2026-04-20- KSR - Hour 1

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Speaker 1: Known for his crowd work.

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Speaker 2: Comedy Off Broadway and Lexington Welcome's Club Favorite Ian Bag April ninth through the eleventh, then from Saturday Night Live and the hit TV show DMV catch ten Meadows April sixteenth through the eighteenth, and from Netflix and social media catch Amber Autrey, me first and second. Four tickets to all Comedy Off Broadway shows called eight, five, nine, two, seven to one joke or visit Comedy Off Broadway, dot com.

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Speaker 3: Comedy off Bay.

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Speaker 4: This is Kentucky Sports Radio presented by Stockton Mortgage.

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Speaker 1: Now here's Matt Jones.

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Speaker 5: Well, welcome everyone. It is Kentucky Sports Radio, Monday, April the twentieth. I'm Matt Jones here on what hopefully will be the last few cool days of spring before I think to starting tomorrow, maybe summer weather is here.

00:00:53
Speaker 3: Yeah, Hi, it's supposed to be in like the low fifties today. We all have thinges on.

00:00:57
Speaker 5: Yes, but this is it because I think starting Tuesday it's gonna be great. You can give shown the Clark's Puppet Shop phone line A five nine two eighth twenty two eighty seven. A Vision Auto Glass text machine is seven seven to two four five two five four and this distion sponsored by the TJ. Smith Office. You called Tj'll make them pay. Shannon is in Louisville. Ryan and I are in Lexington after a big, adventure filled weekend of recruiting. I'm in a good mood, Shannon, because last night I got to do something I'll probably never get to do again.

00:01:25
Speaker 1: What's that?

00:01:26
Speaker 5: Which was sit on my porch right outside of my house and listen to one of my favorite artists, like Plane live to where I could hear it from my porch.

00:01:38
Speaker 1: He didn't even have to pay to get a tench, didn't have.

00:01:41
Speaker 5: To pay for a ticket, just got to sit there and listen to him go thous miles from nowhere. And I like that was kind of cool. Shannon. That's the first time they've had a concert in that park that I and the acoustics, I think it sounds better at my house than it does so I'm moving unfortunately, but like, actually, I think that's shading the perfect place.

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Speaker 4: You can maybe book them to play your backyard barbecue, maybe at your new house.

00:02:04
Speaker 5: I don't know if I can do. Zz Top and Dwight Yolk.

00:02:07
Speaker 1: You're close enough to hear it where you're close enough to see him.

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Speaker 5: I can't see it. I got some there's some trees that block it. But honestly, it was interesting learning about acoustics in some ways because when I turned into onto my street, I couldn't hear anything, and then halfway to through the street, it sounded like I was on stage, which just shows, you know, Shannon, how acoustics can work like that.

00:02:29
Speaker 1: They've got them done to a science. They do.

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Speaker 4: They really do big festivals and everything. They got the real stages, but somehow they've got it to where you can only hear it in this area you know, this zone, Yes, and you could.

00:02:39
Speaker 5: And you could tell, and like it felt like they designed that entire Gaton Park thing for my porch. They did your movie that's a movie, Yeah it was, but it was really cool. Like he's one of my favorite artists of all time. I mean I saw him play for the first time when I was like fifteen years old, and he's right outside of my house, right in your backyard. The thing the only thing I couldn't do is like it seems shake his tail like he likes to do.

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Speaker 4: They just announced five minutes ago August twenty eighth, Dwight yoakum lobll Palace.

00:03:09
Speaker 5: Yeah, but again that's not at my house. But you know, I know, but this was to sit on your porch like I mean imagine Stone Tiple, Pilots Shannon, but.

00:03:20
Speaker 1: I would be there, I would be front row.

00:03:22
Speaker 5: Yeah, you know, well I heard, I will say I heard that the actual if you went, maybe a little bit they may need to work on their logistics a little bit.

00:03:32
Speaker 3: First big concert they had, very.

00:03:34
Speaker 5: First big concert. I heard maybe they need some more bathrooms. Really fourteen porta potties for that entire place, and there a huge crowd. I mean they were expected between four and five thousand people.

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Speaker 1: Fourteen five thousand people.

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Speaker 5: That's just what I heard. I'm not if somebody wants to tell me that that, but that was it. I thought that was Sannon such a specific number that it kind of had to be ye And then I actually think this is cool enough the people that organize it'll think it's cool. Manchester Street now people just learned you can just stand on the street and watch it.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, as you can.

00:04:09
Speaker 5: So there's just people standing on the street.

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Speaker 1: It's got hurt ticket sales.

00:04:13
Speaker 5: That my in the future. Now that people people know that, but I'll tell you where you can't be. You can't come to my porch. Because my porch, You're not gonna find a better place.

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Speaker 3: You could charge the fortune for parking and bathroom.

00:04:24
Speaker 5: I'm gonna allow all these people in my bathroom be kidding me.

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Speaker 3: Hey, you got okay, five dollars for your bathroom five.

