2025-10-13 BBI Statewide

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
From border to border across the Commonwealth of Kentucky. This
is Big Blue Insider. Talk to Tick Gabriel. Call eight
five nine two eight zero cats that's eight five nine
two eight zero to two eight seven. Or state wide
that's one eight hundred six soho six game that's one

(00:27):
eight hundred six oh six four two six three. Or
you can tweet the show that's Big Blue Insider one.
Now here's Tick Gabriel.

Speaker 2 (00:36):
Hell are running through the facilities of the iHeartMedia Megaplexus
is Dick Gabriel. It is the state wide edition of
the Big Blue Society. You've heard the comments from Mark
Stoops and maybe you took in Big Blue Man. This
basketball season is here. Cole Park is also here in
the studio. He's from the Cass Balls. Be part of
the state wide BBI Well Pike if it is a

(01:03):
Big Vingsider, Dick Gabriel, Cole Park of the cast, Paul
has been a busy guy. It is crossover time and Cole,
you were at Madness and they put on a good show, didn't.

Speaker 3 (01:13):
They They did. It was a it was a fun event.
We got to see John Wall back in uh Rupp Arena.
You know, did the famous dance up there on the
the lift along with Mark Pope. A fun one saw
the dunk contest, three point contests, the women's team obviously,
you know we always get our intermission with the cheer
and dance teams. It was a exactly what you wanted
to be a celebration of the basketball season that's upcoming,

(01:35):
and it was a lot of fun. You know, we
got to see the fans involved in a lot of ways.
A couple lucky fans got to coach the teams and
the scrimmage, they got to vote on the dunk contest,
and good time all around.

Speaker 2 (01:45):
I was gonna ask you, how has it been. How
was it different from the madnesses they've had through the years.

Speaker 3 (01:50):
Yeah, for me, especially the ones I've covered, I feel
like the both of the ones under Pope, there was
no It was no glass floor last year. That's that's
putting him out there. But it's also probably a lot
cheaper than that too, So it was fun, you know,
seeing the players rise out of the stage. It feels
like someone I saw in my social media feed said,
at best it felt like for a long time madness
was like, yeah, I'm sure it'd be fun to go

(02:11):
to but oh well, but now it kind of feels like,
especially since Pope has gotten here, it's like, yeah, I
need to watch Madness, even if there's no major news
or anything like that. Like it's just it's a spectacle
and it feels like a love letter to Kentucky basketball.

Speaker 2 (02:23):
By the way, we have not forgotten football. We will
talk about that in our next half hour. Jepicora will
join us as well to talk about the Wildcats and
the Longhorns. But as we said, it is excuse me,
crossover time, and I think that a lot of it
when it comes to Madness is curiosity about year number two.
Everybody saw how exciting it was last year when he

(02:46):
pulled a team together out of thin air. But now
he's got new faces, maybe a more talented team, and
maybe a better handle on how to put it together.

Speaker 4 (02:56):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (02:56):
Absolutely, I mean I think year two, you know, you
hear about it, whether it's in pros with the players
a sophomore slump, or whether it's with coaches. You know,
year two, Year two is where it really matters. I think,
you know, year one, you're figuring stuff out, especially in
Mark Pope's case, or you get hired midway through the
cycle already you got to just pull together a team
exceeded all expectations. I feel like most people are laid
out for them. But year two, you've had a full

(03:19):
cycle to recruit, You've had a full cycle to get
transfer portal players, to build your team, bring guys back,
and this is where we're really going to see. You know,
what does Mark Popek Kentucky look like? What is this
going to look like going forward? And we're really going
to get an idea of you know, I don't want
to put the cart before the horse here, but really
get an idea for what the rest of his tenure
could look like, just based on this year.

Speaker 2 (03:42):
Yeah, and you got I think, if you're a recruit
or if you're a portal candidate, let's put it through
that way. Having a chance to watch Pope's team last
year I think was invaluable for this year.

Speaker 4 (03:55):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (03:55):
Absolutely, I mean I've heard that all along the way
when I'm talking. You know, I talked with a couple
of players at Peach Jam, particularly some of the bigs,
and they said, just looking at the way you know,
he played through his bigs is the reason why I'm
considering Kentucky the way I am. You know, you hear
that from players that transferred there this year. Jalen Low
when we talked to him at the media day, you know,
he said, seeing the way Lamont Butler and otakea Oway's

(04:18):
numbers just jumped up offensively when they got put in
a system that plays to their strengths like that, That's
part of why I wanted to come to Kentucky. You
hear that all across the board.

Speaker 4 (04:26):
You know.

Speaker 3 (04:27):
Quainton said the same thing as well, about the way
Pope plays to his big So having that first year
to really establish your identity, you know, now you're getting
guys who aren't coming because it's it's Kentucky. You know,
they need players. Now they're coming because like I know
what the system is. I know that I want to
play in this system and it's Kentucky.

Speaker 2 (04:44):
Oh yeah, absolutely. And how many people raise your hand
if you thought Kentucky would have not one, but two
players drafted off last year's team. One was the forty
first pick. One was a forty six pick. Admittedly not
lottery picks. No, I don't think anybody saw a future
NBA player on this roster. And those guys have to
make the teams. But I thought that was a real

(05:05):
pleasant surprise and that spoke volumes for what they did.

