Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, everybody, hope you had a great weekend. Welcome into
the Leech Report, presented by Bobcat Enterprises, and we have
a couple of guests today that will spend a good
bit of time talking about the changing landscape for college athletics.
Mark's story from the Lexington Herald Leader and Ralph Russo
(00:21):
from the Athletic And on Friday, if you're a college
sports fan, you probably saw this the House Settlement. That
phrase has been thrown around a lot. The case is
named for somebody named House, and it was a settlement
between the plain offfs and defendants that a judge had
to sign off on and she did on Friday. And
(00:46):
so now colleges can directly compensate players up to north
of twenty million dollars. So that's got to be spread
over all the sports. And that's part of the story
here that will play out over the coming months and
years maybe is how those decisions are made to fund
(01:12):
various sports and do any sports end up getting cut
all of that? So we'll get into some of that today.
It's one of those good summer topics. No games going on,
so we can delve a little deeper into something like this.
With Ralph Russo who's covered it Intanley for The Athletic,
and then Mark Story who has written about it for
(01:32):
The Harold Leader Wildcat News of the Day, a service
of Giuseppes of Lexington. Shay Gilgis Alexander gets his first
win in the NBA Finals last night and caseon Wallace too.
They went with that same starting lineup, so both of
them started last night in Game two for OKC, which
beat the Pacers one twenty three to one oh seven,
so the series is now even at one win apiece
(01:55):
and Shay had thirty four points and eight assists, so
he's gone thirty plus in both of his games so far.
Games three and four will be in Indianapolis. I believe
it's Wednesday and Friday of this week. UK Baseball picking
up a transfer. They have tried to bolster their pitching
(02:17):
staff through the portal so far, and I believe this
is the fourth pitcher that they've picked up from North
Florida Bryson, and I'm assuming it's Trickle. He was four
and five of a five point two five ERA, struck
out seventy four batters in sixty one innings this past season.
A right handed pitcher, and then Baseball America reporting I
(02:38):
think this was on Friday. Four key Wildcats have made
the decision to stick with Kentucky and not enter the portal.
Tyler Bell, the outstanding freshman shortstop, Ryan Schwartz, outstanding freshman
right fielder, and pitchers Ben Cleaver and Nate Harris two
of the three weekend starters. So some great news there
(03:01):
for coach Bingio. And after all of the change that
happened from the College World Series team last summer to
this season, seems like they'll have a good bit more
carryover with key guys heading into next season, which should
bode well for the prospects for Kentucky baseball. And you
(03:23):
know how baseball and other sports that don't generate as
much revenue as football and men's basketball are going to
fare in this new world of college athletics is going
to be an interesting discussion how they'll get funded, et
cetera that we'll get into with our guests today. Several
pieces of news for Kentucky men's basketball. Tyren Stokes reportedly
(03:45):
is on campus making an official visit. Number one recruits
in the class of twenty twenty six, and Walker Horn
is returning to the team. He had announced he was
entering the portal earlier. Some of that was related to
this house settlement because I didn't know how that was
going to shake out. As far as your rosters can
(04:08):
go to fifteen players now for men's basketball, and so
there's going to be a spot for Walker because Kentucky
has fourteen.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
And I know he.
Speaker 1 (04:18):
Didn't play a lot, but he was a very key
piece of what they do, the son of coach Darren Horne.
Walker was always on the scout team that would run
the other team's offense against the Wildcats in practices, and
he was frequently the guy player, the role of the
other team's best player if he was on the perimeter
(04:39):
and give them a quote unquote good look in practice.
And just a nice young man. So happy to see
that Walker is going to be back with the team
next season. K sor ry to report of the numbers
being set Jersey numbers for the players heading into next season.
Several newcomers. So let me just go through these. Denzel
(05:00):
Aberdeen will wear number one, Jasper Johnson number two, Cam
Williams number three. It's always interesting you to go through
think about what other players have worn that number. Rix
Chapman was number three for example, Andrea Yalovich number four.
It's Kyle Macy's number. Jalen Low fifteen. First one that
(05:21):
pops to mind at fifteen's DeMarcus Cousins. Ironically it's been
a big man number. Alex Croza I think was fifteen. Also,
I'll have to look at the Wildcat History site from
John Scott to get all of these. I know Jaden
Quaint's has got a number with a lot of history
to it. Twenty one that's the Goose plus s Tay
Shawn Prince, Brandon Hawthorne. Twenty two, that's our dear friend
(05:44):
Mike Pratt's number, Mohammed Diabate twenty three, that's the number,
Anthony Davis war Malachai Moreno. Twenty four, Rhys Potter number
thirty three. So those are the jersey numbers for the
Newcats for next season. Wildcat News of the Day a
service of Giuseppes of Lexington and they're located just off
(06:08):
Nicholasville Road outside Man of War here in Lexington. When
you're looking to celebrate a special occasion or just have
a really special night out, make a Giuseppes Live Jazz
music to a company your meal if you sit in
the lounge area. The food's fantastic. The pasta's homemade handcut
steaks for seafood shipped in a lot of locally sourced ingredients.
You can check it all out of Juseppes Lexington dot
(06:28):
com and go to open table to make your reservation.
Speaker 2 (06:31):
We're head into a break.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
As we do, let me remind you about the Committee
of One O one aka the Blue Coats.
Speaker 2 (06:37):
They're looking for new members.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
Email UK one o one Membership at gmail dot com
to get information about their organization and find out how
you can apply. It's open to men and women, commonly
renown again as the Blue Coats, an all volunteer group
that has proudly served UK athletics with distinction since nineteen
sixty six. That's UK one on one membership at gmail
dot com. We'll be right back with Mark's story from
(07:01):
the Herald Leader. Inch of course presented each day by
Bobcat Enterprises, and they have four locations around the state.
Google Bobcat. When you need to buy or rent some
heavy equipment for a job site. They're getting excavators or forklifts, tractors,
et cetera, and if you need a new zero turn
mo or for your home, they'll have that two parts.
Speaker 2 (07:22):
For those equipped pieces of equipment.
Speaker 1 (07:24):
As well, all at Bobcat Enterprises with four locations around Kentucky.
Mark's story joins us now from the Lexington Herald Leader
at Kentucky Sports dot com on the Club Blueenile dot
com hotline, Mark one of the real cool stories in
college sports could be the Murray State Racers going to
the College Baseball World Series.
Speaker 2 (07:45):
They beat Duke yesterday, so it's the.
Speaker 1 (07:47):
Only game left to decide the final birth in the
College World Series tonight at seven on ESPN and Murray
State against Duke.
Speaker 2 (07:54):
And you know, Kentucky fans would.
Speaker 1 (07:58):
Love to see Duke go down in any sport, and
now you can happen at the hands of the Racers.
Would be an amazing story for Murray State.
Speaker 3 (08:05):
Oh my gosh, it would be one of the most
amazing stories I think in the history of Kentucky college sports.
Marie State can win this game tonight and go to
the College World Series. I mean, it's hard to overstate
the magnitude of what that achievement would be.
Speaker 1 (08:22):
And it's going to be interesting, you know, moving forward,
I wanted to get you on to talk about the
aftermath now of this house settlement that's been approved that
we were expecting for a long time and now it's happened,
and a lot of talk about how college sports is changing,
and a lot that we don't know how it's going
(08:43):
to fully impact the sports that we have all grown
up following, but what things for sure, it's going to
have some significant impact on the sports that don't bring
in as much money, like baseball.
Speaker 2 (08:57):
Right.
Speaker 3 (08:59):
You know, it's hard to say. I mean, one of
the interesting things about this is you can now offer
you know, baseball has been a sport without an abundance
of scholarships. I think most players on most teams have
been drawing partial scholarships. Well now you can, you know,
the schools can offer the full the full ride. It'll
be interesting to see how many are in a position
(09:21):
to do that. You know, it's hard to It's just
hard to say what's going to happen because I just
don't think we know, and I think there's gonna be
a lot of unintended consequences from this, and people want
to make kind of grand sweeping statements just as we've
entered this phase where there's been all this, you know,
so much has been changing so fast. You know, people
(09:42):
want to, you know, make sort of sweeping generalizations, and
I just don't know that we have enough evidence to
really do that. I mean, I don't think people mostly.
I think put people care about it is how it's
going to impact their team or are they going to be
more competitive or less competitive? And I just think it's
too soon to know.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (10:00):
No, I think that's a great point because you know,
there's always as I say, there's a twenty four hour
cycle and a lot of channels and a lot of
platforms and things that need need content, So people are
always going to be talking about it and offering up
opinions and debating it and et cetera, and so a
lot of times more guessing than than really truly analyzing it,
(10:25):
I think, And you wonder. I mean, there's there's a
set we know, one thing's for sure. They're going to
have a set amount of funds that every school will
have to distribute, I say, every school, the major leagues
to distribute how they choose. If you if you have
football in you know, SEC, Big ten, Big twelve, acc.