00:04:31
Speaker 5: Yeah. So anyway, it was, that was very very cool last night. I didn't I didn't expect it to be as awesome as it was. All Right, so let's talk about what happened this weekend. It was massive recruiting weekend. Really two stories. Let's do a positive story. First for me, maybe the player in the portal that I wanted Kentucky to get the most, Well, the one I wanted to get the most was Rob Wright. Obviously that didn't happen. Zoom Diallo for me would be point guard two. So I was good with it. But my second favorite player in the portal was Alex Wilkins from Furman and he commits to Kentucky. Yes, I think he's going to be our best player next year, or well at least our best scorer next year. To me, this is a steal. I don't care where he's ranked in the ratings twenty fifth, twenty eighth. I will go on record as saying I'll look in the camera when the after the season's over portal rankings come out, that kid will have been a top ten to fifteen player in the port I genuinely believe that he is a dynamic scorer who I think is exactly what Kentucky needs. And I don't know how the rest of the portal. I don't know how this team is going to look next year, but I know we will come at the end of that season and go that was the best get Martin Pope got.

00:05:48
Speaker 3: I got looks at who else wanted him? You know, he pick Kentucky over Yukon.

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Speaker 5: Yukon Dampionship game.

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Speaker 3: I think they had a pretty good year last couple of years in Alabama's Alabama been killing it.

00:05:58
Speaker 5: Yes, and there are other schools that try but just didn't have the money that they wanted to put that the that knowse Kentucky album in Ukon.

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Speaker 3: So I got so mad at some of our fan base said, oh, come on, where we're settling for a transfer from Furman.

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Speaker 5: Everybody wanted this kid, everybody, and let me give you some numbers. I put this on Twitter. I think it's really important. And again this is it's a small sample size. It's four years. We need to look at this in fifteen years. But twenty first Team All Americans in college basketball in the last four years, ten of them came from the same school the whole time. Okay, now think about that for me. Yeah, ten of them were upper classmen who always played at one school, showcasing there is value in getting guys and keeping them in your program. We only kept two people on our three three Trent Noah, but ten of them were those guys. Four of them were freshmen. Okay, probably less than people.

00:06:57
Speaker 3: Think, less than I thought.

00:06:59
Speaker 5: Four were fresh and by the way, three of those were.

00:07:01
Speaker 3: This say this season alone, this.

00:07:03
Speaker 5: Season four refreshmen and then six guys were transfers from low schools to high schools. You know what's yet to be a first team All American in the Anile era someone that transferred from a power for school to another power for school. Really, so we keep hearing, let's just get this kid from Kansas, from Arizona State, from you know, Washington, from Oregon, from Maryland. Whatever turns out, the ones that turn into stars are actually the ones from the men majors. Yaxle was won this year, Dalton Connect, Dalton, Mark Sears, Walter Clayton Junior. I mean, I'm giving you the ones over the years. So I just thought that was interesting. Sat Alex Wilkins is going to be a first team All American. Now, if you go back five years, Oscar was a power for to a power form, but that was pre in Il. He came here before in Ale. Yeah. Now while he was here, you got in Ile, but he came here before in Aisle. So anyway, Ryan, I think that you know, I think that was a huge gift for Mark. All these schools wanted him. It was really the first guy he's gotten. The other schools bid the same amount and he picked them.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, he had to get a couple of these guys. He had to win these recruiting battles, whether it's a freshman or a transfer portal guy. So now you're hearing some of these national punnits calling this maybe Pope's best backcourt he's put together in his top three first three years here.

00:08:28
Speaker 5: Who said that.

00:08:31
Speaker 3: On the internets?

00:08:32
Speaker 5: But you said some of these punnets, I.

00:08:33
Speaker 3: Can't remember who it was well.

00:08:34
Speaker 5: I mean, is it plausible, Yeah, it's plausible, But like I think he's you know, I think Oway and Aberdeen ended up being pretty good. I think Butler and Jackson, Robinson and and Brea and Oway were pretty good.

00:08:47
Speaker 4: You're gonna have a hard time putting together a better backcourt in what you had last year with Oway and Aberdeen.

00:08:52
Speaker 5: I think this one can be. I do think this one can be as good though. I think this one, this one will be better passers. This one I think will be better creatively. Now will we? Aberdeen at the end was a pretty good shooter. We'll have to see if these guys end up like that. Yeah, oh wait, it was great going to basket.

00:09:10
Speaker 3: So the Diallo kind of struggle as the shooters a freshman, he did, but made a big jump like something.

00:09:15
Speaker 5: They have a point guard who could pass no, and Diallo will be that So I like it. I think they actually did did really well with that. Now I will say, Shannon, you know you hesitate. This is Can I can I say a criticism with love? Of course? Can I do a criticism with love, especially when you put it that way? Okay? Because I love I love my good friends at KSR the website, Yes, and they do an amazing job. They get too much criticism, a lot of which is just because it's KSR and you. They want to criticize me, so they criticize them.

00:09:51
Speaker 1: Guilty by association.

00:09:53
Speaker 5: It's a guilty buye association. And I tell them that all the time. Like a lot of these times, these people are mad at me and they're taking it out on you. With that said, I love Adam Luckett does an awesome job.

00:10:04
Speaker 3: Yes he does.

00:10:05
Speaker 5: Adam Luckett's my guy. Adam Loloett's probably gonna be on here one day this week to talk football Seneon. We got to talk to him about headlines he puts on stores.

00:10:14
Speaker 1: Oh okay, what's the headlines?

00:10:15
Speaker 5: You see the headline he put up Saturday? Marios laughing.

00:10:18
Speaker 1: I don't think I saw it.