Speaker 3 (05:08):
Yeah, I mean, I think coming into the season, you
could have maybe guessed that Kobe Braa would get a
spot somewhere if he can shoot, like you thought he
could well maybe get a good look so get a
good looks. So I don't know that you would have
thought that he would have shot as well as he
did at Kentucky. But you know, theoretically, if you're like
he's a sharpshooter, if you're a sharp shooter Kentucky, you
can probably get a look somewhere. But a Mario Williams
going to my Boston Celtics that there you go a

(05:29):
moment for me. And then you know, a lot of
those guys signed other kind of deals and contracts, you know,
two ways, stuff like that. The amount of pros on
last year's team, I think that nobody really expected that.
I mean, like you said, he kind of pulled a
team together out of the air. I mean, these are
some guys that in a lot of ways had been
looked over, and you know the fact that they were
able to be as successful as they were to go

(05:50):
back to the first Sweet sixteen since twenty nineteen. It
was really impressive, and I think that, you know, it's
a testament to the foundation that those veteran guys laid down,
and that it really plays into what Pope spoke about
in recruiting characters and not just basketball players.

Speaker 2 (06:06):
I have to keep reminding myself as well that that
team last year. I know you remember this because I
think when you write as a beat Rider, you're a
little more in tune. Not that I'm scatterbrained, but you
do have to remind yourself of the injuries that that
team had last year. They were profound, they were ongoing,
they were at some point really worrisome, you know, and

(06:29):
still they made the Sweet Sixteen. Enough guys got just
healthy enough at the right time.

Speaker 3 (06:35):
Yeah, I mean, you look at it when you go
down the list. I mean, kerkkrisa broke his foot was
out for the rest of the season.

Speaker 2 (06:41):
That was big, bigger than people thought it would be.

Speaker 3 (06:43):
People wanted to minimize that was a big deal.

Speaker 2 (06:45):
That was a big deal, especially after Lamon Butler got.

Speaker 3 (06:47):
Yes, yeah, you know, Lamont Butler was off and on
all season long. It felt like dealing with his shoulder.
You know, I think he might even had some lower
body thing at one point too. People forget in retrospect.
You know, Andrew Carr had his back issues during the season.
Jackson Robinson gets injured, comes back, and then gets injured again,
is out for the season. I mean, there was a
ton of injuries in that team last year, and it
got to the point where there was games where they

(07:09):
had no point guard, so they moved Jackson over to
point guard. And then Jackson gets hurt too, and you're
down three point guards. You're seeing Colin Chandler and Travis
Perry taking the ball up the court, and you know,
it's no disrespect to those guys and that both of
those guys weren't built for that. No, Like, if you
would have told someone at the start of the season
that Travis Perry or Colin Chandler was taking the ball
off the court, he'd be like, Oh, we're bad, aren't we.

(07:29):
But that's not the case. You know, this team really
made lemonade out of lemons, and they were able to
get guys healthy at just the right time. They were
able to you know, even with that Colin Chandler having
to take a bigger role. By the time the tournament
came around, he was draining threes that I would have
probably looked like I might have closed my eyes if

(07:50):
he'd attempted those when he first started playing. And then
he just pulls from you know, almost half cores and
it's perfect, and you're just like, you know this team,
I don't know. It was almost like a fairy tale
for year one and more.

Speaker 2 (08:00):
Pope, Well, he shut the rust off, didn't he?

Speaker 3 (08:02):
He did? He certainly did.

Speaker 2 (08:04):
I don't know if you were standing there, but I
know everyone was probably asking him, but media day, when
did it feel like you were back to your old stuff?
And he said I couldn't put my finger on one
particular game, but he definitely felt it late, didn't he.

Speaker 4 (08:18):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (08:18):
I mean I think something that he said that was
pretty interesting to me, and it's it makes sense logically,
but it was a very mature response from him. He said,
I can't really place when it started to feel different
for me, because he's like, there's so many little moments,
and also you're only seeing the games. He's like, I'm
seeing the days in practice, I'm seeing the days in
the facility, days in between games. So I don't really
know exactly when, but it was a process and I

(08:41):
think that that we saw that I personally have pretty
high you know, not saying he's going to get drafted
after this year anything, but I think Colin Chanla could
be really good for Kentucky this year. And a lot
of it is because of the amount he was leaned
on last year and the the way Pope kind of
trusted him, you know, throughout some of the flaws and
mistakes to keep growing key and some of that, you know,

(09:01):
he didn't have a choice with injuries, but some of
them was also a conscious decision to trust that guy
and focus on developing him. And I also think when
you're looking at recruiting for Mark popeen Kentucky in the future,
that's an important thing that you know, Pope kind of
showed Colin Chandler's one of my guys. I brought him
in here and I didn't give up on him when
things were tough at the beginning. I stuck with him.
And look at what he's become. He's already looking like

(09:21):
a far more confident player and a leader on defense.

Speaker 2 (09:24):
And to your point about Colin playing point guards some
last year, no pun intended. I mentioned that on the
the Pro Day telecast that we did on SEC plus
Jack Gibbons and me, and Jack mentioned a couple of
other players before he even got to Colin, Like, let's
say Jalen Lowe's in foul trouble, you know, or has

(09:45):
is nicked up a little bit, And he mentioned Otega
and I can't remember who else. Oh, you mentioned Aberdeen.
I think it was, you know, And then he mentioned Colin.
But to me, and again, Jack has forgot more basketball
than I'll ever know. But if you got to play
old away at the point, you know, I think you're
you're robbing Peter to pay Paul. You're taking your best,

(10:05):
you know, perimeter player and making him essensibly pass for
a shoot second. So I don't know about Aberdeen at
the point. I don't know about Colin Chandler. I do
wonder what happens if and when Jalen logants in foul trouble.

Speaker 3 (10:19):
Right, Yeah, I mean I think putting a take at
the point would be as my old journalism adviser would say,
that's taking your best reporter and mak him an editor.
What are you doing here?

Speaker 2 (10:28):
No offense to you editors out there but you know
what we mean.

