KSR - 2026-04-16- KSR - Hour 2

Episode Date: April 16, 2026

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Another podcast from some SNL late-night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and Friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer Streeter Seidel, help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter.

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Their locker room stories, their reactions in the moment, and the stuff nobody gets to hear. Listen to Sports Slice on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more, follow Timbo Slica Life 12 in the TikTok podcast network on TikTok. Life is full of hurdles. So how do you keep going? On Hurtle with Emily Abadi, we're talking with the most inspiring women in sports and wellness from professional athletes, coaches, and Olympic champions, about the challenges that shape them and the mindset that keeps them moving forward. At our level, at this scale, being able to fail in front of the entire world. Like, I can do anything. I can do anything. Listen to Hurtle with Emily Abadi on the IHeart Radio app.

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I've even used Stockton Mortgage myself on my own home loan. For your home loan needs, Stockton.com and click Get Started. Stockton Mortgage, NMLS 8259 Equal Housing Lender, NMLS Consumer Access.org. Welcome to Hour 2 of Kentucky Sports Radio, presented by Stockton Mortgage. Now, here's Matt Jones. Welcome back. Hour number two, Kentucky Sports Radio, 859-280-2287 here at KS Bar and Grill, open for lunch. And remember tonight, trivia, 7 o'clock, get your team. It should be a beautiful evening of fun and excitement.

And, you know, what are you laughing at? You said Judge Gabe is bringing some ringers tonight. Yeah, Judge Gabe's coming. We've got all kinds of people. This is going to be a celebrity-filled trivia, which I'm going to spend a lot of this afternoon getting ready for. One person writes, Matt, is there a chance Otega would come back for a fifth year if we have the five-year rule? I think Otega already – wasn't there already a fifth-year thing? Did he sit out or something a year?

Or do you know? I'm not aware if he did. Well, let's talk about that rule real quick. Otega, so the NCAA is going to adopt, according to reports, you get five years of eligibility. But it's five years, no exceptions unless you go on a religious mission or military service. So if you get hurt, it counts towards the year. Yeah.

If you graduate or whatever, it counts towards the year. Everything is, but you can play for five. years, which means there's going to be a lot of guys play for five years. Sure. You know how we'll see players and be like, that guy's been in school forever. Get ready. That's going to be even more of that. But no injured reserve.

I think it's really only religious mission trips and service in the military are the only things that will not take away your five years. And it's five years from when you graduate high school or if you're overseas from when you turn 19. So I guess the theory is there won't be any college players that are 25, 26. It'll be that. So do you like the rule? I like the rule.

I don't stats nerds are not happy about it because it's going to make all the records seem a little obscure. Yeah, some of the records will fall. Yeah. Some of the Pete Marevichy kind of records will probably fall. Yeah, but most guys, you know, especially in football, they red shirt anyway, and they're there for five years anyway. But you know, you can't make changes about the future of the sport just for, stat sheets from the past. No doubt.

When you do that, when you do that, you're just, you know, that's the same argument I made about the Triple Crown, you can't keep saying, well, well, the pretenance is going to be two weeks later if none of the horses run in it, then what's the point, right? Now, the question is, apparently all players in college now will get an extra year. So, like, take Trent Noah. He's been in college for two years.

Trent Noah is going to wake up and now find himself with three years of eligibility instead a two, which is kind of interesting. For a guy like Trent that's not going to make the NBA, he can make a lot of money in three years here. That's exactly right. So these guys now have a lot more time to play basketball. Now, the counter to that is they don't know what they're going to do with seniors right now. So guys who just finished went through their senior days, Denzel Aberdeen. And apparently the decision has yet to be made.

Do you think the guys that just graduated that would think their career was, was over, you think they should get another year? I mean, you've got to draw the line somewhere, right? So, I mean, if this is the new rule effective today, then if it was yesterday, it's too bad. I think it's effective today. Okay. So nobody? Nobody.

Give us some option to maybe get some more players. I will say if they decide the guys that are seniors get another year, all of a sudden you're going to have a whole new group of people that have the ability to play college basketball. No doubt. No doubt. And so the portal, all of a sudden, you're going to have a whole new group of people. all of a sudden gets a little bigger because you're going to get, although, you know, Denzel Aberdeen is the only guy I saw that got in the portal. What's interesting is the portal closes on Monday.

If they decide after Monday you get an extra year, but the portals closed, that would mean those people could only play at the school where they were. So you'd have to come back to Kentucky. So it would be interesting to me to see, as these reports that it's going to happen, do some of these graduate seniors do what Aberdeen did and jump in the portal really quick? Just in case. Just in case. Very interesting. I don't know. Aberdeen might end up have been a smart one.