00:10:19
Speaker 5: Could Zoom Diallo, Alex Wilkins be Mark Pope's John Wall Eric Bledsoell.

00:10:24
Speaker 1: Oh you know what I did see that?

00:10:27
Speaker 5: Yeah, Adam's slow down, man, I know what he means. What he means is the way Mark Pope plays. Wal and Bledsoe were both point guards, but they made it work. And Diallo and Wilkins there's nuance uh huh, yes, and you can't put nuance in a headline because then what ends up Like that went everywhere and I just wanted to go, you know, I was like, I'm not gonna let Adam have his weekend, but you know, I don't put these guys in the wall bled cub category. Shandon just yet was I love them, but like, come on now, don.

00:11:07
Speaker 4: I saw I come through on my Facebook fade or a Facebook feed, and they got a lot of those laughing emojis, more than I think the like emojis, just because people are like, what are you saying?

00:11:16
Speaker 1: There's no way these guys are gonna better than those two.

00:11:18
Speaker 5: I think Adam just got excited, right.

00:11:20
Speaker 3: Yeah, because like I said in theory, Cal played two point guards together.

00:11:24
Speaker 5: That what means it can be Mark Pope playing two point guards.

00:11:27
Speaker 3: Yes, that's exactly I'm sure what he meant.

00:11:29
Speaker 5: But that's like saying, if we get Wall, if we get Diallo, Wilkins and Freeman, is this our Lebron Bosh way, It's like slow down? So all right, so that's step one. We get a player, got a good player. That's step two. Not as good a news we talked about. They had two big guys to choose from, right, Donny Freeman and Sebastian Ransick. They were both here last week, both here last week on Saturday morning. I was essentially told by the end day Sunday, we'll have one of them. And I didn't say this specifically, but at the time I was told Sebastian Ransick would come now trying to get Freeman on board. If not, do Ransick Sunday. Saturday. They do everything they can to try to get Freeman on board. Doesn't happen. Get to Sunday, Ransick picks Florida, stay tired to wait. Now it's all in on Freeman. As the day goes on Sunday, Saint John's ups their offer. They're now offering more money than Kentucky, and as of this moment, you have neither one of them. You know, this is an elaborate, high stakes poker contracts game. That's what this is.

00:12:45
Speaker 3: Absolutely, that's what it is.

00:12:47
Speaker 5: Once the kid likes you, this is a poker game, huh. And you gotta be good at the game. And they made a decision. Freeman's better than Ransick. Will wait on Ransick. Eventually, Ransick says, all right, I'm your second choice. I'm Florida State's first choice. I'll go there. You lose your leverage now, yes, you do, because you don't have a fallback. Freeman's agent seems like he's probably a pretty good agent, says hey, Saint John's. Now look, I got some leverage Saint John's. I guess Tino doesn't have a lot of love for Pope. Here. Put the pressure on. They make a higher offer, and now Kentucky could end up not getting either one of them.

00:13:28
Speaker 3: That's uh, that would be the whiff. We talked about the whiff, like we he can't have any whiffs. That would be a whiff. If you lose it on both of those guys you just had on campus and feel good about both of them. I feel like at one point.

00:13:37
Speaker 5: So what do you do, Shannon? Do you blame them? If you think? No, no, no, no, I don't blame rig But if they end up with neither of these guys, is that is that? Dare say a whiff?

00:13:50
Speaker 1: Yes, yes it is. That's on Pope.

00:13:52
Speaker 4: I would love to be a fly on the wall just to know what the pitch is. What are they saying?

00:13:57
Speaker 5: I don't know, See, I don't think this is a pitch. I think this was a.

00:14:00
Speaker 1: Money issue because we spent more money than anybody.

00:14:03
Speaker 5: But no, I think we play the game incorrectly. Here we thought, here's what I think they should have done Hindsight's twenty twenty. But when they didn't get an answer yes on Freeman on Saturday night, they probably should have just taken him. Take him, just get him in and say, listen, we can't afford a situation. Whether we where we get neither of it.

00:14:22
Speaker 3: That's correct.

00:14:23
Speaker 5: Now, now maybe they still get him, maybe they go match Saint John's offer, at which point we just ended up paying more money than we wanted.

00:14:32
Speaker 3: The money got Saint John's that Micropoli, it's the guy with the horses. The horses, Yeah, and he's got some deep pockets. So we don't want to get no bitting warri And they don't have.

00:14:40
Speaker 5: To pay for football. That's the thing. The thing you have to remember about the Big East is they can win these bidding wars because they don't have to pay for football, so their REV share they can spend it on basketball. So Shannon, that was you know. So so Pope gets a win this weekend. I think a big win. Beat you Kana and Alabama for this kid. But now Ransick, he could have had him, chose to to wait on Freeman. If you got to get Freeman. Now I think you got to pay the extra money, don't you.

00:15:15
Speaker 3: I think you have to think.

00:15:16
Speaker 1: The big thing is though he got one over the weekend, he did, and a.

00:15:21
Speaker 5: Good win he did, and that is good. And I think one of two is better than zero, of course, but you you know, you had this situation where you've got a bird in the hand, but there's another in the bush, and you want the one in the bush more. Do you let the bird out of your hand to go jumping at the bush? We did, and Ransick flew off.

00:15:47
Speaker 4: And now bird in the hand is worth two in the bush, not one in the bush.

00:15:51
Speaker 5: I have a different version.

