May 23, 2025 • 37 mins
Tom talks with Darrell Bird about the 1975 ABA Kentucky Colonels 50th Anniversary Championship and John Clay joins to talk the latest Kentucky sports information.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Good day, everybody. Welcome into the Leach Report, presented by
Bobcat Enterprises thanks to Dick Gabriel were filling in the
last couple of days. I am redoing the home office
slash studio here and wanted somebody to be covering the
show in case everything didn't come back together the way
(00:22):
it was taken apart, but all as well as you
can tell you're since you're hearing me. It's kind of
like Apollo thirteen where they had to boot everything back
up and go through the checklist and got through everything
at the radio equipment, hooked up the internet, hooked up
or vice versa, and then got to the computers and
hooked up one and then the last computer didn't work,
(00:44):
but we figured that one out yesterday and all good
to go. Now from the studio here for the Leach
Report on this Friday. Heading into a holiday weekend, we'll
have the best of show on Monday and then come
back to regular shows next Tuesday. Jump right into the
Wildcat News of the Day presented by Juseppes of Lexington.
(01:05):
Darryl Byrd will join us to start off the show
right for of course the Cat's pause heads up the
team there, and we will talk about a story that
Daryl has done and posted this week about the fiftieth
anniversary of the Kentucky Colonels winning the ABA Championship, only
professional championship by a team based in Kentucky, and he
(01:28):
did a Linthy interview with dan Isissel to reminisce about that,
and John Clay will join us in the second half
of the show from the Lexington Herald Leader in Kentucky
Sports dot Com on a lot of bases to touch there.
Jayalen Lowe announcing yesterday he is returning to UK. That
wasn't as expected, but still nice to get the confirmation
if you're a Wildcat fan. He I thinks what still
(01:51):
makes the most sense is to say he tweeted out
because he xed out. Makes no sense the ridiculous name change. Nevertheless,
we'll say he tweeted out that he can't miss out
on this opportunity. See y'all soon be And so now
he gets the keys to the car, so to speak,
as the point guard for the Wildcats, and I think
(02:13):
he is going to be a player that people will
be talking about as one who has dramatically improved on
his numbers from last season when he was at pitt
So we'll see if it plays out that way. But
now all the focus shifts to otega Oway and he
has until Wednesday, I guess at midnight to make his
decision about staying in the NBA Draft or coming back
(02:34):
to Kentucky. And I still haven't heard anybody or read
anywhere anybody saying anything other than he has expected to
return to UK. But we'll get the confirmation one way
or the other middle of next week. Braydon Holloorde officially
signed with UK. Mark Pope able to comment on that
(02:55):
acquisition for his roster and said he quote said quote,
his ceiling is incredible and he really wants to be
here at Kentucky, and he certainly Hawthorne taking on quite
a challenge to come on to a stacked roster, but
suggests that the young man has confidence in his game.
(03:16):
Mentioned that it'll be a best of show on Monday.
But there is big news coming Monday, and that will
be the projection or the bracket for the NCAA Baseball Tournament.
And every projection I see still has Kentucky safely in.
I don't see any where the Cats are listed on
any of the last four in first four out lists,
(03:36):
so they hopefully are safely into the field and so
Monday will learn which regional they will head to. As
likely a three seed, it seems from what the projections
are saying, and two three really doesn't make much difference
because that's who you're going to play in the first
game of a four team regional. UK continues to accept
(04:00):
donations for victims of the tornadoes in London and in
Somerset and that'll be today at the Kroger Field Blue
Lot off Alumni Drive starting at eleven am. You can
go to UK Athletics dot com and get more information.
Saw that Nick vinji Own and his baseball team on
the bus ride back from Hoover, Alabama and the SEC
(04:22):
tournament stopped off to help with the cleanup, to put
some manpower into it and be able to just help
folks clear debris down there, So a nice thing for
them to do. And if you can't get down there
to help, there are ways you can help through these
donations and that's starting at eleven am today at Kroger
(04:44):
Field on the Blue Lot side of the stadium that's
off Alumni Drive, and again UK Athletics dot Com has
all the details links to the stories that we talk
about each day. You can find those on the bud
Light Leach Report at Tom Leachky dot com. Well, come
back and visit with Darryl Bird Cat's Pause here on
the Leach Report. Our opening segment always presented by Just
(05:04):
Seppies of Lexington. Go to Open Table right now, make
a reservation for useepes and enjoy just a really special
night out. Dave Haul's Live Jazz Music Company is your
meal if you sit in the lounge area. The Pasta's
homemade seafood, chipped in fresh handcut steaks, a lot of
locally sourced ingredients on the menu too. At GI Seppies
(05:26):
Lexington dot com. We'll be ready. Leach Report comes to
you each day from the Clark's Pumping Shop studio. They
have a new loyalty rewards program that can help you
get some discounts on fuel and items in their stores. Return,
refresh and refuel at Clark's. Darryl Bird joins us from
the Cat's Pause and you can he joins us via
the Club Blueennil dot com hotline, and you can go
(05:49):
to Catspause dot com and read Daryl's latest story, which
is about the seventy fifth anniversary, excuse me, the fiftieth
anniversary of the nineteen seventy five Kentucky Colonel's team that
won the ABA championship. And you did a long interview, Daryl,
with dan Issel and got a lot of great stories
out of that.
Speaker 2 (06:11):
All the stories were above and beyond, and I appreciate
you having on to talk about it because, I mean,
you and I've been doing this a long time, and
there's a few things, a few instances that really jump
out at you during that time. And I will never
I mean, as long as I live, I'll never forget
sitting at the dan Issel's kitchen table in Denver talking
(06:32):
for two to three hours about the ABA. And there's
time when he was looking through a book about the Colonels.
I'm like, and this is so surreal. I'm sitting across
the table from dan Isel sharing stories. And the best
part was I had the Kentucky Colonel's book that Gary
West did about two thousand and two thousand and five,
and he's slipping through it, hadn't seen it in a
(06:53):
long time, and every picture sparked another story. So it
just one to after another after another. And they just
got better and better, and it was it was a
lot of fun and so many great stories and couldn't
pass up the fiftieth anniversary.
Speaker 1 (07:07):
Growing up here in Kentucky followed the Colonels naturally, because
you know it was the Kentucky team, the only one
in professional sports that was from the state. And you
had all these Kentucky guys on the team. Louis Daniere,
dan Issel, Mike Pratt was on the team for a while,
(07:29):
Darryl Carrier was on for a while out of Western Kentucky. Yes,
so there was a lot of Kentucky connections there and
they were really good, and you know, they had a
lot of tough beats. I know Dan talks about that
in your story. I've heard artist Gilmore talk about it,
(07:49):
just the tough beats that they had. One year, they
went like sixty eight and sixteen and they got upset
in the first round of the playoffs.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
Right Dan called him, said, we probably had the best
team four or five years, but we only won it
once because we just we underachieved. And I said, well,
what flip the switch? He credited Hugh be Brown first
year Code the Hub, Brown his first head coaching job
when he was forty one was with the Colonels in
that seventy five season that he was of all he
(08:20):
played for Rupp he said, I played for four Hall
of Fame coaches. I think, he said, wow. And there
was never anybody as organized as Hue Brown. He was
so far ahead of the curve, had his own playbook.
Nobody had playbooks very detailed. He said, We'd come in
before a game and there would be a handwritten on
a chalkboard every play that we ran against this team
(08:41):
the last time we played them, How it worked, what happened.
It just broke down the analytics of today that are
instant and computerized that the Colonels were doing by hand
on a notebook pad during the game tracking stuff. Yeah,
analytics organized, he was.
Speaker 1 (08:57):
Analytics were with pen and paper.
Speaker 2 (09:00):
Yes, they were, absolutely they were.
Speaker 1 (09:04):
I think about that sometimes in doing the job on
the UK network. How but how many more resources I
have at my disposal, mainly because of the Internet and
what it was like for Kwood, you know, researching the opponent,
those kinds of things without creasy the benefit of a computer.