He might be one of the few that would have the ability to go somewhere else. You're right. You would think others would follow suit, you know, just in case this rule passes. Now, let's talk about a couple teams real quick. Florida is going to be stacked next year. Stacked. Yeah. They're bringing back their whole team except for that Lee kid.

And they brought in Aberdeen to replace him. All those guys came back. Condon, Hal. What's the big guy? Can never pronounce his name. The strong guy. Oh, Agluly. That's not even close to the name.

So I'll just get you to stop trying. Stop, just stop. But they're all coming back, and now they add Aberdeen. I think Aberdeen's better than Xavier and Lee, so they might be better next year than they were this year. Is Boogie staying also? Boogie stay or all stay? Oh, my goodness. So they're going to be good.

Louisville's going to be good. Does that bother you? Yes, it does. I ask you this during a break. Where is Louisville getting all this money to sign these kids? I don't know. Louisville just decided. Louisville fans got mad because I put out they were going to have the most expensive roster in the country.

I put that out a couple days ago, and they were like, you're coping, you're lied. It's just coast, Peltie's Grace McCuterman Ball Time. And then, of course, yesterday, Goodman and Norlander said Louisville's going to have the most expensive roster in the country. How? Tell me how You know what I think Louisville's doing? Yeah

You know, we talk about Pope They have some of the same questions about Kelsey Like is this I think they're like We're going to give you a squad, Pat Let's see what you do Like we're going to give you And if you can't do it with these guys

Then you can't do it So we'll see I mean they're going to have a really good team But they're also You know We'll see I don't know But they've got

Louisville's always had money. It's just they've spread it out around a lot of sports, but they're going all in on basketball. They are going to have the most expensive roster in the country. Well, they had a good transfer portal team put together last year. This one's better. This one's going to be better. All right, so I have a question.

A name from the past popped up a few minutes ago, and he wrote something, and I actually think there's, it's not bad, and I want to get your take on. Okay. This is from Mark Maggard. Wow. The name Mark Maggard for the past, Mark Maggard, for those of you that were on the Internet for Kentucky fans, he was, if you go back to the Billy Gillespie years and the late Tubby Smith years,

if you were to said, who are the big names in UK online sports, Mark Magar would have been one of them. Oh, he absolutely was one of them. It would have been three or four, and he was one of them. Then he kind of disappeared. But he wrote this. This was what he said on Twitter today. Look, for better or worse, and I think a case can be made for worse, Mark Pope has info on lockdown.

He's been that way for a while. He doesn't tell anyone anything. No leaks, no whispers, no friend in the media to help drive the narrative. When you do this at UK, the void will be filled by others who drive a narrative. And normally that's not better. When you don't leak to reporters, they're going to find a way to have something to write. They'll tell a side of the story that benefits those who do cooperate. with them. That is one of the reasons you hear so many false stories about UK. The truth is nobody knows what Pope is trying to do, who he's prioritizing, etc. He doesn't even tell close friends who he's spoken with. So when you hear detailed accounts of stuff that's supposedly happening, I take it all with a grain of salt. Most of its rumors place together as people make

wild-ass guesses. I think he's, Mark and I have rivaled over the years, but I think he's 100% I think he's dead on. I think he's 100% correct about this. People, Mark has made a decision that I don't think any other coaching staff in the country has made, which is talk to no one at all. Every coaching staff will talk to different people. Like for a while, Cal talked to me, then he stopped,

and then he talked to Kyle Tucker, and then he stopped, and then he talked to Seth Greenberg and Andy Katz, and then he's, well, I think he still talks to those guys, right? every coach has their guy or guys but mark has taken the view we're speaking to no one and i don't know that that's a good idea i actually think it's a bad idea but he clearly thinks it's a good idea but so people when they're getting mad at reporters like they all got mad at jeff goodman yesterday i think mark maggard makes a good point it's natural that jeff goodman's going to get information from other people and when he puts it out, it might not have a great spin for Kentucky,

in part because Kentucky's not giving them any information. And so, you know, I actually think that's a bad PR strategy, but it is clearly Mark's PR strategy. Do you think it's good or bad? I don't like it. I mean, I got to give Cal credit. He kind of knew how important it could be to leak certain info out. You know, hey, Matt, I want you to pump up this Indiana series or whatever it might be.

You know, he'd use your voice to kind of help promote something. Pope can also use our voices today with recruiting news or scheduling news or whatever it is. An overseas trip. He just keeps it all so quiet. We fill the void with noise. Shannon, what do you think? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, you need to.

