports, they dug it
Speaker 3: out last week, and that paves the way for state
Speaker 3: schools in Tennessee, UT, Vandy, Memphis, et cetera, and their
Speaker 3: affiliated collectives to break House Settlement related rules and prevents
Speaker 3: college sports New Enforcement Entity from penalizing those schools. I
Speaker 3: mean this is directed squarely at the INNSA membership power
Speaker 3: conferences and their desire to police the revenue sharing era
Speaker 3: of college sports takes aim at any athlete compensation cap
Speaker 3: and any penalties for rule breakers and policies that prevent
Speaker 3: phony booster backed image, name, image and likeness deals to players.
Speaker 3: What they basically did was say, we're going to do
Speaker 3: whatever we damn well please, and by our state law,
Speaker 3: there's nothing you can do to hurt us within the
Speaker 3: state of Tennessee. What's to stop other states from doing
Speaker 3: the same things? Now, Power conferences, according to the story,
Speaker 3: have plans to combat such laws. You have officials from
Speaker 3: the Big Tennis he see Big twelve acc There's a
Speaker 3: draft of what Yahoo describes as groundbreaking, first of its
Speaker 3: kind document intended to prevent these schools from using their
Speaker 3: state laws to violate the new enforcement rules and requires
Speaker 3: schools this is Big now to waive their right to
Speaker 3: pursue legal challenges against the new enforcement entity called the
Speaker 3: College Sports Commission. And remember, this is what everybody, fans, administrators, coaches,
Speaker 3: players not so much, have been calling for from day one.
Speaker 3: Guard rails everybody said, it's the wild West out there.
Speaker 3: And there are people, some administrators who had said, you know,
Speaker 3: we really don't like the terminology.
Speaker 2: So what it fits.
Speaker 3: It is the wild West, and it's ruining college athletics.
Speaker 3: Not that players should get what's coming to them, but
Speaker 3: it's just a little too crazy right now.
Speaker 2: Isn't it.
Speaker 3: So they came up with this design, and now the
Speaker 3: state of Tennessee jumps in and says, no, Now, we're
Speaker 3: gonna do whatever we want, and we're gonna make it
Speaker 3: so there's nothing you can do about it. Well, now
Speaker 3: the power conferences are pushing back, and dozens of leading
Speaker 3: school administrators, it says, are checking out this document. It
Speaker 3: would bind institutions to the enforcement policies. They basically would
Speaker 3: have to agree, all right, we want to be a
Speaker 3: part of the NCAA, or if you want to do
Speaker 3: a way of the nca and give it a new initial,
Speaker 3: who cares? Whatever it is this membership, this group, if
Speaker 3: you want to be a part of it, you got
Speaker 3: to follow the rules.
Speaker 2: And there's nothing wrong with that.
Speaker 3: So, and it also says, even if their state law
Speaker 3: is contradictory, it would exempt the CSC from lawsuits from
Speaker 3: member schools over enforcement decisions, offering instead a route for
Speaker 3: schools to pursue arbitration. Arbitration, how about that membership agreement affiliation,
Speaker 3: call it whatever you want. But a draft of this
Speaker 3: contract's been distributed to a lot of school presidents, general councils,
Speaker 3: athletics directors have expressed legal concerns with several of the
Speaker 3: document's concepts, and so they're trying to hammer them out right.
Speaker 3: But in the state of Tennessee, they're trying to fight
Speaker 3: at all. Why because they want their schools to have
Speaker 3: a leg up on everybody else. Whether this enforcement policy
Speaker 3: takes rute or not, the College Sports Commission, whether it
Speaker 3: takes rude or not. We in Tennessee are saying, you can't.
Speaker 2: Tell us what to do. We're gonna do whatever we
Speaker 2: damn will.
Speaker 3: Please, and if you try to stop us, we will
Speaker 3: sue you. And I already saw one commentator on Twitter
Speaker 3: say Greg Sanki, not that Sankie could do it, and
Speaker 3: not that they're gonna do it, but said Greg Sanki
Speaker 3: should kick Tennessee out of the sec That ain't gonna happen.
Speaker 3: But this could get messy, This could get bloody. But
Speaker 3: one athletic director said, you have to sign it or
Speaker 3: we don't play you. As a condition of membership, you
Speaker 3: must comply with a settlement and enforcement says one president,
Speaker 3: or you're out. This is going to get tied up
Speaker 3: in the courts. Lawyers are going to get rich. But
Speaker 3: this has to happen in order to save college athletics.
Speaker 3: It's going to be easier to deal with the portal.
Speaker 3: They can pass a rule saying you can come through
Speaker 3: the portal as many times as you like, but after
Speaker 3: the first one you gotta sit. That to me seems
Speaker 3: like it's going to be on the way. But this
Speaker 3: involving all the nil dollars is going to be a
Speaker 3: lot more complicated.
Speaker 2: A couple of other notes before we hit the brakes.
Speaker 3: Ryan Ritter, former Kentucky Gold Gloves shortstop, is the Pacific
Speaker 3: Coast League Player of the Week. He plays for the
Speaker 3: Albuquerque Isotopes Go Topes. That's a Homer Simpsons favorite team,
Speaker 3: the Springfield Isotopes. But Ritter last week get This delivered
Speaker 3: either a game time or winning hit in the ninth
Speaker 3: inning of three straight games wins over Tacoma and in
Speaker 3: that series ten for twenty two with four doubles, two triples,
Speaker 3: and a homer. We all knew this watching him, he
Speaker 3: knew he'd be. He's already special when he was at Kentucky.
Speaker 3: The only thing that held him back a little bit
Speaker 3: was his bat, but he had shown flashes of brilliance
Speaker 3: at the plate. And once he gets that worked out,
Speaker 3: he'll be in the biggs, and he'll be in the
Speaker 3: biggs for good. Finally a tip of the BBI Captain
Speaker 3: our man, Sewan Woods. He'll be with us on the
Speaker 3: air schedules permitting tomorrow. He has been named the coach,
Speaker 3: the head coach of La Familla.
Speaker 2: For this coming year.
Speaker 3: He was an assistant last year and takes over coaching
Speaker 3: the team the head coach now that he's the head
Speaker 3: coach at Scott County High by the Way for this
Speaker 3: coming tournament. So we'll talk to Sean about that tomorrow night.
Speaker 2: All right.
Speaker 3: Up next to great story about Sunday sile Ons how
Speaker 3: he survived a near death experience literally to bounce back
Speaker 3: when the Derby win the Preakness, which happened on this
Speaker 3: day in nineteen eighty nine, and in I number two,
Speaker 3: David Sisk of Cats illustrated Forrest Tucker of WTVQ back
Speaker 3: in a minute on six thirty WLAP Welcome back to
Speaker 3: the Big Blue Insider. It was on this day in
Speaker 3: nineteen eighty nine that Sunday Silence won the Preakness Stakes.
Speaker 3: This is the time of year when people pay attention.
Speaker 3: Even if you're not a horse racing fan, you pay
Speaker 3: some attention, especially Derby Week, of course, but if there's
Speaker 3: a triple crown up for grads and sadly there is
Speaker 3: not this year, but there was in nineteen eighty nine,
Speaker 3: and the reason was because of a horse that was,
Speaker 3: by you know, usual thoroughbred standards, not the prettiest animal
Speaker 3: you're going to see. And his name was Sunday Silence
Speaker 3: and he was black, technically dark.
Speaker 2: Brown, but black.
Speaker 3: You know, you've got to qualify in a certain way
Speaker 3: to be in the jockey club black, but Sunday Silence
Speaker 3: jet black. Again, not the prettiest of horses, but man
Speaker 3: could he run. And it's a great story. This is why,
Speaker 3: if you'll indulge me, I'm going to share it with you,
Speaker 3: because I covered that horse as the Thoroughbred Racing Guy
Speaker 3: at WKYT Channels twenty seven, and to me, it was
Speaker 3: a great story because he was owned locally. He was
Speaker 3: winning his way to Churchill Downs out in California, but
Speaker 3: Arthur Hancock owned him. Arthur of course, from Stone Farm
Speaker 3: over outside of Paris and Bourbon County, the brother of
Speaker 3: Seth Hancock, part of that Clayburn Farm family. It's a
Speaker 3: famous story. Bull Hancock was the great horseman who created
Speaker 3: Clayburn Farm, and then when he died, the board of
Speaker 3: directors named Seth the younger brother, to run the farm,
Speaker 3: not Arthur, the older brother. So Arthur set off and
Speaker 3: bought his own land, created his own farm called Stone Arm.
Speaker 3: He liked the name Stone just because it was, you know,
Speaker 3: of the earth, that kind of thing. And I got
Speaker 3: to know Arthur and his wife, Stacy, who grew up
Speaker 3: in Louisville as I did. She went to Westport High School,
Speaker 3: which doesn't exist anymore. But Westport High School was one
Speaker 3: mile away from from my home. If I had not
Speaker 3: gone to Trinity, which was one mile this direction toward
Speaker 3: the west, one mile east was Westport High School. In fact,
Speaker 3: I went to summer school there to take typing because
Speaker 3: I wanted to be a journalist.
Speaker 2: All right, there you go.
