Speaker 1: Welcome to the Big Blue and Sider this day after Christmas,
Speaker 1: Dick Gabriel with you, taking another day off here for
Speaker 1: the holiday. So this is the best of the Big
Speaker 1: Blue Insiders, starting with our conversation earlier in the month
Speaker 1: with Tim Couch just before he ended to Las Vegas
Speaker 1: for the ceremony inducting him into the College Football Hall
Speaker 1: of Fame. Here on the best of the Big Blue Insider.
Speaker 2: I'm super excited, Dick. I mean, you know, it's a
Speaker 2: tremendous honor, very humbled by, you know, being recognized in
Speaker 2: this year's twenty twenty four Hall of Fame class, going
Speaker 2: in with a great group of guys, and you know,
Speaker 2: just very thankful for my time at Kentucky and for
Speaker 2: the coaches and teammates that I had an opportunity to
Speaker 2: play with, and you know, just just a great thanks
Speaker 2: felling the place for me, you know, with coach Mommy
Speaker 2: coming in and putting in the air raid offense, and
Speaker 2: you know, very it suited my skill set perfectly and
Speaker 2: was able to have a great run by my time
Speaker 2: at Kentucky.
Speaker 3: So I'm very, very thankful and grateful for it.
Speaker 1: You were talking last night briefly on the show with
Speaker 1: Mark Stoops and Tom Leech, and I could tell what
Speaker 1: you really wanted to say was you would love to
Speaker 1: take all your teammates in there with you, wouldn't you?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 3: Absolutely?
Speaker 2: You know, you know this is you know, we played
Speaker 2: the ultimate team sport, and you know, so to get
Speaker 2: an individual recognition is you know, just something that.
Speaker 3: I'm kind of kind of uncomfortable with, to be honest, because.
Speaker 2: There were so many people that helped me get there,
Speaker 2: and you know, I wish I could take all those
Speaker 2: guys with me, and I certainly, you know, when I'm
Speaker 2: on that stage, I'll be thinking about my teammates and
Speaker 2: and very appreciative of you know, having them, you know,
Speaker 2: to play with in my time at Kentucky, and you know,
Speaker 2: hopefully they feel part of this as well.
Speaker 1: You know what was part of how Mummy's genius with
Speaker 1: the passing game and obviously he had the right man
Speaker 1: pulling the trigger, but you also had the right guys
Speaker 1: catching the footballs and Craig Yeast and Anthony White and
Speaker 1: Michelson and all these guys. You guys made it look
Speaker 1: so easy on offense. Why is that with the air
Speaker 1: raid when it's run right you can't have a bunch
Speaker 1: of rum dumbs out there. But when you got the
Speaker 1: right people running it, why does it look so simple?
Speaker 2: You know, I think the offense in itself is very simple.
Speaker 2: You know, the concepts are simple. It's a it's not
Speaker 2: a very complicated system to learn. It doesn't take very
Speaker 2: long to install. But like you said, Nick, it's you know,
Speaker 2: you can have the greatest, you know, scheme in the world,
Speaker 2: but if you don't have a quarterback who's who's accurate
Speaker 2: with the football, make quick decisions, you know, can can
Speaker 2: get process information quickly. And then you have receivers who
Speaker 2: were great with run after the catch, you know, because
Speaker 2: a lot of the air raid is the short intermediate
Speaker 2: passing game. So you're relying on those guys to break tackles,
Speaker 2: the quarterback to be accurate, to put the ball on
Speaker 2: the spot where receivers can catch and run. And you know,
Speaker 2: so we had all those guys, like you said, we
Speaker 2: had Craig Yeast, who was, you know, one of the
Speaker 2: best receivers in the history of the SEC. You know,
Speaker 2: Lance Michelson, Quintin mccoor, James Whalen, Jimmy Robinson, you know,
Speaker 2: so many guys Kevin Coleman. You know, obviously Anthony White
Speaker 2: was unbelievable out of the backfield. It's uh, we we
Speaker 2: just had a perfect, perfect fit of guys for to.
Speaker 3: Run that scheme. It was.
Speaker 2: It was just a match made in heaven with with
Speaker 2: coach Mummy coming in and the guys we had there
Speaker 2: on campus.
Speaker 1: Okay, I've got you on the phone, So I got
Speaker 1: it because I have Anthony White on He's on every
Speaker 1: Sunday morning. But I always bring up the fact that
Speaker 1: his nickname was aunt B and you hung that on him.
Speaker 1: Why did you call him an b?
Speaker 3: Uh?
Speaker 2: You know, I can't remember exactly. It seems it seems
Speaker 2: like somebody in practice said that, you know, we called
Speaker 2: him aunt and then somebody said aunt me ballin or something,
Speaker 2: because you know, they couldn't stop him. You know, he
Speaker 2: was he was, you know, running for a hundred catching
Speaker 2: for one hundred some games, and he was just he
Speaker 2: was just a you know, all around kind of guy.
Speaker 2: So we just started calling him aunt bee her short
Speaker 2: and it just kind of stuck. But what what a
Speaker 2: t to minus football player?
Speaker 3: He wan?
Speaker 1: Oh, Now that helps me because I had the mental
Speaker 1: image of ant B from Andy Griffith. So now I
Speaker 1: know it's a short for Anthony. Okay, that helps me
Speaker 1: so much. But I also bring up the fact tim
Speaker 1: and you may embarrass him a little. I don't think
Speaker 1: it does that. When he left the UK, he was
Speaker 1: a top five all time combo back, wasn't he. I
Speaker 1: mean he was a perfect for that offense.
Speaker 3: He really was.
Speaker 2: I mean, if you're going to run that type of system,
Speaker 2: you know you need a running back. You know, Anthony
Speaker 2: had wide receiver skills. You know, he could have been
Speaker 2: a wide receiver, but he also had great running back
Speaker 2: skills as well, and he could and he could block.
Speaker 2: You know, he could pick up flitzes. You know, he
Speaker 2: was unbelievable catching the ball out of the backfield. You know,
Speaker 2: third and third and medium, third and short. When we
Speaker 2: were in a passing game and I saw man coverage,
Speaker 2: you know, it was either you know, Craig one on
Speaker 2: one on the outside. If Craig didn't win, I was
Speaker 2: coming underneath to to Anthony because I knew he was
Speaker 2: going to be matched up with a linebacker or potentially
Speaker 2: a safety maybe, and he was going to win that
Speaker 2: match up every time. You know, with the option routes,
Speaker 2: and the angle routes we were running, uh, some of
Speaker 2: those things. He was just literally a perfect fit for
Speaker 2: this game.
Speaker 3: Yep.
Speaker 1: And you mentioned Craig and his speed, and of course
Speaker 1: he not only caught passes but return kicks in the NFL.
Speaker 1: But people, somebody said this to me the other day,
Speaker 1: you know, Tim Kasch didn't throw deep berry off and
Speaker 1: I said, yeah, because they dropped two safeties back because
Speaker 1: they knew Yeast could kill it back there. But Craig
Speaker 1: could still, as you said, catch and run. I mean,
Speaker 1: he was just the greatest.
Speaker 3: He was. He was, you know, in my opinion.
Speaker 2: I know there's been a lot of great players at Kentucky,
Speaker 2: and no disrespect any of those other guys, but obviously
Speaker 2: I'm biased to Craig. I think he's the best receiver
Speaker 2: ever played at Kentucky. You know, he was just the
Speaker 2: guy was incredible, man. And you know, like you said, teams,
Speaker 2: that was how they tried to defend us with keeping
Speaker 2: two safeties back because they couldn't leave one on one
Speaker 2: on the outside with Craig. And when they did, that's
Speaker 2: when we took our deep shots. But you know, as
Speaker 2: much as we were throwing the ball as kind of
Speaker 2: a ball controlled passing attack. So a lot of those
Speaker 2: screens and things we considered those runs, to be honest with,
Speaker 2: you know, those were just tall sweeps us get on
Speaker 2: the outside, you know, get the ball in Craig EA's
Speaker 2: hand in space, or you know, throw a screen to
Speaker 2: Anthony or something like that. Those were extension of the
Speaker 2: run game for us. And if teams wanted to sit
Speaker 2: back and play cover two, cover four, and we just
Speaker 2: had to kind of you know, take our you know,
Speaker 2: you pick and shoes underneath and just take what the
Speaker 2: defense is given us.
Speaker 1: You're one of three quarterbacks going in with the Clash
Speaker 1: of twenty twenty four. It also includes Alex Smith, who
Speaker 1: helped you tak to the top of of polls, and
Speaker 1: Urban Meyer, and I was really pleased to see as well,
Speaker 1: the kid from Apple Aachian State going in. Gosh, Harmani Edwards. Right,
Speaker 1: when you get together with guys like that, do they
Speaker 1: ask do you guys talk about the systems you're in?
Speaker 1: Do they ask you what it was like to run
Speaker 1: the air raid?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 2: We always talk about, you know, schemes that we were
Speaker 2: involved in, players we played with, you know, things like that,
Speaker 2: and you know, it's it's a great class. Like you said,
Speaker 2: we've got Randy Moss going in, Larry Fitzgerald, Warwick Dunn,
Speaker 2: Julius Peppers who just went into the NFL Hall of
Speaker 2: Fame as well, So it's a very strong class loop.
Speaker 2: You know, it's just you know, list goes on and on,
Speaker 2: and you know, we just just you know, we got
Speaker 2: to take a look at that list. It's very humbling
Speaker 2: to go in with those guys. And you know, I
Speaker 2: think the Hall of Fame sent me some information on
Speaker 2: the hall, and I think they said there's been something
Speaker 2: like five point five million people play college football and
Speaker 2: there's a little over a thousand guys that have been
Speaker 2: selected to the Hall of Fame. So obviously a very
Speaker 2: selective group of guys. And you know, completely honored to
Speaker 2: be going in.
Speaker 1: Talking to Tim Kuch of course, UK Hall of Fame
Speaker 1: quarterback and now the College Football Hall of Fame going
Speaker 1: to be honored at the game on Saturday. But yeah,
Speaker 1: what a class. And I love seeing Danny woodhead. It
Speaker 1: was a running back at chaddern State, you know, a
Speaker 1: small college player, but man, what a great player. And
Speaker 1: then it kind of makes me feel a little bit
Speaker 1: old because I grew up watching the Nebraska Oklahoma series
Speaker 1: and Dewey Selman part of the Salmon family going in
Speaker 1: he played at Oklahoma back in the early seventies. The
Speaker 1: game has changed so much, though, Tim through the years,
Speaker 1: and now it's it's much more about offense, isn't it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's changed, you know, so much. You know, I think,
Speaker 2: you know, when I was coming into the SEC, the
Speaker 2: SEC was really, you know, very much a running conference
Speaker 2: that was known for having great running backs. Really the
Speaker 2: only team at that time that was kind of throwing
Speaker 2: the ball quite a bit was Coach Spurrier down down
Speaker 2: in Florida. And then you know, Coach Mummy and Leaks
Speaker 2: came in and just completely, you know, revolutionized the game,
Speaker 2: and you know it. You know, I was doing broadcasting
Speaker 2: for several years after I was done playing, and it
Speaker 2: was it was always amazing to me to go to
Speaker 2: all these campuses and meet with these coaches that had
Speaker 2: different spots, and how all of them, you know, would
Speaker 2: come to me and say, hey, we we came to
Speaker 2: Kentucky in ninety seven or ninety eight and saw what
Speaker 2: you guys are doing, and we're still running a version
Speaker 2: of that even today. You know, twenty years later, so
Speaker 2: you know, it was pretty cool to be on the
Speaker 2: ground floor that thing, the air raid, and to make
Speaker 2: it popular and to see that it's still very prevalent
Speaker 2: across the country today.