So I thought that was really interesting angle to the
(09:24):
story that you know, kind of early version of analytics.
Hubie Brown, I know of go ahead.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
It failed to Stan Albeck, the one assistant coach, it
all feel to him to try. Dan said, I'm not
sure he ever saw us play and make a play
on defense because he was tracking so hard everything they
were doing on the offensive end.
Speaker 1 (09:45):
Hubie Brown has said it was the best team he
ever coached, that seventy five Colonel's team. And Dan talks
about this in your story that for the team to
be all that it was ultimately able to it required
Dan taking a little bit of a step.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
Back mm hmm, and he said he glad they do
it all over again. He said, Hubey Brown was the
first coach he ever had that walked into the locker
room and said, Artists, you're the center. Dan, you're a forward.
He said, all the other coaches had tried to play
a double post, and he did, and Dan's numbers went
down and Artist Gilmore was MVP, and he just he said,
(10:26):
he told me in the in the story and he's
told me that before. He said, you know, I'm the
leading scorer at Kentucky. I would give up every single
point to have a banner.
Speaker 1 (10:36):
And yeah, he tells the story about when Cal had
him come out and talk to one of the Kentucky
teams and tell us that story.
Speaker 2 (10:44):
Yeah, I thought that was really fascinating. That he went
to a practice when Cal Perry was still here and
he said that Cale introduced him to the player, said
this is Dan Issel, Kentucky's all time leading scorer. Blah
blah blah these stats. He won it all, and Dan said,
I took the myone. He's in the craft center of
the practice facility where they have all the national championship banners.
(11:06):
He said, gentlemen, I was here from nineteen sixty seven
to nineteen seventy Do you see any banners? Because they
look around they said no. I said, no, I didn't
win at all. So it just it burned him that
he never had a title, and that's what really drove
him in seventy five. They were determined to get a
championship despite all he said, they really good. I thought.
(11:29):
At his part, he said, you know, when you're young,
all that individual stuff is a lot of fun. But
the older you get, you're like, you know, don't have
a title, so nothing, it's not complete. Whatever I've done
is not complete because there's no championship attached to it.
Speaker 1 (11:44):
Tom with Daryl Byrd from katspaws dot com about his
story that's up now on the anniversary fiftieth anniversary of
the Kentucky Colonels winning their only championship in their ABA
days and just the incredible team that they had built
at that time. We'll continue talking about that when we
come right back. It is the Leach Report and it's
(12:07):
presented by Bobcat Enterprises with four locations around Kentucky. When
you're looking to buy or rent some heavy equipment, Bobcats forklifts, excavators,
et cetera. That's where you go. They'll have what you need.
They'll take great care of you and give you a
fantastic service after the sale or the rental as well
at Bobcat Enterprises, four locations here in Kentucky. We'll be
(12:29):
right back the Leech Report and Darryl Byrd is with
us from katzpause dot com. We're talking about history on
the anniversary fiftieth anniversary of the Kentucky Courtels winning their
only ABA championship. It was this week in nineteen seventy five.
They beat the Indiana Pacers, their big rival, in a
five game series. Interesting angle to that Colonel's team too,
(12:50):
is that you had the two big men, dan Isissel
and Artist Gilmore, and you were talking about what ub
Brown did more clearly to find their roles, and they
had gone up against each other, and you know, Artists
was part of the Jacksonville team that kept Danissel from
winning that championship.
Speaker 2 (13:11):
Yeah, in such a brute force. And I asked Dan
about Artist Gilmore. He said, the sweetest, kindest soul you
ever meet in your life, which is contrary to what
you think with this big, powerful player who could do
anything he wanted on the basketball court. And they're still
super close to this day, talk very frequently.
Speaker 1 (13:31):
Same way Mike Pratt was the same way with him.
When Kentucky played down in Jacksonville in twenty nineteen, Mike
and Artists hung out together and then the artists came
to the game. In fact, Kentucky actually practiced at Jacksonville.
There were pictures of that seventy team up on the
walls there, and then Artists came by our broadcast spot
and I shook hands with him, and my hands are
(13:53):
not small, and they were just engulfed by Artist's hands.
He would you know be in the low posted you know,
was a fan of the Colonels, and he would hold
the ball out extended as he was being guarded, and
it looked almost like he was holding a tennis ball.
Speaker 2 (14:11):
Yeah, it's crazy.
Speaker 1 (14:14):
Just an incredible talent and and just a great, great player.
In that decisive, decisive fifth game against the Pacers that
saw he had twenty eight points and thirty one rebounds.
Speaker 3 (14:25):
You also point out in your story that a lot
of elements of the ABA were incorporated into the NBA
and helped maybe drive the popularity of.
Speaker 1 (14:36):
The NBA, along with you know, magic and bird arriving
and that too in the late seventies, a lot of
the NBA when the merger happened, the NBA incorporated a
lot of the ABA. The not the multi colored ball,
but a lot just about.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
Everything else, everything except the red, white and blue ball
because as Dan told me, red Auerbix, the legend of
the balls and Celtics that basketball belongs on the seals nose,
not in our game. So they didn't do that. But
the three point line, there was no three pointer in
the NBA at that time. That was the big one
and the tempo. Dan told me he said, send me
(15:12):
in a lot of the younger readers will fall over
because they're the NBA playoffs underway right now, he said.
In my and when the ABA was popular, the NBA
was on tape delay after the ten o'clock news in
most markets. That's how that's how much the popularity said.
It just wasn't a very exciting game. They had the
(15:32):
up tempo, they had a three point shot, and the
A B A was or the NBA at that time,
was more get the ball down a little to the
little post and just play it that way. For uh
what the analytics park came with it too. The ABA
is the one that introduced what we need expanded box
scores with assiths, offensive rebounds, steels all that the NBA
(15:56):
didn't do that as part of the again, the the
early analytics jump at the av A.
Speaker 1 (16:01):
Did you write about a story involving Julius Irving, famously
known as Doctor Jay as you write and something.
Speaker 2 (16:11):
He was so.
Speaker 1 (16:14):
Gifted and so spectacular to watch that it affected how
hub Brown wanted his guys to defend him, and I'll
let you pick up the story.
Speaker 2 (16:25):
Yeah, I'd actually forgotten that one for just as there
are so many good stories. Is that basically he'd be
Brown called a meeting after Doctor J went off for
forty something against them, and he said, going forward, if
Doctor J is ever going in for a dunk, I
want you to grab him and tackling. Basically said, do
not hurt him. We're not after flagger. Just wrap your
(16:46):
arms around him and do not let him dunk the
ball because he's turning our own fans against us. He's
so spectacular to watch, said, do not let him dunk
no matter what.
Speaker 1 (16:56):
Uh, that's funny, brazy. There's so many eight stories there.
We could keep doing this for you know, an hour,
because yeah, I grew up like you, you know, following the
colonels and you couldn't follow on TV. Uh, I mean
I listened to Van Vance on w h A S
call the games that then occasionally. I never went to
a game at Freedom Hall, but they would play a
(17:17):
few games in the coliseum here in Lexington, and yeah,
uh dad got tim did they Okay, Well, my dad
got tickets and we went to the games. They were
like five or six. But I mean you'd see Doctor
J playing at Memorial conlose and Moses Malone made his
debut at the Colosseum.
Speaker 2 (17:33):
Yeah, it's a great story taking high school players. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:37):
Yeah, that was one of the other things the Uh
it was revolutionary for the A B. A. You can
read all about this at katzpause dot com. Uh, Daryl, well,
we'll talk to you in a few weeks about the
football yearbook. But best of luck, we're getting.
Speaker 2 (17:49):
That out all right. Thanks their appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (17:52):
That's Darryl Byrd Katzpause dot com on the Leech Report.
We'll be right back. One of our partners here on
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This is the good life. John Clay joining us now
from the Lexington Herald Leader in Kentucky sports dot com.
And John, a lot of bases will touch here for
as long as we can cover the time. And one
(18:57):
of them is your latest column at Kentucky sports dot
com about college athletics and a suggestion for a commission
to study the issues of nil transfer portal, you know, competitiveness,
et cetera, all of that, and I would agree with
you that those things end up. Al maguire used to
(19:20):
have the best announcement, but he's arrested lying on it.