Speaker 3 (10:30):
Yeah, I mean I was an editor myself. I get it.
That is, you know, I think it'd be kind of
like that. I agree that wouldn't necessarily be a strength.
But I think the key here is, you know, Colin
Chandler's capable of doing it. You wouldn't want to lean
on him in that scenario as much as you know
you would Jalen Lowe. But in a scenario which Jalen
logets into trouble, I think Aberdeen could do it. I
think Colin Chandler is capable of doing it. I think

(10:52):
even you know, we saw a little bit last year.
We'll have to see what these guys look like this year,
but a little bit last year even saw him. Trust Amari
Williams take it up the course. He's he's willing to
play his big at points. Sometimes they don't have one
guy like that. No, not necessarily, but we'll see, We'll
see what some of these guys grow into.

Speaker 2 (11:06):
I mean, who knows, we guys now a Boston Celtic.

Speaker 3 (11:09):
He is a Bosston Celtic. The jersey's on its way.

Speaker 2 (11:12):
Yeah, buddy.

Speaker 3 (11:14):
By the way, your patriots, hey, three in a row.
Tell you what watch out.

Speaker 2 (11:18):
I know, Uh, we're talking to Cole Parking agains. Was
he covered midnight man, it's big bou madness and uh
we will talk football at a bottom of the hour
with Cold and with Jeffi Coral, But the madness is here.
We had media day. We all heard from Mark Pope
for about what forty minutes. I don't know if he
plowed any new ground. But it was always interesting, wasn't it.

Speaker 3 (11:37):
Yeah, it's always interesting. I think he said a few
things that really stuck out to me. I mean, nothing
that was those groundbreaking, but a bunch of stuff that,
you know, as we would say in our good soundbites,
Yeah they're good too, good to build stories around, good
to good to put out there. You know, about his recruiting,
about the upcoming exhibitions against George Humperdue. We had a
lot of really interesting things to say that I think
we're valuable things to be said, not necessarily anything that

(11:59):
was roundbreaking for us. Nothing that's like, oh my gosh,
I can't believe he just said that, But it was
all interesting stuff.

Speaker 2 (12:04):
I know we'll have a lot of time leading up
to that Purdue exhibition, but I wonder what's going to happen. No,
I don't. I know what's going to happen if Kentucky
doesn't a beat Purdue, b take him down to the
last couple of minutes, or god forbid, what if Purdue
blows him out? You know, I mean, you talk about

(12:26):
teaching moments, but I know how the Big Blue Nation
is going to feel about that.

Speaker 3 (12:30):
I'm already preparing myself for some of the overreactions I think.
But I don't think Kentucky will be Purdue. I don't.
If they did, I'll be shocked. Well, you know, Mark
Pope even said on you he said, we're using Purdue
as a gauge for where we want to be. I mean,
Purdue's a team. You look at the way Matt Painters
built that team. There's so many returners on that team.
They have their core nucleus already. I mean, you've got

(12:52):
Braden Smith, who when CBS did their poll with the
candid coaches, he was predicted fifty one percent to be
the best player in college basketball here from one hundred
coaches surveyed. That's that's pretty telling. You know, we saw
the ap pole drop this morning preseason rankings Number one
perdue right there, as most of us suspected. I mean,
some people said Houston had a case. I said Houston

(13:12):
had a case. But Perdue is still even be my
number one. If you catch our basketball yearbook, which just
dropped for the Cat's more great, thank you, thank you.
If you catch our basketball yearbook, which just dropped as well,
I picked Perdue as my national champion. I don't think
I was the only one. Maybe someone else did. But
this is a very good Purdue team, and I think
it is It's important to understand that a loss for

(13:34):
Kentucky does not mean that Kentucky can't be the national
champions at the end of the season. If that's you know,
the assignment, as they say. But it's a test, like
Mark Pop said, it's a test to see where they
are right now. And you look at that schedule, you
look at the pole which just dropped for preseason rankings.
It is even outside the SEC. It is a tough schedule.

(13:55):
This Kentucky team is going to lose games. It's going
to happen, and that's that's part of bast ssketball. And
it's really going to be a test of how much
they can grow through that and how ready they are
like we just talked about some of the injuries last year,
how ready they are when it really matters, and marsh
rolls around.

Speaker 1 (14:11):
You know.

Speaker 2 (14:11):
When Pope talked about that about engaging themselves, I flashed back,
and I've talked about this before in other inanceans on
twenty seventeen, when Nick Bnjeong took over as the baseball coach,
and he scheduled a top ten North Carolina team whose
Friday night starter, and this was in Chapel Hill, whose

(14:32):
Friday night starter was going to be a first round
draft pick, and he was. And Kentucky lost all three games,
but was in each game until the ninth inning. And
after the game, min Gie Owe spent forty five minutes
talking to his team and trying to convince them, first
to many conversations that they were good man. They didn't

(14:55):
have any confidence, you know, for whatever reason. And he
went through, oh it wasn't no golly, we got swept.
It was hey, we did this, we did that, we
did good things. And it took him about, I don't know,
a month to convince these guys to believe in themselves.
I don't think Pope's got that problem, but I do

(15:15):
think it's a similar situation where you play somebody better
than you are. It's a lot more indicative of your problems.
It exposes more of your weaknesses than beating a crap
out of somebody and trying to pick through game video.
You know what I mean?

Speaker 3 (15:31):
No, absolutely, And I think you know when you look
at especially you know Kentucky's got some tough games early
on in the regular season at Louisville and the Young Center,
that's going to be a tough game. Pat Kelsey's got
that squad really good. You play Saint John's pretty early on,
Michigan State pretty early on. I mean, there's some tough
games on this schedule. But you also have all these
buy games. You know, your your Tennessee Techs, your your
team in C Central's, those kind of teams, And what

(15:54):
good do those games do you if you don't know
what you need to work on exactly. You know, you
play these games against Purdue early, you play an exhibition play,
you play these games against Louisville early, and then you
can say, all right, we need to work on this, this, this, this,
We got plenty of games to work on that you
don't want to You don't want to find out what
your problems are when you get into SEC play because
there's not a lot of opportunities to figure it out.