I mean, we saw what happened with the football team last year, right? I mean, we were making up our own. Good point. Thoughts on what the football team was going to be like because they wouldn't speak to me about it. Same thing at the end. Mark Stoops did the same thing at the end. And I think there's a narrative sometimes online about me specifically where people will go, well, these staffs have stopped talking to you because you're whatever. They don't talk to anybody. At the end, Stoops was talking to no one. Pope's doing the same. And I just don't think it works. And I'll use the realm of politics because I think it's the closest equivalent. The Republicans have been very good under Trump of many years of kind of getting the information out they want through their mouthpieces, whoever it is. And I think the Democrats did it wrong in 2024. So Trump went on these podcasts and he got his message out to all these people and Democrats kept it to themselves and they didn't use like they used to. And I think

it hurts you. I think you have to have voices out there promoting you. Absolutely. And he Pope is not doing that. Now, it may in the end, work out. But I will use. the Rob Wright thing as an example. I knew what had happened with Rob Bright. And as I was watching people get excited, I knew that internally folks around UK weren't as confident once he got on campus and everybody got themselves worked up in a frenzy. And I wanted to kind of calm everybody down, but I couldn't get the confirmation that I needed from UK. So I didn't say. And then when he went somewhere else, you saw what happened. And I, you know, I wish that, I wish they would do a better job about that because a lot of the anger that comes out at Pope and the staff could be managed

better. And I've expressed this to them, and there are people at UK that agree with me, but I don't think the head coach does, so this is how it is. And usually there's even an assistant coach that may talk to the media. It's always an assistant. Yeah. With Cal, so in his, Cal would talk directly to me, but that's rare. Usually it's assistants. And let me say who's doing a great job of it. Will Stein.

Yeah, you're right. Like, Will Stein is doing a great job, and he talks, like his people talk to it, but like, have you noticed all the good publicity, Will Stein's getting? How many times do you see a national college football reporter going? Things are going well at UK. Why do you think they're

doing that in part? It's because they like him. That's right. And because he's talking to him and he gets them excited. He's talking to him. The assistant coaches are going on shows talking to people. It definitely helps spread your message. I think it helps. Who's up next? Let's go to Brady. Brady. Go ahead, Brady. Hey, Matt. Listen, was it being asked anything Thursday? I have a question that I've been wanted to ask for the past few years. So to revert back to a previous roster, when we got Zee into school, you alluded to the fact that there was crazy stuff that went on behind the scenes. to get him in.

Now with him being far removed from Kentucky, can you get into that at all? All right, I'm going to jump off here. So that's a great question. I appreciate the call. So remember when Z got into school, the semester had already started. Correct.

I heard you could tell me if you agree with this. It was past time you could register someone for school. The deadline had already passed. I heard that they registered a fake student. This is just what I heard. I can't swear this, but I think it's true. They registered a fake student, and then when Z decided to come, filed a paperwork that said, we got the name wrong, and put Z as the student. Well, if it's true, it worked. No, I don't think this was like pulling one. I think everybody agreed, kind of under our UK bylaws, this is what we have to do. So, Shannon,

and they registered like, you know, Zach Isaac. Yeah. And they got them registered. And then when Avicic decided to come, they went and did a name change form and said, Jean, whatever, how you pronounce his first name, Avic. He's the first player I've ever heard that could just come in whenever you want.

So, I mean, you can pull that off with him. But they did it. So somewhere there was the name of a student that was not a student. Zach Isaac. Let's just say Zach Isaac, so it could become a visit. It was kind of miraculous how all of a sudden the middle of semester I can't swear to that, but I've had multiple different people tell me that story. I kind of love that story.

Everybody was like, we got to get somebody registered. How about Zach Isaac? Oh, yeah. And then they wrote back and go, listen, we got his name wrong. It was, you know, translation issues. Shannon, it was translation. It was lost in translation. That's what I heard.

happen. I love that story. I hope it's true because I love the fact that's what Kentucky did to get him in. The weather's warming up. The days are getting longer. So why not cornbread if fused seltzers? Can you imagine just sitting back on your porch? Yeah. You know, Dwight Yolkerman's easy top, I can sit on my porch. You could. And watch it just have a selter. Yeah. That's what you can do. Everything cornbread makes is expert crafted, third party lab tested and made with all natural ingredients. First time customers. Cornbread hemp.com code KSR for 20% off. What is it? Code KSR, 20% off. For cornbreadhemp.com, you get your gummies, you get your oils, but now these seltzers are flying off the shelves. Cornbreadhemp.com, this is the good life.

We'll take a break. Be right back. Kentucky Sports Radio. Last night, a blown call changed a game. This morning, the internet lost its mind. Highlights are trending, opinions are flying, and nobody's telling you exactly what happened. That's where sports slice comes in. I'm Timbo.

Every episode, we're cutting through the noise. Breaking down the plays, the controversies, and the stories behind the headlines. We go straight to the source, the athlete themselves, their locker room stories, their reactions, the stuff nobody gets to hear. The laughs, the drama, the triumphs, the moments that never make the highlight real. From viral moments to historic games, from buzzer beaters to controversial calls, we break it down, give you context and ask the questions everybody wants answered. Sports slice brings you closer to the action with stories told by the people who live them. Listen to Sports Slice on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast.