Speaker 1: You didn't get to spend as much time, I know,
Speaker 1: as you like with Mike Leach because he just went
Speaker 1: on to great and greater things in college football, helped
Speaker 1: Oklahoma win a national Thailand and then made a name
Speaker 1: for himself. But what was it like, Tim? I mean,
Speaker 1: he was such a free spirit and a unique kind
Speaker 1: of guy, wasn't he.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he was, you know, the most unique coach I
Speaker 2: think I ever played for.
Speaker 3: And he was Mike was one of.
Speaker 2: Those guys that you know, you go to his office
Speaker 2: and talk to him, and you know, he would talk
Speaker 2: talk to you about.
Speaker 3: Anything except football.
Speaker 2: You know, he wanted to talk about pirates and you know, wars,
Speaker 2: Andy and history and all this kind of stuff. And
Speaker 2: he was just a very different, very different guy. But
Speaker 2: he was also extremely intelligent. He was ahead of his
Speaker 2: time as far as the passing game goes, and he
Speaker 2: had a very clear vision for what he wanted an
Speaker 2: offense to look like and how he wanted to install it.
Speaker 2: And he was very precise. You know, he coached our
Speaker 2: wide receivers and was the offensive coordinator when I was there.
Speaker 2: And what he was all those wide receivers every single
Speaker 2: day about you know, just doing the little things right
Speaker 2: where you know, if you're split is supposed to be,
Speaker 2: you know, inside the numbers, and that's where you better
Speaker 2: line up. If you're supposed to run at twelve yards,
Speaker 2: I don't want you at thirteen, don't want.
Speaker 3: You at eleven.
Speaker 2: And you need to be precise. And you know that's
Speaker 2: what made our offense so successful. We were all so
Speaker 2: dialed in and locked into the to the little details
Speaker 2: which made everything work.
Speaker 1: It was all so shocking when he left us way
Speaker 1: too soon that that had to be a punch and
Speaker 1: a gut for you.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, I really hated to see that. And
Speaker 2: you know, Mike and I have we kept in touch
Speaker 2: over the years and would talk and you know, I
Speaker 2: just talked to him a few months before that and
Speaker 2: was completely shocked by the news and sad and buy it,
Speaker 2: and you know, I really wish it, you know that
Speaker 2: he was around. I know he would be, you know,
Speaker 2: in Las Vegas in December celebrating with me going into
Speaker 2: the Hall of Fame, and you know, really really just
Speaker 2: take that for his family, and he was such a
Speaker 2: great guy and surely he's very missed.
Speaker 1: When we come back. More from my conversation back in
Speaker 1: the fall with Tim Couch, Say what us here on
Speaker 1: the Big Blue and Siders six thirty w l ap
Speaker 1: Welcome back to the Big Blue Insider. Dick Gabriel with you.
Speaker 1: It is the best of the Big Blue Insider here
Speaker 1: on this Christmas Eve. We'll pick up with my conversation
Speaker 1: with Tim Couch from back in the fall. He talked
Speaker 1: about his upcoming induction into the College Football Hall of Fame.
Speaker 1: When you set foot, you come back quite often, when
Speaker 1: you set foot on that field, inside that stadium. How
Speaker 1: does that make you feel?
Speaker 2: You know, I think the very the first thing I
Speaker 2: feel is a sense of pride, you know what we
Speaker 2: were able to accomplish, and and just how fun that
Speaker 2: the game was when we were there, and you know
Speaker 2: how how into it the fans were. And you know,
Speaker 2: because Kentucky football was kind of in a rough point
Speaker 2: there when I first got to UK and and they
Speaker 2: weren't winning many games. They were running the option. It
Speaker 2: was wasn't a very exciting style of football. And then
Speaker 2: we came in and you know, we were going spread offense,
Speaker 2: four or five wide receivers and throwing the ball all
Speaker 2: over the field, and uh, you know, it's just just
Speaker 2: you know, a great time to be playing at Kentucky.
Speaker 2: And and you know that coaching staff we had, you know,
Speaker 2: you talk about coach Mummy and Leash and Hatcher and
Speaker 2: Sonny Dykes and Tony Franklin and and all those guys.
Speaker 2: We had so many creative minds on the offensive side
Speaker 2: of the ball. And you know, like we talked about earlier,
Speaker 2: we had a great fit of players who run that
Speaker 2: system as well.
Speaker 3: So so yeah, just to sense the pride.
Speaker 2: When I walked into the stadium about what we were
Speaker 2: able to accomplish while while I was playing there.
Speaker 1: You know, you mentioned Mummy and it was You're right.
Speaker 1: He was such an interesting individual as well. You could
Speaker 1: see why he and Leech were so tight. Uh. But
Speaker 1: it was interesting to meet Tim. When things went went
Speaker 1: south for how Here course, the fans were all over him.
Speaker 1: And then when Kentucky was looking for a new coach
Speaker 1: a dozen years ago, people were lobbying like crazy for
Speaker 1: a how Mummy disciple somebody to be the next town mommy.
Speaker 1: So you know, as long as you win, that's what
Speaker 1: it's all about. But that people want to be entertained too,
Speaker 1: don't they.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think so. And you know, it's just a
Speaker 2: you know, I think people see, you know, how teams
Speaker 2: have been very successful with that system across the country
Speaker 2: and other places, and and you know, it was a
Speaker 2: fun style of football to watch. I think it was
Speaker 2: very popular obviously with our fan base here a Kentucky
Speaker 2: and and people didn't want to see that come back,
Speaker 2: you know, and coach Sjuts did bring bring it back
Speaker 2: for a little bit. He brought Neil Brown back here
Speaker 2: for a couple of years, and obviously Neils went on
Speaker 2: to do great things as a head coach at West Virginia.
Speaker 2: And uh so it's you know, it's uh it was
Speaker 2: a great, great, great offense to play in, and it's
Speaker 2: very popular, like I said, with the fans and obviously
Speaker 2: with cornerbacks and receivers love it. And you know, it's
Speaker 2: just it's just a lot of fun to play in
Speaker 2: that type of system.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I got to ask you, being a father, do
Speaker 1: you have to queue up video to show your son
Speaker 1: what you do. Because I remember Jamal Mashburn when he
Speaker 1: wanted to the Kentucky Sports Hall of Fame, he said
Speaker 1: his kids didn't really believe that he was a great
Speaker 1: player at the NBA. He had to show them video.
Speaker 1: Do you have to do that?
Speaker 2: I've done it before. Yeah, yeah, when they when they
Speaker 2: were smaller, I had to do that. And you know
Speaker 2: they used to love to watch those videos when they
Speaker 2: when they were little. And you know, now I've got
Speaker 2: a I've got a freshman in college and a freshman
Speaker 2: in high school. My oldest son is he signed a
Speaker 2: scholarship to play for Holy Cross up in Boston, so he's, uh,
Speaker 2: he's playing defensive end up there. And then my youngest
Speaker 2: son is a freshman at Lectern Christian Academy. So you know,
Speaker 2: they're they're both good athletes and good students and you know,
Speaker 2: certainly very proud of.
Speaker 1: Them defensive ends. So you got to You've got to
Speaker 1: talk to him about what it's like to go attack
Speaker 1: a quarterback.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I told him. You know, he was playing quarterback
Speaker 2: up until like eighth grade when he switched over the
Speaker 2: defensive end. And I was like, I can't tell you
Speaker 2: anything about playing defensive end.
Speaker 3: Other than I don't like those guys.
Speaker 4: That's all I know about it.
Speaker 1: He's going to relish the licks he puts on quarterbacks.
Speaker 1: You mentioned broadcasting and you stepped away from that, and
Speaker 1: you and your brother now very successful businessman. And a
Speaker 1: tip of the cap to your brother. I always love
Speaker 1: what he did at EKU. I keep reminding people that
Speaker 1: Greg Couch was the last QB to lead EKU to
Speaker 1: an undefeated OVC record and an OVC title, so and
Speaker 1: always will be now that they're out of the league.
Speaker 1: But anyhow, you were on your way to a pretty
Speaker 1: good broadcasting career when you stepped away. Now, Tom Brady,
Speaker 1: a guy you know, a little bit has started and
Speaker 1: it kind of got lukewarm reviews. But for crying out loud,
Speaker 1: he's a rookie. But if you could give him some advice,
Speaker 1: you giving Tom Brady advice on broadcasting.
Speaker 3: What would it be? You know?
Speaker 2: I think the biggest thing that I had to learn is,
Speaker 2: you know, you do have to prepare like you're playing,
Speaker 2: you know, I mean, it is so much prep work
Speaker 2: as far as you know, watching film, understanding schemes and
Speaker 2: systems and game plans, and talking to coaches and players
Speaker 2: throughout the week to get a feel from what they're
Speaker 2: going to try to do that week, so you can
Speaker 2: go on TV and explain that. And you know, for me,
Speaker 2: you know, I don't want to say dumb it down,
Speaker 2: that's not the right word, but I wanted to talk
Speaker 2: like I was talking to like maybe like my mother
Speaker 2: at home, who knows who watches football, but she doesn't
Speaker 2: understand like the you know, really inside of x'es and O.
Speaker 2: So you can get on there and you know, obviously
Speaker 2: Tom could talk about you know, the game as in
Speaker 2: depth as anyone who's ever played it. But you know,
Speaker 2: you have to make it simple for the people watching
Speaker 2: on TV so they you know, you can say, oh,
Speaker 2: it's cover too, but you know, no one, no one
Speaker 2: really knows what cover two is unless you you know,
Speaker 2: you've studied the game, played the game, So so you
Speaker 2: make it you know, you make it simple for the
Speaker 2: fans watching at home so they can follow along with
Speaker 2: you and understand what you're talking about. But you know, Tom,
Speaker 2: you know he's going to be great in whatever he does.
Speaker 2: You know, it's it's very difficult to walk in that
Speaker 2: booth and call a game if you've never done it before.
Speaker 2: He's just going to get better and better with with
Speaker 2: with refs than each game he does.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they keep comparing comparing him to Greg Olsen, who
Speaker 1: was not great when he started. None of us was
Speaker 1: not that I know.
Speaker 5: No.
Speaker 1: Yeah, before I let you go, I got to ask you.