Speaker 2 (16:15):
And if Purdue is going to be a Final four team,
what better way yeah to take game at the final four.
Here's what we have to do to be that good.

Speaker 3 (16:23):
You take a shot at a potential Final fourteen, potential
national champion. You got the whole season to figure out
how you're going to beat that team when it comes
to it in March.

Speaker 2 (16:30):
That's right, we'll take a break, come back and talk
more basketball with cole Park at the Cat's Paws. We'll
switch to football at the bottom of the hour. When
Jef Pecorrel joined us as well on the statewide BBI
frumpike up to Perduca. It is the Big Blue Cider.
Dick Gabrielle cole Park from the Cat's Pause will cover
Big Blue Madness. We talked last week about the fact
back in the day, if you could get a recruit

(16:53):
to Madness, you pretty well had a lock on him.
Not the case anymore, which I understand the Internet, social
media things are more sophisticated now, big dollars involved, not
that there weren't back in the day, but it's up
front now. But I'm wondering, Cole, is there a what
kind of balance is there? Would you say there's clearly

(17:14):
a balance between going after the highly rated, top ten
or whatever five star guys and the portal because essentially
you're gonna have both of them for one year.

Speaker 3 (17:27):
Yeah. Absolutely, I mean it's all a balance and wearing
a spot in college athletics where it kind of feels
more like a pro team than anything. Yeah, you know,
I wouldn't be surprised if in the near future, dare
I say the boogeyman word of a CBA or even
contracts kind of deal, because it kind of right now
feels like you have to re recruit your entire roster

(17:47):
every single year, and we've seen some great coaches leave
multiple sports because they don't like the way it's going.
But it is interesting. You know, you can't really fly
out other teams players for baby bloom Man. That's not
really something you can do until the end of the portal.
But with recruits, I mean, I think it's all about
finding that healthy balance. I think a lot of people
got pretty frustrated with John Caliper in his last year

(18:08):
is that he was going all in on the freshman still,
you know, trying to build these these you know, teams
that we're working in the mid twenty tens. But towards
the end of his tenure there, it's like, you need
to be a little bit older. You need some of
these transfer portal guys. And obviously last year we saw
Mark Pope have to go pretty much entirely in the
transfer portal by necessity. But I think it's about finding
a healthy balance. I mean, I think we were just

(18:30):
talking about Purdue and Matt Painter that was pretty candid
about it with CBS. You know, he's like, we're trying
to find a balance because we're looking at guys that
we can bring in and we can develop them. We
can say you are our guys, but we're also going
to need to supplement those guys with portal guys. Every year.
You know you're gonna lose guys. You're not gonna have
someone necessarily ready to fill that role, so you got
to go get those guys. I think the goal should

(18:51):
be building a team, you know, preferably with some young guys,
but you always have to run the risk of the
one and done's. You know, those times you need some
of those guys. But also, you know, supplementing that with
the transfer portal, I think I think any team that
goes all in on one of the other is doomed
to fail. You're gonna have to kind of find a
blending between the two.

Speaker 2 (19:09):
Yeah, you know, and and Cali Perry did try to
go old that one year when he brought in on
his name has escaped me. The kid from Davidson was such.

Speaker 3 (19:17):
A great shooter, Kellen Grady.

Speaker 2 (19:20):
Kellen Grady. Yeah, if that team staysts healthy, I mean,
when they were on top of their game, they were
as good as any team in the country.

Speaker 4 (19:27):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (19:27):
But I mean even by the end of that year,
Kellen Grady what just basically didn't have feet It would
hurt to wait. Yeah, is awful.

Speaker 2 (19:34):
How he played basketball is beyond me.

Speaker 3 (19:36):
Amazing to me.

Speaker 2 (19:36):
I mean, you know, anybody ever had that.

Speaker 3 (19:38):
I don't.

Speaker 2 (19:39):
My wife has had it, a good buddy of minds
had it. It's excruciating. And the fact that he could.

Speaker 3 (19:43):
Play basketball as a testament to you know, you it
kind of reminds me of like hockey. You know, you'll
see these guys that are playing hockey games. You're like, oh,
they're banged up or whatever, and then they'll they'll get
eliminated and it's like, yeah, he's been playing with a
broken leg for like a month. It's ridiculous what some
of these athletes are able to go through and keep
playing their and I you know when.

Speaker 2 (20:01):
And they'll do it unless you stop them.

Speaker 3 (20:03):
Yeah, absolutely, I mean, it's that's what it's all about.
And you know, especially in sports like this where you're
a guy like Kellen Grady, you know, you don't have
that many more chances of this if you're if you
into your season prematurely, you probably end your career prematurely maybe.
And you know, even if you did get to come back,
there's always the concern of well, did someone else take
my spot? You know, it's always that. But it's it's tough,

(20:25):
and I think by the time the end of that
season it rolled on, people are getting frustrated, like why
is he not playing the same And then you know,
then it comes out what he's been dealing with and
everyone's like, oh, like, I had no idea, I just
thought he was dropping off. You know, he's been dealing
with excruciating pain and somehow still playing basketball with it.

Speaker 2 (20:42):
Well, you know, the Oscarbway teams were a little bit older,
but they just they couldn't find the balance. They couldn't
find the personnel balance, you know. He just and and
then Cali Perry. Obviously people got tired of when he
did go ahead more heavily onto the young guys. He'd
always throw that, well, I'm helping these kids, you know,
Well that's all. Well, I'm good, you know, but you all,

(21:04):
you know, you got more than one missionaire boss. But
I mean it's, you know, the water under the bridge.
He's moved on. I hope he's helping kids. That's great.
But you can do both.