Speaker 2 (10:49):
I think the.
Speaker 1 (10:50):
Feeling is that's where the majority of the dollars are
going to go. But how the percentages are going to
break down is going to be interesting. And you know,
you think about a place like Mississippi State for examples,
one comes to mind, where baseball's been, you know, huge
part of their athletic identity more so than a lot
of other places. You know, will they spend more on
baseball at the expense of you know, football and men's basketball,
(11:11):
et cetera. All those kinds of decisions are going to
be debated.
Speaker 3 (11:14):
Right right, and you knows, most schools that have announced
their formula are basically about seventy five percent to football.
It'll be interesting to see around the margins, if you know,
people go higher or lower. It looks to me like
the way this is set up where everybody essentially has
(11:35):
you know, twenty point five million to spend across their
entire athletic department. You know, but you players can still
reap individual nil deals, but they have to go through
this Deloitte run clearing house who they declare whether it's
a legitimate nil deal or not. And I think the
(11:57):
key to this is who can figure out how to
get their nil deals cleared? So you have more money
above the revenue share.
Speaker 1 (12:04):
Yeah, and do you have you know, businesses that can
offer up quote unquote legitimate nil deals to the level
that the schools might want to do the commercials for
the local car dealer or the local contractor or whoever
it might whatever, you know, business it might be. And
you know, does that help schools in bigger cities more
(12:27):
or does it help you know, schools that are true
college towns like you know, Lexington, they don't have a
pro town. Again, all that kind of comes under what we.
Speaker 3 (12:35):
Don't know, right, that's exactly correct, and it's a good point.
You know, are USC and UCLA at an advantage because
they're in the Los Angeles market and their quote unquote
legitimate nil deals are going to be worth more than
you know, you mentioned Mississippi State. You know, I don't
know how abundant the commercial opportunities are in Starkball. So
(12:57):
that that's one thing we don't know and the other
other thing we don't know, particularly as it pertains I
think to men's men's basketball, there's a feeling that the
Big East teams that the schools that are not supporting
big time college football programs are going to have more
money to spend on men's basketball players. So does you
(13:18):
know is Saint John's and Marquette and Creighton and Gonzaga
who obviously is not in the Big East but is
a big time basketball school that does not support major
college football. Are those schools now at an advantage? Villanova,
which I think plays FCS football, are they at an advantage?
You know, that's one of the questions to be determined.
Speaker 1 (13:39):
We're talking Mark's story from the Herald Leader, and we'll
continue doing that here in just a moment on the
Leads Reports twenty three past the top of the hour,
and we're coming to you from the Clark's Pumping Shop studio. Return,
Refresh and refuel at Clark's. Make sure you get signed
up for their loyalty rewards program too.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
We'll be right back.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
Mark story with us on the Club blueinil dot com online.
You read his work in the Lexington Herald Leader Kentucky
Sports dot com online, and we're talking about the approval
of the quote unquote House Settlement, which has nothing to
do with the House of Representatives. It's an individual named house,
(14:17):
so we're talking about that. You've also got a your
most recent postmark is about the all quarter century team
for Kentucky men's basketball, other words, the best Kentucky players
since two thousand. Obviously, Anthony Davis is an easy choice.
How difficult was was it for you to fill out
(14:38):
the rest of your first team?
Speaker 3 (14:40):
You know, the first team I thought was pretty easy
to do. Now, my criteria was, I wasn't just picking
straight up, you know, here's a list of the ten
best players. I was trying to, you know, pick the
players who had had the biggest impact at Kentucky. You're
on Kentucky. And obviously that formulation is a little different
than just straight up who the ten best players. And
(15:02):
I also decided to pick by position. I just think
it's more interesting if you're picking teams to go with
positional integrity. So with those those criteria, my first team,
my small forward was well my full My power forward
was Oscar Sheebwey. My small forward was Tayshaun Prince. Anthony
(15:25):
Davis was my center, Keith Bogans is the shooting guard,
John wall is the point guard. And then I also
picked six men, and I picked the six men from
among players who had come off the bench in that role.
But Darius Miller was my first team sixth man.
Speaker 2 (15:41):
And Reed Shepherd was the second team.
Speaker 3 (15:43):
And he was That's correct because read much to the
chagrin of the fan base, that mostly came off the bench.
Speaker 4 (15:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:51):
The second team, I've got it here real quickly. It
is Willie Caley Stein at center, Jody Meeks Tyler Uless
in the backcourt, and then Kys and m kg at
the forward spots. What was the toughest call for you
to who was the who was the u of the starters?
Speaker 2 (16:10):
Who was the eleventh guy.
Speaker 3 (16:12):
The second The second team was really hard because you know,
Daron Lamb and Terrence Jones are both one thousand point
scores at the University of Kentucky. Both played here two
years and went to the final four both years, and
you know, won a national championship, you know, and it's
it's really hard not to have them on this team. Basically,
(16:33):
I got down with Chuck Hayes at power forward. You know,
Chuck played on three really good teams at Kentucky. He's
the second leading rebounder at Kentucky in the twenty first century,
and you know, just you look at what happened to
the program after he left in terms of his impact
on winning. So that's why I picked Chuck. And then
you know Jody Meeks. I was putting a big emphasis
(16:55):
on players who had done unique things at Kentucky, and
I think Jody's junior year is last year here. I
don't think anybody's had as explosive and offensive year as
he had that year. And he set that. You know,
he broke one of the most revered records and you know,
not just UK but State of Kentucky history, the all
time or the single game scoring record when he had
(17:17):
fifty four points to break Dan Issel's fifty one point record.
So I gave that a lot away to pick joke.
Speaker 1 (17:25):
It's one of those things that it makes for a
interesting debate among fans, and you can see it at
Kentucky Sports dot com. You have one for Kentucky women's
basketball coming up this week, so fans can watch for that.
Speaker 3 (17:38):
And then and then in two weeks we'll do Kentucky football.
Speaker 2 (17:41):
Ah good, okay, great, Mark, Thank you for the time,
as always.
Speaker 3 (17:45):
Thanks Tom.
Speaker 1 (17:46):
That's Mark's story at Mark c Story on x or
Twitter if you prefer. It's the leagu's Report presented by
Bobcat Enterprises Ralphrusso from the Athletic.
Speaker 2 (17:55):
We'll join us when we come right back.
Speaker 1 (17:57):
Second half of the league's report presented by Bob kat Enterprises,
and we are working to connect with Ralph Russo from
the Athletic, who's done a bunch of stories about this
house settlement that came down on Friday and that will
make big changes to the funding of college athletics and
(18:23):
to the NIL world. Supposedly they're going to try to
put up the often discussed guardrails on NIL and we'll
see if it survives legal challenges that I'm sure will
come at some point. The Commissioner of the SEC, Greg Sank,
(18:44):
and the Notre Dame ad were reportedly playing golf with
President Trump over the weekend, as college administrators are still
looking to get some help from the folks in Washington
and to lock things in to make it illegal or
(19:06):
make it illegal to challenge some of the things that
they have been put in place for the moment. You know,
if an IL deal gets turned down, I'm assuming they could,
you know, take.
Speaker 2 (19:17):
That to court and fight it. So we'll see.
Speaker 1 (19:19):
As Mark Story said, a lot to be determined on this.
Hopefully we can connect with Ralph Russo Hill here shortly
because he's should have some.
Speaker 2 (19:26):
Great insight on it.
Speaker 1 (19:28):
In the meantime, let me wrap up our triple Crown
coverage the Spring, which has once again been presented by
Clayburne Farm doing the usual, unusually well and an impressive
performance by Sovereignty. I was taking my stand again with
Journalism and he was well positioned, didn't have any of
the traffic issues that were there for him in the
(19:50):
Derby of the Pregous and made his move turning for
home and if he was good enough, that was the
time to open up and show it. And instead Sovereignty
just ran right past him like he did in the
Derby and got a speed figure buyer speed figure that
was higher than his Derby speed figure. So Journalism ran
(20:12):
a very solid race and Baiza was third as he
was in the Derby, but neither one could have a
good answer for Sovereignty. So he has firmly established himself
as the top three year old in the country. And
next will be pointed to the Traverse Stakes in late
August back there at Saratoga at that same mile and
a quarter distance, basically what he just did in the Belmont,
(20:35):
and then after that it would be the Breeders Cup
Classic and then the Dubai World Cup next year for
Sovereignty to complete a very ambitious schedule. Or a horse
that really kind of had his breakout moment in a
stakes race in the opening of the Fall Meet at
Churchill Downs late last October, and I think is a
(20:57):
Maiden one a steak very impressively and then came back
to win the Derby. So congrats to the connections of Sovereignty.