Speaker 3: So anyhow, I got to be very friendly with the Hancocks,
Speaker 3: and I began to really follow Sunday Silence his progress
Speaker 3: derby week. I got there on Monday morning, and I
Speaker 3: liked him because he had won the Santa Nita Derby.
Speaker 3: But Easy Goer was the horse. Easy Goer was a
Speaker 3: son of the great Ali Dar, you know, the horse
Speaker 3: that came in second to a firm and all three
Speaker 3: legs at a triple Crown in nineteen seventy eight, and
Speaker 3: he was supposedly the greatest horse to look through a
Speaker 3: bridle in the last twenty five fifty years or whatever.
Speaker 3: Big beautiful red horse reminded people of Secretariat was coming
Speaker 3: through New York, so he had New York height behind
Speaker 3: him and a great trainer in Suge McGee, and Sunday
Speaker 3: Silence was kind of he wasn't a little horse, but
Speaker 3: in terms of his reputation was, you know, shaping up
Speaker 3: as the little horse that could. But the reason I
Speaker 3: bring it up is because the Preakness Stakes that he
Speaker 3: won after he won the Derby was probably still the
Speaker 3: greatest Preakness steaks that I had ever seen leading up
Speaker 3: to this recent one where Journalism managed to fight his
Speaker 3: way to the finish line two different types of races,
Speaker 3: because in eighty nine it was Sunday Silence and easygo
Speaker 3: or battling down the stretch one on one.
Speaker 2: You'll hear that in a moment.
Speaker 3: But when I was looking at this year's Preakness, asking myself,
Speaker 3: was it the greatest I've ever seen? I had to
Speaker 3: go back to one of my favorites in eighty nine.
Speaker 3: But let's back it up. Sunday Silence was lucky to
Speaker 3: be there. He got really, really sick when he was
Speaker 3: a weanling and survived this terrible virus that might have
Speaker 3: killed him, but he didn't pass the eyeball test. He
Speaker 3: was not the prettiest of horses, and in a great coincidence,
Speaker 3: he was bred and owned by oak Cliff's Stables, the.
Speaker 2: Guy who owned that outfit out of Texas.
Speaker 3: Oak Cliffe is a part of Dallas. That's where I
Speaker 3: lived when I was in Dallas. I didn't know that
Speaker 3: until recently. He was bred known by Oakliffe Stables at first,
Speaker 3: but as Arthur Hancock told Bloodhorse Magazine, there's a video
Speaker 3: on YouTube, he was not a pretty horse. And one
Speaker 3: of the people who worked for oak Cliff Stables, owned
Speaker 3: by Tom Taysam, There's a guy named Ted Keefer who
Speaker 3: made a pointed comment when the colt was just a
Speaker 3: foal and hadn't turned black. And he was kind of
Speaker 3: silver gray running around the paddock and some people liked him,
Speaker 3: but this guy named Ted Keeper did not.
Speaker 5: And one time they brought him out and Ted said,
Speaker 5: put that some bitch up said I've seen him enough.
Speaker 5: This was another time and Pete Logan said, Miss Pete
Speaker 5: said this. He said, mister Keith said the roses looked
Speaker 5: mighty pretty around his neck, and Ted said, the only
Speaker 5: time that sun bitch will have roses on him is
Speaker 5: when he's six feet under the ground. And I'm staying
Speaker 5: there thinking, what is this so eerie?
Speaker 4: You know this?
Speaker 3: He hated this horse, And again that's Arthur Hancock talking
Speaker 3: to the Blood Horse magazine on camera. Might have hated
Speaker 3: the horse just because the horse was funny looking, who knows.
Speaker 3: So they put him in the July Select sale at Keenlan, right,
Speaker 3: but they didn't think he'd get much, And sure enough
Speaker 3: the bidding came in and they didn't even get what
Speaker 3: they were hoping to get. So Arthur stepped in.
Speaker 5: They put him in the sale in the summer sale
Speaker 5: at Keenlan and he was going to go for ten eleven,
Speaker 5: twelve thousand, and I jumped in, started bidding, brought bought
Speaker 5: him back for seven and I took the ticket out
Speaker 5: to Time behind the pavilion, said Time, I bought that
Speaker 5: cold back for the wishing Well cold because he.
Speaker 4: Went too cheap. And he said, Arthur, we don't want him,
Speaker 4: because Ted doesn't like him. And I had I said okay.
Speaker 4: I handed him the you know, the.
Speaker 5: Sales slip and I said okay, and I stuck it
Speaker 5: in my short pocket and I remember thinking, well, I
Speaker 5: guess I just blew another seventeen downs.
Speaker 4: I owed a lot of money at the time.
Speaker 3: And that's the part of thoroughbred racing that a lot
Speaker 3: of people who don't like it don't understand. It's not
Speaker 3: simply a bunch of rich people playing with their toys.
Speaker 2: There are jobs on the line every week, every month,
Speaker 2: every year.
Speaker 3: There are smaller farms and employ people and you know,
Speaker 3: provide for the tax base in the state of Kentucky
Speaker 3: and other states. So it's kind of a misunderstood sport
Speaker 3: in my opinion. And in talking to Arthur through the years,
Speaker 3: he made me understand that, you know, he had a
Speaker 3: mortgage he had borrowed against land, things like that, He's
Speaker 3: trying to make ends meet doing the one thing he
Speaker 3: knew best, and that was thoroughbred racing. So moving ahead,
Speaker 3: they send the horse to California to try to sell
Speaker 3: him as a two year old, and once again he
Speaker 3: doesn't get nearly the money that they needed, so they
Speaker 3: decide to bring him back. Well, he's in a van
Speaker 3: with other horses and somewhere in South Texas, the driver
Speaker 3: of the van has a heart attack and dies, crashes.
Speaker 3: One or two of the other horses was killed. Sunday
Speaker 3: Silence was seriously injured. But he comes back and they
Speaker 3: think he's never going to race again. They just turned
Speaker 3: him out the field and they thought, well, we'll just
Speaker 3: try to sell him as a saddle horse or something.
Speaker 3: But within a week to ten days he was racing
Speaker 3: around the field looking like a racehorse again.
Speaker 5: It's the perfect tale of the ugly duckling turning into
Speaker 5: a swan.
Speaker 3: So when he had fully recovered, they send him to
Speaker 3: cal to Charlie Whittingham, the Hall of Fame trainer since passed,
Speaker 3: but back then known as one of the greatest in
Speaker 3: the history of the game. And Charlie on the phone
Speaker 3: one morning told Arthur, you know this, this this black
Speaker 3: sob that you named Sunday Silence. Arthur pulled that name
Speaker 3: from a Chris Christofferson song. Arthur was a big songwriter anyway, Uh,
Speaker 3: Whittingham said.
Speaker 2: This, this horse can run a little bit.
Speaker 3: So they ran him at age two, didn't win anything,
Speaker 3: was second in a maiden, second in an allowance race.
Speaker 3: But at age three they raced him at Santa Anita.
Speaker 3: He wins an allowance race, then he wins the San Felipe,
Speaker 3: then he wins the Santa Anita Derby. So now the
Speaker 3: ugly duckling has become a swan, and now he qualifies
Speaker 3: for the Kentucky Derby. So obviously Arthur Hancock's excited, and
Speaker 3: they ship him east. And I will never forget spending
Speaker 3: a lot of time on the backside that week with
Speaker 3: the Hancocks. And I was walking over to the barn
Speaker 3: on Thursday after Sunday. Silence worked a half mile in
Speaker 3: forty five and change of forty six, and Arthur had
Speaker 3: just left Charlie Whittingham side, and he was blown Arthur
Speaker 3: was blown away by the work, and he was more
Speaker 3: impressed after he had talked to Charlie as they walked
Speaker 3: back to the barn.
Speaker 4: And we were walking back and Charlie.
Speaker 5: Said, my boy, we will get the money Saturday. I said, Charlie,
Speaker 5: you really think so? He said, my boy, we will
Speaker 5: get the money. I said, what do you think of
Speaker 5: his work? He said, well, a good horse will work
Speaker 5: like that. He said, this is a good horse. I said,
Speaker 5: you really think we can beat easy Gore? He said
Speaker 5: it was the third time he said we will get
Speaker 5: the money.
Speaker 3: And I didn't know this until I watched this video
Speaker 3: from Blood Horse. I didn't know that they had had
Speaker 3: that conversation. I probably should have because I come up
Speaker 3: to Arthur and I said.
Speaker 2: How did he look? What did you think? And he
Speaker 2: told me the time.
Speaker 3: He knew the time at that point of the work,
Speaker 3: and his eyes were bugging out of his head and
Speaker 3: he looked right through me and he goes, that's a
Speaker 3: heck of a work. I said yeah, and then he
Speaker 3: said it again. Arthur said, that's a heck of a work.
Speaker 3: That was the point where I became convinced this is
Speaker 3: the horse I need to bet on in the Kentucky Derby,
Speaker 3: not Easygoer.
Speaker 2: Sunday.
Speaker 3: Silence would be my key horse, my big money horse,
Speaker 3: right And at that point Arthur still wasn't sure the
Speaker 3: horse could win the derby and beat Easygoer, but he
Speaker 3: thought he could get a piece of the purse and
Speaker 3: pay some bills.