Speaker 1: I'm sure your heart went out to the what your
Speaker 1: Wildcats and a rock Vandergriff He had a rough day
Speaker 1: at the office against South Carolina. But that's life in
Speaker 1: sec isn't it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's the way it goes, you know. I mean this, Uh,
Speaker 2: in this league, anyone can embarrass you quickly if you're
Speaker 2: not not on top of your game. And obviously we
Speaker 2: didn't play well. You know, I'm not going to make
Speaker 2: any excuses. We didn't play well up front, quarterback didn't
Speaker 2: really have many opportunities to play well.
Speaker 3: And uh, you know we just in South Carolina played great.
Speaker 3: Give him credit.
Speaker 2: That's a good defense they got after us. And you know,
Speaker 2: things can go go go south on you pretty quickly
Speaker 2: in this league if you're not playing well. And you know,
Speaker 2: I think we'll bounce back. I think we've got a
Speaker 2: very talented football team. I love our coaching staff. Obviously,
Speaker 2: you know, coach Steps is the winning his coach we've
Speaker 2: ever had here, so I have all the faith in
Speaker 2: the world that he's going to get this, get these
Speaker 2: guys rallied rallied up, and get them going back in
Speaker 2: the right direction. And obviously got a tough one this
Speaker 2: week with Georgia. But you know, it doesn't get any
Speaker 2: it done get easier, you know, I think I saw
Speaker 2: we played five of the top seven teams in the
Speaker 2: country coming up over the next several weeks. So those
Speaker 2: schedules just brutal, But you know, we got the guys
Speaker 2: that can go turn it around, and you know, I'm
Speaker 2: still confident in those guys.
Speaker 1: People knocking the offense, of course, that's what fans do,
Speaker 1: but it's too soon that I have no idea what
Speaker 1: to make of this offense yet. And I'm sure you
Speaker 1: know more about this stuff than I do. But it's
Speaker 1: it's gonna be tough after this week, isn't it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know you said it didn't get any easier,
Speaker 2: you know, with with Georgia and that defense coming into town,
Speaker 2: so you know, it is it is kind of hard
Speaker 2: to see what what we have yet offensively, you know,
Speaker 2: because you know we got to you know a little
Speaker 2: over half a game in week one with the weather,
Speaker 2: and then you know soon didn't play well at all,
Speaker 2: you know, only thirty yards passing or so in Week two.
Speaker 2: So you know, these guys, you know, just have to
Speaker 2: get it gone, get it to you know, get everyone
Speaker 2: on the same page and executing a game plan. And
Speaker 2: you know, and it takes everyone. You know, it takes
Speaker 2: the you know, the offensive line gave protection and brought
Speaker 2: making quick decisions receivers, you know, getting that out of breaks,
Speaker 2: catching football is getting separation from the defenders, and you know,
Speaker 2: it takes all eleven guys on outside of the ball
Speaker 2: to make it, make it work and make it look good.
Speaker 2: So you know, hopeing they can bounce back a little
Speaker 2: this week and get a little momentum build on that.
Speaker 1: That's my conversation with Tim Katch back in the fall,
Speaker 1: and he was recognized prior to a UK football game.
Speaker 1: That was back in September when things were still looking
Speaker 1: better for the Wildcats. But life is good to Tim.
Speaker 1: He's got his healthy family and he's going into the
Speaker 1: College Football Hall of Fame tonight. It is out in
Speaker 1: Las Vegas, and it's going to be somewhere on ESPN
Speaker 1: if you want to check it out. Up next more
Speaker 1: the Best of the Big Blue and Sider, we'll hear
Speaker 1: from Van Hiles, former Kentucky d back, conversation I had
Speaker 1: with him following the UK season earlier this month on
Speaker 1: the Best of the Big Blue Insider. Welcome back to
Speaker 1: the Big Blueing Sider on this Christmas Eve special edition.
Speaker 1: It is the Best of the Blue Insider and in
Speaker 1: this hour we've been talking football. You heard from Tim
Speaker 1: Couch a conversation I had with him before he was
Speaker 1: inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame. I'm going
Speaker 1: to take you back a couple of weeks to the
Speaker 1: chat I had with former Kentucky defensive back Van Hiles.
Speaker 1: He breaks down UK football on a number of social
Speaker 1: media stops, and we talked about this past Kentucky season
Speaker 1: a disappointment for anybody who played or rooted for the Wildcats.
Speaker 1: You hear Van Hiles all over the place. He is
Speaker 1: a co host of The Locker four one one host
Speaker 1: of Driving with Styles. Here him on Sunday Morning Sports
Speaker 1: Talk with Anthony White. Tom Leech has him on every
Speaker 1: Monday morning. Is the Monday Morning Quarterback and we bug
Speaker 1: him in Renow and then here on the Big Blue Insider, Van,
Speaker 1: I've got to think that in a way, are you
Speaker 1: kind of glad this season is limped to an end
Speaker 1: for the Wildcats?
Speaker 5: Geez, with all that you said, I think we found
Speaker 5: the reason why we had a bad season. I was
Speaker 5: on tom Leased Monday morning. Without me there, we don't
Speaker 5: lose out these games. Yeah, it was a hard season,
Speaker 5: not because of the results, but because of the expectations.
Speaker 5: And when you have expectations and in the season turns
Speaker 5: out the way it turns out, it's going to be
Speaker 5: a lot of disappointed people, a lot of people who
Speaker 5: want pitch folks outside of a lot of coaches halts.
Speaker 1: When I look at expectations that fall way short, I
Speaker 1: always the first thing I say is was I wrong?
Speaker 1: How wrong was I to expect that? You know what
Speaker 1: I mean? I mean, were we because going in I
Speaker 1: still didn't have full belief in the offensive line. And
Speaker 1: that don't mean to keep banging on this position group.
Speaker 1: But we talked before it all starts there. But I
Speaker 1: mean the defense. What confuses me, Van is the Georgia game,
Speaker 1: the Old Miss game that they showed what they're capable
Speaker 1: of doing and it just fell apart.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it is a comedy of errors out Here's my
Speaker 5: thing is people will blame the old line, and it's
Speaker 5: the easiest position to blame, just like the cornerbacks are
Speaker 5: the easiest position to blame. The miss mark for me
Speaker 5: on this season was a quarterback. I wasn't because look,
Speaker 5: there's there's two people who touch the ball every snap.
Speaker 5: It's a quarterback in the center. Those are the only
Speaker 5: two people who touch the ball all the time on
Speaker 5: innyside of the ball. And that result was not what
Speaker 5: I envisioned it to be because a quarterback can make
Speaker 5: an old line look better and we did not do
Speaker 5: well at that position this year. And as a guy
Speaker 5: who played on a team where the offense wasn't the
Speaker 5: strong part, the strong part of the team, at a
Speaker 5: point of the season, defenses start to do things that's
Speaker 5: out of character because you know that the offense is
Speaker 5: not going to be able to put in them points
Speaker 5: on the board to keep in games when you are
Speaker 5: going to falter.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'll tell you what though, And I was talking
Speaker 1: to somebody about this this week. I went back and
Speaker 1: I was looking at video from early in the year
Speaker 1: and Brock Vandergriff looked like a different guy. And I
Speaker 1: agree with Jeff Picory. He played with a couple of
Speaker 1: quarterbacks who got happy feet because they were beaten up
Speaker 1: so badly because they couldn't protect him very well. And
Speaker 1: I know that's maybe over simplification with Rock Vandergriff, but
Speaker 1: he just looked like a different guy down the stretch
Speaker 1: for sure.
Speaker 5: Look for sure. And here's I don't like to do this,
Speaker 5: but here's the thing. Certain positions requires certain elements, and
Speaker 5: that position requires more than any other position on the field,
Speaker 5: and sometimes you have to endure things that other players
Speaker 5: on the team does not have to endure because of
Speaker 5: When we win, it's because of the quarterback. When we lose,
Speaker 5: it's because of somebody else. So sometimes, even though it's
Speaker 5: a tough position, that's the responsibility you have to You
Speaker 5: have to be able to eat that. And I would
Speaker 5: say that some of those stuff, some of the things
Speaker 5: early in the seasons were on the old line, but
Speaker 5: a lot of those things were on the quarterback. So
Speaker 5: it goes fit this this.
Speaker 1: He made some bad decisions and force some throws or
Speaker 1: actually took some shacks he probably should have taken them exactly.
Speaker 5: And that's and that's the thing is is we have
Speaker 5: to That's why football is the best team sport out
Speaker 5: of any sport because it really requires everyone. So for him,
Speaker 5: the old line needs him to be able to help them,
Speaker 5: and they need to help him. And sometimes as a
Speaker 5: quarterback you need to not hold the ball so long
Speaker 5: and throw the ball away. I mean, if you look
Speaker 5: at Colorado severe standards has at least has forty plus sacks.
Speaker 5: So it's not like every old line is a great
Speaker 5: old line and they wont gat Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Talking to Van Hiles, the former Kentucky defensive back V
Speaker 1: Styles driving with Styles, he breaks down Kentucky football on
Speaker 1: the interweb and is a frequent guest on the election
Speaker 1: and media outlets. And of course we're talking about this
Speaker 1: past season which ended with Cutter Bowley behind center. Now,
Speaker 1: Jeff Picoro and I have been debating over the last
Speaker 1: couple of weeks. Do you go ahead and commit to
Speaker 1: him even though you know he looked good at times,
Speaker 1: but it's not like he grabbed the program and threw
Speaker 1: it on his shoulders. But man, they've got to get
Speaker 1: some continuity at quarterback. You know, the plan I keep
Speaker 1: going back to this, the plan was for Drew Barker
Speaker 1: to be the guy for three years and when he
Speaker 1: went down injured. Now that the door starts spinning with
Speaker 1: juco's and transfers. And there was some success with Steven
Speaker 1: Johnson and Will Evis, but there wasn't success as well.
Speaker 1: So do you go ahead and bite the bullet as
Speaker 1: a staff and say this is our guy, we're to
Speaker 1: hang with him.
Speaker 5: I'm glad you stated that, because I've said that many
Speaker 5: times that one quarterback affected the evolution of the quarterback position.
Speaker 5: Here's the deal with Cutter. The next season. Let's just
Speaker 5: say we won seven games, or let's say we won
Speaker 5: six games. I think the transition to him and the
Speaker 5: expectation of him being a quarterback next year for potentially
Speaker 5: three seasons would be easier. But the fact that we
Speaker 5: won four games. I don't think that the fans who
Speaker 5: would take on another potential five and seventh season learning
Speaker 5: to live with him as a quarterback. I truly think
Speaker 5: if you can find him, you have to find a
Speaker 5: quarterback that Bush Hampden loves and fits his scheme to
Speaker 5: a t. Because people forget that Bush came late because
Speaker 5: Liam left in February. So give him a chance to
Speaker 5: find his quarterback in a pour if it exists. If
Speaker 5: it doesn't exist, then we just got to get it
Speaker 5: the Cutter.