Speaker 3 (21:15):
Yeah, absolutely, I think you can definitely do both. And
you know, going all in on these freshmen, Yeah, you
can help some kids and get them there. But what
about these guys in the portal? You can help them too.

Speaker 2 (21:26):
Yeah. You know, by the way, what about the rest
of the kids on the roster?

Speaker 3 (21:30):
Yeah exactly, I mean, what about the guys who are
dedicating multiple years of their life to you? And I mean,
you think Mark Pope didn't help Amari Williams. You think
he would have gotten drafted by the Boston Celtics if
he'd stayed Atrexel Probably not, and that's not a disrespect
to Drexel. I love me some Big Five hoops plus
Drexel since they're not technically included in that, but love
me some Philadelphia hoops.

Speaker 2 (21:50):
But you were a Boston guy.

Speaker 3 (21:54):
I love the Philadelphia high or college hoops. I don't
actually room for any of the teams. I just respect
the city rivalry.

Speaker 2 (22:00):
Just for a kid who grew up in Richmond, Kentucky.
You're skewing Northeast.

Speaker 3 (22:04):
Had the plestra as the cathedral.

Speaker 2 (22:06):
Oh yeah, yeah, not that I've ever been there, but
you know, you know, you chose the Patriots. I'm thinking, oh,
you're a Tom Brady guy. But then you were telling
me you want to go to Boston College or Boston
you and now you're you're you're you're pumping Philly.

Speaker 3 (22:19):
No, I'm not pumping Philly, don't get it. I just
I respect the city rivalry. I wish that Boston's teams
were good enough that there was a good raverry in
the city. I wish that theyre you know, back when
the Big Five was hot, Yeah, and there was no
better Boston. I'll over for the Bean Pod all day
long and hockey, but in basketball, It's just I don't
really care to see Boston College, Northeastern and Boston University

(22:40):
place and rivalry.

Speaker 2 (22:41):
No, not right now.

Speaker 3 (22:43):
No.

Speaker 2 (22:44):
Although I covered BC snapped North Carolina's long streak of
crashing the Sweet sixteen and the NCA tournament Dean Smith,
that is phenomenal record. Way back in the day, Boston
College broke it and I worked that game. Brother, there
you go about that. From border to border. It is

(23:08):
the big momensider. Dicabrielle Cole Park join on the Celebrity
Hoideline by mister Jeff of Coorro. Jeff, you had your
charity golf tournaments today? Tell everybody about it.

Speaker 4 (23:19):
Well, a great event we have up here in Cincinnati
at cold Stream Country Club. We raise a ton of
money for autism. We're trying to build an assisted living
community here for people with developmental disabilities. I have a
thirty three year old son who's autistic, so hopefully a
lot of this money goes to getting this endeavor finished.
It's about a seventy five million dollar campus that we're

(23:44):
trying to build up here, so it's it's pretty big. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (23:46):
And you and I've talked before, and as you know,
my daughter works with special needs kids. We haven't tendency
to think of autism when it comes to children, but
obviously kids grow up, don't they. Yeah, and you can't
just forget about them once they turned twenty one.

Speaker 4 (24:05):
No, you're exactly right taking that. That's it. I don't
want to see an epidemic, but it's it's pretty amazing.
Back in nineteen ninety one when my son was born,
it was like one in every two hundred and fifty
male children, you know, was born with autism. And now
it's down to like one in thirty. So it's it's
getting close to being an epidemic type of type of

(24:27):
problem that you have to do something with it, because, as
you said, these kids are growing into young, young, young
and Middle Asian results. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (24:37):
Well, let me shift over to football. Jeff of course
is the color analyst whether UK Radio Network, and I
know you're looking forward. We all look forward to covering
the game last year down in Austin. That was really
an experience. And now, Jeff, as a guy who grew
up watching UK football, you played for the Wildcats, You're
going to see that burn orange and those iconic helmets

(24:59):
and what it used to be Commonwealth Stadium. How's that
going to feel.

Speaker 4 (25:03):
I think that's it's really neat. You and I have
a great job. I mean Texas A and M was
an unbelievable experience. Going to Texas was an unbelievable experience.
We got there early, we got to see Bibo, we
got to go down right next to his little ten.
It's just awesome. At the SEC is ridiculous these teams

(25:26):
that are in it, and now adding Texas and Oklahoma
only adds for the aura. And to have Texas coming
to Lexington is going to be just fantastic. And I
know there's going to be a thousands of thousands of
fans coming toe. You're going to have Keeenland during the day,
Kentucky game at seven o'clock at night. It's going to
be a Ruckus event all day Saturday.

Speaker 2 (25:46):
Let me ask you both, Jeff and Cole, what was
your reaction? How did you feel about all the preseason hype?
And Cole, I'll start with you about Archie Manning. I've
weighed in more than once. I thought it was ridiculous.
Not a knock him, but here's a guy who never
played for the most part, he had done mop up
duty and the next thing, you know, he's a Heisman

(26:07):
candidate and the surefire number one pick in the draft
after one full year as a starter. Yeah, I mean,
what did you think about then? What do you think
of it?

Speaker 4 (26:15):
Now?

Speaker 3 (26:16):
You gotta love the August Heisman's right. Yeah, No, I
I think Mark Stoops said it best today. Quite Mark
Stoops actually said a lot of what I've been thinking,
he said. He said, I can't speak for Arch, but
he didn't ask for any of that. If anything, every
time they were coming at him with these preseason Heisman expectations,
he said, you know, tone it back a little bit.