They stood by their plan to skip the Preakness and
their horse was ready to deliver a big time shot
in the Belmont Stakes on Saturday. Dick Girardi, our analyst
who was with us on Friday, may have helped you
(21:20):
cash a bet yesterday. He told you that his bet
for the Belmont was actually a daily double with Deterministic
in the Manhattan Stakes to Journalism in the Belmont, and
they ended up because of all the rain up at
Saratoga postponing the Manhattan Stakes to yesterday. And if you
stayed with the Dick Girardi's thoughts on Deterministic, you would
have cashed to the tune of five or six to
(21:42):
one yesterday in the Manhattan for Deterministic to win that,
so hopefully it was a little productive for you financially.
This day in Wildcat history, it's always the service of
Kentucky road Show Sports cards and memorabilia. They're on Romney
Road in Lexington and at roadshow cards dot Com. And
it's some wild kad birthdays. Lamont Butler celebrating a birthday today.
(22:06):
Was a great player in his one season at Kentucky
for Mark Pope's first team, and then had his season
derailed by injuries. He was able to finish it out,
but was in and out of the lineup. And you know,
I always go back to the fact that friend Mike O.
Coursey had him as a preseason or excuse me, he's
a mid season second team All American. It's how well
(22:26):
Lamont was playing at the time the injuries started to
surface for him. James Lee on the seventy eight National
Championship team, James celebrating a birthday today, and Dicky v
Dick Vitale, Happy birthday to him and congrats to him
on his cancer free diagnosis that he recently received. It's
the Leads Report and we are presented each day by
(22:49):
Bobcat Enterprises, one of our great Partners is also Cornbread
Hemp and Father's Days coming up, so you can give
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Speaker 2 (23:04):
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a tough round of golf, maybe the infused gummies could
do the trick. Or a new line of infused Seltzers
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(23:49):
We'll be right back here on the Leach Report Radio Network.
Guess on the Leads Report, company of you, the Club
Blueennil dot com hotline and UK baseball coach Nick Minjeo,
and should be as lucky as we are here on
the Leach Report to have a Hall of Famer in
the bullpen. Uh, Gabriel, Big Gabriel joins us. Now, we're
(24:12):
unsuccessful on our efforts to reach Ral Russo from the Athletics,
So we'll get every scheduled to talk about this house
settlement and maybe get into a little bit of that
with Gabe here. But first game, I just wanted to
talk with you a little bit, and I appreciate you
jumping in to help us out Kentucky Baseball. To me,
I mean, you are closer to the scene than I am.
(24:33):
But it seems like things are shaking up pretty well.
I mean, you know, you're gonna lose some people in
the portal every year, but they've been able, it seems like,
to hold on to most of their key guys.
Speaker 2 (24:43):
Right.
Speaker 3 (24:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (24:45):
I was just you know, it's funny I was looking
at that preparing for my show today.
Speaker 4 (24:50):
But you always have to check the portal, don't you.
Speaker 5 (24:52):
When you meet up in the morning again next you know,
next thing you know you find a ye're in the portal.
But Kentucky basically had as what could be it's starting
infield back.
Speaker 4 (25:03):
You know, I.
Speaker 5 (25:03):
Couldn't say that going into this year, could they? But
starting with Tyler Bell they all freshman shortstop.
Speaker 4 (25:10):
But Luke Lawrence comes back.
Speaker 5 (25:12):
He was terrific defensively, and you know, he let Illinois
State in batting for two years before he transferred in
and by the end of this year he was probably
Kentucky's most consistent hitter. You know, they got Hudson brown Back,
that Ethan Handleback. The key though time, you know, is
the pitchers. And you've got Ben Cleaver and Ethan Walker,
a couple of lefties. But right now they're really stocking
(25:34):
up in the portal on pitching.
Speaker 4 (25:37):
So yeah, you got to feel pretty good right now.
But it is way early, isn't it?
Speaker 2 (25:41):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (25:42):
It is, I think is it four pitchers they've forgotten already,
the most recent being the young man from right hander
from North Florida.
Speaker 5 (25:48):
Yeah, Bryson Trichel or Trischel. They got a kid from
Western Kentucky, got the kid from Northern.
Speaker 4 (25:54):
Kentucky and e KU. So you know, they're kind of.
Speaker 5 (25:58):
Pulling kids from the regional schools just to be expected.
And I always like it when you get a kid
from a program like in North Florida. You know, I mean,
obviously Nick Minjill knows a lot more about those programs
than we do. But I was just listening to a
podcast or talk about an NAI team the LSU Shreveport.
Speaker 4 (26:16):
Tom went fifty nine and oh and won.
Speaker 5 (26:19):
The national titles. So you got to wonder how many
of those.
Speaker 2 (26:21):
Kids might be in a portal fifty nine and O.
Speaker 1 (26:26):
What they said, goodness, that's that's quite a number. So
that it sounds good for Kentucky baseball, you know, better
than it did this type of a year ago with
just all of the you know between you know, guys
that just were out of eligibility and and moving on
and so forth.
Speaker 2 (26:47):
Yeah, they had so many a.
Speaker 4 (26:49):
Lot of guys went pro. Yeah, yeah, a lot of
guys signed contracts.
Speaker 1 (26:53):
So hopefully they should have a probably a much higher
opinion of Kentucky baseball hitting in the next season.
Speaker 2 (27:00):
And you had a nice year this year.
Speaker 1 (27:02):
It was frustrating with the last loss there to West Virginia,
and what a many frustrating losses, but a lot of times,
you know, some of that there's an element of I
think it's Phil Steele does his analysis of college football teams,
and he always builds in a luck component, which is
obviously is entirely subjective, but that's part of it, you know,
(27:23):
whether it's luck with injuries or luck with you know,
a bad bounce or a ball you rip down the line,
hits the line instead of going foul or whatever. That
a lot of that seemed to go against Kentucky. So
you would hope fate would turn the other way next year.
Speaker 5 (27:39):
Yeah, you know, and you've got to close teams out.
North Carolina eliminated at home, Arizona's going to Omaha because
Carolina couldn't hold a three two eighty eighth inning. Bullpen
let it down, bullpen, let Kentucky down. Odd the enough
defense I just mentioned Lawrence and Bell, each one made
a crucial error in games. So you know, you just
(28:01):
everything went right last year and too many things went
wrong this year. And still the fact Darren Hedrick Keith
pointing this part of our chain gang the UK radio
voice that just for this team tom to get into tournament,
to get to a regional and put itself in a
position to get to a super regional when you look
at the big picture, was pretty phenomenal.
Speaker 2 (28:22):
Talk with Dick Gabriel.
Speaker 1 (28:22):
It's that Big Blue Insider one on X and the
Big Blue Insider Show weeknights here in the Lexington market
from six to eight pm Eastern Time. How cool a
story would it be if Murray State could be Duke
tonight to make the college mild serious not impossible.
Speaker 5 (28:39):
I mean, we saw Murray State come in here and win.
And right now the Racers are playing their best baseball.
They got guys who can put the bat on the ball.
I don't know how deep their pitching is, because right now,
that's what it's all about. When you're in tournament play
and you turn around, but you talk about confidence. Man,
I don't think Murray's ever been to Omaha. So and
(29:00):
you got teams going back for the first time in
a long time, that would be the story of the tournament.
And I was telling somebody that first time I ever
went to the College World Series was when I was
actually working in Dallas in nineteen eighty four, but I
produced a show for CBS Radio Sports, so I flew
to Omaha just to do a piece on the College
(29:20):
World Series. And there was Johnny Reagan, the venerable Murray
State coach, and he was surrounded by all these VIPs
because he was a VIP, you know, one of the
grow all time greats in college baseball. So that will
kind of bring things full circle.
Speaker 2 (29:34):
How about that.
Speaker 1 (29:35):
We're talking with Dick Gabriel here on the Leads Report
presented by Bobcat Enterprises, and the house settlement is going
to get talked about a lot now that it's in place.
The judge signed off on it heading into the weekend,
and as Mark Story said earlier when he was with.
Speaker 2 (29:52):
Us, there's just so much that we don't know.