He said, they're they're really not only do they not
get anything done, they often do bad things because they
get to go to these nice places and they feel
like they have to do something.
Speaker 4 (19:35):
Right right, they'd be more harm than good and a
lot of those Yeah, I thought it was funny that,
you know, President Trump spoke at the Alabama commencement and
met with Nick Saban before the commencement, and he came
after out afterwards, and you were saying that Trump was
some people who wanted to form a commission, and people
thought that Saban put that idea in his head. And
then Saban comes out of his golf tournament this past
(19:55):
week and said, I don't think we need a commission.
I think the commission is a bad idea. So so
you can't even get everybody on the same page on
that sort of thing. Yeah, I mean, I don't have
much faith that those committees are commissions. I thought Jay
Billis made a good point that you know, there was
the Night Commission and then the Rice Commission, and neither
one that studied college athletics and made suggestions or you know,
(20:18):
put out a papers, you know, advocating for change, and
nothing really happened with either one of those. I don't
think that's the answer. I'm not sure what the answer is,
but I don't think commissions or committees are the answer.
Speaker 1 (20:32):
One thing I am absolutely sure of. The guy who
wrote quote I agree, and personally I'm all in on
the chaos. Won't be on that committee.
Speaker 4 (20:39):
John No No, I don't think I will be picked,
and I don't think Jay Billis will be picked either
for the commission. No, I don't think. I don't think
I have to worry about that. So, you know, I think,
as I say in the Calm, not to give away
the calm, I think the ultimate answer is they're going
to have to treat college college athletes udent athletes as
(21:00):
in CBA likes to call them. They're going to have
to at some point treat them like employees. That's the
only way you're treating everything else in the game as professional,
like professional sports. Eventually, that's the only the only way
you're going to be able to have some sort of
fairness and some sort of clarity is through collective bargaining,
have some sort of employee employer employee relationship with the
(21:23):
with the athletes. Now, whether that I don't think that's
going to happen anytime soon, but I still think that's
going to be the end result.
Speaker 1 (21:29):
Where you if you want some changes to the portal
or n I L it's a where the players in
some collective fashion are agreeing to that for something they're
getting in return, or you know, everybody's agreeing it's better
for the game, whatever that is, because a lot of times,
I mean, there's the story now, like Ross Ellinger had
(21:50):
the story this week from Yahoo Sports about leagues at
the SEC reacting to what's happening in the Tennessee legislature,
and that might draft an agreement that every school would
have to sign to agree that you wouldn't do what
Tennessee is telling its schools that it can do and
(22:10):
basically ignore the rules. And that sounds like a good plan,
except a lot of times those things don't hold up
in court.
Speaker 4 (22:18):
Right right is? I think Michael McCann, the sports lawyer
who writes for several publications, including Sports Illustrated, So you're
just inviting litigation if you do that. I don't see
how they can happen. But that's another one of the problems.
You've got a lot of various entities acting on their
own behalf and they're not really working together. Just like
you mentioned, the Tennessee legislature passing the law that the
(22:40):
athletes at Tennessee University and schools can get as much
ANIL money and can keep as much in NIL money
or whatever as they want, regardless of the rules of
their conference and so forth. So you know, it's kind
of like it sort of reminds me of our recent
discussion about the Triple Crown, you know, and well, should
they change the Triple Crown and what's the best for
(23:02):
the Triple Crown. The problem with that, of course, is
unlike the Breeders' Cup, there is not really there is
no Triple Crown organization. There's Churchill Downs that runs the Derby,
there's the Stronac company that runs Pemical and runs the Preakness,
and then you have NIRA which runs the Belmonte Stakes,
and they all act independently, and so therefore there's not
really it's hard to get them together to get a
(23:24):
consensus about you know, if we do change the Triple Crown,
this is what we should do, because all three want
to do what's best for them. I think they've got
kind of the same You get the same thing in
college athletics.
Speaker 1 (23:36):
Yeah, no, that's exactly correct, And especially even a couple
like Churchill's publicly traded companies, so they had there commandated
to do what is in their best interests and their shareholders.
So we'll get to fix it. The Triple Crown here
at a bit, but it is interesting. I spoke to
a group this week over at the Coliseum. It was
(23:56):
a law firm and some of their clients, and when
I took questions, the first two or three questions were
about NILT. And it's usually like that when I've talked
to groups where you know, fans, it's it's something that
they are really UH interested in, and I'm not sure
that they are sure if they like UH and yet
(24:16):
it is I think inevitably here to stay. I wonder
if you know, UK just formed this LLC with their
athletics department, kind of understilling the umbrella of the university,
but it's a separate entity. If that is a way
at some point that those those kinds of uh A
legal or accounting restructuring would enable them to at some
(24:41):
point then move toward that employee relationship.
Speaker 4 (24:45):
Yeah, I think I think it's definitely a step that UH.
I think we're going to see other schools follow. Yeah,
that you know, they're obviously obviously they think there are
a lot of advantages to doing it that way. I
think it's kind of ironic because I can remember when
Lee Todd came in as president. One of the things
doctor Todd wanted to do and did do. He talked
about silos that you had. The medical One of the
(25:08):
big things he talked about was UK Hospital was kind
of its own separate silo and he wanted to bring
it inside the university and bring them all together. Now
we're seeing kind of the exact opposite with the athletic department.
The athletic department kind of wants to break away and
have its own silo if that's the work for it.
So obviously, you know they feel like that. There's advantages
to that, especially when you're coming into where we're going
(25:29):
to have if it ever gets approved. The revenue sharing
and how to NIL the big thing in My colleague
John Hale, who covers UK football at The Herald, makes
this point all the time, and it's true. There's really
no transparency to anything right now. We don't know how
much these players are getting in NIL. You know, there's
nothing that's not like you know, the NFL. You know
(25:50):
what the salaries are. You know, we have no transparency
of what kind of deals are being made and who's
making those deals. You know, you have some we've already
seen in the number of instances at schools where a
player said, well, I didn't get my anil money. So
and so promised me nil money. Well, and it may
be some booster who has made some kind of private
deal with this player. If you come here, I'll give
(26:12):
you this. If you come to my university that I support,
I'll give you X amount of money. There's really you know,
we don't know, we really know. There isn't any transparency.
And I think one thing that if you did have
some sort of collective bargaining agreement where the players are
employers employer, more of that would be, you know, become transparent.
We would know what we were dealing with and what
the college athletes, the athletes were dealing with.
Speaker 1 (26:34):
I wouldn't be surprised if Doctor Todd had a different
thought on that. Now, just as market profits or the
landscape has changed, much like with our televisions where UH
people cut the cord and UH wanted a a la
carte shop, and now it's moving back toward bundling. So
nothing's right to say.
Speaker 4 (26:56):
I thought that I ran into Doctor Todd in town.
It's been a couple of years show, and uh, you know,
I have a lot of respect for it. Think Holly
at Doctor Todd and we we were just exchanging pleasantries
and at that time I can't remember exactly what was
going on at UK at that time, but doctor Codd
kind of leaned into me and sort of whispered and said,
I'm glad I'm out of it. I'm sure I'm sure
(27:18):
he feels probably that way even more so now.
Speaker 1 (27:22):
With John Clay from the Lexington Herald leader at John
Clay ivy on X and we will continue the conversation
here in just a bit on the Club Blue anil
dot com hotline. Club Blues the official NIL fundraising partner
of UK. We've been talking a lot about that. They
have a new initiative, Club Blue Kids, and you can
get your youngster signed up by going to Club Blueenil
(27:43):
dot com and clicking on the kids tab and your
young man or young lady will get official Kids Club
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Club Blueenile dot com. Click on the Kids tab and
you will get signed up Club Blue Kids, where future
(28:04):
Wildcats repped the Blue with pride. Will be right back
on the Leach Report Radio Networks thirteen Away from the
Top of the hour here on the Leach's Report presented
by Bob Katt Enterprises, and John Clay is with us.