00:15:53
Speaker 1: If there's only one bird in the bush, I'm keeping the one in my hand. If there's two, well there you go.

00:15:58
Speaker 5: No, there was one in the but the one in the bus was a better bird. Oh and so now we're fighting with an old man in the bush for the other bird. So of course it also happens to be your you're you're father.

00:16:11
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's true.

00:16:13
Speaker 5: So now we're all I mean, if the analogy could use some work. I could have workshopped it a little bit. Yeah, it just kind of came up on the top of it. If I'm nine eight twenty eighty seven, we will take a break very Backscazl. I was like singing too, because it was your neighbors appreciate it. Because here's the thing. The music is so loud that I could sing and feel like I was at the concert singing. But I think unlike if I sang at the concert, the people around me could have heard. So I think about them, like my neighbors, had they if they were sitting on their porch, then Shannon, they probably just heard an a cappella version of these songs.

00:16:54
Speaker 4: Mean yeah, well, you know you had the best case situation. Though you could hear it, it was like you were can hear it? But then when you needed to use the restroom or going to get something to eat, it was right.

00:17:02
Speaker 5: I didn't have to stand in the person right. Matt, I was there. It was a disaster at the porta potties. He said, It's not just Gatton Park's fault. Some of it was the people. Instead of lining up in front of each porta potty everybody just stood in a mass in front of the porta potty and then grabbed the quickest one that opened. It was not a good thing.

00:17:24
Speaker 4: Oh but at that point, I'm just going all the way to the front. There's no line.

00:17:29
Speaker 5: Well that's the zipper merge, right, that's the porta potty zipper merge.

00:17:34
Speaker 1: You gotta do what you gotta do sometimes.

00:17:36
Speaker 3: Yeah, the first first concert, they'll get it. They'll get the king.

00:17:39
Speaker 5: Yeah yeah, I mean yeah, they'll get it. It did sound great, though, I was, could.

00:17:42
Speaker 3: You hear it inside your house?

00:17:44
Speaker 5: Was oh yeah, yeah. I mean like when they have music there you don't like though, Yeah, people, well they've already they had DJs there last year one night, and I was like, all right, y'all, just I was, can y'all go home? You can hear it, but you but I mean, you can die. You can definitely hear O. Yeah. It's it's loud, it's but it's also it's also nice. If I'm nine two eight oh twenty two eighty seven, when person writes Matt that article was quoting something Jeff Goodman said about poor Man's Wall and Cousin or Wall and Blood. So I understand, but you just have to like somebody just sees the headline. It's what's great about headlines. Headlines can make you. A good headline makes you click on the absolutely article. So, by the way, Adam's headline probably did make people click on the artic. Yes, in that respect it was successful, yep. But you also gave something that like when we lose next year to you know, Georgia at home, people go, oh better than Wall and Blood. Soe like you give people fodder.

00:18:39
Speaker 3: So yeah, there are people whose main jobs a lot of time are just come up with headlines. Well he used to be in the newspaper business for sure. Just do headline.

00:18:46
Speaker 5: One person rights Matt. Multiple people who know more basketball than you say this back court will be better than Away and Aberdeen. What do you think about that? Well, I hope so. But Ohway and Aberdeen were pretty good. I know we lost fourteen games, but it wasn't because of Oway and Aberdeen.

00:19:03
Speaker 1: No, they were your offense.

00:19:06
Speaker 5: They were the team. It was because they had no backups because the rest of our team was ice cold most of the year. But we didn't lose because of Oway and Aberdeen.

00:19:16
Speaker 3: No, it might be where would we have been without those two guys would.

00:19:20
Speaker 5: And if they had a bad game, we were done.

00:19:23
Speaker 3: We're done.

00:19:24
Speaker 5: There was nothing we could do like they had if they had a bad game, we were done.

00:19:28
Speaker 3: Especially oh way, if he had it when that's why he had to score double figures and twenty points every game for us to have a chance to seem to win.

00:19:34
Speaker 5: All right, so let's go back to the negotiating strategy. I want to act like Ryan Lemon's my coach. Okay, Ryan, you know you know you have two players, and let's just say you definitively think player A is better than player B. Right, you can get player B for I'm going to create a magical number two million dollars. Okay, you can get player A for I'm going to create a magical number three million dollars. Okay, So player as better and he costs you one more million dollars. B says, I'm here. You can have me. A says, I love it here, I'm coming. Just give me a minute. How long you wait?

00:20:18
Speaker 3: I think you got to wait at least give him the end of the.

00:20:22
Speaker 5: Day, so by midnight Saturday night. No, yeah, then you just get the other guy. Get like you said, you risk losing. Well, he says, Look, I'm gonna do it tomorrow. I'm just waiting.

00:20:37
Speaker 3: I'm I'm I'm saying I got nobody the end.

00:20:39
Speaker 5: Of the day. So you're gonna let him go because.

00:20:41
Speaker 3: I wouldn't want to lose both of them.

00:20:43
Speaker 5: What are you gonna do?

00:20:44
Speaker 4: Shit, I'm telling them both hang on, hang on to Monday.

00:20:49
Speaker 5: Well, then you might lose them both.

00:20:51
Speaker 1: Well no, not a both.

00:20:54
Speaker 5: Ransick called their bluff.

00:20:56
Speaker 3: He did.