And for more, follow Timbo Slic Life 12 in the TikTok podcast network on TikTok. Welcome to my new podcast, Learn the Hardway with me, your host, and your favorite therapist, Kear Games. And in recognition of Mental Health Awareness Month, I'm bringing over a decade of my own experience in the mental health field and conversations with so many incredible guests. I'm talking, Tripp Fontaine, Ryan Clark. Sometimes when we're in the pursuit of the thing, we get so wrapped up in the chase that we don't realize that we are in possession of the thing.

And we're still chasing it. And we don't know when we've done enough. Because people scoreboard watch. Life becomes about wins and losses. Steve Burns, Dustin Ross, because you find it important to be a good person while you hear on earth? Are you a good person because you're afraid? Because that's two different intentions, bro.

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Jacob told Levan, you're ruining my life. Listen to Kingdom of Fraud on the IHeart Radio app. Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcast. Life throws hurdles big and small. The question is, how do you conquer them? On hurdle with Emily Abadi, we sit down with the most inspiring women in sports and wellness, professional athletes, coaches, and Olympic champions to talk about the challenges that shaped them and the mindset that keeps them going from the WNBA standout Kate Martin and rising hockey star Leila Edwards.

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and have their face light up and smile, that means the world to me. And that's what motivates me to win more gold medals. At our level, at this scale, like being able to fail in front of the entire world. Like, I can do anything. I can do anything. because resilience isn't just about winning. It's about showing up, even when it's hard.

Listen to Hurtle with Emily Abadi on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Presented by Capital One, founding partner of IHeart Women's Sports. Welcome back, Tucky Sports Radio. 859-280-2287. One person writes, Matt, if what you said is true, why would we listen to anything you say if Pope doesn't talk to anybody? That's actually a fair question.

because I'm not getting my information from Pope. So everything comes secondhand, but that's a fair question. I mean, that's part of the reason we don't say as much is because we want to make sure it's right. And if you don't get it direct from the source, you have to go through other direction. He's not talking. His assistant coaches aren't talking. So we have to fill the void with what we think. What we think.

Whiskey thief tomorrow in Frankfurt. Yes. What's the address? Crab Orchard is the name of the street out there. Crab Orchard Street. We will be there tomorrow with the crew. So come see us tomorrow at Whiskey Theater. It's awesome out there.

Now they've got live music like two nights a week. They've got food trucks out there on the weekend. So it's awesome. I love it out there. Is Derek Anderson going to be there? I don't know he's going to be there, but they've got like one of these bourbon lines getting ready to start. Is he supposed to be there? I don't know.

I think Derek Anderson will be there. Good. So you can meet Derek Anderson. He can do the little. Derek says he'll be doing us signing right after the show. Derek Anderson will be signing autographs. Look at that. So we will see.

Whiskey Thieves always a fun when it's beautiful out there. It is beautiful. It is really, really beautiful. So come on out and join us there tomorrow. Before we go, 859-28027, Dina Rusini resigned from the athletic for the finger-locking thing. Do you think she should have had to resign, Mr. Journalist? There was a lot of pushback because their stories that they told didn't seem to add up. They said they're there with a group of six people, but yet there were no...

But do you think cheating... Let's just say that they were cheating. Do you think that should... Should you have to resign as a reporter for that? If it's with someone that you cover, maybe? So you think it's not so much the cheating. It would be because it was someone you cover. Yeah.

somebody that she has to work with on a regular basis. What about you, Shannon? I'm obviously not going to condone the cheating part, but I don't think you should lose your job because you're covering somebody that you're dating. But, I mean, let's be, can we be honest here for just a second? Like, can we be honest? If every reporter that has cheated on their spouse had to be fired, I mean, this is not, they're going to be a lot of people.

that are not going to be having their jobs. And I ain't saying anything, Shannon, about people who, but, like, there'd be a lot less people in positions of employment. I'm sure there's a lot of this that goes on behind the scenes that most of us have no idea about. I mean, leave aside, though. Leave aside that it's who she covered. You can't be firing people for cheating on their spouse.

You'd be firing 80% of the reporters out there. No, I just think it's the fact that her beat was, NFL and covering his teams. So it was the fact that she's covering his team. Yes. And they give her a different team to cover. They could shipped her out to Los Angeles and they could cover the Rams and the Chargers out here.

But why doesn't he get in trouble? Don't know. Yeah. You guys get a new coach. Yeah. I mean like... Dave, he's continued to deny, deny, deny. Well, I mean, I'm not, I'm not... I thought their explanation, like

that, like they were just friends and First of all, they have no pictures of the friends. Zero. Like they said there was a group of six people. We haven't seen one picture of the friends. None. We've seen no proof that friends were there. There come to AI photos.