Speaker 1 (29:55):
It would be a lot of speculation on what's going
to happen and how things are going to play out
that we just really do not know. And it's everything
from you know, how will it stand up to legal
challenges to you know, how you know money is going
to be distributed by the athletic departments for the money
that they will you know, oversee b outside of you
(30:16):
know nil, but just the twenty plus million that they're
going to distribute and figure out how to do it,
how to spread it among the sports, and that's going
to be a very hot topic.
Speaker 2 (30:25):
I would think, right.
Speaker 4 (30:27):
Oh, absolutely, that's what's going to be the topic.
Speaker 5 (30:30):
Really, although you mentioned the lawsuits inevitably, you know, you
run no right now. There are attorneys who are looking
at chops right now because they know they are going
to be opportunities. Athletes just want an opportunity. Well, and
I'm not knocking the profession, but we're so litigious now
as a society. But here's the thing to remember, Tom,
I was over in Richmond last week and you talked
(30:52):
about Jan Weisberg being hired by EKU, and you know,
he had spent he was at a D three school,
Birmingham Southern and wildly successful, spend a year of Valdosta
State D two. Now he signs up to coach as
a head coach in D one And I asked him,
I said, this is the most challenging time in the
history of D one sports. But he said, you got
(31:13):
to plow into it. Not like it's a problem, you know,
but here's the challenge. I always worry about the Ekus
of the world in a situation like this. UK's athletics
budget now it's one hundred and fifty million dollars. I
remember when they announced it a top one hundred million,
and it wasn't that long ago. Ekused budget Tom is
twenty three million dollars in athletics and when they get
(31:36):
a the money, the upcoming chunk of money, it's going
to be two hundred and seventy thousand dollars. So and
that's a D one school with everything but football. So
I worry about you just mentioned Murray State Western Kentucky
in fact D one at football.
Speaker 4 (31:50):
I think the.
Speaker 5 (31:51):
Sad truth is I firmly believe, and it's already starting
because I think one of the might be UNC Greensboro
or one of those schools down there, has dropped base.
You are going to see sports and athletic programs slowly
but surely dropped from colleges, which means opportunities for a
lot of kids to go to school.
Speaker 4 (32:10):
I'm not talking about grooming them for the pros.
Speaker 5 (32:12):
I'm talking about going to college on a scholarship or
a partial scholarship.
Speaker 4 (32:17):
That's going to be gone, you know.
Speaker 5 (32:19):
So I think this is going to be again and
I said this five years ago when all this started
the end of college athletics.
Speaker 4 (32:26):
As we know it.
Speaker 5 (32:27):
And I don't know what the solution is, but thankfully
there are some smart people in charge.
Speaker 2 (32:32):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (32:32):
I mean, it's definitely going to be significantly different. It's
just how it's going to all shake out. And you
know how you know how many sports will will go away?
If you know, if there is there going to be
a small number, is it going to be a large number?
Speaker 2 (32:49):
Uh?
Speaker 1 (32:49):
And you know they're obviously football, men's basketball, and then
other sports at various places, Uh, you know are bigger
someplace than others.
Speaker 2 (33:01):
Uh, outside of those two.
Speaker 1 (33:02):
But you think about here at Kentucky, you know, it's
the track program, for example, has had a lot of
success one of picking out out of the group you
know that produced Olympic champions and you know, Cidy McLaughlin
and Zi Russell a couple come to mind, et cetera,
Jasmacho Quinn, et cetera that have done great things that
(33:26):
Kentucky fans you know, get into take pride in ye.
But all that, you know, to to compete in any
of these sports at a high level, it takes funds.
Speaker 4 (33:36):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (33:37):
Yeah, And I think Kentucky's going to be okay because
it's in the SEC. And I always think back to
all the people, some media people banging them.
Speaker 4 (33:44):
They've got to get out of the SEC? Are you
kidding me?
Speaker 5 (33:46):
Do you know how smart it was now to stay
in the SEC? But yeah, it's gonna be okay. But yeah,
like you said, what they call the Olympic sports, the
non revenue sports, Uh, they're the ones that are going
to be in danger. And I'm hoping that guys like
Greg Sankie think about that what's best for college sports
not just the SEC, but commissioners have to do best
(34:09):
by their own conferences. So but somebody and now they've
they've they've signed basically a commissioner now for college sports
and I'm hoping. I can't remember the guy's name.
Speaker 1 (34:19):
Is Brian Sealey. He's like a former MLB guy, Ivy
League educated. Uh yeah, guy that's been in uh but
has a uh, you know, a background somewhat in you know,
this kind of areas. He's gonna basically be the head
of the College Sports Commission, which is going to be
kind of the new n C double A right.
Speaker 5 (34:38):
Yep, And I'm just hoping he doesn't spend all this
time bending and need to the TV people, to the
money people. Let's do what's best for college sports in general. Uh.
And I know you've got to take care of the
schools at the top because they float the boats. But uh,
it's it's gonna be a challenge.
Speaker 1 (34:53):
I know.
Speaker 5 (34:53):
By the way you mentioned Mark's story typically BB I
cap to John Clay announcing his retirement. Great guy, great reporter,
and a great guest on a talk show.
Speaker 1 (35:03):
Isn't he Yes, he'll be available more now, I guess
to us. But yeah, I knew that was coming. I
don't know if it had been announced yet.
Speaker 4 (35:10):
So yes, yeah, it's on Twitter.
Speaker 1 (35:15):
He has been an outstanding writer. John and I worked
in the Kentucky Colonel together. You were a Colonel writer.
John and I were in our freshman years at UK
in nineteen seventy nine writing stories for the Colonel.
Speaker 2 (35:28):
Together.
Speaker 1 (35:29):
One of us went on to become a great writer.
Speaker 4 (35:32):
I didn't know. I don't think I knew you worked
for the Colonel. I'm so proud of you.
Speaker 1 (35:36):
Oh yeah, John, I I don't know if you'd say
I worked for the Colonel, went on on staff or anything,
but I wrote some stories. In fact, I have a
football preview tab as the phrasing used to be, and
John and I both had stories in it.
Speaker 2 (35:49):
I have it.
Speaker 5 (35:50):
John was coming in as I was going out, so
I just missed you.
Speaker 2 (35:54):
Well all at greatness that you missed from the right there.
Speaker 4 (35:59):
I can go back and.
Speaker 1 (35:59):
Look, as Corey Price shows us, you can go back
and find about anything.
Speaker 5 (36:05):
That's truck He's the master. He is the absolute master.
Speaker 1 (36:09):
Gabe, thank you for coming out of the bullpen. All right, brother,
that's the Gabriel Big Blue Insider one on x or Twitter,
and uh, we'll get to a quick break, come back
and close out this edition of the Leach Report.
Speaker 2 (36:20):
In just a moment.
Speaker 1 (36:22):
Let's talk about shuffle Bean Coffee, Kentucky based company that
started a little more than a decade ago. A group
of Kentuckians got together with this plan to start a
coffee company, and they said.
Speaker 2 (36:34):
We're gonna do this. Let's be the best.
Speaker 1 (36:37):
And so they like to say they follow the process
of the producing the coffee from seed to cup. So
it starts with the very best of the coffee beans
that they can find, and then that turns into shuffle
Bean coffee, which is available at events at Rupperino in
the KFC Young Center and various restaurants here in Central
Kentucky as well. Go to Shufflebean dot us. You can
(36:59):
find out more about the cup. You can order some
product there. You can get it through Amazon and you
can also pick it up at Central Kentucky Meyer stores.
It's Shufflebean Coffee. Have you got your youngster signed up
for Club Blue Kids yet? I can go to Club
Bluenil dot com and do that for free. Click on
the Kids tab. The young man or young lady in
your home will get a T shirt, a membership card,
(37:19):
a lanyard, plus access to exclusive events, athlete experiences, meet
and greets. I think they just had one over the
weekend with Brandy Garrison, one of those exclusive events that
your youngster can be involved with through Club Blue Kids.
Club Blues, the official NIL fundraising partner.
Speaker 2 (37:36):
For UK Athletics.
Speaker 1 (37:37):
That's going to do it for this edition of the
Lead Report. We will see you tomorrow. Have a good day, everybody,
Hey, everybody, hope you had a great weekend. Welcome into
the Leech Report, presented by Bobcat Enterprises, and we have
a couple of guests today that will spend a good
bit of time talking about the changing landscape for college athletics.