00:20:57
Speaker 5: He called their bluff and just went to Florida stay.

00:20:59
Speaker 3: He sure did.

00:21:00
Speaker 5: And at that moment you lost your leverage because you were playing them off each other.

00:21:04
Speaker 3: I think this day and age, that's what agents are going to do for their clients.

00:21:08
Speaker 5: So that gets me to my point. I don't think this staff. We saw this last year. The staff is not good at the negotiating part of this. I'm not even talking about the basketball park, whether somebody's a good player or not. I think we saw a lot of the guys they lost out on last year ended up being pretty good where they went. They're actually talent evaluation. Ryan was pretty good last year. Yes, it was the problem was when it came down to the business mechanics of the deal. We were the dude at the poker table that wasn't as good as everybody else. There's that line in Rounders. If you look around and say who's the sucker at the poker table, and you can't figure out who it is, that means it's you, right, good point. I kind of wonder if at the poker table, in these business negotiations, Shennon, are we the sucker?

00:22:04
Speaker 1: I think we are.

00:22:06
Speaker 4: I think you're seeing a lot of players using Kentucky to get a better deals elsewhere, but.

00:22:12
Speaker 5: These other schools are not having it happen to them as much.

00:22:16
Speaker 1: Yeah, Like these other schools are.

00:22:18
Speaker 5: Getting a kid on campus and they're committing the next day.

00:22:21
Speaker 1: That's why I said they're using Kentucky a lot of times.

00:22:24
Speaker 5: They are we not using them to use a different frame.

00:22:27
Speaker 1: That's a good question. That's what.

00:22:30
Speaker 5: We need sharks. As I said, a lot of people online last night were blaming Freeman's agent. I don't blame Freeman's agent. That's you know, what an agent's job is to make you money. That's it. He's not there to be people's friend. You know, when I was doing Hey Kentucky, I had this agent, my agent say let me do that deal. I was like, dude, I'm a lawyer. I can do it. He's like, let me do it. I can be the jerk. I let him do it. All of a sudden, I was making twice as much money as I would otherwise. We need to have somebody who can do that for us.

00:23:03
Speaker 1: We need a jerk.

00:23:04
Speaker 5: We need a jerk. We'll be right back. TJ. Smith, personal injury attorney called TJ. He'll make them pay.

00:23:13
Speaker 4: Now more of Kentucky Sports Radio presented by Stockton Mortgage.

00:23:16
Speaker 1: Here's Matt Jones.

00:23:17
Speaker 5: Welcome back, Tekey Sports Radio. I'm I'm ready for your calls. Eight. I'm nine two eighty seven text machine seven seven two five four. Did you watch WrestleMania Shine.

00:23:28
Speaker 1: A little bit of it.

00:23:29
Speaker 4: Watched a little bit of the main event on Saturday night, and then last night.

00:23:33
Speaker 1: I thought the main event was good.

00:23:34
Speaker 5: I thought the main event last night was great. Saturday night garbage.

00:23:38
Speaker 4: Yeah, Pat McAfee stuff, he told them jelly roll.

00:23:43
Speaker 1: Yeah.

00:23:44
Speaker 3: I mean, I did enjoy your live tweeting, and I had what I had no idea was going on, just seeing your disappointment terrible.

00:23:51
Speaker 5: But last night was good. Last night, the main event was great seeing Punk and Roman reigns. Dan Housen was in it. I like Dan Housen.

00:23:59
Speaker 4: Uh, But Jelly Roll putting Pat McAfee through a table, I mean, come on, dude, Yeah, I mean.

00:24:04
Speaker 5: Jelly First of all, Jelly Roll doesn't get a lot of air on his jumps. Yeah. The one, dude, your internet guy that I show speed. He did a good job. Did you see him jump off that thing, Shannon? That was pretty impressive. That was pretty impressive for just an internet guy. He gets on the wrestling room, gets at the top pole and then jumps up in the air through a table through Jake Paul. That was kind of cool for a kid who doesn't wrestle. I thought that I did like that. All right, So before we get the phones, when person rights Matt, the fat Lady hasn't sung yet? Are you giving up on Freeman? No, I'm not giving up. And that is an important point. The fat Lady hasn't sung. If you get this kid, then it doesn't really.

00:24:48
Speaker 3: Matt, you know what I mean, doesn't matter at all if you get the kids.

00:24:52
Speaker 5: As Drew would say, ain't my money right? At the end of the day, all that matters is the final thing. But with that said, my assumption is the less money you spend on Freeman, the more money you have to spend somewhere else. That's right, which is why you want to get them as cheaply as possible. Like I don't care how much they spend if the team is good. But if we can't get a player in the future because we don't have enough money because we overpaid Freeman, that's where it matters.

00:25:16
Speaker 3: Is there a backup play, a backup guy.

00:25:18
Speaker 5: There was a huge drop between these two guys and their next plan.

00:25:22
Speaker 3: That makes it hurt even more.

00:25:23
Speaker 5: That's why it hurts. That's unless there's a couple that are better. But Kentucky hasn't been in on them because they didn't want to spend all that money. Now they might have to go to that kid from Arizona State and go, all right, five and a half million. Yeah, so we'll see. I don't know.

00:25:37
Speaker 3: Today's last day for the portal.