Speaker 1: I gotta wonder what what is bush Hamden looking for
Speaker 1: if not Cutter Bowlie. You know that's a real interesting
Speaker 1: question to me.
Speaker 5: Well, I will say this after the four in eight season.
Speaker 5: He needs someone there has had a lot of reps. Yeah,
Speaker 5: and that it's only based before an eight season. I
Speaker 5: not think I know Cutter has the ability with time
Speaker 5: to be a solid quarterback like I really he has
Speaker 5: some intangibles that I see on on film that you
Speaker 5: can't coach. Now, the problem is is he ready to
Speaker 5: take the keys full time? I'm not sure. I will
Speaker 5: put him on a learners permit first, let him drive
Speaker 5: with a parent in the con first, before I give
Speaker 5: him total control over over the program. But it's not
Speaker 5: like he's not close. He's closed. But I think he
Speaker 5: needs a little more time, a little more season.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Well, Van played, as I said, d back and it
Speaker 1: made it all the way to the NFL. So he
Speaker 1: knows how to scout quarterbacks, how to study qbs on video.
Speaker 1: But he was also a quarterback himself. So when you
Speaker 1: talk about what you see and Cutter on video on film,
Speaker 1: as you guys like to say, what do you see?
Speaker 5: I see a guy I don't know Cutter, but I
Speaker 5: see from a visual that he's a confident kid who's
Speaker 5: a fluent athlete, and being able to be fluid is weird.
Speaker 5: He's wired in a way where he never rushes, and
Speaker 5: that is a key component of a quarterback because I
Speaker 5: think his instinctual clock is where it should be, where
Speaker 5: I need to get out of there or I can
Speaker 5: extend the play. He did some great things against Texas
Speaker 5: with extended plays. However, it was after seeing what Texas
Speaker 5: could do and he got into the floid game on
Speaker 5: the sideline this last guess. He didn't have that that
Speaker 5: that opportunity, and I think his clock sped up a
Speaker 5: little bit on him because of that. He has some issues,
Speaker 5: but as a whole, I like the way he throws
Speaker 5: the ball. He gets the ball his hand when he
Speaker 5: needs to, He uses every receiver. He doesn't lock on
Speaker 5: to his favorite receiver. Those are some things that you
Speaker 5: cannot coach his His mechanisms are great, his operations are great.
Speaker 5: I think he has a chance to be special for us.
Speaker 5: But here's a deal. You cannot rush it because if
Speaker 5: you rush it, then that confidence he has now will
Speaker 5: be stagnant. We need him to get even more confident
Speaker 5: and more swag as you prolong in this program.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but how do you do that in a program that,
Speaker 1: in terms of the offense is going to be an
Speaker 1: almost total rebuild this coming year.
Speaker 5: Well, and that's the thing is if they can't find
Speaker 5: the right guy's And that's the thing that I've been
Speaker 5: saying in the past, I think Coach Steps has said recently,
Speaker 5: is finding guys to fit their programs, their system, their culture.
Speaker 5: You've got to find that guy. It doesn't have to
Speaker 5: be cam Ward. It can be Diego Papavilla. It can
Speaker 5: be someone who is just a solid presence in the
Speaker 5: locker room and a solid guy on the field. If
Speaker 5: they cannot find that, then you roll with Cutter Bowli.
Speaker 5: And I think if you roll with him, you have
Speaker 5: to simplify the offense to get him comfortable early, and
Speaker 5: then it's kind of this. This would be a perfect example.
Speaker 5: When Lin Bowm became quarterback in twenty nineteen, the scheme
Speaker 5: was very simple. Each week, Eddie Grant adds some things
Speaker 5: to complement what he ran the previous week. I think
Speaker 5: that's what we should be doing next year. If Cutter
Speaker 5: is the just the answer, you bring him along and
Speaker 5: you progress slowly, run the things that he and his
Speaker 5: teammates know how to run, to the to the to
Speaker 5: the free estate and run fast, and then you just
Speaker 5: add on to it as the season goes.
Speaker 1: Vanheile's my guess when we come back, we'll talk about
Speaker 1: the portal and some big names that stepped away from
Speaker 1: the Wildcats. That's next year on the Big Blue and
Speaker 1: Sider six thirty w we'll come back to the best
Speaker 1: of the Big Blue Insider for visiting with Van Heiuser.
Speaker 1: Paller lives down in the Louisiana now but keeps a
Speaker 1: close eye on his beloved Wildcats, and you see him
Speaker 1: break down video on social media. No surprise, Barrion Brown
Speaker 1: decides to move away from the program. I think a
Speaker 1: lot of us thought by now, if he had progressed
Speaker 1: in such a way, he might have been to the
Speaker 1: NFL by now, but we know that didn't happen. But
Speaker 1: also Dane Key, which was a real disappointment. But again
Speaker 1: we've talked about here on the show a couple of
Speaker 1: nights now that you know, if he wants to make
Speaker 1: that next big step toward the NFL, he's got to
Speaker 1: go to a more stable environment, a team with the
Speaker 1: stable offense for him. But they went out and recruited
Speaker 1: four new Whiteouts, got the kid from Boyle County. Who's
Speaker 1: you know. I'm not gonna say he's as good as
Speaker 1: one Dale Robinson been in that mold, but those are
Speaker 1: those are big losses regardless fan. But you hate to
Speaker 1: see and they didn't get out of them what they
Speaker 1: had hoped this past season.
Speaker 5: Yeah, that's the unfortunate nature of having so many systems
Speaker 5: in three to four years.
Speaker 3: I'm lo, I am.
Speaker 5: It's gonna be a weird thing to say. I am happy.
Speaker 5: I understand why Dan ain't left. I as a parent,
Speaker 5: I as a former player. I do not want to
Speaker 5: go through another coaching change in my position room. I
Speaker 5: don't think he has ever had back to back years
Speaker 5: of having the same wide receiver coach. You're correct, And
Speaker 5: if I'm going to go through that and my last chance,
Speaker 5: why not go through that with somewhere else Because I've
Speaker 5: done it. I've held strong with this program for three
Speaker 5: years going through the turmoil of switching guys that are
Speaker 5: leading my room. If that's the case, let me go
Speaker 5: somewhere else, and I'm gonna be doing it again here anyway,
Speaker 5: So let me spread my wings and find a place
Speaker 5: and find an offense that suits my skill set that
Speaker 5: can propel me to the next level. We have to
Speaker 5: we have to not look at it as a negative,
Speaker 5: so to speak. It's just life. And I think he's
Speaker 5: doing what's right for him.
Speaker 3: In his future.
Speaker 5: I have no critique about it. I would love him
Speaker 5: come back, but I understand.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, And it's not like he didn't give everything
Speaker 1: he had. And I thought dan Key took a step
Speaker 1: forward this year. I thought, for lack of a better term,
Speaker 1: he was more professional and the way he did have
Speaker 1: that that that silly penalty in the in the Louisville game.
Speaker 1: But I thought just the way he ran his routes,
Speaker 1: and you know a hell of a lot more about
Speaker 1: that than I do. But that's the way he carried himself,
Speaker 1: you know. And and uh and obviously the way he played.
Speaker 1: I was really impressed with that. I thought opposing teams
Speaker 1: and everything they could to take away Barran Brown this
Speaker 1: year didn't they.
Speaker 5: Yeah, that look when you learn this and lack the
Speaker 5: best abilities availability and one thing that Dane are presented
Speaker 5: this year he was always available and not only available,
Speaker 5: he was he was a professional with the way he
Speaker 5: conducted himself, with his effort level and being and being
Speaker 5: still focusing and integrated to the game. There are some
Speaker 5: people who when things are I mean, just think about it.
Speaker 5: The little look game. He didn't catch anyvolves, I don't think,
Speaker 5: and he could have easily solved him and been you
Speaker 5: know how some players get He wasn't. He still had
Speaker 5: that focus and effort in the game, the entire game.
Speaker 5: So that to me carries a lot of weight for
Speaker 5: gms and for the future, to whomever his future employee
Speaker 5: is gonna because now they almost gotten employees wherever he
Speaker 5: goes to next I think they're going to take that
Speaker 5: as a positive and hopefully he takes the next step
Speaker 5: and improves enough to get himself in that first, second
Speaker 5: or third round next year.
Speaker 1: Guy I know said he's sharing Dane Key is gonna
Speaker 1: end up at Georgia as can you imagine I mean
Speaker 1: seeing him in the Silver riches. But that would be
Speaker 1: a huge step for him. I don't know if that happens,
Speaker 1: but you know, again, the rich will get Richard.
Speaker 5: Well, you just have a look. Find a place where
Speaker 5: you can still get your targets but also be coached
Speaker 5: by a guy whom you respect. It's not always about
Speaker 5: the name on the front of the jersey. It's also
Speaker 5: find a place that fits you and fits your skills
Speaker 5: that find that place more than where about the national
Speaker 5: championships in the name across the front of the jersey,
Speaker 5: because I think he has the skill set, when used properly,
Speaker 5: can propel him to a higher draft status.
Speaker 1: Just a couple of minutes left with Van Heiles real quick.
Speaker 1: Where you're concerned. I don't know if you're the rumors
Speaker 1: about Brad White to Florida State. They filled that job.
Speaker 1: But his name is gonna come up this time of year, though,
Speaker 1: isn't it. He's he's pretty good.
Speaker 5: Yeah, you know, I'm I'm hoping. Look, this is one
Speaker 5: thing that I have noticed about Brad White from the
Speaker 5: outside looking in, is he is one coach that is
Speaker 5: comfortable in his skin. I don't. I think he has
Speaker 5: an enormous ego, which it takes to be a head
Speaker 5: coach in college football. I think he understands what his
Speaker 5: skill sets are, and I think he likes to be
Speaker 5: He likes to have his hands on young men and
Speaker 5: lead young men. When you're a head coach, you don't
Speaker 5: you don't have the ability to touch a group of players.
Speaker 5: You got to be the overseer of everyone. When you're
Speaker 5: a defensive coordinator, it's a little bit more. You get
Speaker 5: your hands on your twenty plus thirty plus players that
Speaker 5: now you can mold and become great men. Because one
Speaker 5: thing about coaching that is losing in the current landscape
Speaker 5: of college football is the ability to create, to create
Speaker 5: great young men, and I think he has done a
Speaker 5: great job of that. And I think his ego and
Speaker 5: not comfortable, but knowing what his strength and skill sets are,
Speaker 5: I think he likes to be able to lead a room.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a great point. In this day and age,
Speaker 1: guys like him are well compensated. I can relate just
Speaker 1: a little bit. When I was at UK, I wanted
Speaker 1: to be the editor of the newspaper, lost out by
Speaker 1: one vote to a buddy of mine, so I was
Speaker 1: the managing editor. And it turn out he had to
Speaker 1: go to meetings and make speeches. And I'm back hands
Speaker 1: on running the paper, and I'm like, man, I'm so
Speaker 1: glad I didn't get that job, now that you know
Speaker 1: it wasn't a multi million dollar job. All right, I
Speaker 1: got two minutes left. Talk to me about cold weather food.