Speaker 5: I mean, I owed a ton of money, and I
Speaker 5: had bought all this land, you know, and a lot
Speaker 5: of horses.
Speaker 4: And then was eighty eight that.
Speaker 5: Crash came and what was worth a dollar in a
Speaker 5: land or horses became worth about thirty cents. I thought, well,
Speaker 5: you know, if we run second, that that wouldn't be bad.
Speaker 4: And then we got the previous minute.
Speaker 5: I prepared myself, you know, for whatever eventuality occurred.
Speaker 3: So then comes Derby day and again I'll never forget
Speaker 3: handicapping the race and asking myself which horse do I like?
Speaker 3: I mean, I had been swayed by recency bias, by
Speaker 3: being around the handcocks, by watching the horse, and I'd
Speaker 3: watched the Easygoer as well, and that was a great
Speaker 3: horse and a great trainer in Sugar McGahee. But I
Speaker 3: remember that Easygoer as a two year old had raced
Speaker 3: the Churchill Downs and didn't really like the track. And
Speaker 3: again two year old versus three year old, big difference.
Speaker 3: But horses that show you they don't like the track
Speaker 3: at Churchill or really anywhere else, but I think particularly
Speaker 3: Churchill that's telling. That's why I kicked myself after the Derby.
Speaker 3: I mentioned this on the show when Sovereignty won. He
Speaker 3: had already won on that track.
Speaker 2: I'm like, what a dope.
Speaker 3: I didn't bet him, you know, the way I should have.
Speaker 3: And the reason was it was an off track that day,
Speaker 3: but the horse still liked the track. So anyhow, I
Speaker 3: took a big, deep breath and I threw out Easy Goer.
Speaker 3: And I mean I had him in an exact or whatever.
Speaker 3: But I bet big on Sunday Silence. And sure enough,
Speaker 3: on a cold, bitter day, it was spitting snow, really
Speaker 3: uncomfortable out there. But I'm standing on the track and
Speaker 3: here he came, the black horse rider Pat Belnezuela, in
Speaker 3: kind of grayish silver and gold silks, lying down the
Speaker 3: stretch in the middle of the track, kind of weaving
Speaker 3: like a drunken sailor.
Speaker 2: On the inside.
Speaker 6: Thing comes Easy Goer and the awe inspiring come with
Speaker 6: a sixteenth of a mile to go, and here comes
Speaker 6: Sunday Silence. Do this pretch coming to the finish of
Speaker 6: the derby?
Speaker 2: Sunday Silence?
Speaker 7: What is this Comy Fight too.
Speaker 3: Late and that's Dave Johnson Curtisy, ABC Sports. So Sunday
Speaker 3: Silence wins the Kentucky Derby, next stop Baltimore. We'll have
Speaker 3: that after the break on six thirty WLAP Welcome back
Speaker 3: to the Big Blue and Cider coming up David Sisk
Speaker 3: from Cats Illustrated Forrest Tucker from WTVQ. But right now
Speaker 3: we're taking a special look back at the nineteen eighty
Speaker 3: nine Preakness one on this day, all those years ago
Speaker 3: by Sunday Silence, and if you're just joining us, we
Speaker 3: talked about how Sunday Silence survived in illness. As a weenling,
Speaker 3: he was in a terrible van accident in South Texas
Speaker 3: when he was being shipped from California back to Kentucky.
Speaker 3: Nearly died from those injuries, but recovered and prospered. As
Speaker 3: a three year old, Colt won the Santa Anita Derby,
Speaker 3: then won the Kentucky Derby. So now they ship him
Speaker 3: to Baltimore where he's going to challenge Easygoer once again.
Speaker 3: And a lot of people thought, well, you know, maybe
Speaker 3: the Derby was a fluke. The time was terrible in
Speaker 3: the Derby was like two five or something like that,
Speaker 3: and Arthur pointed out to me pragmatically, and I forgot
Speaker 3: about this. It was an off track that day. It
Speaker 3: was kind of a muddy track because of the day,
Speaker 3: like I said, earlier, bad weather and off and on
Speaker 3: rain and snow. And in the post parade, one of
Speaker 3: the horses threw a shoe and so instead of scratching
Speaker 3: the horse, they rushed the horse back in under the
Speaker 3: spires into the paddock, and you know, ferrier came rushing
Speaker 3: out and they reshod the horse. But meanwhile the Derby field,
Speaker 3: those horses waiting to run, circled in the mud for gosh,
Speaker 3: eight or nine ten minutes, and they.
Speaker 2: Finally loaded him into the gates.
Speaker 3: So those horses got an additional work at Think about
Speaker 3: that if you're gonna go sprint, but first you walk
Speaker 3: in the mud for about ten minutes in a circle.
Speaker 3: He was right, so a tiring Sunday silence. But all
Speaker 3: the other horses were tired too, comes weaving down the stretch.
Speaker 2: Weaving in and out, but he was well.
Speaker 3: Clear of the rest of the horses and wins the
Speaker 3: Derby convincingly.
Speaker 2: But a lot of people thought it was a fluke.
Speaker 3: The experts believe that this one would go to easygo Er.
Speaker 3: That Sunday Silence ran a nice race, but this time
Speaker 3: the big horse from New York is going to get
Speaker 3: the black eyed Susans. Well it didn't quite turn out
Speaker 3: that way. It was a great race, and as they
Speaker 3: turned for home, Sunday Silence was on the front end
Speaker 3: and an Easy Goer moved past him. And if you're
Speaker 3: watching the race, you thought, well, that's it. And I
Speaker 3: remember I was over at the TV station for whatever
Speaker 3: reason on that Saturday afternoon, that Saturday evening. I ordinarily
Speaker 3: worked on Saturdays if we were really busy or had
Speaker 3: something else going on, or I'm filling in for one
Speaker 3: of the anchors or whatever, but I happened to be there,
Speaker 3: and I remember we were all crowded together in the
Speaker 3: main room watching the TV and I'm screaming at the
Speaker 3: top of my lungs. And as they were racing down
Speaker 3: the stretch, I see Easygoer put his head in front.
Speaker 3: I thought, well, that's it. And then here's something that
Speaker 3: you never are you rarely see in deep stretch like
Speaker 3: a sixteenth of a mile ago, Sunday Silence retakes the lead.
Speaker 3: Oh I wasn't the only one who saw that. As
Speaker 3: they were coming down the stretch. Arthur Hancock saw it happen,
Speaker 3: and he admitted to the Blood Horse on camera in
Speaker 3: this video that he did ten or eleven years ago
Speaker 3: that he basically had resigned himself to the fact that
Speaker 3: easy Gore.
Speaker 2: Was gonna win.
Speaker 5: Sunday Silence was there and Easy Gore kind of swept
Speaker 5: past him. Looked to me like he might have shut
Speaker 5: him off. I was watching, but Sunday Silence dropped back
Speaker 5: a length or two and I dropped my glasses and
Speaker 5: said to Stacy, I said, Easy Gore just shut us off.
Speaker 4: That's what I thought looking through that. He didn't.
Speaker 5: He was far enough out there, but he swept past us,
Speaker 5: and I thought with a move like that, I thought
Speaker 5: it's over.
Speaker 2: A lot of people thought it was over.
Speaker 3: But Arthur's wife, Stacy, she had her eyes on the
Speaker 3: race and at one point she screamed to Arthur, he's
Speaker 3: coming back.
Speaker 4: Stacy said, he's coming back. He's coming back. You want
Speaker 4: it buy a nose?
Speaker 2: Yes, he did.
Speaker 3: And here's the way Dave Johnson called it for ABC Sports.
Speaker 7: Good way on the turn.
Speaker 6: Heads on the outside of the front on the outside.
Speaker 6: Your comes Sunday silence to kelling down there heads of
Speaker 6: bark Sunday silence with Pat Plinzoela takes Sunay at the
Speaker 6: quarter pole, easy goer back into second position, Dancel's coming
Speaker 6: on third in the stretch on the upside of Sunday
Speaker 6: silence on in the side, easy goer, head down. That's
Speaker 6: French say, come on the outside, it's Sunday silence, easy
Speaker 6: goer with pesday Bector Challis had a bark easy goar
Speaker 6: on the inside of a slight lead by outside Sunday silence.
Speaker 8: Here at the far back, here's the fas of.
Speaker 6: The preakness Sunday sign of an easy goar photo fat
Speaker 6: show you a park I can't tell, but on the
Speaker 6: outside Sunday side of for Pat Velinzuela, he's.
Speaker 9: Waving a quippling. He thinks he wanted to time what
Speaker 9: fifty three and four fifty second tramatic photo finish either
Speaker 9: Sunday silent on the upside tinner of the derby, who
Speaker 9: will try to make it two steps to the triple
Speaker 9: crown or easy if you are at the rail with
Speaker 9: that day.
Speaker 2: What a finish yad was?
Speaker 3: And Sunday Silence wins it, and basically, as Arthur Hancock
Speaker 3: put it, saved their farm. Because of the money he
Speaker 3: made by winning both the Derby and the Preakness, a
Speaker 3: Handcock family was able to pay some bills and keep
Speaker 3: people employed.
Speaker 5: Sunday Silence was a gift from God, and he saved us.