(26:36):
Like I was talking to someone about it at Manis
we were talking about Texas, and I was like, I
kind of feel bad for him because you're in a
situation where like everyone's hyping you up, and you know
what you are, your team knows what you are, and
you can't just come out and be like I'm not
that good. But you know, and it's not that he's
not that, not that he's not he's very gifted. He's

(26:57):
very gifted. He's just not there yet. You know, he's
a young quarterback that needs time to develop, and everyone
was putting all these expectations on him. I think, you know,
Stoop said, I think a lot of that's unfair, and
I agree with that. I think it was pretty unfair
to Arch and I think that he's handled the entire
thing with a ton of maturity. He's been very graceful
and very you know, there was that article that came

(27:17):
out asking if he was the biggest flop in college football.
First of all, no, second of all. You know, he
got asked about that and he said he hadn't seen it,
but he said, people can write whatever they want to.
That's the beauty of the you know, free speech. But
I'm just going to focus on what I can control
social media. Yeah, he said, I'm just going to focus
on getting better. That's all I can do.

Speaker 4 (27:38):
Joe, I agree. I had a nice talk with Eddie
Gran about him before the season started, and I said, Eddie,
what are these people seen in him? Because Quinn Ewers
was a quarterback at Ohio State who couldn't win the
job at Ohio State, so he transfers to Texas. So

(27:59):
Quinn was a nice quarterback, right, he wasn't a great quarterback.
Arch comes in two years ago. Can't beat him out
as a freshman, which I didn't think he would, but
the second year in the system, I thought, okay, if
this guy is the second coming of basically Jesus Christ
in cleats is what everybody was saying. He couldn't beat
him out his sophomore year or his second year, which

(28:20):
would have been his red shirt freshman season. So I
had my questions about him coming into this season. To
anoint someone like that who basically has had less than
one hundred passes before this season as the number one
Heisman tricks picked, wasn't fair to him. Pet m'neil. I'd

(28:45):
be the first one to tell you I'm not fair
for the kid, but they're not going to say that
because of who they are, and he doesn't need them
doing his bidding for him. He's a nice quarterback, He's
not there yet. This is his first year starting, and
you see every game of him maturing a little bit.
I mean, he managed the game well last week, a
game which I really thought they would lose. I agree,

(29:08):
but Texas really played well. And I see that. You
know they're they're a complete team. Kentucky has their hands full. Obviously.
I don't think it's it's a non winnable situation. I
think if Kentucky plays a clean game, they can win.
But going back to Arch, I think it was very
unfair to him to put him as the Heisman front

(29:28):
runner before the season even started.

Speaker 3 (29:30):
Yeah, I think there's some parallels there too with Kentucky situation.
I mean I think that not everybody, I want to
speak for the entire fame. There were some people out
there that that kind of acted like when Zach Calzada
a struggle and that cutter bully was going to come
in and just save everything. He was gonna he was
gonna make everything better. And then he comes out and
he has the good showing in Eastern Michigan, but he
he struggles a lot against South Carolina and there are a
lot of people who are quite upset about it. I

(29:51):
was like, you know, it's he's making his first ever
sec start on the road. I mean, you have to
give these guys some time. And it's kind of like
what you said with Arch. This is a guy who
has all these expectations and belief put into him and
he's played what like one hundred snaps of football at most,
and hasn't really had a chance out there. He hasn't
had the time to He didn't have a chance to

(30:13):
fail in the same way that you know you have
to learn through failure. Sometimes you have to learn what works,
what doesn't work. You know, when it comes to gauging pressure,
what throws you can make, how you need to get
the ball out of there? Where to check? You know
your blind spot, But you know you have to learn
sometimes by taking hits. You got to learn sometimes by
having some bad plays. And a lot of these guys
just haven't had the chance to fail into finding out

(30:34):
what works.

Speaker 2 (30:35):
Yeah, but to Jeff's point, and you're right, he looked
like a mature, poised veteran in st Oklahoma. I don't
know how much game you got to see, but the
turning point in that game was a huge play he.

Speaker 3 (30:46):
Made absolutely And I also thought that, you know, not
quite arch Manning, But I thought Cutter Bolly looked a
lot better against Georgia too. It's amazing what a couple
games under your belt can do for you to grow
that confidence. I mean, I thought Cutter Bully wasn't perfect
against Georgia, but a lot of ways watching him, you
could tell that the South Carolina game impacted him and
he made changes to his game based on what he
learned in that game. Because you know, you can kind

(31:08):
of roll your eyes with how often coaches will say it,
but you can practice all day long. Sometimes reps are
how you are, what you need to grow. Sometimes you
have to get reps and see live game reps against
good teams to really properly understand and internalize what you
need to do.

Speaker 2 (31:23):
Well and to that end, And Jeffery and I talked
about this on the long drive home from Georgia, because again,
you've got a much better look at the game than
I do. But I could see from where I stood
that Bowley was looking quickly getting rid of the boss.
Pretty evident that they change a game plan and it
worked fairly well, not well enough against Georgia. He had

(31:46):
his best game as a Wildcat in a tough spot
against a really good team because he got rid of
the ball. Quicker, didn't he?