Speaker 1: You still, of course it ain't.
Speaker 2: Cold where you are.
Speaker 1: But but tell people up here hearing this frigid weather,
Speaker 1: who still want to grill? What's a good you know,
Speaker 1: bad weather, tough coldness kind of thing. They can go
Speaker 1: out and grill.
Speaker 5: Oh, when I was in Chicago, I grew, I would think, so,
Speaker 5: So what you gotta do is is selling out your
Speaker 5: spot for your grill. And back then I didn't have
Speaker 5: as much money. I was on a little twenty one
Speaker 5: that's Weber kettle grill. Yeah, and you just gotta do
Speaker 5: what you gotta do. Now it's going to take you
Speaker 5: longer obviously to cook because of the elements. But get
Speaker 5: that thing. Don't do it in the garars now, don't
Speaker 5: do that now. Yeah, no, no, no, get yourself out,
Speaker 5: find a spot and you just got a man up.
Speaker 5: As simple as that.
Speaker 1: Is there anything in particular you think that lends itself
Speaker 1: to this kind of weather we have up here when
Speaker 1: it comes to grilling adders. It just the old reliable standards.
Speaker 5: Well, I'll tell you this, I will not do a
Speaker 5: brisket or pool park that takes too long. You know,
Speaker 5: fourteen hours gets your steak. If you if you feel
Speaker 5: like you want to do a rib, do a rib
Speaker 5: that but then just speed it up. Maybe you just
Speaker 5: wrap it the entire time. It's not going to be
Speaker 5: the greatest rib, but wrap it for the five tick
Speaker 5: you two and a half to three hours. And then
Speaker 5: after you wrap it, then you you you unwrap it,
Speaker 5: put it on the brawler in the oven for as
Speaker 5: long as you need, and on how good you are.
Speaker 5: But got to watch it and then cook it that way.
Speaker 5: That that you steak chicken and port of the things
Speaker 5: you can do outside when it's frigid. And if you
Speaker 5: man or nothing, you can do it. You do a rib.
Speaker 5: But you just ain't gonna stay out there for four hours.
Speaker 1: Oh no, you can't stand there poking it for four hours. Well, man,
Speaker 1: always a pleasure, and I will not be I will
Speaker 1: not leave you alone because there's gonna be so much happening. Now,
Speaker 1: what's your portal? And with college football, we'll talk to
Speaker 1: the playoffs as well. But I appreciate it. It was
Speaker 1: a tough season for all of us, but we we
Speaker 1: thank you for helping us get through it.
Speaker 5: I hope I did a good enough job to bring
Speaker 5: people off the edge and at least at least let
Speaker 5: us live another year. Look, there's nothing there's nothing positive
Speaker 5: that comes out of negativity, true, and so don't be
Speaker 5: as Coach Cerry's day of Fellowship of the Miserable. Find
Speaker 5: a way to find a little positive light out of
Speaker 5: this and this the pozzole light could be cut a
Speaker 5: bowling and Jamary and Wilcock find something that you can
Speaker 5: hold on to for the next few months.
Speaker 1: It's the best of the Big Lom Sider here around
Speaker 1: six thirty w l av welcome back to the Big
Speaker 1: Blue and Sider. I re number two. It is the
Speaker 1: best of the Big Blue Insider here. On Christmas Eve,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna take you back to a conversation I had
Speaker 1: with a writer from the Athletic dot Com but the
Speaker 1: name of Brendan Quinn. He wrote a great piece about
Speaker 1: Mark Pope and Mark Pope's family, and it was a
Speaker 1: wonderful piece by a gentleman named Brendan Quinn who's on
Speaker 1: our Celebrity Hotline. He wrote a great feature story about Mark,
Speaker 1: Pope and Brendan. Welcome to the show. I appreciate you
Speaker 1: joining us.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Dick.
Speaker 4: I got to tell me if you you're gonna need
Speaker 4: to check that hotline. If this is a celebrity status.
Speaker 3: Here, I gotta.
Speaker 4: Something is going to wry. But I appreciate. Yeah, I
Speaker 4: appreciate you having me on.
Speaker 1: Here's the rule. While you're on the celebrity hotline. You're
Speaker 1: a celebrity once you have that's all. It's all you.
Speaker 1: It's all you.
Speaker 5: Okay.
Speaker 1: I will say this though, in the Big Bow Nation,
Speaker 1: if people read your story, you'll become a celebrity, at
Speaker 1: least locally. Here was a terrific piece on Mark, and
Speaker 1: there have been a gazillion stories written about him. Of course,
Speaker 1: you kind of went at the family angle, which I
Speaker 1: thought was fascinating. Tell me, first of all, why you
Speaker 1: chose that, and secondly, tell me about the access you got.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 4: So this all of this kind of starts more so
Speaker 4: last basketball season when I wanted to do a story
Speaker 4: on BYU basketball and the intersection of you know, the
Speaker 4: school being owned and operated by the Church of Jesus Christ,
Speaker 4: of the Latter day Saint, right, and that's kind of
Speaker 4: the mission of the university and the athletic department being
Speaker 4: a vehicle for exposure for the religion, et cetera, et cetera,
Speaker 4: et cetera.
Speaker 3: So that the.
Speaker 4: Dynamic of that and the direction of college sports with
Speaker 4: pay for play with nil, you know what I mean,
Speaker 4: where there's this kind of it seems like there's a
Speaker 4: fundamental tension between those two goals, right, So that's what
Speaker 4: I wanted to write about. So I went out to
Speaker 4: Provo and spent three days with with Mark and had
Speaker 4: some behind the scenes access at in on some meetings,
Speaker 4: got to know him fairly well. You know, I thought
Speaker 4: the story was interesting, et cetera, et cetera. But you know,
Speaker 4: we had a lot of conversations that had absolutely nothing
Speaker 4: to do with the story, and it was about him,
Speaker 4: and it was about his life, and it was about
Speaker 4: his family. And I'm the son of a coach, so
Speaker 4: I kind of grew up around. We're in a family
Speaker 4: that kind of was, you know, subscribed to the schedule
Speaker 4: of a college coach. And now my dad coached you know,
Speaker 4: track and field, across country and all that stuff. But
Speaker 4: it was every week at us away recruiting all that stuff.
Speaker 4: But so we talked a lot about that and him
Speaker 4: having you know, a large family that he was raising,
Speaker 4: and you know, Leanne's experience of growing up as a
Speaker 4: coach's child. So I just have stored all of that
Speaker 4: right in the recesses of the mind. And once you know,
Speaker 4: Mark at the Kentucky job, you know, one of my
Speaker 4: first thoughts with Wow, that family's about to get you know,
Speaker 4: a lot of exposure, and that's that's going to be difficult.
Speaker 4: And then obviously, once you know, the great Kyle Tucker
Speaker 4: decided to you know, take his talents elsewhere, you know,
Speaker 4: we had a void for the preseason, and you know,
Speaker 4: we needed to do something on Mark. I would argue that,
Speaker 4: you know, it's they're interconnected, but him going to Kentucky
Speaker 4: and Calgo in Arkansas and those two and Cooper Flag
Speaker 4: are probably the three biggest stories of the preseason, so
Speaker 4: you know, we needed to have them accounted for. So
Speaker 4: I reached out to Mark and said, listen, I would
Speaker 4: like to write something about you, but I think it
Speaker 4: needs to kind of come maybe from the perspective of
Speaker 4: your wife and your daughters, and maybe that can help
Speaker 4: kind of have a broader audience learn about you, because
Speaker 4: one of the big things that you like, you know
Speaker 4: is you know, the second the game starts, you know,
Speaker 4: the human sides over. No one cares anymore who you are,
Speaker 4: right once there's wings and losses. You are a video
Speaker 4: game character and no one cares. So you know, I
Speaker 4: just wanted to maybe give a portrait of the person
Speaker 4: underneath the job title before before things got real.
Speaker 1: Yeah, how did he respond, because a lot of coaches
Speaker 1: are very pretend as well they should be of the
Speaker 1: wife and especially the kids.
Speaker 4: Yeah, you know, he he was. He was open to it.
Speaker 4: I basically just kind of painted a picture of what
Speaker 4: it would entail and all this, and like I said
Speaker 4: to the four girls, his daughters, like, you know, not
Speaker 4: profiling you, right, Like the story is about your dad.
Speaker 4: And and I think that gave everyone a degree of comfort
Speaker 4: of like, you know, what do you want to know
Speaker 4: about me? It's you know, it's not about you. So
Speaker 4: you know, I think that that was put put people
Speaker 4: at ease a little bit. And then also it's like
Speaker 4: a matter of trust, you know that that that the
Speaker 4: job requires sometimes and knowing that there's no other agendas.
Speaker 4: There's no ulterior notice, there's you know, it's just trying
Speaker 4: to produce the best story for the audience. You know,
Speaker 4: I'm not a character in the story, right, It's it's
Speaker 4: just it's just them as a family, and the goal
Speaker 4: is just trying to make them as authentic as possible.
Speaker 1: Talking to Brendan Quinn, he wrote a terrific piece about
Speaker 1: Mark Pope and his family, uh Leanne and the four girls,
Speaker 1: and you know, ultimately this story is about love, about
Speaker 1: their interpersonal relationships with their dad, with the husband and wife,
Speaker 1: and how much he loves this place. And I asked
Speaker 1: Mark the other day during we were broadcasting the pro
Speaker 1: day event, and I said, you know, your early fifties
Speaker 1: or whatever, you only lived here for three years, and
Speaker 1: yet you are so passionate about this place. So there's
Speaker 1: a lot of passion in this story, isn't there.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's that's a great point. And you know, I
Speaker 4: think a lot of it is. You know, there's probably
Speaker 4: more digging to be done if you really want to
Speaker 4: kind of print the screws on that brain and try
Speaker 4: to figure out what's all in there. Like you know,
Speaker 4: he moved around a little bit as a kid. You know,
Speaker 4: he was in Washington and et cetera.
Speaker 5: And then.
Speaker 4: I think there was a fundamental disappointment with how things
Speaker 4: ended at Washington. He was a big time he was
Speaker 4: a big, big time recruit, and he and four other
Speaker 4: this was a wormhole.
Speaker 5: I fell down.
Speaker 4: I was reading all these old newspaper stories about when
Speaker 4: he committed to Washington in eighty nine. There it was
Speaker 4: a big deal. It was him and the program was
Speaker 4: in bad shape right that he and four other Seattle
Speaker 4: area players committed to the program, and that was supposed
Speaker 4: to be the turnaround. Yea, And two years later they
Speaker 4: weren't winning. The coach was fired, and you know, Mark
Speaker 4: had to go find a new place. You know, he
Speaker 4: gave the new coach a chance and met with him,
Speaker 4: but ultimately decided to go elsewhere. And you know that
Speaker 4: he looked at looked at Utah, but but ultimately, you know,
Speaker 4: he was recruited by Kentucky the first time, and and
Speaker 4: then when Potito came back around, you know, I feel
Speaker 4: like that really became part of his identity, and that's
Speaker 4: where that passion comes from.