We're going to Photoshop people in. Yeah. No people have come forward as having been there. And then the interlocking fingers, like, it is what it is. But I don't necessarily think she should have gotten fired for it. I guess she didn't get fired, but she resigned because she thought she was going to get fired. Yeah, they may have had that conversation with the people with the athletic. Like, look, we'll give you the chance to step down.

If not, we're going to fire you. So to save her career, she falls on the sword. Although I will say the explanation of we were with friends. I don't buy that anymore. No. Because you would show some picture of you with your friends. The two of them laying by the pool, by themselves, no friends. That wasn't very friendly.

Who's next? Go to Dennis. Dennis. Dennis. Dennis. All right. No, Dennis. Bob.

Go ahead, Bob. Good morning for Madisonville, K-Y, guys. What's up? A couple questions about Travis Perry. We were just talking about him, dude. Hey, I heard he threw his name in the portal. Yes. Do you all see a landing spot for him?

See, did he save his power for a career with his play in the SEC tournament? And D, could Travis get him at Arkansas Little Rock? Were you listening to Arkansas? conversation during the break? She had to be sitting right between us. You have to be sitting in this restaurant because we just had this conversation seconds ago during the break. I appreciate the call. You were saying you've heard he might go to Arkansas Little Rock. That's the rumor I think people are throwing out there because of Travis in the connection of Western Kentucky with Travis being from Madisonville. Travis Ford. I think he's better than that.

Yeah, I think I, listen, he played well in the SEC tournament. He did. just don't think the SEC is the league for him. But I do think he could play. If I were him, especially now that you've got five years of eligibility, I would go to a school like Western or Wichita State or a school like that, go be really good. Maybe you love it and you finish your career there, or then you get one more chance at a big power school. That's what I would do if I were here.

Western Kentucky would make total sense. He'd probably get a lot of money, probably get a lot of playing time, probably score a lot at Western. I mean, if he goes to Western, though, like, he could be really good there. Yeah. I don't know. Have some NIL deals, probably? I don't know if he's an SEC starting point guard.

Can he play in like the ACC of the Big East or the- Maybe, depending on the team, maybe. Yeah. I wouldn't give up on him yet. We'll take a break. Be right back. KS.R. T.J. Smith, personal injury attorney.

Call T.J. He'll make them pay. Now, more of Kentucky Sports Radio presented by Stockton Mortgage. Here's Matt Jones. Welcome back, Tucky Sports Radio, 859-280-2287. Text Machine 772-7-745-254. Somebody wrote me and said that Travis Perry is between Vandy, Dayton, and Murray State. I ask you, am I crazy, or did he almost go to Vandy when he went to Old Miss after he left Kentucky last year? It seemed like Vandy was one of these choices.

Maybe, yeah, I don't know. Can he play a Vandy? Yeah, he can play a Vandy. I don't know if he could. I don't know if he can start. Although, again, you know, he played really well in the SEC tournament, so maybe that's a level that we haven't seen him hit before. One person writes, this question is for you and Ryan,

since you've been covering UK. What were the two teammates that were on a team together that disliked each other the most? That's an interesting question. Gailt Fitch and Corey Sears. Yeah, so because they were the two guys that got in the fight in the plane, right? On the airplane.

Was that like, though, did they really dislike each other, or was it just they got in the fog? Could have been an isolated incident, yeah, on the plane that night, that day. When I think of rivalries that defined a team, I think the Severe Wheeler Oscar Shibway is the one that sticks out to me. That's the first one I was going to say. They really just didn't get along. And Oscar was the best player, but the team kind of rallied behind Severe. And that's, that was a bad combo when the, you know, when the, you know, the much better player is not the one the teammates like.

I think there was some issues between Rondo and a couple guys, maybe Patrick Sparks. Yeah, that was definitely true. But that didn't really affect the way the team play. I felt like the severe Oscar thing affected the team. I think it definitely did. There was definitely a divide in the locker room that year. Yeah, that's probably the one that would stick out to me as being the most important. One person writes, Matt, I got a question.

that I think would be funny to hear, especially from Ryan. You get a free trip anywhere in the world for two weeks. No questions asked. Where is everyone taking it? Shannon, you go first. Where are you taking? You get a free trip anywhere in the world for two weeks. Two weeks.

Good question. I'm going to say Australia. I don't know why, but I just feel like it would be fun. It's a place I've always learned to go. So I'm going to go Australia. Good call far away. Yeah. I'm going to say a yacht in Greece.

Because I'm trying to think what is expensive, since it's free, I want to go ahead and do an expensive trip, because then when I pay, I'll go to one of the cheaper places. So that's what I would do. Now, Ryan's going to say something like, you know, Jamaica. Nashville. Kentucky. Nashville, Kentucky, which is not a place.