Speaker 4 (31:53):
Yeah. I think both of these quarterbacks managed last week's
game really well, and you can see growth in both
of them. I thought Arch grew up a lot last
week against Oklahoma. It was his first major win over
a top team as the starting quarterback, and I saw
Cutter really grow. I mean, if you watch the Bengals

(32:14):
were a great example yesterday. The defense kept him in
the game in the first time up, and in the
second half, Flacco played well. He was getting the ball
out quicker. They were using quicker plays and what we
call three step drops and things like that where he's
just getting the ball out of his hand quicker. And
I saw that out of Cutter. Now you can build
off that. Here's what Texas is gonna do. Texas gonna

(32:36):
load the box and they're going to force him to
try to go down the field because they think that
their massive defensive front is going to be able to
get to him before he can get rid of the football.
So that's going to be the key for Kentucky. Can
they hold out this Texas defense long enough for Bowlie
to get the ball to the medium basically the second level.
You know, the quick passes, the slants, the quickouts, those

(32:59):
are always going to be there. But for this team
to really move the ball down the field, he's got
to have a couple of plays where he can get
those medium range shots, those twelve to seventeen yard kind
of pass plays. They have to be in the game because,
as you saw last week against Georgia. If you don't
have that explosiveness in your offense, this isn't a team
that can fall behind and get back in the game quickly.

Speaker 2 (33:22):
And I gotta have guys col can get open, ye
in a short amount of time.

Speaker 4 (33:26):
Exactly, yes, exactly.

Speaker 3 (33:28):
You bring up the Bengals game there, Dick, was it
a joy feud?

Speaker 2 (33:32):
And Joel Rough I can tell you that it was difficult.

Speaker 3 (33:37):
You don't expect to face Joe Flacco twice on two different.

Speaker 2 (33:39):
Teams now, and he's already beating us once. So yeah,
but no, Jeff makes a good point. But Jeff has
said more than once from his perch either at Krogerfield
or wherever you are on the road, he gets a
good look at the receivers, and Jeff, they've had a
hard time getting open this year, haven't they They have.

Speaker 4 (33:57):
It's what we call separation. So it's not it's not
just getting all but just separating from the defense. And
then when they have you've got to make the plays.
Last week, you had an open receiver by two yards
on the defense and it was just a little bit overthrown.
You have to hit those balls. You're only gonna get
three or four of those opportunities in a game to

(34:17):
make a big play, and you simply have to hit them,
especially when you're playing Texas and Georgia those types of teams,
and he'll learn just put a little more air under
so the receiver can run to the football. You've got
to hit those. I think Kentucky did a great job
of assimilating the freshman wide receivers in now. And I

(34:38):
think Mark's to the point where if he's going to
catch the ball and he's gonna make us better, we're
gonna play them. And we saw that last week with
twenty two and Miller on the outside, and I think
we're gonna see more of that. I think he now
knows I'm not coaching for three and four years down
the road. I'm coaching. He's coaching for his life right now,

(35:00):
his coaching life. And you know, through these last seven
games of the season.

Speaker 3 (35:04):
Yeah, absolutely, And I mean the the idea that those
guys kind of stepping up, that's something Stoops has talked
about a bunch so far. He said it again today
when I asked him about you know, this is Cutter
Bully's second shot at Texas. He got on last year,
and you know, Stoop said, he's getting a lot more comfortable,
but also he said we need to play better around
him too. You know, those guys are going to have
to do that. And you talked about Miller. Cam Miller

(35:24):
made him an impact last week or two weeks ago,
sorry bye week against Georgia, and he's kind of really
worked his way into playing times, Stoop said today. DJ
Miller's also kind of done a lot of things. And
when it was asked about Quizinbarr, you know, his answer was,
we want to win games. He's like, if I think
that guy's going to go out there and help us win,
then we're going to put him in.

Speaker 2 (35:44):
We'll take a break, come back and talk more Kentucky football.
The Wildcats take on the long Horns in a game
you'll hear on most of these same stations. More to
come on the state wide BBI.

Speaker 4 (36:00):
Border.

Speaker 2 (36:00):
It is the Big Bluinsider Dickabriel, Cole Park, Jeff of Coral,
the UK sports number you call the action along with
Tom Leacher. When the Wildcats take on the Texas Longhorns.
Jeff Kentucky is I think a twelve point underdog called
bigger than that? Yes, even yeah, I thought it might
be more. Did you have Jeff much of a chance

(36:22):
to watch Texas Oklahoma because last Saturday, Buddy, I was
spending the dial like crazy. But it's it's a pope,
the Pope, as Stoop said, typical Texas team, big, strong, physical,
and last year during a commercial break, you marveled to
Tom and me during during a break at how huge
they're old linemen are. That's not going to change, is it.

Speaker 4 (36:46):
No, they're I mean, you know when you look at
Alabama and Texas and Ohio State, it's just it's a
different brand of football, it really is. I mean, they
have seven or eight guys that are like Malachi and
you know, they're they're all six seven through fifty's. It's amazing.
They look like refrigerators with feet out there. And then yeah,

(37:07):
they're just big. Yeah, you know, they go everything bigger
in Texas, right, But they got them on the offensive
defensive line and they can move too.

Speaker 2 (37:15):
There are I think six hundred and something high schools
in the state of Texas alone that play football cools,
so they can choose from practically anywhere.

Speaker 3 (37:25):
Yeah, there's several of them that probably have nicer stadiums
in some college Yeah.

Speaker 2 (37:29):
Yeah, trust me on yes, yeah, but it's all about
the Jimmies and Joe's it really is. Now you got
to execute it, as Stoops has said. But when you
got kids that are that good and you execute well,
they're tough to beat them. I don't know if Kentucky
has to be perfect, but it cannot beat itself the
way it did against Ole Miss and South Carolina.