00:25:39
Speaker 5: And then Mario also asked me tomorrow. Mario also asked me, and this was a good question, who is it that does all this? This is what a GM is supposed to do. And in sports, a GM has two roles. Role one is discovering the player, right right, look all across college basketball and go find the best player and then determine if they're a good fit for you. That's roll one of a GM. I think that's what Keegan Brown is there for.

00:26:07
Speaker 3: The dorm the what and then had the title the dorm director of recruiting.

00:26:12
Speaker 5: The dorm director.

00:26:14
Speaker 3: I think that's what Drew was conning the the director of recruiting management. Yeah, the dorm Okay, I thought you meant like he lived in the dorm.

00:26:21
Speaker 5: I was like, I don't know, Okay, that may be his title, but that's his job. But a GM. Then there's the business job. There's the sleazy job. There's the Ari from ento Ra's job, Shannon, the getting the down and dirty of the contracts and be mean, do we have that guy last year? The guy doing that was a private guy that negotiated contracts for a living, and he was good at it. Now we ended up overpaying for reasons that are a different conversation for a good uncensored podcast one day. But he did probably save Kentucky couple two three million dollars on his negotiating skills on a couple kids. Jay Am I decided to take that in house. So now they are that guy, and we'll just have to see if it's gonna work or not. That's what I know. Are you good at the go be dirty and get the deal done? And we don't know that yet.

00:27:18
Speaker 3: Yeah, that article Jack and Jacob wrote in the fall that Pope can get them to the closing table, had people tell him that Pope's pretty good about getting to the closing table, just couldn't close the deal.

00:27:28
Speaker 5: So that's part two of a GM, and I feel like we can do part one. I think it remains to be seen if we can do part two. And that's what we have to see. All right. Before I go to the phones, I do have to mention, how about my Reds.

00:27:41
Speaker 3: I listened to the ninth inning last night, Shannon.

00:27:43
Speaker 5: I'm not saying. I'm not saying because then they'll probably lose to Stampa Bay tonight. But they're fourteen and eight two comeback once. You know, last year they played fifteen extra inning games. You know what their record was in the extra inning games? Oh, in fifteen, three and twelve, three and twelve. They've played three extraining games this year, three and oh they've already won as many extraining games this year as they did last year the whole year. Yeah, two comebacks on Saturday and Sunday, guys, that stink. They still get a hit. We only have three players hitting over two hundred in the entire lineup. That's amazing. He just win it.

00:28:25
Speaker 4: I love how excited you are. Only one hundred and forty more games to get.

00:28:28
Speaker 5: It's twenty two down, one hundred and forty to go.

00:28:34
Speaker 3: The two worst teams in division, the Reds and the Cardinals, are battling out for first place.

00:28:38
Speaker 5: Right now, good in l Central might be the best division in baseball right now. Everybody's got only the vision. Everybody's got a winning record.

00:28:44
Speaker 3: I did. I just happened to get in the car and turn on at the top of the ninth and they're down three to one, and the announcers you can just tell they are just they're ready to go home, pack it up and get out of the games over because they had like the bottom of the order up and then it hit it.

00:28:58
Speaker 5: Freedo had a huge hit at Friedel, who was Cal's cousin. Decided to So anyway, I'm not saying congratulations. That's the whole weekend the games. Yeah, yeah, are they back home?

00:29:10
Speaker 6: Then?

00:29:10
Speaker 5: Now I know they're in Tampa than home. Then the weekend? All right, who's the first t t o go ahead?

00:29:18
Speaker 6: God bless you. Matt Jones. Good dear from you boys. Good to be on the line today. You got to think you might have heard of some porter party incidents. But back in Estell County in on nine, now, that was a real porter party incident. There was a lot of good men didn't go home that day. Anyways. Okay, man, the reason I called a is because you've been laying it out all morning, Matt Jones. What I've been calling about today. We get these guys right to the edge of committing. We get them right there. It's not the coaches, it's not it's not the program. It's it's the it's the negotiator. It's Jaymi. Is it possible? Just humor me for a second. Is it possible, Jaymi? I've researched the extensively for four or five days, and yes, Ryn, I can read they work with Florida State and Saint John's, but they do not ask the players to sign away their NI rights as soon as they get there. Is it possible, just maybe that a player would say, Hey, this school isn't gaunt me. The only school in America I want you to sign away your nil rights is can.

00:30:36
Speaker 5: Tell you that's okay, So let's offer all right. I appreciate the call I gave you. You said, is it possible? A lot? So I'm gonna stop and answer the question. I appreciate the call. The problem I have about saying it's anybody's fault is I don't know who has the jobs because they have not said a word in a year. I don't know who does what. Mark Pope has yet to do a press conference since the season ended. Mark Pope has yet to talk publicly. Wants to the press about the season that just happened, about what he wants to do now. We have no idea when it comes to JMI. The only interviews they've done have been interviews with themselves, so there's no way to know the answer to these questions. Mitch Barnhardt was asked about these questions, he told the reporter to shut up. We don't know who the new ad is yet. The president has spoken to no one, so these are all legitimate questions. I tend to think the problems are not any one thing's fault. I think there's a lot of stuff in play. But I also think because they have said not a word in months and had the pr strategy of get into a bunker and hope it all goes away, there's no way to know the answer to this question. A person at UK a few months, a few weeks ago to me, Look, it's gonna be what it's gonna be during this portal season in terms of the media. But what if it were you, what would you do? And I said, Look, if y' all know you're gonna get a superclass, it probably doesn't matter if you talk to the media or not. But if you don't, you're gonna need to have like help people understand what's going on. And they've chosen not to do that. And if at the end we get a massive group of great players, it'll be fine, nobody's gonna care. But if we don't, Shannon, Yeah, these questions are going to continue to happen. Who do The natural reaction is who do you blame? And there'll be people who blame Pope, and there'll be people who blame the administration. There'll be people who blame Jami. As we've seen there'll be people who blame me, but all of it is because they don't control the narrative, and it's their own fault. They did this to themselves. If you get Freeman, none of this probably will matter. But if they don't, then Ryan these questions are valid.