Speaker 5: He saved I had wife and children, and Sunday Silence
Speaker 5: saved us.
Speaker 4: He saved the farm.
Speaker 3: Of course, the two horses hooked each other again, and
Speaker 3: the Belmont actually went and covered that Belmont because I
Speaker 3: wanted to be there if the Hancocks won a triple Crown.
Speaker 3: But Easygoer racing on his home track, a bigger track
Speaker 3: with the wide sweeping turns which benefited a big horse
Speaker 3: like Easygoer, wins on his home turf and prevents Sunday
Speaker 3: Silence from winning the triple Crown. Arthur admitted he was disappointed,
Speaker 3: but he said when he got into it, all he
Speaker 3: ever dreamed about was winning the Derby. I didn't dream
Speaker 3: about winning the triple Crown. Just get me a Kentucky Derby,
Speaker 3: which he did, and the horses hooked each other again
Speaker 3: in the Breeders Cup. The following fall and Sunday Silence
Speaker 3: won it again. And if you remember the story from
Speaker 3: earlier when Whittingham told Hancock, my boy, we're gonna get
Speaker 3: the money. Prior to the Breeders Cup, I was told
Speaker 3: a second hand that Whittingham was talking to a pr
Speaker 3: person from the Breeders Cup. She said something to Charlie
Speaker 3: about you know, he's got a pretty good chance at winning.
Speaker 3: And he turned to her and he said, bleeping the bleep,
Speaker 3: we're gonna win that bleeping money. And she said, yeah,
Speaker 3: you got a big chance, and he said it again,
Speaker 3: We're gonna win that bleeping money, which is when they
Speaker 3: loaded up out there on Sunday Silence so a great horse,
Speaker 3: and again, as Arthur said, the ugly duckling that truly
Speaker 3: became a swan and saved the family farm. Now, business
Speaker 3: being business, Arthur had to sell the horse. He wanted
Speaker 3: to keep him, but he at bills to pay, so
Speaker 3: he sold him to a group from Japan, and Sunday
Speaker 3: Silence went on to become the greatest sire in the
Speaker 3: history of Japanese racing. There are champion horses throughout Japanese
Speaker 3: racing now that trace their lineage back the Sunday Silence.
Speaker 3: Arthur brought him home at one point, and he spent
Speaker 3: a lot of time in his later years back here
Speaker 3: in Kentucky, but eventually went back to Japan. And the
Speaker 3: horse actually died in Japan, but not until he had become,
Speaker 3: of course, a great race horse and a great sire.
Speaker 3: And again it was on this day in nineteen eighty
Speaker 3: nine at Sunday, Silence won the Preakness, the second jewel
Speaker 3: of racing's triple Crown. Coming up next, we'll hear from
Speaker 3: David Sisk of Cats Illustrated and Forrest Tucker from w
Speaker 3: tvq D on The Big New Insider six point thirty
Speaker 3: WLAP suact out.
Speaker 8: Such Statuta sat out, such.
Speaker 2: Welcome back to the Big Blue Insider.
Speaker 3: Joining us now is a guy who makes the rounds
Speaker 3: on the radio talk shows because we learned a lot
Speaker 3: of basketball from David Sisks from Cats Illustrated. Part of
Speaker 3: the Rivals Network covers Kentucky and North Carolina recruiting. This
Speaker 3: is a busy time for you, isn't a coach? I
Speaker 3: know that the basketball season's over, but the recruiting season, well,
Speaker 3: it never really ends.
Speaker 2: Does it.
Speaker 7: No?
Speaker 10: And I was getting ready to say, if you had
Speaker 10: to put that on and it never stops, and you
Speaker 10: know it doesn't, so you go from May. Now. The
Speaker 10: one thing about it the we we just got done
Speaker 10: in Memphis. We had a live period. I was at
Speaker 10: the Nike U y b L. But you know, Adidas
Speaker 10: was in uh, Iowa. I think under Armor was in
Speaker 10: uh uh Cincinnati area, and then you had Poom. We've
Speaker 10: got like five shoe circuits now, so you know, Mark
Speaker 10: Pope was in uh he was in Memphis Friday night,
Speaker 10: he was in Iowa Saturday morning, and Anitas didn't turn
Speaker 10: around Saturday afternoon. He's back in Memphis, so you know
Speaker 10: he's he's back and forth. But that's kind of how
Speaker 10: you feel right now. But you know, usually uh, you
Speaker 10: ended up to eyb you had four spring sessions, uh
Speaker 10: they au ball and the last one it will always
Speaker 10: always be around Memortal Day weekend and now you've got
Speaker 10: three and so that's helped a little bit. But to me,
Speaker 10: the biggest thing is getting the transfer portal over with.
Speaker 10: That's That's what I'll make you want to, you know,
Speaker 10: question your career choice is the never ending transfer portal.
Speaker 10: But then you uh, you know, but then you're going
Speaker 10: to get in it'll be okay, and then about the
Speaker 10: middle of June they'll start reaching out directly to the
Speaker 10: twenty twenty six kids, and then all of a sudden,
Speaker 10: you're you're in uh aau ball in July, and then
Speaker 10: you've got official visits and all that getting set up,
Speaker 10: and then you've got the fall, and then you got
Speaker 10: your season and high school season, then you go through
Speaker 10: the whole thing all over again.
Speaker 3: Tell me what your impressions are of the portal class
Speaker 3: that Mark Pope has put together now that things have
Speaker 3: settled down.
Speaker 10: Uh, obviously a tremendous class. Everybody that I've seen has
Speaker 10: them ranked in the top three. And I think myself,
Speaker 10: looking at play now, I don't have I don't go
Speaker 10: down a list into a portal ranking look at everybody,
Speaker 10: but you know who the best ones are. I think
Speaker 10: they're probably right around number two. And you know, when
Speaker 10: when you take high school kids coming in, who should
Speaker 10: get on the floor. Overall, it's a very good class
Speaker 10: that they brought in, a very good group. And I
Speaker 10: think not only did they address means, they they're deep,
Speaker 10: you know, so it's not like they've just got one
Speaker 10: guy this spot. They wanted to go at least too
Speaker 10: deep in every spot, and they've got versatility and flexibility.
Speaker 10: And I think last year they thought they were deep
Speaker 10: and then all the injuries that they got and they
Speaker 10: really found out, you know, they didn't have as much
Speaker 10: depth as what they thought they had. I think he's
Speaker 10: approaching it now now that they kind of lifted the
Speaker 10: capital on the number of scholarships you can have. I
Speaker 10: think it kind of reminds me of an NBA team.
Speaker 10: So if you can put fifteen spots, if you can
Speaker 10: have fifteen spots, why would you have in NBA ten?
Speaker 10: You know, they fill off fifteen, whether it's the two
Speaker 10: way deals or whatever. So it kind of looks to
Speaker 10: me like, you know, Pope's kind of taking that approach
Speaker 10: that you know he's going to try to fill you know,
Speaker 10: every spot and have a deep of a roster is
Speaker 10: what he can have.
Speaker 3: Well, you cover recruiting, you've coached this game, and you know,
Speaker 3: Pope had to answer critics. They were very polite about it,
Speaker 3: but some Kentucky fans were a little i don't know, confused,
Speaker 3: myft whatever. When Pope would have a group on the
Speaker 3: floor maybe to open the game and would get out
Speaker 3: to this great start. Then he starts subbing and people
Speaker 3: began and you and I spoke about that during the season,
Speaker 3: and you talked about how you might be cutting down
Speaker 3: on his subs. But he he was you know, I
Speaker 3: don't want to say stubborn, but he was confident in
Speaker 3: the way he's doing things and that he wants to
Speaker 3: play everybody keep him fresh, that kind of thing. As
Speaker 3: the season went on, did you see more value in that?
Speaker 10: I did, because he built debt. Yeah, so that's the thing.
Speaker 10: You could keep that five out there. You know, Jerry
Speaker 10: Tartanian say, you only need to be about eight deep,
Speaker 10: needed six guys play and two be over in the
Speaker 10: bench's scream with yell well as they could. So Pope
Speaker 10: obviously didn't believe in that. So if he would have
Speaker 10: taken that philosophy and any injury set in, you go
Speaker 10: right in the middle East. See, and your your players
Speaker 10: are not ready, they've never been on the floor, but
Speaker 10: you know, we'd already started playing. I think Travis Perry
Speaker 10: and Noah and and you know your freshman Chandler ended
Speaker 10: up playing a lot. No it was sporadic at times,
Speaker 10: so they may I think toward the end of the
Speaker 10: year That was the thing to me. You never know
Speaker 10: where it was going to come from. You could take
Speaker 10: Travis Perry for example. He may go three games and
Speaker 10: never get in and then all of a sudden when
Speaker 10: he does plays playing twenty five minutes and he has
Speaker 10: a big game, or you know that was the case, Well,
Speaker 10: I think any of the freshmen. So I thought that
Speaker 10: was and I don't not privy to you know the
Speaker 10: thinking behind that. I thought that was a little unusual.
Speaker 10: But it worked out. But she definitely I think, took
Speaker 10: criticism like you said, but I think it did work
Speaker 10: out for and when all the injuries set in, and
Speaker 10: obviously we know they did at the end of.