Kalenberg. Nashville, Kentucky? Isn't there in Nashville, Kentucky? No. Okay, so what do you pick it? I said this one other time on this show. My dream has always been as I was a kid to go to Hawaii. I know you've been.

I've never been. I would probably want to go to Hawaii. It's been my two weeks there. Yeah, but that's what I think I said to you when you said this last time is like that is doable. Yeah. That's still on my bucket list. I've not done it.

So you would use your trip anywhere around the world for free and go to Hawaii? Probably. I would go to Hawaii. Okay. Because it's been a dream. Why is it a dream? I don't know. You know?

You dream is kind of a bucket list? What is it you think? Yeah, what is it you think will be there? What is it that makes it a dream? Beautiful beaches, beautiful scenery, all the tourism thing. Go see the... Go see what? I'm not going to draw the blank.

What's the ship that's saying? You're talking about Pearl Harbor? Yeah. You want to go see Pearl Harbor? Oh, yeah. I think it would be awesome. Okay. Well, you know, we can probably make this happen, which gets me to the announcement today from the NCAA that basketball teams will be able to take foreign trips now every year.

Not just every – the rule before was every four years. Now they can take a trip around the world every year. I expect Ryan Kentucky will do this. Why wouldn't you? Why wouldn't you go? I mean, it costs money, but relatively speaking, making – get somebody to sponsor it and you get to take your team and go play against real teams. Don't you think UK does this every year?

I think the most major teams will do it every single year. Why wouldn't you? Like you said, you get free practice time, free time with your guys to get on the court and play somebody. And you can go a million different places. Sure. So I think Kentucky's going to go somewhere this year. Why wouldn't you?

I think we will have basketball this summer at some point, right? I'm going to say, why wouldn't you do that? Get a chance for your guys to get on the court a lot earlier without this. trip. I think the theory behind this continues to be a revenue-based theory. Basically, they're doing this saying this is ways for schools to make money. I mean, so I don't think these are necessarily going to be free, fun trips to Windsor, Canada. I think these will be trips to resorts that UK packages with tourism companies to sell to people,

and they'll try to make revenue out of it. You think they'll have like little round-robin tournaments like we saw down to the Bahamas? I mean, think about if you. You could have Kentucky, North Carolina, Kansas, and Yukon. That's huge. Right around Robin in the Bahamas, people are going to go. That's huge. Of course, basketball fans would flood that place.

So I think what I think this is, this is a start of, you know, in volleyball, I saw Kentucky is playing Louisville in an exhibition game in volleyball like Saturday. Did you know that? Yeah. What they've basically done in volleyball and baseball is they've made their fall baseball exhibition games. They're spring volleyball. I think basketball is going to create a summer exhibition.

Yeah. Where basically these basketball teams get to play games that do not count during the summer, and I think that's going to start. I guess they could play even like professional teams in Europe if they wanted to go to Europe. We've done that before. Yeah. I mean, when we played the team in Croatia, where Z, Big Zee,

and Yellovich came from. Yeah. So, who's up next? Lee. Lee, go ahead, Lee. Who are? Earlier had mentioned about the 2015 team with guys sitting on rotation. Do you think it hurts where Pope doesn't have like the pro thing that Cal did where guys are still going to sit and listen thinking they're going to go pro?

You know, Pope doesn't really have that in its history. And then the second thing I was going to call about, do you think Pope will ever change his ways on the media and how he wants to go about like feeding things out just to make things better for him? Because right now it's just not really going his way. I think there's a lot of people at U.K., there's an appreciate it. I appreciate the call. There's a lot of people at UK that are giving him Pope advice to change on this,

but as of now, I don't think it's going to happen. I think Mark Pope probably takes the view that next year is such an important year. He's going to do it his way and then hope it works out. And I understand that if that's, I get that view. Like if this is going to be my year that makes everybody judge what I'm going to do, I want to do it my way. And then it'll either work or it won't. He kind of did it his way his first year.

He came in so late. He kind of did put pieces together to fit his system. But it reminds me of you remember the conversation I had, Ryan, when Mark Stoops got here with Vince Mero. This was like one of the wisest things Vince Mero said to me. Vince Mero was talking about recruiting. Because you remember when Mark got here, that first year he got a bunch of players.

Yes. And he got some high-end guys to come here. And I remember Vince saying to me, here's the thing, Matt. Right now we're recruiting based on what Mark did at Florida State Miami, right? And what Neil Brown, his offensive theory and like what I did at Nebraska. He was like, we're recruiting based on other places. He said, but after a year or two, we can't talk about Miami and Florida State. We have to have done it here. Yeah. Right. And he said it's almost easier

to recruit now than it will be when there's results. I think we're seeing it with Will Stein. That's what I was going to say. Will Stein's doing this awesome job. You know, what Will Stein's recruiting on? Oregon. Oregon. He's recruiting on Oregon, and he's recruiting on being the quarterback coach with Lamar. But after these games start, he's going to have to recruit on what he did here. Mark Pope that first year was able to recruit on, here's my system.