Speaker 1: I remember hearing his name from Rick Patino when he
Speaker 1: was unhappy with the way his team rebounded at one season.
Speaker 1: He could next year. That's not going to be a
Speaker 1: problem because Mark Pope going to be here and he
Speaker 1: was already on campus, you know, practicing, So I thought, yes,
Speaker 1: send the bar pretty high for this guy. But I
Speaker 1: have heard Mark. I heard Mark maybe probably as a
Speaker 1: player in the past, talk about some element of failure
Speaker 1: he felt because of what happened. Had you done? But man,
Speaker 1: you talk about second chances. He hit that one out
Speaker 1: of the park, didn't he.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 4: And the thing that I'm kind of always been most
Speaker 4: fascinated by with his Kentucky experience was, you know, Rick
Speaker 4: telling him, you know, you're going to be kind of
Speaker 4: the glue guy that holds this whole thing together, and
Speaker 4: going from the guy I mean he was the Pac
Speaker 4: ten freshman of the year.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, its first.
Speaker 4: Season at Washington. He started every game his first two years.
Speaker 4: You know, he was on his way to having a
Speaker 4: pretty prolific college career, and he he decided, you know,
Speaker 4: I'm going to go be the sixth guy on a
Speaker 4: real good team and with the aim of winning a
Speaker 4: national championship. And he ended up getting drafted. That's great,
Speaker 4: But you know, if you think about how big men
Speaker 4: were treated and thought of by the NBA in the
Speaker 4: early nineties. You know, if he had played somewhere else
Speaker 4: and been you know, all conference this, all conference, that
Speaker 4: averaging you know, seventeen a game, blah blah blah, it
Speaker 4: could have been a first round pick. Yeah, you know
Speaker 4: that he likes to downplay how how big of a
Speaker 4: player he was. But you know, I'm sure if he
Speaker 4: had maybe gone to Utah, gone wherever as a transfer,
Speaker 4: it could have been very different in terms of how
Speaker 4: his his career went from there.
Speaker 1: We're talking to Brendan Quinn of The Athletic about a
Speaker 1: PC wrote about Mark Pope and the family. Will come
Speaker 1: back with more and just a minute for Brendan. You're
Speaker 1: listening to the best of the Big Blue Insider here
Speaker 1: on Christmas Eve, six thirty wlap. Hey, it's Dick Gabriel.
Speaker 1: You're listening to the best of the Big Blue Insider.
Speaker 1: My guest is Brendan Quinn. He is a fine writer
Speaker 1: with The Athletic, and you also see his work at
Speaker 1: times on the pages of The New York Times, which
Speaker 1: now owns the Athletic and uses that basically as its
Speaker 1: sports section. Kind of picks and chooses, did they pick
Speaker 1: your piece? I take the Sunday Times, But was it
Speaker 1: anywhere else in the New York Times yet?
Speaker 4: You know, I would think usually a story of this
Speaker 4: length would probably fall on a weekend edition. Yeah, so
Speaker 4: I would look for it this weekend. For instance, last week,
Speaker 4: my story on John Califari at Arkansas ran on the
Speaker 4: Athletic on like a Tuesday or Wednesday, and then ran
Speaker 4: in print on I believe Saturday, with the leaders of
Speaker 4: the sports section in the print edition.
Speaker 1: Well, and the Times did retweet it, So somebody up.
Speaker 4: There like that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know.
Speaker 1: I was looking through the story about the girls because
Speaker 1: it was so interesting to me that the reason Scott Drew,
Speaker 1: one of the biggest reasons, as you know, he didn't
Speaker 1: take this job, was because Missus Scott Drew would not
Speaker 1: have been comfortable with the spotlight here on her and
Speaker 1: her family. And that's why Drew sent her in the
Speaker 1: plane to Lexing and to check things out while he
Speaker 1: stayed back in Waco. But one of the stories Mark told,
Speaker 1: I'm sure you know, at the PEP rally that served
Speaker 1: as his welcoming back to Kentucky. He told about how
Speaker 1: all the girls were all in and you wrote about
Speaker 1: that how the youngest might have balked a little bit
Speaker 1: because it probably would have been the toughest on her,
Speaker 1: you know, yeah, picking up high schools, making new friends.
Speaker 1: But I was fascinated Brandon by the fact that they
Speaker 1: were all of them all in, weren't they.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 4: I think part of it is, you know, they grew
Speaker 4: up Kentucky fans. You know, even while he was bouncing
Speaker 4: around jobs going Georgia, Wake Forest and then BYU and
Speaker 4: Utah Valley, et cetera, they were always at their core
Speaker 4: Kentucky fans. Yeah, And I think even beyond that, likes
Speaker 4: it's bigger than just oh, Kentucky's like the best job
Speaker 4: in the country, So we want that for dad, or
Speaker 4: it's his dream, so we want that for dad. I
Speaker 4: think a lot of this goes to Lee Man and
Speaker 4: she grew up changing schools every two three years and
Speaker 4: being around a basketball team and like that is her.
Speaker 4: That is her normal, right, It is being a coach's
Speaker 4: kid is you know, seeing the highs of winds and
Speaker 4: the lows of losses and being there being part of
Speaker 4: a team like that was normal. So when Mark dropped
Speaker 4: it out of med school and wanted to go into coaching.
Speaker 4: She was like, let's do it. And one of the
Speaker 4: things and this didn't make it into the final copy,
Speaker 4: and it's because I'm a bad writer. But one of
Speaker 4: the things that got the most is when they were
Speaker 4: Leanne was explaining to me, She's like, you know the
Speaker 4: thing about or no, I'm sorry Mark said this to me,
Speaker 4: or wait, even one of the girls, I'm sorry, I apologize,
Speaker 4: but I think it might have been Layla actually said,
Speaker 4: you know, Mom never has never complained or take an
Speaker 4: issue with or been angry about Dad's schedule or when
Speaker 4: he wasn't there right, And it was because it was
Speaker 4: always breakfast or framed as we have practice today, we
Speaker 4: have a recruiting trip, our team is doing this, our
Speaker 4: team is doing that. So it's not Mark as the
Speaker 4: head coach. They're all the head coach, you know. So
Speaker 4: that is the product. I think of Lehan coming up
Speaker 4: under her father, Lenn Archibald, who coached for twenty eight
Speaker 4: years and had you know, he was fired. He knows
Speaker 4: what it's like to be fired as a job and
Speaker 4: he had yes that place that he took a team
Speaker 4: to the NCAA tournament as a head coach, and I
Speaker 4: think her understanding that made her as a parent so
Speaker 4: uniquely qualified for what's really challenging. It is not easy
Speaker 4: being a coach's spouse, and she's just so hardwired to
Speaker 4: what's most important. And she raced Boord Alltars who were
Speaker 4: in the same way.
Speaker 1: I think really really fascinating. I saw that about Lynn
Speaker 1: Archibald and here's a quick aside. Lynn Archibald for just
Speaker 1: a union and took over for Jerry Pim at Utah, right, yes,
Speaker 1: Jerry Pim's Utah team in nineteen seventy seven. It was
Speaker 1: part of the seventy seven to seventy eight season which
Speaker 1: Kentucky won a national title. His Utah team upset Kentucky
Speaker 1: in their Christmas tournament and won their invitational tournament. Cliff
Speaker 1: Hagen was so ticked off that as he handed him
Speaker 1: the trophy, he said, congratulations, I'm inviting you right now
Speaker 1: to come back next year and try to defend this.
Speaker 1: They did not. But and then as you know, probably
Speaker 1: Pim went on to U see Santa Barbara because he
Speaker 1: wanted to live on a boat. And that's why Archie.
Speaker 4: Wanted to live on a boat. And he said it
Speaker 4: was a better job, and he just wanted to live
Speaker 4: in California.
Speaker 1: I'd say the ocean had a lot to do with that.
Speaker 1: We got a few minutes left with Brendan Quinn. You know,
Speaker 1: it was interesting. Uh. The one of the stories Mark
Speaker 1: told about his girls, I don't remember which one it was,
Speaker 1: but there's a really famous video clip where his ninety
Speaker 1: six team, his championship team in the hallway before they
Speaker 1: came out on the on the court. You may have
Speaker 1: heard about it or seen it, where they chant who's
Speaker 1: in the house tonight?
Speaker 3: UK?
Speaker 1: And when Mark talked about that to his kids, one
Speaker 1: of his daughters started chanting that. That floored me. That
Speaker 1: was I thought that was one of the great anecdotes.
Speaker 1: So that told me that the family was all in.
Speaker 3: Yeah, there's.
Speaker 4: There's a there's a million examples of that. When I
Speaker 4: think it was Shay even it was one of the
Speaker 4: younger ones and went in Shay when there was a
Speaker 4: game when he had the Georgia job. When he got
Speaker 4: the George job as a you know, low level assistant
Speaker 4: assistant to the director of Best Operations, which I didn't
Speaker 4: know was the job. I don't think i've seen that
Speaker 4: listed anywhere in any other programs, the dobo having having
Speaker 4: hit to her own assistant, you know, just a six
Speaker 4: ten ball boy. But he, you know, he had he
Speaker 4: got the position at Georgia. So the family went down
Speaker 4: and you know, one of the girls they grew up
Speaker 4: Kentucky fans and when they were going to their first game,
Speaker 4: realized that they were supposed to be rooting for Georgia
Speaker 4: and it was unacceptable, you know, it was like, we can't,
Speaker 4: we can't root for Georgia. So they had to stop
Speaker 4: and go buy a pair at Kentucky, a blue Kentucky
Speaker 4: stocks for her to wear at the game, Uh, to
Speaker 4: kind of put her at ease for root for an
Speaker 4: out rooting, you know, for for for Kentucky. So yeah,
Speaker 4: you know, I think it's it's it's one of the
Speaker 4: things that really I think was kind of like the
Speaker 4: big picture thought and the idea that when he was
Speaker 4: hired is the notion that you know, the job's too
Speaker 4: big for him, is what you heard a lot.
Speaker 3: And look, I have.
Speaker 4: No idea how this is going to go, right, Like
Speaker 4: if you told me it's not gonna work and in
Speaker 4: three years, you know, there's a change in whatever, I'd
Speaker 4: be like yeah, I can see that. And if you
Speaker 4: told me they're gonna win a national championship, iuld say yeah,
Speaker 4: I could see that. So but but either way it
Speaker 4: won't be because the job is too big for him,
Speaker 4: you know, like, that's not that is not it. Who
Speaker 4: knows what else could happen, but I think it's anything.
Speaker 4: It's the opposite. That's everything in a very unique life
Speaker 4: has been circumscribed for this exact opportunity or moment. So
Speaker 4: you know, let's see what happens from here.
Speaker 1: Well, yeah, and that said, before I let you go,
Speaker 1: I got to ask you to take you back to
Speaker 1: Tuesday night when Mark Pope, just three games into his
Speaker 1: first regular season at Kentucky, gets a signature win over
Speaker 1: Duke of all teams, the team Kentucky fans love to hate.