Speaker 3: The year, Travis Harry waited until literally the last possible, yeah,
Speaker 3: moments before he announced his transfer and did it with
Speaker 3: a little vanfare. How much did that surprise you if
Speaker 3: at all?
Speaker 10: I think the timing I know this. I get so
Speaker 10: busy in the portal, and the thing that I hate
Speaker 10: about the portal is you have all these contents, Well,
Speaker 10: Kentucky's contacted this guy and this guy that guy, And
Speaker 10: it's not like scholarship offers where you've got a limited amount.
Speaker 10: You get into the portal and the next thing you know,
Speaker 10: you're trying to find out about one hundred and fifty
Speaker 10: guys in a too much span, it seems like, and
Speaker 10: it's just it never ends. It's just twenty four hours
Speaker 10: to day, seven days a week, and you're just praying
Speaker 10: for it to get over. So what happens is you
Speaker 10: get in the middle of that and you kind of
Speaker 10: forget who's not putting you and you know, so you're
Speaker 10: not thinking Travis Perry. You're thinking about you know, all
Speaker 10: these guys that are going to Kentucky, and guys are
Speaker 10: in a hunt board to go to Indiana or somewhere
Speaker 10: else and uh a Boogie Land or somebody like that
Speaker 10: that's in now, and you don't even think about it,
Speaker 10: so it sneaks up on you. And but then once
Speaker 10: you see that, I think it's a timing more than anything.
Speaker 10: And when it happens late, but then you're like, well, yeah,
Speaker 10: I guess it does make sense because it's like you
Speaker 10: and I talked about here. When you're at Kentucky, you're
Speaker 10: Mark Pope. You've got a responsibility just like John Teller
Speaker 10: Perry did it for him that he's going to You're
Speaker 10: going to get recruited over. And I've made this statement
Speaker 10: before that the one of the best conversations that I've
Speaker 10: ever had about Kentucky recruiting with with Andy Borman, who
Speaker 10: ran the New York RN's AAU program and was Coach
Speaker 10: K's son in law, and he he had lance Ware,
Speaker 10: and I remember when lance Ware was committed and I
Speaker 10: called talked to him and he told me. He said,
Speaker 10: I told lance when you get recruited over year one,
Speaker 10: don't come back. Don't don't come home. If you want
Speaker 10: to go to Kentucky or North Carolina or Duke or Tangen,
Speaker 10: You're going to get recruited over. When you get recruited
Speaker 10: over your sophomore year, don't come home, you know. And
Speaker 10: he made it three years that Kentucky constantly getting recruited over.
Speaker 10: And a couple of women told him, you go to
Speaker 10: a place like Kentucky, it's going to happen. You need
Speaker 10: to expect that and know that they're constantly going to
Speaker 10: try to upgrade your position. So you know, that's what
Speaker 10: happened with Perry. I think he understood he was constantly
Speaker 10: going to get recruited over, and that's the nature of
Speaker 10: the beast. You know, it's nobody's fault. Nobody's the bad
Speaker 10: guy here, but that's that's just the way it works.
Speaker 3: He is David Sisko, Cats Illustrated, part of the Rivals Network.
Speaker 3: Will come back and talk more hoops with a coach
Speaker 3: on the other side of the break here on six
Speaker 3: thirty WLAP Welcome back. We're talking with David Siske is
Speaker 3: part of the Rivals Network. You see his work on
Speaker 3: Cats Illustrated covering and the recruiting for Kentucky and North Carolina.
Speaker 3: Tell me about Mark Pope and his staff, which is important,
Speaker 3: of course, the entire staff, but their recruiting efforts, David,
Speaker 3: now in year number two, especially coming off year number one,
Speaker 3: when they answered so many questions, you know, because people wondered,
Speaker 3: can this guy and this to me was ridiculous, canny
Speaker 3: recruited and of course he can. They wondered could he
Speaker 3: win in the win in the NCAA tournament. Obviously he can,
Speaker 3: but they put those questions to rest. And now it
Speaker 3: seems like they've got a ton of momentum.
Speaker 2: Am I reading that right now?
Speaker 10: You're correct, and they do. And I don't think into
Speaker 10: the Sweet sixteen necessarily makes you up a hot program.
Speaker 10: I think you need a deep run kind of do
Speaker 10: that nationally. But and what I'm talking about is I
Speaker 10: don't think yet they got the cachet that uh Yukon got,
Speaker 10: well two straight national titles, of Alabama got going to
Speaker 10: a Final four, or Houston's got right now. I know,
Speaker 10: like I said, being an AU event, when Kevin Sampson
Speaker 10: walk walks in, you see him, you just look at it.
Speaker 10: As great as he was, he's one of my favorite
Speaker 10: coaches and has been, you just look at him a
Speaker 10: little differently. And it's just I think in your subconsciousness
Speaker 10: of human nature, it's almost like you've got to glower
Speaker 10: halo around defense. So it's it's that that's you know,
Speaker 10: like I said, that's just the way we're wired. So
Speaker 10: but I do think Kentucky's got like I said, momentum,
Speaker 10: I think the playing style does a lot. Players like
Speaker 10: what they're seeing. They're constantly when they recruit, they're sending
Speaker 10: out there the way I take it, they're texting out
Speaker 10: these these video clips all the time of their playing
Speaker 10: style and what they do and how the player would
Speaker 10: fit in it. And the players really like what they're running.
Speaker 10: The parents like what they're running uh you know, and
Speaker 10: coach Popany's staff I think approached this and recruiting a
Speaker 10: very good way. They put people at ease. So but
Speaker 10: now we know nil is such a big deal that
Speaker 10: even the guys that they're in on now and you
Speaker 10: think they're good shape for all it takes is one
Speaker 10: nil bit over the top and that, you know, the
Speaker 10: house of cards come down. So and that's the world
Speaker 10: we live in now. But yeah, they definitely you know,
Speaker 10: when you when you have a year ahead and you
Speaker 10: put together recruiting class like they had on top of it.
Speaker 10: And if you look what they did even last year
Speaker 10: in the recruiting class now limited amount of time that
Speaker 10: he had to put together a team like that, I mean,
Speaker 10: I think they've been above board, you know, a recruiting
Speaker 10: class the season. In the second recruiting class he had
Speaker 10: knocked at Alla Park all three times.
Speaker 3: What do you like about their playing style?
Speaker 10: I like that it's a modern style. It is free flowing,
Speaker 10: there's a lot of reads. You know. He said that
Speaker 10: they didn't shoot as many three pointers last year. He
Speaker 10: said his press conference last week, did not shoot as
Speaker 10: many three pointers as he wants to shoot. I like
Speaker 10: that type. So the thing is, if you ask me going,
Speaker 10: who's your favorite coach in college basketball? Just from that
Speaker 10: you like the style was Nate Oates and so that
Speaker 10: kind of tells you how I'm wired. Yeah, yeah, so
Speaker 10: I like the I like the modern day offense. I
Speaker 10: like the analytics of it. I think when you watch
Speaker 10: them play, there's a rhyme or reason for everything they do.
Speaker 10: There's just it's style based, it's it's percentage based. It
Speaker 10: translates into the NBA game. It's fun to watch for fans.
Speaker 6: Uh.
Speaker 10: So you know, I like all that I don't like,
Speaker 10: and they ran. I think they were a very You
Speaker 10: had a lot of imagination to be able to play
Speaker 10: all these bigs together like you did and still keep
Speaker 10: the wartch court spread out, and I think it's hard
Speaker 10: to do, but they were really good at it. And
Speaker 10: I don't necessarily like just the old traditional power forward
Speaker 10: and the high post centered down on the block and
Speaker 10: they never get out on the floor and it's just
Speaker 10: it's just pounded in there and throw it off the backboard.
Speaker 10: Five guys try to go get it. You know. I
Speaker 10: just like this stuff of offense much better than than
Speaker 10: than you know what some of the alternatives are well, you.
Speaker 3: Know, speaking of the Bigs and the way they played,
Speaker 3: I found it really interesting by the end of the
Speaker 3: year the value of Mariy Williams value, at least in
Speaker 3: the eyes of fans and maybe yours as well, it
Speaker 3: was more about offense than defense, because you know, they
Speaker 3: had their problems with defense early in the year, and
Speaker 3: Williams was three time defensive player of.
Speaker 2: The Year in this league.
Speaker 3: We knew that, but he wasn't quite the rim protector
Speaker 3: that we thought he might be for whatever reason. However,
Speaker 3: he was such a great passer in that offense that
Speaker 3: was such a good and when he had to run
Speaker 3: the point more than once, I thought it was fascinating. Coach,
Speaker 3: the way that script kind of got flipped. You know
Speaker 3: what I'm saying.
Speaker 10: I think you could go to the shopping mall and
Speaker 10: Lexington or Louisville, Kentucky year one and have a microphone
Speaker 10: and grab the first hundred people and say what kind
Speaker 10: of center does Mark Pope want to have his offense?