You can read him at Kentucky Sports dot com and
in the pages of the Lexington Herald Leader. Let's touch
on another column you did recently, and it was in
(28:25):
reaction to the penalty that Junior Alvarado received for exceeding
the number of times jockey's allowed to strike his horse
with the crop slash the whip. I think he was
two above the limit on sovereignty of the derby, and
so because he had been sighted before, the fine and
(28:46):
pending appeal is set at sixty two thousand dollars. And
you talked about a reaction from just somebody who maybe
had visited the races out of Keeland for the first time,
and the reaction to that part of horse racing, and
then this story and how there's sometimes a disconnect, right.
Speaker 4 (29:06):
But someone that I had met, Oh, this is a
few years back, not not that long ago, and this
person was moved here. This lady had moved here from
Atlanta with her husband who had gotten a job as
a plant manager here in Kentucky. And she said that
her mother back in Georgia where she was from Atlanta
had horses and was interested in horses, and you know,
(29:27):
really liked horses. And she said her mother was coming
up for a visit, and I said, you should take
her to Keenland Kinglin was the meat was going on
at the time, and you know, take her out, you know,
take her out in the morning, see the horses work,
or go to the races. So the next time I
saw her, I said, did your mother come in for
a visit and she said yes, And I said, we
(29:47):
went to the races, said how did you like them?
And she said, to be honest, we didn't like the
way that they beat the horses, that they whipped the horses,
and the races. And I think, I mean, and this
is coming from a horse person. Obviously there's not horse
racing in Georgia, so they were not for familiar or
exposed to that much. You know that many horse racing,
that many horse races. But I think sometimes people inside
(30:08):
the sport we accept that as something that happens. And
I know they have changed the whip rules over the years,
and especially with Haisa coming in, they've made it so
that not only I think that not only the number
of times that they can whip the horse, but also
the constitution of the whip itself, or the crop as
they call it. And I know that there are a
lot of instances, and I know this is true that
(30:32):
it's not used just not used just to make the
horse run faster, but also maybe to get the horse
out of trouble, or to avoid a situation where the
horse would be in trouble, that sort of thing. But
I think sometimes if you're inside racing, you don't you
don't always appreciate or realize how people outside the sports
see it. And I've heard people. I had got an
(30:54):
email from someone who said, well, maybe racing isn't for everyone. Well,
I'm not sure that's a good business strategy, right to
say that you don't want to, you know, you don't
want to, you know, advance or widen your audience. So
I think so I'm in favor of these rules. And
I don't think that Albarado meant anything malicious or anything
(31:16):
like you said. I think he was two over the
limits or anything like that. But I did have other
people who watched the race remark to me that they
noticed how many times that it did seem like that
he was hitting sovereignty a lot of times coming down
the stretch. So I think that was just the point
of my column.
Speaker 3 (31:32):
To me, there's one simple It's not a fix to.
Speaker 1 (31:36):
The issues. That's another debate of you know, the number
of times using a whip, not using a whip, et cetera.
But just to be able to have someone within racing
that is the go to person or two or three
people at a time like this to explain something that
(31:59):
a lot of people, uh, maybe don't fully understand. And
maybe there's some like I said, maybe there is some
reason or maybe the uh uh the striking of the
crop uh doesn't feel like you think it feels when
you're watching it. If if that's true, somebody should explain that.
And the thing is news organizations. When that story came out,
(32:19):
I would watch the Today Show or you know, CBS
Sunday Morning or different things where they would talk about it,
and I thought it would there should be somebody, you know,
when you're in a news organization, a lot of times
if you don't understand something, you need more explanation on
a story. There's a sports information director at schools that
you can call and get some background on tell me
(32:40):
more about this. Okay, now I understand better racing needs
something like that desperately.
Speaker 4 (32:46):
Yeah, that's yeah, definitely. I mean that that has always
been a problem. One thing that you notice when you
cover the other sports in basketball, football, baseball, esquescially when
you cover something like the NCAA tournament and for the
nc Double A, they're probably book relations. They know how
to do it. Horse racing has never really known how
to do it, not from one entity. And that they
know that goes back to what we talked about earlier.
(33:08):
There's so many different entities that act independently of each other.
But you're right, I mean, and I've heard people talk about,
you know, horse racing needs a commissioner. I know Mike
Ropoli has tried to himself as a commissioner, at least
in social media. I'm not sure Mike is the right
person for the job, but you know, but no, I
think you're absolutely right if you had a clear voice.
(33:28):
I mean, look at the Pete Rose thing. Whether you
agreed or disagreed with what the Major League Baseball reinstating
Pete Rose after his death, whether he thought it was
awful that they did it waited till after he died
to do it. You had Rob Manfred. Whether you liked
Rob Manfred or not, whether you liked the decision or not,
he was the one voice who spoke, who said, here,
this is why we did it. And you can agree
(33:49):
with it or not agree with it, but here is
our stance. And racing really doesn't have that one voice
like other sports have.
Speaker 1 (33:56):
John Clay Lexington Herald Leader, Kentucky Sports dot com and
at John Clay ivy on X. Thank you John, as always.
Speaker 4 (34:04):
Have a good holiday, you too, Tom. Thank you.
Speaker 1 (34:07):
That is John Clay joining us here on the Club
Blueennile dot com hotline on the Leach Report, and we
will take a break and come back with our final
segment and just our coverage of the Triple Crown this spring.
Here on the Leach Report is once again presented by
Clayborne Farm. Doing the usual, unusually well for more than
a century, Journalism returned to the track up at Saratoga
(34:31):
yesterday for one mile jog, first time he'd been out
since his win in the Preakness. Is exercise rider telling
the Daily Racing Form that the horse felt just like
he did after the Derby, So one would think that
moves us closer to a decision for Journalism to come
back and run in the Belmont Stakes. Sovereignty is already
(34:51):
pointing for that race. So the Derby winner versus the
Preakness winner and the fast closing Derby third place finisher
by ASA also coming into the mix an interesting storyline
for the final leg of the Triple Crown, so we'll
be following that in the next couple of weeks to
see if we get that much anticipated matchup. Josh Hubbard
(35:12):
is returning to Mississippi State for another season, so that
makes the Bulldogs tougher for the upcoming year. Kentucky's still
waiting for its word from otega Oway and the playoffs.
Tonight it's Game two in the Knicks Pacers series, and
it's gonna be interesting to see how the Knicks bounce
(35:33):
back from that devastating Game one loss. Today is the
anniversary twenty first anniversary of one of the most incredible
plays in playoff history, and it was provided by a
Kentucky Wildcat. I was just looking at the clip off YouTube.
This was the Pacers and the Detroit Pistons in the
Eastern Conference Finals in two thousand and four and Reggie
(35:54):
Miller is on a runout and as he hits the
free throw line, Tayshaun print is outside the three point
line and the Pistons, with twenty seconds to play, are
clinging to a two point lead. Looks like Reggie Miller
is going to tie the game, maybe send it to overtime,
and Prince comes flying in and makes a perfect block
without touching Miller. Tayshan sales like four rows deep into
(36:18):
the crowd. The Pistons get the ball, get fouled, go
on to win an advance to win an NBA title.
Just an incredible play. Lebron James had an impressive block
in a similar fashion more recently in a playoff series.
I think that was in the finals, but this one
was every bit as impressive by Tayshaun And that was
on this day in two thousand and four. Hour wild
(36:39):
Cat History notes each day are presented by Kentucky road
Show Sports Cards d Memorabilia on Romedy Road in Lexington
and at Roadshowcards dot Com. Kevin Galloway had a brief
stint as a Kentucky wild Catty celebrates the birthday today
and tomorrow. Birthday wishes go out to Anthony Epps. The
floor General for the ninety six National Champs. We'll celebrate
(37:01):
a birthday tomorrow. That's going to do it for the
Leads Report presented by Bobcat Enterprises. Have yourself a great
day on holiday weekend. Best of a show on Monday.