It's Kentucky. Here we go. Two years later, he has to recruit on Mark Pope at Kentucky. Correct. And I think that's why you see sometimes the splash when you first get here. But then it becomes, okay, don't tell me about what Cal did. Don't tell me about what you did at BYU. What are you doing here?

So you have confidence he'll get guys to fit his system like he did in the first year. That kind of worked. He got one. See what happens by next week. Let's see what our roster looks like at the end. You know, I said Louisville's going to spend the most money. I bet Kentucky ends up spending the fourth, fifth most money. If you are at Kentucky and you cannot put together a roster that is really good

with the fourth most money in the country, that's on you. Don't you agree? It can almost be a failure if you can't do it. If you can, your first year, you did it. Yep. Your second year, you didn't really. Let's see Got to go

Got to do it Make a break Here's no Here's the great thing About Kentucky basketball There's no excuses Here At Kentucky football

There might be some excuses You don't have as much money You don't have history You don't have Tell you back There's no excuses You've got the money You've got the fans

You've got the resources You've got the history But you got to do it You know what I mean? You know This time last year We thought he was putting together a great roster. We thought they were too deep in every position.

And on paper he did, but it didn't work. Didn't work. Now it's got to, you know, actually work. Let's do Draft Kings. 8-5. Why not I do this? Draft Kings.com. You can make your bet. Put $5 on any game and you can win up to $300 in bonus bets.

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Highlights are trending, opinions are flying, and nobody's telling you exactly. what happened. That's where SportsSlice comes in. I'm Timbo. Every episode, we're cutting through the noise, breaking down the plays, the controversies, and the stories behind the headlines. We go straight to the source, the athlete themselves, their locker room stories, their reactions, the stuff nobody gets to hear. The laughs, the drama, the triumphs, the moments that never make the highlight real. From viral moments to historic games, from buzzer beaters to controversial

calls, we break it down, give you context, and ask the questions everybody wants answered. Sports Slice brings you closer to the action with stories told by the people who live them. Listen to SportsLice on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more, follow Timbo Slic Life 12 and the TikTok podcast network on TikTok. Welcome to my new podcast, Learn the Hardway with me, your host, and your favorite therapist, Kear Games. And in recognition of mental health awareness month, I'm bringing over a decade of my own experience in the mental health field and conversations with so many incredible guests. I'm talking. Trip Fontaine, Ryan Clark. Sometimes when we're in the pursuit of the thing, we get so wrapped up in the chase

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a lot of people. Is there ever a product I could bring up and you would go bad people? I don't think so. Not if they're advertising on this show they're good people. Okay. If they're spending money, good people. So you're just like if you spend money on KSR, you must be good people. I don't think you should take that view.

No. Yeah, because you never know. I mean, like, we don't know all these people. There are bad people, and they might. So, like, I think you, I don't think you want to put your personal credibility on the line for every, like, you need to be careful when you do that. You can't just sell Ryan Limond to the highest bidder. But Shady Raids, we know these people. No, Shady Raes are good.

They are good people. But don't diminish others by saying everyone is good. If you're buying advertising on this show, I think you're good people. I'm so seeing he's not, he's doubling down, Shannon. He's not going to change anything. Did we talk about Louisville yesterday about them getting the U.S. gymnastics trials? You didn't mention it. Yeah, so Louisville is going to host the U.S. Olympic gymnastic trials in 2028.

That's huge. That is a massive event for the city of Louisville. To have the trials, that's huge for them. I don't think Kentucky we've ever hosted anything. gymnastics related to the United States Olympic team. Do we have a gymnastics thing in Kentucky? Like how did we get

picked for that? I don't know. I guess just the downtown Louisville with the Yom Center, kind of perfect setting for hosting events. That's awesome for the city. It's just kind of, feels very random because do you know anyone that does gymnastics? No. And our UK gymnastics team of our UK.

That's true. We have a big... And I'm sure U.S. has a gymnastics team. Shannon, is gymnastics big in Louisville? Like, I know volleyball is big in Louisville. You know, they have volleyball tournaments in Louisville like every week. I'll see like a lot of gymnas, like just randomly driving around gymnastics, like, buildings. But I don't know that it's huge or, you know, bigger here than it is in any other city. Where are the gymnastics buildings in Louisville?

I don't know. I don't have the address. I'm just saying I'll drive by. There's a gymnastics place right there. There's one in Mount Washington, I think. Okay. Well, that's true. The Bullet County to the Olympics pipeline is pretty big.