Mark's story from the Lexington Herald Leader and Ralph Russo
(00:21):
from the Athletic And on Friday, if you're a college
sports fan, you probably saw this the House Settlement. That
phrase has been thrown around a lot. The case is
named for somebody named House, and it was a settlement
between the plain offfs and defendants that a judge had
to sign off on and she did on Friday. And
(00:46):
so now colleges can directly compensate players up to north
of twenty million dollars. So that's got to be spread
over all the sports. And that's part of the story
here that will play out over the coming months and
years maybe is how those decisions are made to fund
(01:12):
various sports and do any sports end up getting cut
all of that? So we'll get into some of that today.
It's one of those good summer topics. No games going on,
so we can delve a little deeper into something like this.
With Ralph Russo who's covered it Intanley for The Athletic,
and then Mark Story who has written about it for
(01:32):
The Harold Leader Wildcat News of the Day, a service
of Giuseppes of Lexington. Shay Gilgis Alexander gets his first
win in the NBA Finals last night and caseon Wallace too.
They went with that same starting lineup, so both of
them started last night in Game two for OKC, which
beat the Pacers one twenty three to one oh seven,
so the series is now even at one win apiece
(01:55):
and Shay had thirty four points and eight assists, so
he's gone thirty plus in both of his games so far.
Games three and four will be in Indianapolis. I believe
it's Wednesday and Friday of this week. UK Baseball picking
up a transfer. They have tried to bolster their pitching
(02:17):
staff through the portal so far, and I believe this
is the fourth pitcher that they've picked up from North
Florida Bryson, and I'm assuming it's Trickle. He was four
and five of a five point two five ERA, struck
out seventy four batters in sixty one innings this past season.
A right handed pitcher, and then Baseball America reporting I
(02:38):
think this was on Friday. Four key Wildcats have made
the decision to stick with Kentucky and not enter the portal.
Tyler Bell, the outstanding freshman shortstop, Ryan Schwartz, outstanding freshman
right fielder, and pitchers Ben Cleaver and Nate Harris two
of the three weekend starters. So some great news there
(03:01):
for coach Bingio. And after all of the change that
happened from the College World Series team last summer to
this season, seems like they'll have a good bit more
carryover with key guys heading into next season, which should
bode well for the prospects for Kentucky baseball. And you
(03:23):
know how baseball and other sports that don't generate as
much revenue as football and men's basketball are going to
fare in this new world of college athletics is going
to be an interesting discussion how they'll get funded, et
cetera that we'll get into with our guests today. Several
pieces of news for Kentucky men's basketball. Tyren Stokes reportedly
(03:45):
is on campus making an official visit. Number one recruits
in the class of twenty twenty six, and Walker Horn
is returning to the team. He had announced he was
entering the portal earlier. Some of that was related to
this house settlement because I didn't know how that was
going to shake out. As far as your rosters can
(04:08):
go to fifteen players now for men's basketball, and so
there's going to be a spot for Walker because Kentucky
has fourteen.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
And I know he.
Speaker 1 (04:18):
Didn't play a lot, but he was a very key
piece of what they do, the son of coach Darren Horne.
Walker was always on the scout team that would run
the other team's offense against the Wildcats in practices, and
he was frequently the guy player, the role of the
other team's best player if he was on the perimeter
(04:39):
and give them a quote unquote good look in practice.
And just a nice young man. So happy to see
that Walker is going to be back with the team
next season. K sor ry to report of the numbers
being set Jersey numbers for the players heading into next season.
Several newcomers. So let me just go through these. Denzel
(05:00):
Aberdeen will wear number one, Jasper Johnson number two, Cam
Williams number three. It's always interesting you to go through
think about what other players have worn that number. Rix
Chapman was number three for example, Andrea Yalovich number four.
It's Kyle Macy's number. Jalen Low fifteen. First one that
(05:21):
pops to mind at fifteen's DeMarcus Cousins. Ironically it's been
a big man number. Alex Croza I think was fifteen. Also,
I'll have to look at the Wildcat History site from
John Scott to get all of these. I know Jaden
Quaint's has got a number with a lot of history
to it. Twenty one that's the Goose plus s Tay
Shawn Prince, Brandon Hawthorne. Twenty two, that's our dear friend
(05:44):
Mike Pratt's number, Mohammed Diabate twenty three, that's the number,
Anthony Davis war Malachai Moreno. Twenty four, Rhys Potter number
thirty three. So those are the jersey numbers for the
Newcats for next season. Wildcat News of the Day a
service of Giuseppes of Lexington and they're located just off
(06:08):
Nicholasville Road outside Man of War here in Lexington. When
you're looking to celebrate a special occasion or just have
a really special night out, make a Giuseppes Live Jazz
music to a company your meal if you sit in
the lounge area. The food's fantastic. The pasta's homemade handcut
steaks for seafood shipped in a lot of locally sourced ingredients.
You can check it all out of Juseppes Lexington dot
(06:28):
com and go to open table to make your reservation.
Speaker 2 (06:31):
We're head into a break.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
As we do, let me remind you about the Committee
of One O one aka the Blue Coats.
Speaker 2 (06:37):
They're looking for new members.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
Email UK one o one Membership at gmail dot com
to get information about their organization and find out how
you can apply. It's open to men and women, commonly
renown again as the Blue Coats, an all volunteer group
that has proudly served UK athletics with distinction since nineteen
sixty six. That's UK one on one membership at gmail
dot com. We'll be right back with Mark's story from
(07:01):
the Herald Leader. Inch of course presented each day by
Bobcat Enterprises, and they have four locations around the state.
Google Bobcat. When you need to buy or rent some
heavy equipment for a job site. They're getting excavators or forklifts, tractors,
et cetera, and if you need a new zero turn
mo or for your home, they'll have that two parts.
Speaker 2 (07:22):
For those equipped pieces of equipment.
Speaker 1 (07:24):
As well, all at Bobcat Enterprises with four locations around Kentucky.
Mark's story joins us now from the Lexington Herald Leader
at Kentucky Sports dot com on the Club Blueenile dot
com hotline, Mark one of the real cool stories in
college sports could be the Murray State Racers going to
the College Baseball World Series.
Speaker 2 (07:45):
They beat Duke yesterday, so it's the.
Speaker 1 (07:47):
Only game left to decide the final birth in the
College World Series tonight at seven on ESPN and Murray
State against Duke.
Speaker 2 (07:54):
And you know, Kentucky fans would.
Speaker 1 (07:58):
Love to see Duke go down in any sport, and
now you can happen at the hands of the Racers.
Would be an amazing story for Murray State.
Speaker 3 (08:05):
Oh my gosh, it would be one of the most
amazing stories I think in the history of Kentucky college sports.
Marie State can win this game tonight and go to
the College World Series. I mean, it's hard to overstate
the magnitude of what that achievement would be.
Speaker 1 (08:22):
And it's going to be interesting, you know, moving forward,
I wanted to get you on to talk about the
aftermath now of this house settlement that's been approved that
we were expecting for a long time and now it's happened,
and a lot of talk about how college sports is changing,
and a lot that we don't know how it's going
(08:43):
to fully impact the sports that we have all grown
up following, but what things for sure, it's going to
have some significant impact on the sports that don't bring
in as much money, like baseball.
Speaker 2 (08:57):
Right.
Speaker 3 (08:59):
You know, it's hard to say. I mean, one of
the interesting things about this is you can now offer
you know, baseball has been a sport without an abundance
of scholarships. I think most players on most teams have
been drawing partial scholarships. Well now you can, you know,
the schools can offer the full the full ride. It'll
be interesting to see how many are in a position
(09:21):
to do that. You know, it's hard to It's just
hard to say what's going to happen because I just
don't think we know, and I think there's gonna be
a lot of unintended consequences from this, and people want
to make kind of grand sweeping statements just as we've
entered this phase where there's been all this, you know,
so much has been changing so fast. You know, people
(09:42):
want to, you know, make sort of sweeping generalizations, and
I just don't know that we have enough evidence to
really do that. I mean, I don't think people mostly.
I think put people care about it is how it's
going to impact their team or are they going to be
more competitive or less competitive? And I just think it's
too soon to know.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (10:00):
No, I think that's a great point because you know,
there's always as I say, there's a twenty four hour
cycle and a lot of channels and a lot of
platforms and things that need need content, So people are
always going to be talking about it and offering up
opinions and debating it and et cetera, and so a
lot of times more guessing than than really truly analyzing it,
(10:25):
I think, And you wonder. I mean, there's there's a
set we know, one thing's for sure. They're going to
have a set amount of funds that every school will
have to distribute, I say, every school, the major leagues
to distribute how they choose. If you if you have
football in you know, SEC, Big ten, Big twelve, acc.
Speaker 2 (10:49):
I think the.