Speaker 10: And they could give you a pretty educated answer. Just
Speaker 10: about everybody. I mean, if you watch them play, and
Speaker 10: we know that ball handling is a big part of that,
Speaker 10: so like, if we look into Malachi Marino that's coming
Speaker 10: in the first we're not looking at really what he
Speaker 10: does down on a block. You're kind of looking at
Speaker 10: how does he handle the ball? Can he dribble it,
Speaker 10: can pass it, canny maneuver with it. And so I
Speaker 10: think that goes back not only the Pope's style, but
Speaker 10: that's because of Amari Williams. So when Mark Pope says, hey,
Speaker 10: when we go into the portal, we are looking analytically
Speaker 10: for which players match our system. So if I've got
Speaker 10: a center and there's found to two guys or one's
Speaker 10: ranked number two and the portal and another guy's ranking twelve,
Speaker 10: if the number twelve guy fits us analytically better than
Speaker 10: what we do, we're gonna take the number twelve guy.
Speaker 10: We're not worried about the rankings. And I think we
Speaker 10: kind of see that cod with him from Drexel and
Speaker 10: maybe with a Kobe Brad and some of these guys
Speaker 10: maybe weren't quite as highly regarded that man. They really
Speaker 10: matched what Mark Pope wants to do. And I I
Speaker 10: look at players now, and you know they recruited a
Speaker 10: kid in the Ukah they're looking at right now, Dean Rukert,
Speaker 10: and I'm sitting there. We're talking to a couple of
Speaker 10: National guys while he's playing, and they're like, man, he
Speaker 10: just looks like Mark Pope's kind of players. So I
Speaker 10: think even in year two, we've already got a good
Speaker 10: idea in all the different positions. What Mark Pope's taught
Speaker 10: the player really is sure. Uh, just one thing that's interesting.
Speaker 10: I was talking to another SEC coach in Memphis weekend
Speaker 10: and he said it's going to be interesting because he's
Speaker 10: brought in some strong, physcal guys like Diabode might be
Speaker 10: one who are not shooters. They're physical. So I'm wondering
Speaker 10: if he's trying to adjust a little bit from that, saying, Okay,
Speaker 10: if we're in the SEC, we've got to be more physical.
Speaker 10: We may have to put some non shooters out there,
Speaker 10: even maybe more than one on the floor at the
Speaker 10: same time, playing extended minutes, because we got to match
Speaker 10: the physicality in the sectate. So he may be making
Speaker 10: a little bit of adjustment. They're up right front of
Speaker 10: my eyes.
Speaker 2: I can see that.
Speaker 3: Just a couple of minutes left with David sisk if
Speaker 3: cat illustrated.
Speaker 2: Uh, I don't know.
Speaker 3: If I've asked you straight up yet your thoughts on
Speaker 3: malachaim Mareno, because I got to cover the state tournament
Speaker 3: all the way through his championship and really for a
Speaker 3: couple of years, and uh, you know, he could be
Speaker 3: the classic low post big man. But you know he
Speaker 3: also looks like a guy. Well, they tell me he
Speaker 3: can shoot threes and make them. They just didn't want
Speaker 3: him to in high school. You know, they needed him
Speaker 3: under the bucket. But yeah, just hear your impressions to him.
Speaker 10: Well you just said there if they didn't have the
Speaker 10: rim protection last year, and you're right, Williams six eleven,
Speaker 10: but he really didn't get off the floor. So they
Speaker 10: got it. Now they got and they're gonna have acquaintance too.
Speaker 10: So you've got two centers right there, two guys playing
Speaker 10: a five who can absolutely protect the rims. So that
Speaker 10: gives you that.
Speaker 2: I like it.
Speaker 10: I think he handles the ball well out front. I
Speaker 10: think he's got a nice little jump shot. I don't
Speaker 10: know how deep it goes out, but I know around
Speaker 10: the elbow areas and stuff, it looks pretty good. You know,
Speaker 10: he can dribble the ball, he can pass it, he
Speaker 10: can handle it. That's a big prerequisite. So I think
Speaker 10: the thing you're looking at Kentucky, I don't think he's
Speaker 10: the one done. So is he a guy that you
Speaker 10: could get them to stay for year two? Perhaps you're three,
Speaker 10: but definitely year two. And being a Kentucky kid, we say,
Speaker 10: and you can say, well, Travis Perry was a Kentucky kid,
Speaker 10: but that's apples and oranges and and you're talking about
Speaker 10: bringing a top twenty guy in here that was the
Speaker 10: second highest ranked high school center in the country in
Speaker 10: his in his group. So you know, I don't care
Speaker 10: if you're in Kansas and you get them out of Camarino,
Speaker 10: you've got a big signee there. But you know, being
Speaker 10: in the state of Kentucky, you know, I think because
Speaker 10: of that, you get a chance that he doesn't hit
Speaker 10: the portal after year one and he sticks around for
Speaker 10: the second year and really develops because you know he's
Speaker 10: already you can't teach seven to one, you know, you
Speaker 10: can't coach it. You can't teach it. Only God give
Speaker 10: you that. So he uh so, yeah, yeah, I definitely
Speaker 10: I'm all in on it.
Speaker 2: Sounds good to me.
Speaker 3: And he's probably after a year could be looking at
Speaker 3: in a take a always situation, go off and get
Speaker 3: the information from the draft, and if you come back,
Speaker 3: you stand to make more money playing another.
Speaker 2: Year of college ball.
Speaker 10: Right, Yeah, And that's what we're looking at now, and
Speaker 10: I've seen some excellent articles on that as i'm time research.
Speaker 10: But you're basically to the point now. It used to
Speaker 10: be if you're in the second round, you might come
Speaker 10: back to college simply because you you didn't get any
Speaker 10: type of guarantees and your your whole motivation was there
Speaker 10: for if I'm a second round it doesn't work out
Speaker 10: daring and you're losing a college degree and everything else.
Speaker 10: But now will be in al The difference is they
Speaker 10: can pay you more than definitely what the second round can,
Speaker 10: but they can pay you more than many in the
Speaker 10: first round picks. I think if you're at a place,
Speaker 10: if you're in an Otago Oway with what he'll be
Speaker 10: getting north three million if he comes back to Kentucky,
Speaker 10: unless you're a lottery pick and you're going to make
Speaker 10: more coming back to Kentucky. Now, I understand, the first
Speaker 10: round gives you guarantees, but Old Ways is not going
Speaker 10: to get first round and I can understand, well, you
Speaker 10: get a two year contractor a three year contract and
Speaker 10: that turns out to the hill. But I had a
Speaker 10: guy tell me, and I think he's exactly right. He said,
Speaker 10: you know, if you don't go come back. He said,
Speaker 10: if you're old way and you don't come back, you're
Speaker 10: spending about three years once you do go pro trying
Speaker 10: to make up the money lost by not going back
Speaker 10: to Kentucky. And I thought that was that was really
Speaker 10: an excellent quote.
Speaker 3: Yeah, everybody wants to get to that second contract, but
Speaker 3: they forget that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he I've heard that quote.
Speaker 3: You're chasing that money and it's going to take a while,
Speaker 3: and you got to stay healthy enough to recoup it.
Speaker 3: So yeah, it's big business, no question. David Sisk is
Speaker 3: big business and the interest of recruiting. And you should
Speaker 3: follow him on Twitter at Coach David Sisk. Look for
Speaker 3: him on the website Cats Illustrated part of the Rivals Network.
Speaker 3: Thank you, coach, talk to you again soon.
Speaker 10: Absolutely, Thank you.
Speaker 2: Up next, Forest.
Speaker 3: Tucker from WTVQ TV channel thirty six, Here on six
Speaker 3: thirty WLAP Welcome back to the Big Moon Sider joining
Speaker 3: us now from ABC channel thirty six WTVQ Forrest Tucker,
Speaker 3: who is a guy who covers a little bit of everything,
Speaker 3: including the derby. I want to double back to that
Speaker 3: because I'm always curious about folks who come in from
Speaker 3: out of town and get a chance to cover that event.
Speaker 3: But you've been covering Mark Pope of late. And he
Speaker 3: sat down and then had quite the frank discussion I
Speaker 3: think with the media the other day Forrest. Was there
Speaker 3: any one particular takeaway from that because there were a
Speaker 3: lot of good sound bites, weren't there.
Speaker 10: Yeah.
Speaker 11: I thought there was a litany of sound bites you
Speaker 11: could have gone with and you could have made into stories.
Speaker 11: And so when I think about the thing that I
Speaker 11: was was a bit disappointed about, but knew it was
Speaker 11: a long shot. I asked him, what's the nil valuation
Speaker 11: of your roster? And who jokingly said posted two hundred million,
Speaker 11: which I touched Lee K Howard from KYK on the Sour,
Speaker 11: I said, he's joking, right, like I just I'm sometimes
Speaker 11: a little bit slow to the trigger with understanding things.
Speaker 11: And I was like, all right, he's definitely joking. But
Speaker 11: then he produced a very as a friend of mine
Speaker 11: put it, you know, steal clapping sound bite for BBN
Speaker 11: if we want to be the best in everything, and
Speaker 11: Lotty Dottie died and so yes, coach Beek. When Mark
Speaker 11: does coach speak, though, I think you don't know it's
Speaker 11: coach speak because he just is so eloquent. Yes, And
Speaker 11: I think, really that's just kind of the thing for me,
Speaker 11: is you you want to know candidly from these coaches,
Speaker 11: whoever it is, what is the emphasis are players coming
Speaker 11: in and what is the question? What question numberre they
Speaker 11: asking about an ilan? Are they asking about this in
Speaker 11: the first five questions the first five minutes or with
Speaker 11: from like Kentucky and Mark Pope. The way he's selling
Speaker 11: it is these guys kind of don't really care about
Speaker 11: that and said he's looking for guys that aren't fishing
Speaker 11: for that, And so I wonder really what the deal
Speaker 11: is because we can be told this all day long.