We'll see you back here live on two
Good day, everybody. Welcome into the Leach Report, presented by
Bobcat Enterprises thanks to Dick Gabriel were filling in the
last couple of days. I am redoing the home office
slash studio here and wanted somebody to be covering the
show in case everything didn't come back together the way
(00:22):
it was taken apart, but all as well as you
can tell you're since you're hearing me. It's kind of
like Apollo thirteen where they had to boot everything back
up and go through the checklist and got through everything
at the radio equipment, hooked up the internet, hooked up
or vice versa, and then got to the computers and
hooked up one and then the last computer didn't work,
(00:44):
but we figured that one out yesterday and all good
to go. Now from the studio here for the Leach
Report on this Friday. Heading into a holiday weekend, we'll
have the best of show on Monday and then come
back to regular shows next Tuesday. Jump right into the
Wildcat News of the Day presented by Juseppes of Lexington.
(01:05):
Darryl Byrd will join us to start off the show
right for of course the Cat's pause heads up the
team there, and we will talk about a story that
Daryl has done and posted this week about the fiftieth
anniversary of the Kentucky Colonels winning the ABA Championship, only
professional championship by a team based in Kentucky, and he
(01:28):
did a Linthy interview with dan Isissel to reminisce about that,
and John Clay will join us in the second half
of the show from the Lexington Herald Leader in Kentucky
Sports dot Com on a lot of bases to touch there.
Jayalen Lowe announcing yesterday he is returning to UK. That
wasn't as expected, but still nice to get the confirmation
if you're a Wildcat fan. He I thinks what still
(01:51):
makes the most sense is to say he tweeted out
because he xed out. Makes no sense the ridiculous name change. Nevertheless,
we'll say he tweeted out that he can't miss out
on this opportunity. See y'all soon be And so now
he gets the keys to the car, so to speak,
as the point guard for the Wildcats, and I think
(02:13):
he is going to be a player that people will
be talking about as one who has dramatically improved on
his numbers from last season when he was at pitt
So we'll see if it plays out that way. But
now all the focus shifts to otega Oway and he
has until Wednesday, I guess at midnight to make his
decision about staying in the NBA Draft or coming back
(02:34):
to Kentucky. And I still haven't heard anybody or read
anywhere anybody saying anything other than he has expected to
return to UK. But we'll get the confirmation one way
or the other middle of next week. Braydon Holloorde officially
signed with UK. Mark Pope able to comment on that
(02:55):
acquisition for his roster and said he quote said quote,
his ceiling is incredible and he really wants to be
here at Kentucky, and he certainly Hawthorne taking on quite
a challenge to come on to a stacked roster, but
suggests that the young man has confidence in his game.
(03:16):
Mentioned that it'll be a best of show on Monday.
But there is big news coming Monday, and that will
be the projection or the bracket for the NCAA Baseball Tournament.
And every projection I see still has Kentucky safely in.
I don't see any where the Cats are listed on
any of the last four in first four out lists,
(03:36):
so they hopefully are safely into the field and so
Monday will learn which regional they will head to. As
likely a three seed, it seems from what the projections
are saying, and two three really doesn't make much difference
because that's who you're going to play in the first
game of a four team regional. UK continues to accept
(04:00):
donations for victims of the tornadoes in London and in
Somerset and that'll be today at the Kroger Field Blue
Lot off Alumni Drive starting at eleven am. You can
go to UK Athletics dot com and get more information.
Saw that Nick vinji Own and his baseball team on
the bus ride back from Hoover, Alabama and the SEC
(04:22):
tournament stopped off to help with the cleanup, to put
some manpower into it and be able to just help
folks clear debris down there, So a nice thing for
them to do. And if you can't get down there
to help, there are ways you can help through these
donations and that's starting at eleven am today at Kroger
(04:44):
Field on the Blue Lot side of the stadium that's
off Alumni Drive, and again UK Athletics dot Com has
all the details links to the stories that we talk
about each day. You can find those on the bud
Light Leach Report at Tom Leachky dot com. Well, come
back and visit with Darryl Bird Cat's Pause here on
the Leach Report. Our opening segment always presented by Just
(05:04):
Seppies of Lexington. Go to Open Table right now, make
a reservation for useepes and enjoy just a really special
night out. Dave Haul's Live Jazz Music Company is your
meal if you sit in the lounge area. The Pasta's
homemade seafood, chipped in fresh handcut steaks, a lot of
locally sourced ingredients on the menu too. At GI Seppies
(05:26):
Lexington dot com. We'll be ready. Leach Report comes to
you each day from the Clark's Pumping Shop studio. They
have a new loyalty rewards program that can help you
get some discounts on fuel and items in their stores. Return,
refresh and refuel at Clark's. Darryl Bird joins us from
the Cat's Pause and you can he joins us via
the Club Blueennil dot com hotline, and you can go
(05:49):
to Catspause dot com and read Daryl's latest story, which
is about the seventy fifth anniversary, excuse me, the fiftieth
anniversary of the nineteen seventy five Kentucky Colonel's team that
won the ABA championship. And you did a long interview, Daryl,
with dan Issel and got a lot of great stories
out of that.
Speaker 2 (06:11):
All the stories were above and beyond, and I appreciate
you having on to talk about it because, I mean,
you and I've been doing this a long time, and
there's a few things, a few instances that really jump
out at you during that time. And I will never
I mean, as long as I live, I'll never forget
sitting at the dan Issel's kitchen table in Denver talking
(06:32):
for two to three hours about the ABA. And there's
time when he was looking through a book about the Colonels.
I'm like, and this is so surreal. I'm sitting across
the table from dan Isel sharing stories. And the best
part was I had the Kentucky Colonel's book that Gary
West did about two thousand and two thousand and five,
and he's slipping through it, hadn't seen it in a
(06:53):
long time, and every picture sparked another story. So it
just one to after another after another. And they just
got better and better, and it was it was a
lot of fun and so many great stories and couldn't
pass up the fiftieth anniversary.
Speaker 1 (07:07):
Growing up here in Kentucky followed the Colonels naturally, because
you know it was the Kentucky team, the only one
in professional sports that was from the state. And you
had all these Kentucky guys on the team. Louis Daniere,
dan Issel, Mike Pratt was on the team for a while,
(07:29):
Darryl Carrier was on for a while out of Western Kentucky. Yes,
so there was a lot of Kentucky connections there and
they were really good, and you know, they had a
lot of tough beats. I know Dan talks about that
in your story. I've heard artist Gilmore talk about it,
(07:49):
just the tough beats that they had. One year, they
went like sixty eight and sixteen and they got upset
in the first round of the playoffs.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
Right Dan called him, said, we probably had the best
team four or five years, but we only won it
once because we just we underachieved. And I said, well,
what flip the switch? He credited Hugh be Brown first
year Code the Hub, Brown his first head coaching job
when he was forty one was with the Colonels in
that seventy five season that he was of all he
(08:20):
played for Rupp he said, I played for four Hall
of Fame coaches. I think, he said, wow. And there
was never anybody as organized as Hue Brown. He was
so far ahead of the curve, had his own playbook.
Nobody had playbooks very detailed. He said, We'd come in
before a game and there would be a handwritten on
a chalkboard every play that we ran against this team
(08:41):
the last time we played them, How it worked, what happened.
It just broke down the analytics of today that are
instant and computerized that the Colonels were doing by hand
on a notebook pad during the game tracking stuff. Yeah,
analytics organized, he was.
Speaker 1 (08:57):
Analytics were with pen and paper.
Speaker 2 (09:00):
Yes, they were, absolutely they were.
Speaker 1 (09:04):
I think about that sometimes in doing the job on
the UK network. How but how many more resources I
have at my disposal, mainly because of the Internet and
what it was like for Kwood, you know, researching the opponent,
those kinds of things without creasy the benefit of a computer.
So I thought that was really interesting angle to the
(09:24):
story that you know, kind of early version of analytics.