Speaker 1 (10:50):
Feeling is that's where the majority of the dollars are
going to go. But how the percentages are going to
break down is going to be interesting. And you know,
you think about a place like Mississippi State for examples,
one comes to mind, where baseball's been, you know, huge
part of their athletic identity more so than a lot
of other places. You know, will they spend more on
baseball at the expense of you know, football and men's basketball,
(11:11):
et cetera. All those kinds of decisions are going to
be debated.
Speaker 3 (11:14):
Right right, and you knows, most schools that have announced
their formula are basically about seventy five percent to football.
It'll be interesting to see around the margins, if you know,
people go higher or lower. It looks to me like
the way this is set up where everybody essentially has
(11:35):
you know, twenty point five million to spend across their
entire athletic department. You know, but you players can still
reap individual nil deals, but they have to go through
this Deloitte run clearing house who they declare whether it's
a legitimate nil deal or not. And I think the
(11:57):
key to this is who can figure out how to
get their nil deals cleared? So you have more money
above the revenue share.
Speaker 1 (12:04):
Yeah, and do you have you know, businesses that can
offer up quote unquote legitimate nil deals to the level
that the schools might want to do the commercials for
the local car dealer or the local contractor or whoever
it might whatever, you know, business it might be. And
you know, does that help schools in bigger cities more
(12:27):
or does it help you know, schools that are true
college towns like you know, Lexington, they don't have a
pro town. Again, all that kind of comes under what we.
Speaker 3 (12:35):
Don't know, right, that's exactly correct, and it's a good point.
You know, are USC and UCLA at an advantage because
they're in the Los Angeles market and their quote unquote
legitimate nil deals are going to be worth more than
you know, you mentioned Mississippi State. You know, I don't
know how abundant the commercial opportunities are in Starkball. So
(12:57):
that that's one thing we don't know and the other
other thing we don't know, particularly as it pertains I
think to men's men's basketball, there's a feeling that the
Big East teams that the schools that are not supporting
big time college football programs are going to have more
money to spend on men's basketball players. So does you
(13:18):
know is Saint John's and Marquette and Creighton and Gonzaga
who obviously is not in the Big East but is
a big time basketball school that does not support major
college football. Are those schools now at an advantage? Villanova,
which I think plays FCS football, are they at an advantage?
You know, that's one of the questions to be determined.
Speaker 1 (13:39):
We're talking Mark's story from the Herald Leader, and we'll
continue doing that here in just a moment on the
Leads Reports twenty three past the top of the hour,
and we're coming to you from the Clark's Pumping Shop studio. Return,
Refresh and refuel at Clark's. Make sure you get signed
up for their loyalty rewards program too.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
We'll be right back.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
Mark story with us on the Club blueinil dot com online.
You read his work in the Lexington Herald Leader Kentucky
Sports dot com online, and we're talking about the approval
of the quote unquote House Settlement, which has nothing to
do with the House of Representatives. It's an individual named house,
(14:17):
so we're talking about that. You've also got a your
most recent postmark is about the all quarter century team
for Kentucky men's basketball, other words, the best Kentucky players
since two thousand. Obviously, Anthony Davis is an easy choice.
How difficult was was it for you to fill out
(14:38):
the rest of your first team?
Speaker 3 (14:40):
You know, the first team I thought was pretty easy
to do. Now, my criteria was, I wasn't just picking
straight up, you know, here's a list of the ten
best players. I was trying to, you know, pick the
players who had had the biggest impact at Kentucky. You're
on Kentucky. And obviously that formulation is a little different
than just straight up who the ten best players. And
(15:02):
I also decided to pick by position. I just think
it's more interesting if you're picking teams to go with
positional integrity. So with those those criteria, my first team,
my small forward was well my full My power forward
was Oscar Sheebwey. My small forward was Tayshaun Prince. Anthony
(15:25):
Davis was my center, Keith Bogans is the shooting guard,
John wall is the point guard. And then I also
picked six men, and I picked the six men from
among players who had come off the bench in that role.
But Darius Miller was my first team sixth man.
Speaker 2 (15:41):
And Reed Shepherd was the second team.
Speaker 3 (15:43):
And he was That's correct because read much to the
chagrin of the fan base, that mostly came off the bench.
Speaker 4 (15:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:51):
The second team, I've got it here real quickly. It
is Willie Caley Stein at center, Jody Meeks Tyler Uless
in the backcourt, and then Kys and m kg at
the forward spots. What was the toughest call for you
to who was the who was the u of the starters?
Speaker 2 (16:10):
Who was the eleventh guy.
Speaker 3 (16:12):
The second The second team was really hard because you know,
Daron Lamb and Terrence Jones are both one thousand point
scores at the University of Kentucky. Both played here two
years and went to the final four both years, and
you know, won a national championship, you know, and it's
it's really hard not to have them on this team. Basically,
(16:33):
I got down with Chuck Hayes at power forward. You know,
Chuck played on three really good teams at Kentucky. He's
the second leading rebounder at Kentucky in the twenty first century,
and you know, just you look at what happened to
the program after he left in terms of his impact
on winning. So that's why I picked Chuck. And then
you know Jody Meeks. I was putting a big emphasis
(16:55):
on players who had done unique things at Kentucky, and
I think Jody's junior year is last year here. I
don't think anybody's had as explosive and offensive year as
he had that year. And he set that. You know,
he broke one of the most revered records and you know,
not just UK but State of Kentucky history, the all
time or the single game scoring record when he had
(17:17):
fifty four points to break Dan Issel's fifty one point record.
So I gave that a lot away to pick joke.
Speaker 1 (17:25):
It's one of those things that it makes for a
interesting debate among fans, and you can see it at
Kentucky Sports dot com. You have one for Kentucky women's
basketball coming up this week, so fans can watch for that.
Speaker 3 (17:38):
And then and then in two weeks we'll do Kentucky football.
Speaker 2 (17:41):
Ah good, okay, great, Mark, Thank you for the time,
as always.
Speaker 3 (17:45):
Thanks Tom.
Speaker 1 (17:46):
That's Mark's story at Mark c Story on x or
Twitter if you prefer. It's the leagu's Report presented by
Bobcat Enterprises Ralphrusso from the Athletic.
Speaker 2 (17:55):
We'll join us when we come right back.
Speaker 1 (17:57):
Second half of the league's report presented by Bob kat Enterprises,
and we are working to connect with Ralph Russo from
the Athletic, who's done a bunch of stories about this
house settlement that came down on Friday and that will
make big changes to the funding of college athletics and
(18:23):
to the NIL world. Supposedly they're going to try to
put up the often discussed guardrails on NIL and we'll
see if it survives legal challenges that I'm sure will
come at some point. The Commissioner of the SEC, Greg Sank,
(18:44):
and the Notre Dame ad were reportedly playing golf with
President Trump over the weekend, as college administrators are still
looking to get some help from the folks in Washington
and to lock things in to make it illegal or
(19:06):
make it illegal to challenge some of the things that
they have been put in place for the moment. You know,
if an IL deal gets turned down, I'm assuming they could,
you know, take.
Speaker 2 (19:17):
That to court and fight it. So we'll see.
Speaker 1 (19:19):
As Mark Story said, a lot to be determined on this.
Hopefully we can connect with Ralph Russo Hill here shortly
because he's should have some.
Speaker 2 (19:26):
Great insight on it.
Speaker 1 (19:28):
In the meantime, let me wrap up our triple Crown
coverage the Spring, which has once again been presented by
Clayburne Farm doing the usual, unusually well and an impressive
performance by Sovereignty. I was taking my stand again with
Journalism and he was well positioned, didn't have any of
the traffic issues that were there for him in the
(19:50):
Derby of the Pregous and made his move turning for
home and if he was good enough, that was the
time to open up and show it. And instead Sovereignty
just ran right past him like he did in the
Derby and got a speed figure buyer speed figure that
was higher than his Derby speed figure. So Journalism ran
(20:12):
a very solid race and Baiza was third as he
was in the Derby, but neither one could have a
good answer for Sovereignty. So he has firmly established himself
as the top three year old in the country. And
next will be pointed to the Traverse Stakes in late
August back there at Saratoga at that same mile and
a quarter distance, basically what he just did in the Belmont,
(20:35):
and then after that it would be the Breeders Cup
Classic and then the Dubai World Cup next year for
Sovereignty to complete a very ambitious schedule. Or a horse
that really kind of had his breakout moment in a
stakes race in the opening of the Fall Meet at
Churchill Downs late last October, and I think is a
(20:57):
Maiden one a steak very impressively and then came back
to win the Derby. So congrats to the connections of Sovereignty.