Speaker 11: And I'm not saying it's something bad, but it's good
Speaker 11: to know in this day and age. It's like a
Speaker 11: job interview. Are you going to care how much money
Speaker 11: you're going to be making right off the bat or
Speaker 11: can we talk about the opportunity first?
Speaker 3: I agree, and I think there are still players out
Speaker 3: there like these guys who came through last year, and
Speaker 3: you were part of the media horde to descend it
Speaker 3: on these guys when we were allowed to talk to
Speaker 3: them in August and throughout the year, and without fail,
Speaker 3: every one of them you could tell how much they
Speaker 3: appreciated being at a place like Kentucky with the t
Speaker 3: tradition and the name on the jersey and all that.
Speaker 3: I do wonder how many generations of players who come
Speaker 3: through here will keep appreciating, you know what I mean.
Speaker 3: I feel like, yeah, at some point that's gonna wear off.
Speaker 3: I worry for that, do you.
Speaker 11: I don't know. I think it really depends on how
Speaker 11: parents are raising their kids these days. And really I'm
Speaker 11: not anywhere near being a parent, but I was raised
Speaker 11: by parents who were not, you know, telling you to
Speaker 11: go after certain things in life, but really value the intangibles.
Speaker 11: That made a big difference. And so I think if
Speaker 11: the kids are having a good head on their shoulders,
Speaker 11: then they'll come in and they'll want to work hard.
Speaker 11: And I think we can criticize the next generation for
Speaker 11: not wanting to do that pretty easily, and some of
Speaker 11: that is warranted. But I do believe, you know, he
Speaker 11: being Pope mentioned that Denzel Aberdeen comes from military family.
Speaker 11: He is a very hard worker, and so that speaks
Speaker 11: to me because that's kind of my background as well well.
Speaker 11: So I think that it's not like Mark Pub's going
Speaker 11: to really go and recruit kids and doing deep guys
Speaker 11: in their families all the time. But I think that
Speaker 11: when you look in the recruiting process and you see
Speaker 11: what's going on. I actually interviewed some people, some Kentucky
Speaker 11: bill Bakers about a documentary they did on Blue Ship
Speaker 11: football recruits. You know, sometimes the parents get involved and
Speaker 11: they really really are a bit over zealous with what
Speaker 11: they want, and that trickles down to the kids. And
Speaker 11: you can talk about looking vicariously through their child's experiences
Speaker 11: with a lot of stuff. That's a whole of a conversation.
Speaker 11: But I think as long as the kids come from
Speaker 11: a good family and they've had good coaches as a
Speaker 11: basis during their youth days, then perhaps that goes well
Speaker 11: for their marketability as a really good recruit as a
Speaker 11: culture fit. Because I think Pope is going for the
Speaker 11: culture fit. And I guess your thought is, is there
Speaker 11: a chance where he may be like, Ah, this guy
Speaker 11: might not be the best culture fit. I'm going to
Speaker 11: have to work with him to kind of mold him,
Speaker 11: you know what I mean?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I do, although I think that in this day
Speaker 3: and age, especially with Kentucky's budget being what it is,
Speaker 3: I don't know that he's going to have to really
Speaker 3: really do that because he'll have enough funding, you know,
Speaker 3: in his background behind him. Rather to be picky, be
Speaker 3: as picky as he needs to be, you know, I
Speaker 3: can't think of a better We'll selective, you.
Speaker 11: Know, I agree. I think that what we realize what
Speaker 11: the transfer portal is develops is it's kind of like
Speaker 11: just the wall of candy and BUCkies or something for
Speaker 11: the wall of beef's turkey, right, I mean, you can
Speaker 11: get any type of thing you want, and it doesn't
Speaker 11: matter if they're out of the one thing. If they're
Speaker 11: out of maple brown sugar, they have maple, they have
Speaker 11: maple bacon or something. Yeah, maple bacon beef turkey is something,
Speaker 11: but don't that exists. But that's my point is there's
Speaker 11: an adjacent player that you know, you may have thought
Speaker 11: that will work and I didn't, And now we'll go
Speaker 11: with him because he still fits a lot of things.
Speaker 11: I mean, these guys. I wonder Mark Pope is ahead
Speaker 11: of it all, and you know he's important, but he's assistant.
Speaker 11: This is what I you know, get. I'm not trying
Speaker 11: to get into the access to some stations in the
Speaker 11: market aver versus others. But the assistant coaches on this
Speaker 11: team are so important because they're doing all of this.
Speaker 11: It's not groundwork, but it's so much of the nitty
Speaker 11: gritty I think makes the hugest difference in recruiting it
Speaker 11: and everything.
Speaker 2: No, I agree.
Speaker 3: And now with the portal being what it is, and
Speaker 3: Mark Troops has talked about this, you've got a much
Speaker 3: better opportunity to know what you're getting in terms of
Speaker 3: playing ability, but also locker room presence, you know, personalities
Speaker 3: and things like that. You don't know about a high
Speaker 3: school senior how he's going to mature in the next two, three,
Speaker 3: four years, you know, but you've got a pretty good idea.
Speaker 3: Some of these portal guys, as you know, are in
Speaker 3: their third, fourth, and even fifty years. That's a huge difference.
Speaker 11: Yeah, I think that it's good because you can definitely
Speaker 11: get the guys that will be your lieutenants in the
Speaker 11: locker room. That's important. Especially on a huge team like
Speaker 11: Kentucky football, you need the guys that are going to
Speaker 11: hold everyone together to the blue. On a basketball team,
Speaker 11: it's different.
Speaker 2: I think.
Speaker 11: You know, we heard last season the guys everybody stepped
Speaker 11: up when they needed to. You know, everybody had a
Speaker 11: mutual trust and kind of respect for each other, which
Speaker 11: was great to hear about. And we saw it on
Speaker 11: the court. You know, we never saw I don't think
Speaker 11: we ever saw last season an instant between two teammates
Speaker 11: jarring at each other because they were upset. We never
Speaker 11: saw that. And how many teams in America can you
Speaker 11: say that hasn't happened on now Maybe behind the scenes
Speaker 11: there was one or two things, but I think that,
Speaker 11: you know, we would have sent some sort someone would
Speaker 11: have known that. Now, not saying that anyone's a choir boy,
Speaker 11: I'm not saying they're not. I just think that it's
Speaker 11: important that Mark Pope keeps this brand of It's kind
Speaker 11: of like you know, Shaneview or South Carolina, you know,
Speaker 11: uses the word excited like every five seconds. Mark Pope
Speaker 11: uses the word beautiful in the same frequency. So he's
Speaker 11: trying to keep He's trying to find people that aren't
Speaker 11: afraid to kind of not be this you know, rugged, rigged,
Speaker 11: you know, rugged, just like kind of you know, stereotypical
Speaker 11: masculine guy. He's looking for the guys that are in
Speaker 11: touch with their emotions.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, you.
Speaker 3: Know, and there's nothing wrong with that. We're talking to
Speaker 3: Forrest Tucker of WTVQ. He's been covering, among other things,
Speaker 3: Mark Pope and the moves he's made with his roster.
Speaker 3: And I've already heard people for us say, maybe you agree.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 3: This year's team may be more talented than last year's team,
Speaker 3: may accomplish more, which means, of course, a final four.
Speaker 3: I think, yeah, Pope already knows about the expectations. He
Speaker 3: he brought him up the day he was introduced. You know,
Speaker 3: he knows the assignment. But he didn't do himself any favors,
Speaker 3: did he.
Speaker 2: I mean, he's.
Speaker 3: He's he's already kind of worked himself into a corner,
Speaker 3: hadn't he.
Speaker 11: Well, I think if you're Mark Popener at Kentucky, you
Speaker 11: don't believe in corners, You don't believe in being backed
Speaker 11: into a corner. You believe in being the top dog.
Speaker 11: And he said that a couple days ago last week
Speaker 11: with the presser about being the best with everything, you
Speaker 11: already mentioned that. Uh, but yeah, I think I'm going
Speaker 11: to hear for the rest of my life. We are
Speaker 11: here to win banners and his loud, just booming voice
Speaker 11: around ruughs. You know about a year and change ago
Speaker 11: and uh that that's something where you say that day
Speaker 11: one and it's an expectation and so you have to
Speaker 11: be held to that. And I think that's the thing
Speaker 11: with BBN is they're going to wonder, so when is
Speaker 11: it going to happen? Yeah, you know when they're going
Speaker 11: to have to see a year over year progression and
Speaker 11: you know what one year is going to happen.
Speaker 1: Uh.