Hubie Brown, I know of go ahead.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
It failed to Stan Albeck, the one assistant coach, it
all feel to him to try. Dan said, I'm not
sure he ever saw us play and make a play
on defense because he was tracking so hard everything they
were doing on the offensive end.
Speaker 1 (09:45):
Hubie Brown has said it was the best team he
ever coached, that seventy five Colonel's team. And Dan talks
about this in your story that for the team to
be all that it was ultimately able to it required
Dan taking a little bit of a step.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
Back mm hmm, and he said he glad they do
it all over again. He said, Hubey Brown was the
first coach he ever had that walked into the locker
room and said, Artists, you're the center. Dan, you're a forward.
He said, all the other coaches had tried to play
a double post, and he did, and Dan's numbers went
down and Artist Gilmore was MVP, and he just he said,
(10:26):
he told me in the in the story and he's
told me that before. He said, you know, I'm the
leading scorer at Kentucky. I would give up every single
point to have a banner.
Speaker 1 (10:36):
And yeah, he tells the story about when Cal had
him come out and talk to one of the Kentucky
teams and tell us that story.
Speaker 2 (10:44):
Yeah, I thought that was really fascinating. That he went
to a practice when Cal Perry was still here and
he said that Cale introduced him to the player, said
this is Dan Issel, Kentucky's all time leading scorer. Blah
blah blah these stats. He won it all, and Dan said,
I took the myone. He's in the craft center of
the practice facility where they have all the national championship banners.
(11:06):
He said, gentlemen, I was here from nineteen sixty seven
to nineteen seventy Do you see any banners? Because they
look around they said no. I said, no, I didn't
win at all. So it just it burned him that
he never had a title, and that's what really drove
him in seventy five. They were determined to get a
championship despite all he said, they really good. I thought.
(11:29):
At his part, he said, you know, when you're young,
all that individual stuff is a lot of fun. But
the older you get, you're like, you know, don't have
a title, so nothing, it's not complete. Whatever I've done
is not complete because there's no championship attached to it.
Speaker 1 (11:44):
Tom with Daryl Byrd from katspaws dot com about his
story that's up now on the anniversary fiftieth anniversary of
the Kentucky Colonels winning their only championship in their ABA
days and just the incredible team that they had built
at that time. We'll continue talking about that when we
come right back. It is the Leach Report and it's
(12:07):
presented by Bobcat Enterprises with four locations around Kentucky. When
you're looking to buy or rent some heavy equipment, Bobcats forklifts, excavators,
et cetera. That's where you go. They'll have what you need.
They'll take great care of you and give you a
fantastic service after the sale or the rental as well
at Bobcat Enterprises, four locations here in Kentucky. We'll be
(12:29):
right back the Leech Report and Darryl Byrd is with
us from katzpause dot com. We're talking about history on
the anniversary fiftieth anniversary of the Kentucky Courtels winning their
only ABA championship. It was this week in nineteen seventy five.
They beat the Indiana Pacers, their big rival, in a
five game series. Interesting angle to that Colonel's team too,
(12:50):
is that you had the two big men, dan Isissel
and Artist Gilmore, and you were talking about what ub
Brown did more clearly to find their roles, and they
had gone up against each other, and you know, Artists
was part of the Jacksonville team that kept Danissel from
winning that championship.
Speaker 2 (13:11):
Yeah, in such a brute force. And I asked Dan
about Artist Gilmore. He said, the sweetest, kindest soul you
ever meet in your life, which is contrary to what
you think with this big, powerful player who could do
anything he wanted on the basketball court. And they're still
super close to this day, talk very frequently.
Speaker 1 (13:31):
Same way Mike Pratt was the same way with him.
When Kentucky played down in Jacksonville in twenty nineteen, Mike
and Artists hung out together and then the artists came
to the game. In fact, Kentucky actually practiced at Jacksonville.
There were pictures of that seventy team up on the
walls there, and then Artists came by our broadcast spot
and I shook hands with him, and my hands are
(13:53):
not small, and they were just engulfed by Artist's hands.
He would you know be in the low posted you know,
was a fan of the Colonels, and he would hold
the ball out extended as he was being guarded, and
it looked almost like he was holding a tennis ball.
Speaker 2 (14:11):
Yeah, it's crazy.
Speaker 1 (14:14):
Just an incredible talent and and just a great, great player.
In that decisive, decisive fifth game against the Pacers that
saw he had twenty eight points and thirty one rebounds.
Speaker 3 (14:25):
You also point out in your story that a lot
of elements of the ABA were incorporated into the NBA
and helped maybe drive the popularity of.
Speaker 1 (14:36):
The NBA, along with you know, magic and bird arriving
and that too in the late seventies, a lot of
the NBA when the merger happened, the NBA incorporated a
lot of the ABA. The not the multi colored ball,
but a lot just about.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
Everything else, everything except the red, white and blue ball
because as Dan told me, red Auerbix, the legend of
the balls and Celtics that basketball belongs on the seals nose,
not in our game. So they didn't do that. But
the three point line, there was no three pointer in
the NBA at that time. That was the big one
and the tempo. Dan told me he said, send me
(15:12):
in a lot of the younger readers will fall over
because they're the NBA playoffs underway right now, he said.
In my and when the ABA was popular, the NBA
was on tape delay after the ten o'clock news in
most markets. That's how that's how much the popularity said.
It just wasn't a very exciting game. They had the
(15:32):
up tempo, they had a three point shot, and the
A B A was or the NBA at that time,
was more get the ball down a little to the
little post and just play it that way. For uh
what the analytics park came with it too. The ABA
is the one that introduced what we need expanded box
scores with assiths, offensive rebounds, steels all that the NBA
(15:56):
didn't do that as part of the again, the the
early analytics jump at the av A.
Speaker 1 (16:01):
Did you write about a story involving Julius Irving, famously
known as Doctor Jay as you write and something.
Speaker 2 (16:11):
He was so.
Speaker 1 (16:14):
Gifted and so spectacular to watch that it affected how
hub Brown wanted his guys to defend him, and I'll
let you pick up the story.
Speaker 2 (16:25):
Yeah, I'd actually forgotten that one for just as there
are so many good stories. Is that basically he'd be
Brown called a meeting after Doctor J went off for
forty something against them, and he said, going forward, if
Doctor J is ever going in for a dunk, I
want you to grab him and tackling. Basically said, do
not hurt him. We're not after flagger. Just wrap your
(16:46):
arms around him and do not let him dunk the
ball because he's turning our own fans against us. He's
so spectacular to watch, said, do not let him dunk
no matter what.
Speaker 1 (16:56):
Uh, that's funny, brazy. There's so many eight stories there.
We could keep doing this for you know, an hour,
because yeah, I grew up like you, you know, following the
colonels and you couldn't follow on TV. Uh, I mean
I listened to Van Vance on w h A S
call the games that then occasionally. I never went to
a game at Freedom Hall, but they would play a
(17:17):
few games in the coliseum here in Lexington, and yeah,
uh dad got tim did they Okay, Well, my dad
got tickets and we went to the games. They were
like five or six. But I mean you'd see Doctor
J playing at Memorial conlose and Moses Malone made his
debut at the Colosseum.
Speaker 2 (17:33):
Yeah, it's a great story taking high school players. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:37):
Yeah, that was one of the other things the Uh
it was revolutionary for the A B. A. You can
read all about this at katzpause dot com. Uh, Daryl, well,
we'll talk to you in a few weeks about the
football yearbook. But best of luck, we're getting.
Speaker 2 (17:49):
That out all right. Thanks their appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (17:52):
That's Darryl Byrd Katzpause dot com on the Leech Report.
We'll be right back. One of our partners here on
the Leech Report is corn Bread Him and they have
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This is the good life. John Clay joining us now
from the Lexington Herald Leader in Kentucky sports dot com.
And John, a lot of bases will touch here for
as long as we can cover the time. And one
(18:57):
of them is your latest column at Kentucky sports dot
com about college athletics and a suggestion for a commission
to study the issues of nil transfer portal, you know, competitiveness,
et cetera, all of that, and I would agree with
you that those things end up. Al maguire used to
(19:20):
have the best announcement, but he's arrested lying on it.