Speaker 1: I know you were spending the dial that night in
Speaker 1: your role as a guy who follows college basketball nationally.
Speaker 1: But what were you thinking, knowing this coach and this
Speaker 1: family the way you know now as they put the
Speaker 1: finishing touches on this upset?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean I think there was. It was a
Speaker 4: fine example of he's a Duke coach. I know that
Speaker 4: he presents as a certain way right. But I mean
Speaker 4: he is a really good basketball coach, and this team
Speaker 4: is is a very interesting blend of like guys that
Speaker 4: I think kind of has pieces of him where it's
Speaker 4: you know, there is it's almost a bunch of glue guys.
Speaker 4: Like I don't know who's the who's the star of
Speaker 4: this team?
Speaker 5: I don't know.
Speaker 4: I know and Andrew Carr was the leading scorer, right,
Speaker 4: but like, yeah, who's the guy who's the lottery pay
Speaker 4: I don't. I don't think that exists. It's a lot
Speaker 4: of pieces. There's a lot of bodies. I like that
Speaker 4: at any given time, the second that opposing team gets comfortable,
Speaker 4: he can roll a completely different lineup out there, give
Speaker 4: you a wildly different look. You know, you sub in
Speaker 4: Kobe Brea for at one stop or to play that
Speaker 4: other team is a pandemic, he's gonna bang it for
Speaker 4: two threes, you know, or you know kerk Creed to
Speaker 4: coming off a bench, giving a you know, a big
Speaker 4: time change of pace at at the league guard position,
Speaker 4: you know, and they're going to get looks. It's gonna
Speaker 4: be you know if they if they go down. But
Speaker 4: that's that.
Speaker 3: Was good basketball.
Speaker 4: You know, three point thirty seven two use seventeen assists.
Speaker 4: It's they're going to play I think good aesthetic basketball.
Speaker 4: Do they have the star power to go, you know,
Speaker 4: to to reach April. I don't know, but but yeah,
Speaker 4: I think it's gonna be good ball.
Speaker 1: It will be and Brendan Quinn will keep an eye
Speaker 1: on it for the Athletic. You can read him online
Speaker 1: or in the pages of The New York Times. Follow
Speaker 1: him on Twitter at b F Quinn. Tell me real quickly,
Speaker 1: what is what does your slogan mean? Is that is
Speaker 1: that Latin at astra per alasporchie.
Speaker 4: At uh It translates to to the stars on the
Speaker 4: wings of a pig. And it was. It was what
Speaker 4: Steinbeck wrote on the first page of every novel he
Speaker 4: submitted to his publisher. And it was because when he
Speaker 4: was a grade school student, a teacher told him, yeah,
Speaker 4: you want to be a writer. You'll be a writer
Speaker 4: when pigs flock ah, And so he went with astruct
Speaker 4: rally of ports. And I am no John Stevenbeck. But
Speaker 4: I did almost like basically fail out of every class
Speaker 4: I ever took, and was told by many, many people,
Speaker 4: you will not actually be a writer of any so
Speaker 4: nice reminder, Yeah.
Speaker 1: No one ever said that to me, but I'm sure
Speaker 1: they were thinking it, so I'm right there with you. Brenda,
Speaker 1: Thank you so much again, congrats on a great piece,
Speaker 1: and I'll be looking for more of your work.
Speaker 4: I really enjoyed the conversation Tick, thank you, and.
Speaker 1: Again I really recommend that story in The Athletic by
Speaker 1: Brendan Quinn. You can search, go back and find it
Speaker 1: because there were so many things written about Mark Pope
Speaker 1: and his decision and Mitch Barnard's decision to bring him here,
Speaker 1: but how it was made as a family, how excited
Speaker 1: they were for him to come back to his alma mater.
Speaker 1: So I would check it out up next on the
Speaker 1: Best of the Big Moonsider, Ken Spencer from over in Louisville,
Speaker 1: whas here on six point thirty WAP Welcome back this
Speaker 1: Christmas Eve. It's the best of the Big Blue Insider.
Speaker 1: And at the end of the football season, I thought
Speaker 1: I would check in with sports director over at whas
Speaker 1: Kent Spencer, who for the longest time was the sports
Speaker 1: director here at WTVQ and a guy who played college
Speaker 1: football and as I always say, a guy knows what
Speaker 1: it's like to get hit in the mouth of a
Speaker 1: football game, college football game. It is Kent Spencer of
Speaker 1: WHS over Louisville formerly WTVQ here in Lexington. And as
Speaker 1: I mentioned before, Kent, in your job, you cover both
Speaker 1: ends of the interstate, and you and I have talked
Speaker 1: all season long about how this Kentucky football program is
Speaker 1: just sagging. Can I assume you weren't surprised by the
Speaker 1: outcome Saturday?
Speaker 6: Actually I was a little surprised. My final score prediction
Speaker 6: was Louisville twenty eight fourteen, okay going into the game,
Speaker 6: So I was not surprised that one. I was not
Speaker 6: surprised that they were They won by a couple of touchdowns,
Speaker 6: but I was generally surprised with just the complete physical
Speaker 6: dominance in the game by the Cards over the Cats.
Speaker 6: And look, I didn't think that Louisville was going to win,
Speaker 6: despite Kentucky being the much more physical team. Like I
Speaker 6: just if you never really see that out of this
Speaker 6: Kentucky football team, you can't expect them to show that
Speaker 6: kind of dominance over anybody. I mean, think about how
Speaker 6: many times Murray State got for the quarterback left, you know,
Speaker 6: a couple weeks ago and so so I wasn't surprised
Speaker 6: about that, but I was. I was certainly surprised by
Speaker 6: that dominant physically in the game and just how easy
Speaker 6: it looked. Like we kind of talked about like, look,
Speaker 6: Kentucky just kind of looks like a team that's just
Speaker 6: ready for the season as they played like it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, looking for a place to fall down. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: you know through the years, and I was, I've talked
Speaker 1: about this last week. Bud and my brother I always
Speaker 1: look them up in Louisville at the U L game
Speaker 1: and they always say the same thing, your linemen are
Speaker 1: so big. I don't know if size was the difference,
Speaker 1: but certainly execution and attitude were the difference in the
Speaker 1: trenches on Saturday, were they not.
Speaker 6: Yeah, And I think that's kind of been a I
Speaker 6: think that's kind of been a sign of a lot
Speaker 6: of things over the course of this season for this
Speaker 6: Kentucky football team. I mean, you know, we make so
Speaker 6: much out of you know, the Cats offensive line and
Speaker 6: not being able to protect the quarterback. I think, you know,
Speaker 6: generally speaking like yards per rush. You know, I think
Speaker 6: they were fine this year in that department. There was
Speaker 6: a couple of things you know, they didn't break big
Speaker 6: runs and they were really poor on short yarded situations.
Speaker 1: Yes, you know, and those two.
Speaker 6: Departments I think that they were they were lacking, but
Speaker 6: you know, in the in the general like down and
Speaker 6: distant stuff. I mean, I think they were fine getting
Speaker 6: the three the five to six yard runs and maybe
Speaker 6: you know, just a little bit longer than that every
Speaker 6: now and again. But those two departments, they just weren't good.
Speaker 6: But you know what, like the defensive line wasn't very
Speaker 6: good this year, Eason. No, I mean, you know in
Speaker 6: case in point, and I think Louisville and I mentioned
Speaker 6: and I after the game, I think I asked Louisville
Speaker 6: running back Duke Watson and true freshman running back at
Speaker 6: that I said, did you see anything from their game
Speaker 6: against Texas that allowed you to that made you think
Speaker 6: you could have some success? And he was like absolutely,
Speaker 6: because if you look back at that Texas game, I
Speaker 6: mean that defensive line and linebacker corps was just absolutely
Speaker 6: dashed the entire game into the run game, and in fact,
Speaker 6: when they got close and made it a game, Texas
Speaker 6: just ran the football all the way down the field.
Speaker 6: I mean we're talking like you know, seven eight nine
Speaker 6: ten yard runs each and every play, and that's just
Speaker 6: not something that you're accustomed to see from this defense.
Speaker 6: Just was the case this year.
Speaker 1: And you know, after that game, Van Hiles, who you
Speaker 1: probably know, I don't know if you've ever talked to Van,
Speaker 1: but former Kentucky d back analyzes a video on the internet.
Speaker 1: He said that Texas game really illustrated just how much,
Speaker 1: to your point, they missed Derick Jackson. You know, not
Speaker 1: that one guy's gonna stop everything, but as you know,
Speaker 1: there's a ripple effect. You know, he knew, he knows
Speaker 1: where to be or at least knew where to be
Speaker 1: and when, and he could execute. You know, I thought
Speaker 1: Kentucky's tackling against Texas and at times against Louisville was
Speaker 1: so poor. You know, Texas running backs are bouncing off
Speaker 1: people that didn't happen with Jackson, so plus they're worn
Speaker 1: down as well.
Speaker 6: Yeah, and think about think about this. You know, sometimes
Speaker 6: it's football can be a game of a half a second. Yeah,
Speaker 6: and Derick Jackson is somebody who's who's seen it all.
Speaker 6: And so if you're there, you know a second or
Speaker 6: you know, not even a second, but if you're there,
Speaker 6: like a half second sooner. Yeah, you know, the plays
Speaker 6: completely stopped. If you're a half second lay, that game's
Speaker 6: going for ten or more yards. And so you know,
Speaker 6: I think you you probably saw a lot of that. Yeah,
Speaker 6: I mean Derek Jackson not being in the lineup absolutely,
Speaker 6: you know, completely stuffed him. But you know, even him
Speaker 6: not being there a linebacker like you know, the front four.
Speaker 6: I mean, it just it wasn't a good day for them,
Speaker 6: you know, at all. And it really wasn't a good
Speaker 6: season for that unit.
Speaker 1: No, no, And you know the craziest thing was after
Speaker 1: the Old Miss win. For the next week or two, Ken,
Speaker 1: I heard some of the regional and national talking heads
Speaker 1: speaking of the Kentucky defense and using words like elite
Speaker 1: and when you go back and look at what they
Speaker 1: did against Georgia in all miss, I think that was fair.
Speaker 1: And then the bottom just fell out. Injuries took their toll. Uh,
Speaker 1: the offense left the defense out on a field for
Speaker 1: so long. So yeah, it was not clearly not a
Speaker 1: typical Mark shoots defense.
Speaker 6: No, not no. And you're right, you know you mentioned
Speaker 6: national talking heads. I mean honestly this like I said
Speaker 6: that about Kentucky's defense. But but I would say that
Speaker 6: about Kentucky defense after the Old Myth game. You know,
Speaker 6: one of those things where you know, you don't know
Speaker 6: if they can score enough points to win a bunch
Speaker 6: of games, but they're at least going to stop people.
Speaker 6: And they they stopped. They stopped people, and and to
Speaker 6: be honest with you, sometimes like they were their own
Speaker 6: worst enemy on that side of the ball as well.