Speaker 11: But it's interesting just his his next team. We're going
Speaker 11: to compare it to this year's team, but it could
Speaker 11: be totally different. And I think that what we will
Speaker 11: see with the transport line. This is why it's a
Speaker 11: good thing is you can get high school crud saying
Speaker 11: where you want, right but your portal guys, we you
Speaker 11: kind of already see who they're going to be, you know,
Speaker 11: as far as who's going to come in. And I
Speaker 11: think that uh, Mark is never going to be upset
Speaker 11: about losing in a Caden Lewis to the portal. He's
Speaker 11: never going to be upset about losing, you know, a
Speaker 11: couple targets that you know, just didn't work out for him.
Speaker 11: He's onto the next one. He knows he has what
Speaker 11: he has. And so someone said a lot there's a
Speaker 11: reason he shakes Joe and Kelly Kraft's hand every he
Speaker 11: walks out there. And you know, I just think, I
Speaker 11: think we're about to see a lot of difference in
Speaker 11: everything in you know, what what we how we look
Speaker 11: at this athletic and these athletic departments and how the
Speaker 11: sports just based on what we're already already doing. They're
Speaker 11: already looking at it differently. But I think that it's
Speaker 11: it's we have to remember that these players are our
Speaker 11: people and and even though they're getting paid money. I
Speaker 11: think that's what actually Pope's mentality maybe helps is he's
Speaker 11: not this he's not a fatino, he's not someone who's
Speaker 11: super super vicious. Sometimes he kind of he kind of
Speaker 11: is able to insulate these guys from the loud just
Speaker 11: noise outside of where they practice and play. But when
Speaker 11: they see Rapperina, they understand and they you know, they
Speaker 11: respect it, and so that's why I think a guy
Speaker 11: like Trendo is a big deal this year. Brandon Garrison's
Speaker 11: a big deal. I think that, you know, I think
Speaker 11: they might. I would I would say there's a good
Speaker 11: seventy five percent chance of the yedt otego way back.
Speaker 11: I mean having him back. I mean there are guys
Speaker 11: that are like, they're just world beaters this year. They
Speaker 11: are just world class. So it's it's an exciting time.
Speaker 3: We'll talk more with Forest Tucker on the other side
Speaker 3: of the break here on six thirty WLAP Welcome back.
Speaker 3: We're talking with Forest Tucker of WTVQ Channel thirty six,
Speaker 3: who has not been in the market all that long.
Speaker 3: But you're you ingratiated yourself. Of course by covering horse races.
Speaker 3: You had to learn how to cover the sport. It's intimidating,
Speaker 3: I know. But also you you either had to or
Speaker 3: got to cover the Kentucky Derby, and I wonder how
Speaker 3: you because that is a tall task if you are
Speaker 3: working and just going there, fighting the crowd is one thing,
Speaker 3: but to work that event, and I've been to almost
Speaker 3: fifty of them, yeah, it's it's it's a challenge, but
Speaker 3: did you enjoy that?
Speaker 11: Yeah, I enjoy I enjoy every challenge, Dick. I mean,
Speaker 11: there's not a day you can wake up and you
Speaker 11: can't be happy for what you do. If you're not,
Speaker 11: if you don't have a zeal for it, I think
Speaker 11: you need to stop doing it. I mean, it's just
Speaker 11: like people who say they need to retire from being
Speaker 11: a pro athlete. So, yeah, we were more methodical with
Speaker 11: how we split things up this year, and that was
Speaker 11: something that I had, you know, I wanted to make
Speaker 11: sure we had our needs met and that the needs
Speaker 11: of you know, our management was met as well and
Speaker 11: what they wanted out of us, and so we were
Speaker 11: able to execute well. And you know, it's tough. It's
Speaker 11: it's hard. I used to work mornings as a news reporter.
Speaker 11: And when you get it at four thirty every morning,
Speaker 11: which was two hours later than I would used to up.
Speaker 11: You know, you're you're working ten hours from that point.
Speaker 11: You know you're you're driving there, but you know, there's
Speaker 11: an excitement that builds, and it's it's crazy to see
Speaker 11: your pronounced transform. You know, you you you see what
Speaker 11: happens day in and day out from you know, about
Speaker 11: five am to ten am. And it's just it's it's
Speaker 11: it's a magical. It's a magical, beautiful Mark Poe word
Speaker 11: right there, you know, just experience. It's just there's nothing
Speaker 11: like it. I think what you want to do is
Speaker 11: you want to be on the biggest stage you can.
Speaker 11: You want to be at the event everybody's talking about.
Speaker 11: And I made the most of it, which is great.
Speaker 11: You know, it's not about me, But I hope people
Speaker 11: enjoy our coverage because that's what matters is that they
Speaker 11: learned something, they were able to get something. I hope
Speaker 11: they got a kick Outsy and Kenny Rice back on
Speaker 11: our air for about three minutes and change on Everily
Speaker 11: was Thursday, and and Kenny's great and I love him
Speaker 11: and everything, but uh yeah, just it's it's a great spectacle.
Speaker 11: We've had two years in a row of Derby doubles,
Speaker 11: Kenny McPeek last year, the God Dolphin team this year.
Speaker 11: And I think that makes it easy for people in
Speaker 11: this day and age where we're talking about a lot
Speaker 11: about crown, frequency of races, we're talking about a lot
Speaker 11: of things related to just so many more things that
Speaker 11: I that I kind of see as as issues and
Speaker 11: touching points in the sport to have to have it
Speaker 11: easy to remember that a trainer won the Derby and
Speaker 11: the Oaks last year and then an ownership group won
Speaker 11: the Derby and the Oaks this year. It's good because
Speaker 11: we're not getting in the weeds with things it's not
Speaker 11: inside baseball, and it is hard to think about just
Speaker 11: you know, everything that goes into the sport. I mean,
Speaker 11: I'm still learning, I'm still thinking, you know, trying to
Speaker 11: piece together stuff. But once you kind of catch the bug,
Speaker 11: it's hard to not think about it and it's hard
Speaker 11: to not I was.
Speaker 10: I was.
Speaker 11: That race yesterday at Baltimore was crazy. So you know,
Speaker 11: there's a there is. This sport may be a little
Speaker 11: bit of a cross road, but everyone has their own
Speaker 11: opinion and they say it's been there before, so you
Speaker 11: know that that's the next thing I'm just interested to
Speaker 11: see about is that. And yeah, there's like like the Derby,
Speaker 11: when you've done it once, you can kind of feel like,
Speaker 11: you know, it's good to feel at ease in those moments.
Speaker 11: You're like, ah, this is this is my element. So
Speaker 11: I love thriving in those environments. There's nothing like it.
Speaker 3: Well, the good news is getting a chance to Chad
Speaker 3: with the forest Tucker. But the bad news is you're
Speaker 3: leaving us. You're leaving the market, which happens all the time,
Speaker 3: and TV young men and women get a chance to
Speaker 3: move the bigger markets, you know, arguably better. But it's
Speaker 3: what you make of it. And how long have you
Speaker 3: been here in election? And what are going to be?
Speaker 3: What's going to be? Again the popular word? Your takeaway
Speaker 3: from your time here?
Speaker 11: Two years? Dick Stanner two years? Deal Nothing that's crazy
Speaker 11: or abnormal about that. But you know, I've never been
Speaker 11: to Kentucky for I came here and I think that
Speaker 11: you hear about BBN and you hear about Kentucky basketball.
Speaker 11: And getting chances to cover cal for a year was
Speaker 11: an underwhelming experience for a lot of reasons, and for
Speaker 11: many people on the beat, it was an underwhelming year,
Speaker 11: but you can't have every year be an amazing time.
Speaker 11: And then covering Pope was certainly an exhilarating journey and
Speaker 11: getting to kind of just see the transition and see
Speaker 11: things was interesting. I think that there's no beast like
Speaker 11: the fans of Kentucky basketball. It's them in Ohio State football,
Speaker 11: and that's what's just kind of crazy to me is
Speaker 11: you know, you go across the country you see fan
Speaker 11: bases and I think I'll probably be comparing fan bases
Speaker 11: to beat me in for the rest of my life.
Speaker 11: And so that's what Lextington offers. It offers this interesting
Speaker 11: kind of people say, it's it's it's it's a cult.
Speaker 11: You know, it's like it's just crazy to see it
Speaker 11: blew everywhere you go, and not just you know, visually,
Speaker 11: but in every sense. So you know, I I will
Speaker 11: say I hope that I would hope that they're more
Speaker 11: Louisville fans out there, because it seems like in a
Speaker 11: lot of ways it's a one side of rivalry and
Speaker 11: you know that they're they're a minority of people in
Speaker 11: the state are Louisville fans. I mean, I love to
Speaker 11: see more Louisville fans. I love to see, you know,
Speaker 11: a little bit more of their chests out with it
Speaker 11: because nationally they're a very well known brand. But in
Speaker 11: this state, you come here and they're kind of that,
Speaker 11: they're they're not kind of they are the and unless
Speaker 11: you're the football team this year, they are you know,
Speaker 11: their little brother.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, yeah, we've heard that term before and we'll
Speaker 3: hear it again, but appreciate it man. Thank you Dick,
Speaker 3: and that's a good night from the garage and lexing.
Speaker 2: Such a.
Speaker 7: Who's giving them the business, such.
Speaker 8: Tact sat down anything one can back out like a
Speaker 8: tapers to tap inting donating to the