He said, they're they're really not only do they not
get anything done, they often do bad things because they
get to go to these nice places and they feel
like they have to do something.
Speaker 4 (19:35):
Right right, they'd be more harm than good and a
lot of those Yeah, I thought it was funny that,
you know, President Trump spoke at the Alabama commencement and
met with Nick Saban before the commencement, and he came
after out afterwards, and you were saying that Trump was
some people who wanted to form a commission, and people
thought that Saban put that idea in his head. And
then Saban comes out of his golf tournament this past
(19:55):
week and said, I don't think we need a commission.
I think the commission is a bad idea. So so
you can't even get everybody on the same page on
that sort of thing. Yeah, I mean, I don't have
much faith that those committees are commissions. I thought Jay
Billis made a good point that you know, there was
the Night Commission and then the Rice Commission, and neither
one that studied college athletics and made suggestions or you know,
(20:18):
put out a papers, you know, advocating for change, and
nothing really happened with either one of those. I don't
think that's the answer. I'm not sure what the answer is,
but I don't think commissions or committees are the answer.
Speaker 1 (20:32):
One thing I am absolutely sure of. The guy who
wrote quote I agree, and personally I'm all in on
the chaos. Won't be on that committee.
Speaker 4 (20:39):
John No No, I don't think I will be picked,
and I don't think Jay Billis will be picked either
for the commission. No, I don't think. I don't think
I have to worry about that. So, you know, I think,
as I say in the Calm, not to give away
the calm, I think the ultimate answer is they're going
to have to treat college college athletes udent athletes as
(21:00):
in CBA likes to call them. They're going to have
to at some point treat them like employees. That's the
only way you're treating everything else in the game as professional,
like professional sports. Eventually, that's the only the only way
you're going to be able to have some sort of
fairness and some sort of clarity is through collective bargaining,
have some sort of employee employer employee relationship with the
(21:23):
with the athletes. Now, whether that I don't think that's
going to happen anytime soon, but I still think that's
going to be the end result.
Speaker 1 (21:29):
Where you if you want some changes to the portal
or n I L it's a where the players in
some collective fashion are agreeing to that for something they're
getting in return, or you know, everybody's agreeing it's better
for the game, whatever that is, because a lot of times,
I mean, there's the story now, like Ross Ellinger had
(21:50):
the story this week from Yahoo Sports about leagues at
the SEC reacting to what's happening in the Tennessee legislature,
and that might draft an agreement that every school would
have to sign to agree that you wouldn't do what
Tennessee is telling its schools that it can do and
(22:10):
basically ignore the rules. And that sounds like a good plan,
except a lot of times those things don't hold up
in court.
Speaker 4 (22:18):
Right right is? I think Michael McCann, the sports lawyer
who writes for several publications, including Sports Illustrated, So you're
just inviting litigation if you do that. I don't see
how they can happen. But that's another one of the problems.
You've got a lot of various entities acting on their
own behalf and they're not really working together. Just like
you mentioned, the Tennessee legislature passing the law that the
(22:40):
athletes at Tennessee University and schools can get as much
ANIL money and can keep as much in NIL money
or whatever as they want, regardless of the rules of
their conference and so forth. So you know, it's kind
of like it sort of reminds me of our recent
discussion about the Triple Crown, you know, and well, should
they change the Triple Crown and what's the best for
(23:02):
the Triple Crown. The problem with that, of course, is
unlike the Breeders' Cup, there is not really there is
no Triple Crown organization. There's Churchill Downs that runs the Derby,
there's the Stronac company that runs Pemical and runs the Preakness,
and then you have NIRA which runs the Belmonte Stakes,
and they all act independently, and so therefore there's not
really it's hard to get them together to get a
(23:24):
consensus about you know, if we do change the Triple Crown,
this is what we should do, because all three want
to do what's best for them. I think they've got
kind of the same You get the same thing in
college athletics.
Speaker 1 (23:36):
Yeah, no, that's exactly correct, And especially even a couple
like Churchill's publicly traded companies, so they had there commandated
to do what is in their best interests and their shareholders.
So we'll get to fix it. The Triple Crown here
at a bit, but it is interesting. I spoke to
a group this week over at the Coliseum. It was
(23:56):
a law firm and some of their clients, and when
I took questions, the first two or three questions were
about NILT. And it's usually like that when I've talked
to groups where you know, fans, it's it's something that
they are really UH interested in, and I'm not sure
that they are sure if they like UH and yet
(24:16):
it is I think inevitably here to stay. I wonder
if you know, UK just formed this LLC with their
athletics department, kind of understilling the umbrella of the university,
but it's a separate entity. If that is a way
at some point that those those kinds of uh A
legal or accounting restructuring would enable them to at some
(24:41):
point then move toward that employee relationship.
Speaker 4 (24:45):
Yeah, I think I think it's definitely a step that UH.
I think we're going to see other schools follow. Yeah,
that you know, they're obviously obviously they think there are
a lot of advantages to doing it that way. I
think it's kind of ironic because I can remember when
Lee Todd came in as president. One of the things
doctor Todd wanted to do and did do. He talked
about silos that you had. The medical One of the
(25:08):
big things he talked about was UK Hospital was kind
of its own separate silo and he wanted to bring
it inside the university and bring them all together. Now
we're seeing kind of the exact opposite with the athletic department.
The athletic department kind of wants to break away and
have its own silo if that's the work for it.
So obviously, you know they feel like that. There's advantages
to that, especially when you're coming into where we're going
(25:29):
to have if it ever gets approved. The revenue sharing
and how to NIL the big thing in My colleague
John Hale, who covers UK football at The Herald, makes
this point all the time, and it's true. There's really
no transparency to anything right now. We don't know how
much these players are getting in NIL. You know, there's
nothing that's not like you know, the NFL. You know
(25:50):
what the salaries are. You know, we have no transparency
of what kind of deals are being made and who's
making those deals. You know, you have some we've already
seen in the number of instances at schools where a
player said, well, I didn't get my anil money. So
and so promised me nil money. Well, and it may
be some booster who has made some kind of private
deal with this player. If you come here, I'll give
(26:12):
you this. If you come to my university that I support,
I'll give you X amount of money. There's really you know,
we don't know, we really know. There isn't any transparency.
And I think one thing that if you did have
some sort of collective bargaining agreement where the players are
employers employer, more of that would be, you know, become transparent.
We would know what we were dealing with and what
the college athletes, the athletes were dealing with.
Speaker 1 (26:34):
I wouldn't be surprised if Doctor Todd had a different
thought on that. Now, just as market profits or the
landscape has changed, much like with our televisions where UH
people cut the cord and UH wanted a a la
carte shop, and now it's moving back toward bundling. So
nothing's right to say.
Speaker 4 (26:56):
I thought that I ran into Doctor Todd in town.
It's been a couple of years show, and uh, you know,
I have a lot of respect for it. Think Holly
at Doctor Todd and we we were just exchanging pleasantries
and at that time I can't remember exactly what was
going on at UK at that time, but doctor Codd
kind of leaned into me and sort of whispered and said,
I'm glad I'm out of it. I'm sure I'm sure
(27:18):
he feels probably that way even more so now.
Speaker 1 (27:22):
With John Clay from the Lexington Herald leader at John
Clay ivy on X and we will continue the conversation
here in just a bit on the Club Blue anil
dot com hotline. Club Blues the official NIL fundraising partner
of UK. We've been talking a lot about that. They
have a new initiative, Club Blue Kids, and you can
get your youngster signed up by going to Club Blueenil
(27:43):
dot com and clicking on the kids tab and your
young man or young lady will get official Kids Club
T shirt, a membership card to lanyard, and a lot
more like access to exclusive events, meet and greets, athlete experiences.
Club Blueenile dot com. Click on the Kids tab and
you will get signed up Club Blue Kids, where future
(28:04):
Wildcats repped the Blue with pride. Will be right back
on the Leach Report Radio Networks thirteen Away from the
Top of the hour here on the Leach's Report presented
by Bob Katt Enterprises, and John Clay is with us.