Speaker 6: Fifteen yards, you know, with penalties and mistakes and different
Speaker 6: things along that, like like you know, all of the
Speaker 6: stuff about you know, there's so much there, but this
Speaker 6: just wasn't a disciplined football team. Yeh, from the from
Speaker 6: the penalties, from the assignments. Like you know how many times,
Speaker 6: you know, after I say this, after the Old this game,
Speaker 6: how many times did this team just not look prepared
Speaker 6: and focused?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 6: And so like to me, when you don't have a
Speaker 6: team that's prepared and focused, man, that's that that starts
Speaker 6: at the highest position and then it works its way
Speaker 6: down Like if you're not prepared and focused, it starts
Speaker 6: at the top.
Speaker 1: Speaking of what did you make of Mark Tup's postgame comments.
Speaker 6: I made of the postgame comments, I mean, it was
Speaker 6: I think it was much of the same that we've
Speaker 6: heard pretty much all year, not good enough, not going anywhere,
Speaker 6: going to put in the work. Like I've said this,
Speaker 6: and I've said this to my kids, and I've said
Speaker 6: it to other people. And this has nothing to do
Speaker 6: with about Kentucky football. This has everything to do about everything.
Speaker 6: But but I think it still stands true here. It's
Speaker 6: easy to use words. It's easy to say I am competitive.
Speaker 6: It's easy to say we're going to go back to
Speaker 6: work and we're going to get this fixed. But do
Speaker 6: your actions back up your word?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 6: Like, like when the hours that you're putting in each
Speaker 6: and every week to get this right, to get this fixed,
Speaker 6: are they matching the words that are coming out of
Speaker 6: your mouth. Nobody's you know, we're we're not in that complex.
Speaker 6: We don't see the things. But the proof and the
Speaker 6: pudding on the field doesn't match the words that are
Speaker 6: coming out of the mouth.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: You know, I got to thinking about everything Stoop said,
Speaker 1: both on the radio and in the postgame news conference,
Speaker 1: and I thought back kent to when he first got here,
Speaker 1: a young, younger decoordinator looking for a chance to prove
Speaker 1: himself in a big boy league, and he did that,
Speaker 1: and he came in and he was a dervish, a
Speaker 1: buzz saw, whatever you want to call him. Brought a
Speaker 1: great friend and Vince Merriw built a good staff. He said,
Speaker 1: some issues there, but you know, he knew he had
Speaker 1: a plan, the blue collar Youngstown approach of coaching football,
Speaker 1: and he did it. But now that approach would work
Speaker 1: to a point. But when you mix in the two
Speaker 1: things he abhors and every coach does the portal and nil,
Speaker 1: it's just I can't imagine him, you know, trying to
Speaker 1: throw himself back into this job the way he did
Speaker 1: twelve years ago because everything has changed so much.
Speaker 6: Uh, yeah it has. And you know you mentioned, you know,
Speaker 6: twelve years ago when he got the job and he
Speaker 6: came in and the mindset that you have when you've
Speaker 6: tasted success, and you know, let's be honest, when you win,
Speaker 6: you know, what is it ten games and three years
Speaker 6: or earth? You know what I mean? When that ten
Speaker 6: win seasons or whatever a couple and that many and
Speaker 6: that timeframe at a place like Kentucky that's just not
Speaker 6: used to ten win seasons. And then all of a sudden,
Speaker 6: you know, and look like it's all this is all
Speaker 6: part of the conversation. When you're making nine million dollars
Speaker 6: a year like now at this point, you're living on
Speaker 6: the yacht, and can you have the blue collar mentality
Speaker 6: when you feel like you're on the yacht now? Some
Speaker 6: people can't. Some people keep it? Did he keep it?
Speaker 6: Like I said, I'm not in that. I'm not in
Speaker 6: that facility. I don't know, but what I'm seeing on
Speaker 6: the field says it seems like somebody took the foot
Speaker 6: off the gas.
Speaker 1: Yeah, don't know how, when or why, but it was
Speaker 1: pretty evident this year and a lot apparently it will
Speaker 1: be happening fairly quickly in terms of personnel, according to
Speaker 1: Stoop's players, and he's hoping to keep his staff together
Speaker 1: over the next year three weeks.
Speaker 6: Here's what I Here's what I would also say, Dick.
Speaker 6: This is my opinion, and you may agree with it,
Speaker 6: and you may you may not, But like, this isn't
Speaker 6: this isn't a this wasn't in my opinion, this wasn't
Speaker 6: a twenty twenty four problem. Was this was All of
Speaker 6: these things that we're talking about now they took place
Speaker 6: in twenty twenty three, But the biggest thing that happened
Speaker 6: that masked everything was they beat louis at the end
Speaker 6: of the year.
Speaker 3: Yep.
Speaker 6: And if they don't win that game, everything that we're
Speaker 6: talking about right now we would have talked about last year.
Speaker 6: But that mass and it was a band aid over
Speaker 6: a lot of stuff. And so instead of all of
Speaker 6: this coming to light after one season, now you've had
Speaker 6: two seasons of erosion. So it's probably, honestly, it's probably
Speaker 6: worse now than if it would have taken place last year.
Speaker 1: Ken Spencer, my guest sports director whas formerly WTVQ, We'll
Speaker 1: come back and talk basketball with Kent on the other
Speaker 1: side of the break. You're listening to the best of
Speaker 1: the Big Blue Insider. Welcome back, my guest. Kent Spencer,
Speaker 1: sports director, whas over in Louisville and worked for several
Speaker 1: years here at WTVQ in Lexington. And being in Louisville,
Speaker 1: Kent covers both ends of the interstate. As I said,
Speaker 1: so now Kent, Kentucky basketball fun. Everybody's happy, Louisville basketball fun.
Speaker 1: I don't know if everybody's happy over there, but they
Speaker 1: got to be happier than they were because good things
Speaker 1: are happening on both ends of the interstate, which means
Speaker 1: all is right with our world when it comes to
Speaker 1: covering college basketball, right.
Speaker 6: Oh yeah, look, look I think I think Louisville fans
Speaker 6: and the Battle for Atlantis had so much fun, right Like,
Speaker 6: first off, they beat the Brakes off of Indiana and
Speaker 6: then they come and win a hard fought game against
Speaker 6: West Virginia. They're in the championship game of that tournament.
Speaker 6: And what a nice response for them after getting blown
Speaker 6: out at home by Tennessee a couple of weeks ago.
Speaker 6: So you know, like they're already starting to match like
Speaker 6: win totals under the Kenny Paint era and certain and
Speaker 6: certain points right like like this is this is like
Speaker 6: there they are. They're on cloud nine. And I think
Speaker 6: for for Kentucky fans, like yeah, I mean, you know,
Speaker 6: I've been asked this a couple of times and I
Speaker 6: would say this, like has anything.
Speaker 2: Gone wrong for Mark Pope?
Speaker 6: Yet Nope, Like he said all the right things, He's
Speaker 6: done all the right things. They've had the results on
Speaker 6: the court. You know, there's the video of the Duke
Speaker 6: game and him calling what Cooper Flag was going to do?
Speaker 6: Like you know, all of these things are are are
Speaker 6: are happening and in the right way, and it really
Speaker 6: feels like this is a team that people really like
Speaker 6: as far as personality, how they play, the style. You know,
Speaker 6: it's just it's all, it's all really well right now.
Speaker 1: You know I mentioned this more than once, and forgive
Speaker 1: me if I'm if I'm boring people with it, but
Speaker 1: I just think it's vital. Jack Gibbons made this point.
Speaker 1: And by the way, if you haven't had a chance
Speaker 1: to listen to Jack, because I know you work a lot,
Speaker 1: but he is. There's so much joy in his voice
Speaker 1: watching this team, especially because they're always jacking it up.
Speaker 1: You know, Jack was a shooter, unabashedly, unapologetically, and he
Speaker 1: loves what he's seeing. But he made this great point
Speaker 1: Kent in this third or fourth game. He said, it's
Speaker 1: so refreshing to see this team working when the shot
Speaker 1: clock is winding down and a play has broken down
Speaker 1: and they fix it among themselves. They don't stop as
Speaker 1: freshmen need to do and turn to look at the
Speaker 1: bench so their maniacal coach can wave his arms and
Speaker 1: scream and yell and direct traffic. They know what to do,
Speaker 1: and it's it's kind of fun to watch isn't it.
Speaker 6: Oh yeah, I mean, you know, sometimes it's it's changing
Speaker 6: the way that the game is played. You know, I thought,
Speaker 6: going back to a couple of weeks ago, right like
Speaker 6: in the first half, Duke's physicality was almost overwhelming to
Speaker 6: them in the first half, and they really struggled with
Speaker 6: it because up until that point, you know, when you're
Speaker 6: playing directional team, you there's not a whole lot of
Speaker 6: that going around. So they had to adjust to that,
Speaker 6: and at halftime they adjusted to that, and they just
Speaker 6: kept chipping away. Like in the NCAA tournament or in
Speaker 6: college basketball in general, I think you have to your
Speaker 6: way just can't be the only way. You're going to
Speaker 6: have to win different ways. And for me, it proved
Speaker 6: that that team can win a different way. They still
Speaker 6: scored seventy seven points, and they had not a very
Speaker 6: good night offensively at all that game, and you found
Speaker 6: a way to win that game. And so there's one thing.
Speaker 6: You know, some national folks out there will tell you
Speaker 6: that this Kentucky team and they're breaking down like other
Speaker 6: teams and stuff like that, and they're like, this Kentucky
Speaker 6: team is close to their ceiling. And I would I
Speaker 6: would push against that because this team has a new
Speaker 6: coaching staff that's only like Jackson Robinson is the only
Speaker 6: dude who's played for Mark Pope, and they've got so
Speaker 6: many new pieces. Yes, are they older, absolutely, But are
Speaker 6: they close to their ceiling in my opinion when it
Speaker 6: comes to getting used to each other and this system
Speaker 6: on a court in the heat of the moment in games,
Speaker 6: absolutely not. I think it's a lazy take to be,
Speaker 6: to be quite honest with you, because they can, you know,
Speaker 6: being comfortable with each other and knowing what somebody is
Speaker 6: going to do in the fight and the fire is
Speaker 6: completely different. And so I think that this team still
Speaker 6: has a long way to go as far as you know,
Speaker 6: reaching their ceiling. But watching them right now has it's
Speaker 6: been a lot of fun.
Speaker 1: And that'll do it for now. On this special Christmas
Speaker 1: Eve edition, the best of the Big Blue and Sider
Speaker 1: coming up tomorrow on Christmas Night and Encore presentation of
Speaker 1: our postseason football special. Yes, there were some highlights, especially
Speaker 1: the upsetable miss and our celebrity monologue. That's all I had.
Speaker 1: Hope you have a great Christmas everybody.
Speaker 3: That's it.
Speaker 1: Good night from the garage in Lexington.
Speaker 6: And in
Speaker 5: No Co