They stood by their plan to skip the Preakness and
their horse was ready to deliver a big time shot
in the Belmont Stakes on Saturday. Dick Girardi, our analyst
who was with us on Friday, may have helped you
(21:20):
cash a bet yesterday. He told you that his bet
for the Belmont was actually a daily double with Deterministic
in the Manhattan Stakes to Journalism in the Belmont, and
they ended up because of all the rain up at
Saratoga postponing the Manhattan Stakes to yesterday. And if you
stayed with the Dick Girardi's thoughts on Deterministic, you would
have cashed to the tune of five or six to
(21:42):
one yesterday in the Manhattan for Deterministic to win that,
so hopefully it was a little productive for you financially.
This day in Wildcat history, it's always the service of
Kentucky road Show Sports cards and memorabilia. They're on Romney
Road in Lexington and at roadshow cards dot Com. And
it's some wild kad birthdays. Lamont Butler celebrating a birthday today.
(22:06):
Was a great player in his one season at Kentucky
for Mark Pope's first team, and then had his season
derailed by injuries. He was able to finish it out,
but was in and out of the lineup. And you know,
I always go back to the fact that friend Mike O.
Coursey had him as a preseason or excuse me, he's
a mid season second team All American. It's how well
(22:26):
Lamont was playing at the time the injuries started to
surface for him. James Lee on the seventy eight National
Championship team, James celebrating a birthday today, and Dicky v
Dick Vitale, Happy birthday to him and congrats to him
on his cancer free diagnosis that he recently received. It's
the Leads Report and we are presented each day by
(22:49):
Bobcat Enterprises, one of our great Partners is also Cornbread
Hemp and Father's Days coming up, so you can give
dad a break that he'll feel with a little help
from cornbread Hemp. If it's sore muscle, get them some
of the bombs and lotions from cornbreadthamp dot com.
Speaker 2 (23:04):
If he just needs.
Speaker 1 (23:05):
To relax at the end of a tough day after
a tough round of golf, maybe the infused gummies could
do the trick. Or a new line of infused Seltzers
that they're offering at cornbreadamp dot com. They're all made
right here in Kentucky with Kentucky grown hemp. It's the
kind of gift that says thanks Dad for everything without
the wrapping paper.
Speaker 2 (23:23):
So if you're the dad in question and they don't
get it for you, get it.
Speaker 1 (23:27):
For yourself at cornbreadhamp dot com. And if you put
in the code Tom at checkout and it's your first order,
your new customer, you'll get twenty percent off cornbreadamp dot com.
Cornbreadhamp this is the good life. And again it is
all one hundred percent federally legal and ships throughout the
US except in Idaho. Check it out at cornbreadhamp dot com.
One hundred percent legal and made with real Kentucky grown hemp.
(23:49):
We'll be right back here on the Leach Report Radio Network.
Guess on the Leads Report, company of you, the Club
Blueennil dot com hotline and UK baseball coach Nick Minjeo,
and should be as lucky as we are here on
the Leach Report to have a Hall of Famer in
the bullpen. Uh, Gabriel, Big Gabriel joins us. Now, we're
(24:12):
unsuccessful on our efforts to reach Ral Russo from the Athletics,
So we'll get every scheduled to talk about this house
settlement and maybe get into a little bit of that
with Gabe here. But first game, I just wanted to
talk with you a little bit, and I appreciate you
jumping in to help us out Kentucky Baseball. To me,
I mean, you are closer to the scene than I am.
(24:33):
But it seems like things are shaking up pretty well.
I mean, you know, you're gonna lose some people in
the portal every year, but they've been able, it seems like,
to hold on to most of their key guys.
Speaker 2 (24:43):
Right.
Speaker 3 (24:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (24:45):
I was just you know, it's funny I was looking
at that preparing for my show today.
Speaker 4 (24:50):
But you always have to check the portal, don't you.
Speaker 5 (24:52):
When you meet up in the morning again next you know,
next thing you know you find a ye're in the portal.
But Kentucky basically had as what could be it's starting
infield back.
Speaker 4 (25:03):
You know, I.
Speaker 5 (25:03):
Couldn't say that going into this year, could they? But
starting with Tyler Bell they all freshman shortstop.
Speaker 4 (25:10):
But Luke Lawrence comes back.
Speaker 5 (25:12):
He was terrific defensively, and you know, he let Illinois
State in batting for two years before he transferred in
and by the end of this year he was probably
Kentucky's most consistent hitter. You know, they got Hudson brown Back,
that Ethan Handleback. The key though time, you know, is
the pitchers. And you've got Ben Cleaver and Ethan Walker,
a couple of lefties. But right now they're really stocking
(25:34):
up in the portal on pitching.
Speaker 4 (25:37):
So yeah, you got to feel pretty good right now.
But it is way early, isn't it?
Speaker 2 (25:41):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (25:42):
It is, I think is it four pitchers they've forgotten already,
the most recent being the young man from right hander
from North Florida.
Speaker 5 (25:48):
Yeah, Bryson Trichel or Trischel. They got a kid from
Western Kentucky, got the kid from Northern.
Speaker 4 (25:54):
Kentucky and e KU. So you know, they're kind of.
Speaker 5 (25:58):
Pulling kids from the regional schools just to be expected.
And I always like it when you get a kid
from a program like in North Florida. You know, I mean,
obviously Nick Minjill knows a lot more about those programs
than we do. But I was just listening to a
podcast or talk about an NAI team the LSU Shreveport.
Speaker 4 (26:16):
Tom went fifty nine and oh and won.
Speaker 5 (26:19):
The national titles. So you got to wonder how many
of those.
Speaker 2 (26:21):
Kids might be in a portal fifty nine and O.
Speaker 1 (26:26):
What they said, goodness, that's that's quite a number. So
that it sounds good for Kentucky baseball, you know, better
than it did this type of a year ago with
just all of the you know between you know, guys
that just were out of eligibility and and moving on
and so forth.
Speaker 2 (26:47):
Yeah, they had so many a.
Speaker 4 (26:49):
Lot of guys went pro. Yeah, yeah, a lot of
guys signed contracts.
Speaker 1 (26:53):
So hopefully they should have a probably a much higher
opinion of Kentucky baseball hitting in the next season.
Speaker 2 (27:00):
And you had a nice year this year.
Speaker 1 (27:02):
It was frustrating with the last loss there to West Virginia,
and what a many frustrating losses, but a lot of times,
you know, some of that there's an element of I
think it's Phil Steele does his analysis of college football teams,
and he always builds in a luck component, which is
obviously is entirely subjective, but that's part of it, you know,
(27:23):
whether it's luck with injuries or luck with you know,
a bad bounce or a ball you rip down the line,
hits the line instead of going foul or whatever. That
a lot of that seemed to go against Kentucky. So
you would hope fate would turn the other way next year.
Speaker 5 (27:39):
Yeah, you know, and you've got to close teams out.
North Carolina eliminated at home, Arizona's going to Omaha because
Carolina couldn't hold a three two eighty eighth inning. Bullpen
let it down, bullpen, let Kentucky down. Odd the enough
defense I just mentioned Lawrence and Bell, each one made
a crucial error in games. So you know, you just
(28:01):
everything went right last year and too many things went
wrong this year. And still the fact Darren Hedrick Keith
pointing this part of our chain gang the UK radio
voice that just for this team tom to get into tournament,
to get to a regional and put itself in a
position to get to a super regional when you look
at the big picture, was pretty phenomenal.
Speaker 2 (28:22):
Talk with Dick Gabriel.
Speaker 1 (28:22):
It's that Big Blue Insider one on X and the
Big Blue Insider Show weeknights here in the Lexington market
from six to eight pm Eastern Time. How cool a
story would it be if Murray State could be Duke
tonight to make the college mild serious not impossible.
Speaker 5 (28:39):
I mean, we saw Murray State come in here and win.
And right now the Racers are playing their best baseball.
They got guys who can put the bat on the ball.
I don't know how deep their pitching is, because right now,
that's what it's all about. When you're in tournament play
and you turn around, but you talk about confidence. Man,
I don't think Murray's ever been to Omaha. So and
(29:00):
you got teams going back for the first time in
a long time, that would be the story of the tournament.
And I was telling somebody that first time I ever
went to the College World Series was when I was
actually working in Dallas in nineteen eighty four, but I
produced a show for CBS Radio Sports, so I flew
to Omaha just to do a piece on the College
(29:20):
World Series. And there was Johnny Reagan, the venerable Murray
State coach, and he was surrounded by all these VIPs
because he was a VIP, you know, one of the
grow all time greats in college baseball. So that will
kind of bring things full circle.