Speaker 3 (37:48):
Yeah, I mean I thought that, you know, I'd seen
some like if you want to get into the nitty
gritty on Texas, a lot of their fans have not
been super happy with some of their wide receiver play.
There's been some things that have been up and down
with that team. I wasn't very high on them after
they lost to Florida. You know, I thought they'd look
shaky in some of their games. I fully bet against
them against Oklahoma and they come out and they shocked
me personally. I mean, I know you had the things

(38:09):
with Mateer's hand, maybe not being ready to go. Oklahoma
has its own issues, but I was stunned. It was
the like, Oklahoma's a good football team. They may go
on to lose several more games. They got a really
tough slate coming up. We'll see how Matier ends up
going with his hand. But it was the first time
all season to me, a really good Oklahoma team just
straight up looked outgunned. They like Texas, looked like it

(38:30):
wasn't a fluke. They looked like the better team pretty
much the entire game. And I was stunned by that.
I think Texas got a lot of disrespect from myself,
included after some of their shakier games early on the
loss to Florida. But they're a very very good football team.
And it's something Stoop said to us during the bye week.
You know, someone asked him about Texas having a disappointing season,
and he said, that's what's interesting, right, because there's still

(38:51):
a pretty good football team. He's like, I get it,
you know, preseason number one, they haven't really lived up
to that. But like, they're a very good football team,
and they're they're playing a really tough schedule and it's
not it's no it's no walk in the park by
any you.

Speaker 4 (39:04):
See it that way, Jeff, Yeah, I mean they started
the year playing at you know, Ohio State. I mean
that the number of the defending champion good and that,
and they're not in the SEC. So then they saw
eight SEC games to play. So yeah, I think that
a lot of people, you know, I think that a

(39:25):
lot of people had illusions of greatness for this Texas
team and arch Manning. I think they thought they were
he was going to lead them. This is still a
very good football team. That lost to Ohio State wasn't
a fluke. I mean, the High States are defending champion.
They proved it. They're number one right now. But I
like Texas. I think they're They're a really nice team.

(39:47):
But in saying that, I think they can If Kentucky
plays their best game this year, they can win. They
just have to finish. They have to not hurt themselves,
and they've done that time and again this year.

Speaker 2 (39:58):
Well Oklahoma through but threw three picks and they all
led to points. I mean, Texas doesn't need that kind
of help, right.

Speaker 3 (40:06):
They don't, And it's.

Speaker 4 (40:07):
Yeah, go ahead.

Speaker 3 (40:10):
It's just kind of the story of this season, right,
Like Kentucky could have beaten Ole Miss and then they
shot themselves in the foot. They could have beaten South
Carolina and they have the twenty one zero second quarter Georgia.
Maybe I don't know. The defense wasn't all that great,
but like most of these games, Kentucky could do it,
and Texas is no different. You can win this game.
I don't believe that Kentucky is going into this game

(40:30):
just without any hope that that's not realistic. Texas has
proven that they're not invincible. But like you said, it's
gonna come down to, can you not shoot yourself in
the foot consistently over and over again the way you
have in every conference game so far.

Speaker 4 (40:45):
Well, don't you think this is? This is the key
to the game is Look, this is a Kentucky team
that simply doesn't have the firepower to go out there
and score forty points against a really good football team. Right,
So in saying that you can't have a pick six,
you can't have a fubble recovery for a touchdown, you
can't throw three interceptions like Matier did, you can't have

(41:07):
six or seven or eight penalties in the game. And
you know, I kept laboring this point to Dick during
the game and in the post game. Against Georgia. It
wasn't just the Kentucky the go I had five penalties,
but it was when the penalties come and the yards
they lose on their offense, because this isn't a team
that can fall behind and make up points in a game.

(41:30):
Kentucky can't go out and score forty against Texas. They're
just not going to. They're not built for that. We
had a conversation, cannot fall by, they can't fall behind.

Speaker 2 (41:39):
We had a conversation and Jeff, I don't remember what
game it was last year, but you know, you brought
up hidden yards more than once and I don't I
cannot remember the game, but it added up to more
than one hundred, you know, and that's that's what kills you, right.

Speaker 4 (41:53):
Yeah, yeah, because that's one thing that why Mark made
the change with the return guys in the game. Yeah,
because if you let the ball hit the ground, it's
going to roll in another ten or fifteen yards. Well
that's one and a half first downs that your offense
doesn't have to make up. So if you don't catch it,
the thirty five rolls of the twenty, that's a whole

(42:14):
nother you know, first down and a half. You can't
do that. That's they hid in the yardage is what
really affects the team, and it's affected Kentucky Adversely, for
the last couple of.

Speaker 2 (42:25):
Years, we've spent a lot of time talking about the
Texas offense, the Kentucky offense. But conversely, guys, Kentucky's got
to get to arch Manning. They can't let him a
get comfortable and be beat him or beat Kentucky with
his legs with his feet, because he's capable of doing that, isn't.

Speaker 3 (42:44):
He coal he is, and Kentucky's shown this year they
can struggle at times with that, and or Sellers torched him,
and even Gunnar Stockton I think their first two touchdowns
came from him on the ground, didn't they. So it's
another situation where Kentucky's going to have to balance not
letting him throw it over your head but also not
letting him beat you on the ground too, And that's tough.
I'm not going to pretend that that's not a very

(43:05):
hard thing to do, but it's it feels like a
story of this season again. This this Texas game, in
so many ways just feels like a culmination of all
the things that have just burned Kentucky all year long,
and can they finally overcome those demons?

Speaker 4 (43:19):
Yeah, this is this is a game that's kind of
Texas is kind of like South Carolina and Georgia combined.
And why I say that is this, you can't let
Arch beat you with his legs like sellers can for
South Carolina, right, But what else they have is they
also have a running game like Georgia does, where they've
got some bouts that can really run the football. So

(43:41):
they can beat you with a quarterback, but then they
can also beat you with the running back. So it's
a double edged sword when you're playing this team. To me,
it's take away the passing game of Texas and make
them run the football and that gives you a chance.

Speaker 2 (43:54):
Yeah, we'll see you Saturday. Thanks boy, thanks for listening.
That's a good night from Lexington.