00:33:07
Speaker 3: I feel like this is when, above all, we need a leader, and it seems to be a leaderless institution going on over there right now.

00:33:13
Speaker 5: Mark Pope is I think the biggest mistake he has made, besides his coaching heirs, is that he hasn't spoken since the season ended.

00:33:23
Speaker 3: He's our coach, that is our leader.

00:33:25
Speaker 5: To me from a leadership perspective, that's malpractice. How do you know, how have you not spoken since then? How have you thought that was a good idea? How did people think that was going to be positive? The last time we saw him was him yelling about Yaxel Lindenberg in that press conference. You remember that when he was asked about.

00:33:51
Speaker 3: The Yeah, he didn't like one coaches show.

00:33:54
Speaker 5: After that coaches show, but those coaches shows are just like, let's bring on Jeff Shepard.

00:33:58
Speaker 3: And that's when he brought out all the stats about him versus Cow remember, which was also weird. It was kind of weird.

00:34:04
Speaker 1: Yeah, for that to be the last thing we've heard.

00:34:06
Speaker 5: The last thing we've heard is him comparing his resume to John Caliperry.

00:34:10
Speaker 3: Yeah, which was weird. It was kind of weird.

00:34:13
Speaker 4: Well, that might be an inclination of what you know goes on behind the scenes with these recruits.

00:34:18
Speaker 5: I just it was just weird, weird. Listen again, get all these guys, and it probably doesn't matter.

00:34:23
Speaker 3: It doesn't matter, you know, corn bred hemp.

00:34:28
Speaker 5: I didn't have corn bread hemp on Friday, didn't sleep very well Saturday took it. Oh my goodness, baby, Oh that's not I didn't make that sound. For the record, corn Bread hemps Seltzer's gummies topic oils all help you sleep and relax. Expert crafted, lab tested and worked like a charm use the COKSR. It is cornbreadthimp dot com. They're fighting to help you rest and also to keep these ingredients legal. Go to cornbreadhimp dot com. Slash action it's corn bread hemp promo code KSR. We'll take a break, be right back. Take you Sports Radio lone Star. Yeah, I kind of fell in love with the woman in this video.

00:35:12
Speaker 1: Are you still every time I playing the song, you talk about.

00:35:15
Speaker 5: Her, well, I remember, definitely had an effect on yous.

00:35:17
Speaker 4: Young Matt Jones, Have you given up on Bailey the backup dancer with Motley Cruze.

00:35:21
Speaker 5: Yeah, I've given up. I feel like she's probably moved on.

00:35:24
Speaker 1: That's a shame.

00:35:25
Speaker 5: She was never here to have moved on from.

00:35:28
Speaker 1: She wasn't aware of you. She wasn't aware of my aware of her, That's for sure.

00:35:31
Speaker 5: I do. Yeah. Sometimes you know what, once every five years, you just see somebody and go, this was probably me in nineteen ninety six or something.

00:35:39
Speaker 3: Yeah, did they still do the little shake across the stage and stuff?

00:35:44
Speaker 5: Who?

00:35:45
Speaker 3: Uh?

00:35:45
Speaker 5: Quite? Yoakum? I mean I told you I couldn't see, so I assume so I.

00:35:49
Speaker 3: Can say he's I mean, I can't.

00:35:52
Speaker 5: I can't hear him.

00:35:53
Speaker 3: He's an older guy. I know if he still does that or not.

00:35:55
Speaker 5: Till I bet he does, what's the point otherwise he's the best at it? No, he actually really is, so, one person writes, Matt will Stein and staff speak almost daily to the press. You should talk more about it, I will We're gonna We're gonna lead the second hour with spring Game. Ryan is our spring game reporter. Gotcha, he's been keeping up. One thing I do want to note, Bob of Bob and Tom die yes, And if you're in the radio world, Bob and Tom like one of the biggest shows of all time, just a syndicated show of two old men telling bad jokes and laughing NonStop. I listened to it a lot. I lost a friendship over Bob and Tom. What. Yes, I was living with Garland Hurt one summer who lives here in Lexington. Shout out to Garland. And we were living together one summer and I would before I went to work at Casual Living and Patio Center to go deliver patio furniture around the state. I would wake up and my alarm would be Bob and Tom. And he hated it so much, and he didn't tell me, and he grew a growing resentment over the fact that I would play Bob and Tom so loud while I was waiting. And then finally we were moving out, he was like, I cannot stand Bob and Tom.

00:37:13
Speaker 3: Wow.

00:37:14
Speaker 5: I was like, well, why didn't you say something before? But I listened to it, Shannon, because it was good, past the time, wholesome for the most part radio, right, Yeah. Yeah.