Speaker 2 (29:34):
How about that.
Speaker 1 (29:35):
We're talking with Dick Gabriel here on the Leads Report
presented by Bobcat Enterprises, and the house settlement is going
to get talked about a lot now that it's in place.
The judge signed off on it heading into the weekend,
and as Mark Story said earlier when he was with.
Speaker 2 (29:52):
Us, there's just so much that we don't know.
Speaker 1 (29:55):
It would be a lot of speculation on what's going
to happen and how things are going to play out
that we just really do not know. And it's everything
from you know, how will it stand up to legal
challenges to you know, how you know money is going
to be distributed by the athletic departments for the money
that they will you know, oversee b outside of you
(30:16):
know nil, but just the twenty plus million that they're
going to distribute and figure out how to do it,
how to spread it among the sports, and that's going
to be a very hot topic.
Speaker 2 (30:25):
I would think, right.
Speaker 4 (30:27):
Oh, absolutely, that's what's going to be the topic.
Speaker 5 (30:30):
Really, although you mentioned the lawsuits inevitably, you know, you
run no right now. There are attorneys who are looking
at chops right now because they know they are going
to be opportunities. Athletes just want an opportunity. Well, and
I'm not knocking the profession, but we're so litigious now
as a society. But here's the thing to remember, Tom,
I was over in Richmond last week and you talked
(30:52):
about Jan Weisberg being hired by EKU, and you know,
he had spent he was at a D three school,
Birmingham Southern and wildly successful, spend a year of Valdosta
State D two. Now he signs up to coach as
a head coach in D one And I asked him,
I said, this is the most challenging time in the
history of D one sports. But he said, you got
(31:13):
to plow into it. Not like it's a problem, you know,
but here's the challenge. I always worry about the Ekus
of the world in a situation like this. UK's athletics
budget now it's one hundred and fifty million dollars. I
remember when they announced it a top one hundred million,
and it wasn't that long ago. Ekused budget Tom is
twenty three million dollars in athletics and when they get
(31:36):
a the money, the upcoming chunk of money, it's going
to be two hundred and seventy thousand dollars. So and
that's a D one school with everything but football. So
I worry about you just mentioned Murray State Western Kentucky
in fact D one at football.
Speaker 4 (31:50):
I think the.
Speaker 5 (31:51):
Sad truth is I firmly believe, and it's already starting
because I think one of the might be UNC Greensboro
or one of those schools down there, has dropped base.
You are going to see sports and athletic programs slowly
but surely dropped from colleges, which means opportunities for a
lot of kids to go to school.
Speaker 4 (32:10):
I'm not talking about grooming them for the pros.
Speaker 5 (32:12):
I'm talking about going to college on a scholarship or
a partial scholarship.
Speaker 4 (32:17):
That's going to be gone, you know.
Speaker 5 (32:19):
So I think this is going to be again and
I said this five years ago when all this started
the end of college athletics.
Speaker 4 (32:26):
As we know it.
Speaker 5 (32:27):
And I don't know what the solution is, but thankfully
there are some smart people in charge.
Speaker 2 (32:32):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (32:32):
I mean, it's definitely going to be significantly different. It's
just how it's going to all shake out. And you
know how you know how many sports will will go away?
If you know, if there is there going to be
a small number, is it going to be a large number?
Speaker 2 (32:49):
Uh?
Speaker 1 (32:49):
And you know they're obviously football, men's basketball, and then
other sports at various places, Uh, you know are bigger
someplace than others.
Speaker 2 (33:01):
Uh, outside of those two.
Speaker 1 (33:02):
But you think about here at Kentucky, you know, it's
the track program, for example, has had a lot of
success one of picking out out of the group you
know that produced Olympic champions and you know, Cidy McLaughlin
and Zi Russell a couple come to mind, et cetera,
Jasmacho Quinn, et cetera that have done great things that
(33:26):
Kentucky fans you know, get into take pride in ye.
But all that, you know, to to compete in any
of these sports at a high level, it takes funds.
Speaker 4 (33:36):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (33:37):
Yeah, And I think Kentucky's going to be okay because
it's in the SEC. And I always think back to
all the people, some media people banging them.
Speaker 4 (33:44):
They've got to get out of the SEC? Are you
kidding me?
Speaker 5 (33:46):
Do you know how smart it was now to stay
in the SEC? But yeah, it's gonna be okay. But yeah,
like you said, what they call the Olympic sports, the
non revenue sports, Uh, they're the ones that are going
to be in danger. And I'm hoping that guys like
Greg Sankie think about that what's best for college sports
not just the SEC, but commissioners have to do best
(34:09):
by their own conferences. So but somebody and now they've
they've they've signed basically a commissioner now for college sports
and I'm hoping. I can't remember the guy's name.
Speaker 1 (34:19):
Is Brian Sealey. He's like a former MLB guy, Ivy
League educated. Uh yeah, guy that's been in uh but
has a uh, you know, a background somewhat in you know,
this kind of areas. He's gonna basically be the head
of the College Sports Commission, which is going to be
kind of the new n C double A right.
Speaker 5 (34:38):
Yep, And I'm just hoping he doesn't spend all this
time bending and need to the TV people, to the
money people. Let's do what's best for college sports in general. Uh.
And I know you've got to take care of the
schools at the top because they float the boats. But uh,
it's it's gonna be a challenge.
Speaker 1 (34:53):
I know.
Speaker 5 (34:53):
By the way you mentioned Mark's story typically BB I
cap to John Clay announcing his retirement. Great guy, great reporter,
and a great guest on a talk show.
Speaker 1 (35:03):
Isn't he Yes, he'll be available more now, I guess
to us. But yeah, I knew that was coming. I
don't know if it had been announced yet.
Speaker 4 (35:10):
So yes, yeah, it's on Twitter.
Speaker 1 (35:15):
He has been an outstanding writer. John and I worked
in the Kentucky Colonel together. You were a Colonel writer.
John and I were in our freshman years at UK
in nineteen seventy nine writing stories for the Colonel.
Speaker 2 (35:28):
Together.
Speaker 1 (35:29):
One of us went on to become a great writer.
Speaker 4 (35:32):
I didn't know. I don't think I knew you worked
for the Colonel. I'm so proud of you.
Speaker 1 (35:36):
Oh yeah, John, I I don't know if you'd say
I worked for the Colonel, went on on staff or anything,
but I wrote some stories. In fact, I have a
football preview tab as the phrasing used to be, and
John and I both had stories in it.
Speaker 2 (35:49):
I have it.
Speaker 5 (35:50):
John was coming in as I was going out, so
I just missed you.
Speaker 2 (35:54):
Well all at greatness that you missed from the right there.
Speaker 4 (35:59):
I can go back and.
Speaker 1 (35:59):
Look, as Corey Price shows us, you can go back
and find about anything.
Speaker 5 (36:05):
That's truck He's the master. He is the absolute master.
Speaker 1 (36:09):
Gabe, thank you for coming out of the bullpen. All right, brother,
that's the Gabriel Big Blue Insider one on x or Twitter,
and uh, we'll get to a quick break, come back
and close out this edition of the Leach Report.
Speaker 2 (36:20):
In just a moment.
Speaker 1 (36:22):
Let's talk about shuffle Bean Coffee, Kentucky based company that
started a little more than a decade ago. A group
of Kentuckians got together with this plan to start a
coffee company, and they said.
Speaker 2 (36:34):
We're gonna do this. Let's be the best.
Speaker 1 (36:37):
And so they like to say they follow the process
of the producing the coffee from seed to cup. So
it starts with the very best of the coffee beans
that they can find, and then that turns into shuffle
Bean coffee, which is available at events at Rupperino in
the KFC Young Center and various restaurants here in Central
Kentucky as well. Go to Shufflebean dot us. You can
(36:59):
find out more about the cup. You can order some
product there. You can get it through Amazon and you
can also pick it up at Central Kentucky Meyer stores.
It's Shufflebean Coffee. Have you got your youngster signed up
for Club Blue Kids yet? I can go to Club
Bluenil dot com and do that for free. Click on
the Kids tab. The young man or young lady in
your home will get a T shirt, a membership card,
(37:19):
a lanyard, plus access to exclusive events, athlete experiences, meet
and greets. I think they just had one over the
weekend with Brandy Garrison, one of those exclusive events that
your youngster can be involved with through Club Blue Kids.
Club Blues, the official NIL fundraising partner.
Speaker 2 (37:36):
For UK Athletics.
Speaker 1 (37:37):
That's going to do it for this edition of the
Lead Report. We will see you tomorrow. Have a good day, everybody,
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