You never know. I never knew the city of Louisville, though, was a pipeline for United States women's gymnastics. Well, it's very cool. Be a great event for the city. I get a great opportunity for the city to kind of shine. Yeah, so I thought that was good news. Who's up next? Go ahead, Kevin.

Kevin. Go ahead, Kevin. Yeah, thanks for taking my call. First of all, Matt, a couple comments ago from you, you took my reason for my call with the Will Stein. and let's see what he does before, you know, the media honeymoon is over. But so I'll just switch to a second topic. Let's say we get Freeman and Wilkins and then obviously Diallo, paired with the six guys we have coming back are already in house and maybe two to three role players from the portal.

Do you think this team is as good or better than the team with? Yeah, that's a great question. So let's say that's the team. Appreciate the call. Diallo, Wilkins, Freeman, Malacom. Cam Williams, Trent Noah, Mason Williams, and let's say we go get one or two shooters and another big in the portal.

That's your team. How good is that team? Just me on the outside looking in, I would think it's not a final four team, but that's a good team I could get behind that could really win a lot of games. I don't think that's a final four team. I think that's a team

that's probably in the ballpark of the team the first year. So like Sweet 16-ish? Yeah. but you're one player away from being a lot better. And that player might be Tyron Stokes or that player might be a kid from overseas. But you're one player. I think the first year I thought we were like, I thought Jackson Robinson would be a star and he was really good,

but he just wasn't quite a star. And I think that's what kept us from hitting that other level. Last year, I think the combination, of some guys not improving, and then Jalen Rowe getting hurt kind of kept us from being what I'd hoped. And then I don't know that Pope did the best job with that team. I think that's a really good team, but I think in order to take another leap, it needs something.

You know, and maybe that's something stokes. Like we said, Zoom made a huge jump from his freshman year to his sophomore year. If he does the same thing moving to the SEC, that's something you can get excited about. But is there a star? on that team. I don't know. Like are Diallo and Wilkins, will they be better than Aberdeen and O.

Hmm. Maybe not, but I think Freeman will be better than any big we had if we get them. And I think Malachi will make a jump. You got to see Malachi gets better. You get a full year of Cam. Yeah.

But if you're asking me, I still think we're one player way. I think we're just. Cam Williams, you know, was just kind of finding himself. He just became a starter and was playing well. He hit eight three-pointers in that one game against Bellarmine. But it's also worth remembering this.

College basketball as a whole is not going to be nearly as good next year. Not nearly as many freshmen. A lot of the fifth-year guys and the COVID got, like, all that's kind of ending. So I think the quality of college basketball, the best teams in college basketball won't be quite as good as they were, say, last year. Yeah. So that might help us too. Who's next?

Justin. Justin. Go ahead, Justin. Hey, Matt, I feel like everybody's forgotten that we don't have a full staff. We still need one more assistant coach. What's going on with that? If you heard anything about that? Don't know.

We're halfway to the portal and we're working with incomplete staff. It's a great question. We are missing an assistant coach. Do you wonder why? It almost like they're feeling it by committee. The guys that are already on staff are kind of filling that missing. But do you think they have a person and they just haven't announced it? I kind of felt like they're going to promote one of these guys from within.

It's kind of acting as an assistant coach now. Yeah, I don't know if I love that. I think we've got to continue to shake it up. But we'll see. But right now, Freeman, I think his visit is either ending or may have ended. Wilkins, well, this is today is his visit. And I'm sure we will hear about another person or two over the course of the day. Take him to Keenland.

Don't take him to Carson. and we'll get him. Oh, by the way, yes, Diallo went to Malones. There we go. Just keeping the restaurant. Diallo was at, or no, no, Freeman was at Malones. Diallo was at Carson, so Carson's got one. Okay.

All right. Thank you, folks very much. Trivia tonight. Good luck, Ryan. Thank you. We'll see you later. It's been Kentucky Sports Radio. Another podcast from some SNL late-night comedy guy,

Not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and Friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, S&L's Mikey Day and head writer, Streeter Seidel, help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and Friends on the IHeart Radio app,

Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Last night, a blown call changed the game. This morning, the internet lost its mind, and nobody's telling you exactly what happened. That's where SportsSlice comes in. I'm Timbo, and every episode, we're cutting through the noise, breaking down the biggest moments in sports and giving you the real story behind the headlines. And we're going straight to the source, the athletes themselves, their locker room stories, their reactions in the moment, and the stuff nobody gets to hear.

Listen to SportsSlic on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more, follow Timbo Slical Life 12 in the stuff. the TikTok podcast network on TikTok. Life is full of hurdles. So how do you keep going? On Hurtle with Emily Abadi, we're talking with the most inspiring women in sports and wellness

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