00:37:23
Speaker 4: For me growing up in the nineties, it was either Howard Stern or was the Bob and Tom Show.

00:37:28
Speaker 5: And you could listen to Bob and Tom with your parents, yep, Howard Stern, not with your.

00:37:32
Speaker 4: Parents, that's right, yep. But he was a broadcasting legend. You know. I think they're a big reason why Pat McAfee has his show now because he got his start on The Bob and Tom Show, and it was good.

00:37:45
Speaker 5: Friends with Bob, is that right?

00:37:47
Speaker 7: Yeah?

00:37:47
Speaker 1: Yeah, they would bring him on as a guest, like.

00:37:50
Speaker 5: Yeah, I didn't know that.

00:37:51
Speaker 3: You know, they're based out of Indianapolis, and with Macari's playing for the Colts, they did a lot of work with him.

00:37:56
Speaker 5: I actually didn't know that. A lot of comedians, you know, Oh yeah, Eda May's and Rick Wilson's and all that went through there.

00:38:03
Speaker 1: Tim Wilson, Yeah, Tim Wilson.

00:38:05
Speaker 5: Sorry. What was the name of the sports director? I always thought he was funny chick McGee Yeah, yeah, Christy Lee. Yeah. So rest in peace to Bob, Bob and Tom. The show is still on.

00:38:15
Speaker 3: Still on.

00:38:16
Speaker 4: When he retired, they still kept the name the Bob and Tom Show, So I.

00:38:19
Speaker 5: Bet like they did a tribute today that was probably very sweet.

00:38:22
Speaker 1: Probably so yeah, yeah this morning.

00:38:24
Speaker 3: There was a time in my life where I did not miss the show one day. I listened to it every day.

00:38:30
Speaker 5: Yeah.

00:38:31
Speaker 3: Now I haven't heard it probably the past ten years.

00:38:33
Speaker 5: Yeah, me either. But rip Bob of Bob and Tom. Who's next to run? Ron? Go ahead Ron? Ron? All right? No run Joey, Joey, go ahead, Joey.

00:38:50
Speaker 4: Hey.

00:38:51
Speaker 7: But as far as has anybody seen Pope, because it is kind of odd. The last time we heard from him was two cryptic tweets, the plane ride tweeting, and I don't forget I forget what the other one was.

00:39:03
Speaker 5: But as far as.

00:39:04
Speaker 7: The coach is communicating, like I've seen the other day where the Louisville coach was like I had some kind of video. He was shown up to an event April twenty eight, a bunch of hoop law. But no, I feel like it's circling the wagons, like this is the end all be all. It's circle the wagons, and I don't think it helps.

00:39:22
Speaker 5: But I'm with you. I'm with you. I appreciate the call. I don't I don't understand. I don't understand. I haven't understood anything pr wise since last fall, before the football season, when you when Mark Stoops and them did no preview of the year. I mean I remember before football season they did nothing.

00:39:43
Speaker 3: He didn't even go back to last springs or spring football season, no publicity, spring.

00:39:48
Speaker 5: Game, not a year that with the exception of Will Stein, who has a different view on this, their entire mentality has been silenced. Yeah, and it's a it's a arable ranging from every I mean it's everything. It's football, it's basketball, it's Mitch Barnhardt's contract. Everything just silence. And when I when people ask questions, yell at them.

00:40:15
Speaker 3: Not the best thing for leader.

00:40:17
Speaker 5: Right, It's not been a great it's not been a great strategy. And you know, we'll see if they get Freeman, won't matter a lot. What's next?

00:40:25
Speaker 3: Brend Brn go ahead, Brent hey Man.

00:40:28
Speaker 8: I wanted to ask you the two athletic directors that you think that might have the job after Mitch Barnhart. Do you think what's your guess that they will make a move on Marko if he doesn't do good this next year. And then my second question is do you think Jiyi Lupas can come in and take all the pressure, yes, and do a good job.

00:40:55
Speaker 5: He's going to be a star. And I appreciate the call. The longer you let him be his program at Miami, he might be a star at Miami. And just felt like he never needs to leave. But Jay Lucas is gonna be. Jay Lucas is smart. He knows how to interact with kids. You know, I'll give you a little Jay Lucas tidbit Jay Lucas and Cal, but it hits And why was that? I mean, I feel like we can say it now nobody's here. Jay Lucas was saying to Cal on the staff, you guys got to modernize, like you guys got to do stuff differently, and Cal was like no, and they basically shut Jay Lucas out, which is why I left. He was like, I'm trying to help his job, trying to help the program, and they just they pushed him out. And then as soon as they pushed him out, it collapsed. But it was gonna like they weren't less. He literally was. They had him to where he was doing nothing because they didn't want to hear it. And now he's at Miami and he got a great class. Yeah, he was a good coach this year. I think he's gonna be a star. The only good thing for us is that, like the Duke, job's not gonna come open anytime soon, unless Shire were to go to like the NBA. But yeah, I think he's gonna be great. As far as how long the new ad, I don't know. We don't know who that idea is, so there's no way for me to know the answer to that question. Here.

00:42:20
Speaker 3: I thought, like a week and a half ago, they're about to make an announcement.

00:42:23
Speaker 5: I they had told everybody that it was gonna come mid April. We've kind of passed that now, so we'll talk a little football and some other stuff in just second. KSR