You can read him at Kentucky Sports dot com and
in the pages of the Lexington Herald Leader. Let's touch
on another column you did recently, and it was in
(28:25):
reaction to the penalty that Junior Alvarado received for exceeding
the number of times jockey's allowed to strike his horse
with the crop slash the whip. I think he was
two above the limit on sovereignty of the derby, and
so because he had been sighted before, the fine and
(28:46):
pending appeal is set at sixty two thousand dollars. And
you talked about a reaction from just somebody who maybe
had visited the races out of Keeland for the first time,
and the reaction to that part of horse racing, and
then this story and how there's sometimes a disconnect, right.
Speaker 4 (29:06):
But someone that I had met, Oh, this is a
few years back, not not that long ago, and this
person was moved here. This lady had moved here from
Atlanta with her husband who had gotten a job as
a plant manager here in Kentucky. And she said that
her mother back in Georgia where she was from Atlanta
had horses and was interested in horses, and you know,
(29:27):
really liked horses. And she said her mother was coming
up for a visit, and I said, you should take
her to Keenland Kinglin was the meat was going on
at the time, and you know, take her out, you know,
take her out in the morning, see the horses work,
or go to the races. So the next time I
saw her, I said, did your mother come in for
a visit and she said yes, And I said, we
(29:47):
went to the races, said how did you like them?
And she said, to be honest, we didn't like the
way that they beat the horses, that they whipped the horses,
and the races. And I think, I mean, and this
is coming from a horse person. Obviously there's not horse
racing in Georgia, so they were not for familiar or
exposed to that much. You know that many horse racing,
that many horse races. But I think sometimes people inside
(30:08):
the sport we accept that as something that happens. And
I know they have changed the whip rules over the years,
and especially with Haisa coming in, they've made it so
that not only I think that not only the number
of times that they can whip the horse, but also
the constitution of the whip itself, or the crop as
they call it. And I know that there are a
lot of instances, and I know this is true that
(30:32):
it's not used just not used just to make the
horse run faster, but also maybe to get the horse
out of trouble, or to avoid a situation where the
horse would be in trouble, that sort of thing. But
I think sometimes if you're inside racing, you don't you
don't always appreciate or realize how people outside the sports
see it. And I've heard people. I had got an
(30:54):
email from someone who said, well, maybe racing isn't for everyone. Well,
I'm not sure that's a good business strategy, right to
say that you don't want to, you know, you don't
want to, you know, advance or widen your audience. So
I think so I'm in favor of these rules. And
I don't think that Albarado meant anything malicious or anything
(31:16):
like you said. I think he was two over the
limits or anything like that. But I did have other
people who watched the race remark to me that they
noticed how many times that it did seem like that
he was hitting sovereignty a lot of times coming down
the stretch. So I think that was just the point
of my column.
Speaker 3 (31:32):
To me, there's one simple It's not a fix to.
Speaker 1 (31:36):
The issues. That's another debate of you know, the number
of times using a whip, not using a whip, et cetera.
But just to be able to have someone within racing
that is the go to person or two or three
people at a time like this to explain something that
(31:59):
a lot of people, uh, maybe don't fully understand. And
maybe there's some like I said, maybe there is some
reason or maybe the uh uh the striking of the
crop uh doesn't feel like you think it feels when
you're watching it. If if that's true, somebody should explain that.
And the thing is news organizations. When that story came out,
(32:19):
I would watch the Today Show or you know, CBS
Sunday Morning or different things where they would talk about it,
and I thought it would there should be somebody, you know,
when you're in a news organization, a lot of times
if you don't understand something, you need more explanation on
a story. There's a sports information director at schools that
you can call and get some background on tell me
(32:40):
more about this. Okay, now I understand better racing needs
something like that desperately.
Speaker 4 (32:46):
Yeah, that's yeah, definitely. I mean that that has always
been a problem. One thing that you notice when you
cover the other sports in basketball, football, baseball, esquescially when
you cover something like the NCAA tournament and for the
nc Double A, they're probably book relations. They know how
to do it. Horse racing has never really known how
to do it, not from one entity. And that they
know that goes back to what we talked about earlier.
(33:08):
There's so many different entities that act independently of each other.
But you're right, I mean, and I've heard people talk about,
you know, horse racing needs a commissioner. I know Mike
Ropoli has tried to himself as a commissioner, at least
in social media. I'm not sure Mike is the right
person for the job, but you know, but no, I
think you're absolutely right if you had a clear voice.
(33:28):
I mean, look at the Pete Rose thing. Whether you
agreed or disagreed with what the Major League Baseball reinstating
Pete Rose after his death, whether he thought it was
awful that they did it waited till after he died
to do it. You had Rob Manfred. Whether you liked
Rob Manfred or not, whether you liked the decision or not,
he was the one voice who spoke, who said, here,
this is why we did it. And you can agree
(33:49):
with it or not agree with it, but here is
our stance. And racing really doesn't have that one voice
like other sports have.
Speaker 1 (33:56):
John Clay Lexington Herald Leader, Kentucky Sports dot com and
at John Clay ivy on X. Thank you John, as always.
Speaker 4 (34:04):
Have a good holiday, you too, Tom. Thank you.
Speaker 1 (34:07):
That is John Clay joining us here on the Club
Blueennile dot com hotline on the Leach Report, and we
will take a break and come back with our final
segment and just our coverage of the Triple Crown this spring.
Here on the Leach Report is once again presented by
Clayborne Farm. Doing the usual, unusually well for more than
a century, Journalism returned to the track up at Saratoga
(34:31):
yesterday for one mile jog, first time he'd been out
since his win in the Preakness. Is exercise rider telling
the Daily Racing Form that the horse felt just like
he did after the Derby, So one would think that
moves us closer to a decision for Journalism to come
back and run in the Belmont Stakes. Sovereignty is already
(34:51):
pointing for that race. So the Derby winner versus the
Preakness winner and the fast closing Derby third place finisher
by ASA also coming into the mix an interesting storyline
for the final leg of the Triple Crown, so we'll
be following that in the next couple of weeks to
see if we get that much anticipated matchup. Josh Hubbard
(35:12):
is returning to Mississippi State for another season, so that
makes the Bulldogs tougher for the upcoming year. Kentucky's still
waiting for its word from otega Oway and the playoffs.
Tonight it's Game two in the Knicks Pacers series, and
it's gonna be interesting to see how the Knicks bounce
(35:33):
back from that devastating Game one loss. Today is the
anniversary twenty first anniversary of one of the most incredible
plays in playoff history, and it was provided by a
Kentucky Wildcat. I was just looking at the clip off YouTube.
This was the Pacers and the Detroit Pistons in the
Eastern Conference Finals in two thousand and four and Reggie
(35:54):
Miller is on a runout and as he hits the
free throw line, Tayshaun print is outside the three point
line and the Pistons, with twenty seconds to play, are
clinging to a two point lead. Looks like Reggie Miller
is going to tie the game, maybe send it to overtime,
and Prince comes flying in and makes a perfect block
without touching Miller. Tayshan sales like four rows deep into
(36:18):
the crowd. The Pistons get the ball, get fouled, go
on to win an advance to win an NBA title.
Just an incredible play. Lebron James had an impressive block
in a similar fashion more recently in a playoff series.
I think that was in the finals, but this one
was every bit as impressive by Tayshaun And that was
on this day in two thousand and four. Hour wild
(36:39):
Cat History notes each day are presented by Kentucky road
Show Sports Cards d Memorabilia on Romedy Road in Lexington
and at Roadshowcards dot Com. Kevin Galloway had a brief
stint as a Kentucky wild Catty celebrates the birthday today
and tomorrow. Birthday wishes go out to Anthony Epps. The
floor General for the ninety six National Champs. We'll celebrate
(37:01):
a birthday tomorrow. That's going to do it for the
Leads Report presented by Bobcat Enterprises. Have yourself a great
day on holiday weekend. Best of a show on Monday.
We'll see you back here live on two
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