Joker Phillips

[Derek]

Too bad. I hate to see any SEC go this far south.

And his wife is hot.

http://espn.go.com/college-football/story/_/id/8592978/joker-phillips-coach-kentucky-wildcats-season

[Swamp Daddy]

Well, around here (KY) he's been on the hot seat all last year. Mitch Barnhart has essentially been looking for a way to keep him. His recruits from last year were as a class ranked very high. He was in many ways an ideal coach, played for UK, assistant coach for years, loved the program, etc.

But, results on the field just did not add up. The real problem is who can UK possibly get. The university simply won't put the money back into football that they should. They drain the revenue to pay for other things. For years people didn't seem to care about football results, tailgating was huge, the stands were full, etc. It was party time before basketball season started.

Jealousy about UL (at least UL was trying to get better, sinking money into the program, new stadium, now vastly expanded, etc.) started UK fans to care about football. And, in the modern era (excluding Kragthorpes boo-boos) UL has regularly beaten UK. Nothing a UK fan hates worse than losing to UL (except may losing to TN in football) in any sport.

First nail in Joker's coffin was losing to UL first game of the year. And, the final nail was really the loss to Western KY (only a few years for WKU in FBS (1-A) football). After the loss to Western, their coach, Willie Taggart, bragged WKU was the new blue in KY. And that UK had slid to the #3 football power in KY. Still the AD held off announcing his dismissal until it was obvious that the one guaranteed SEC win (Vanderbilt) normally on their schedule was vastly better too.

UL fans were hoping he'd be kept on, probably a guaranteed win for us each year .

The question remains, with all the good coaching positions that will be open this year, who would want to come to UK knowing the adminstration simply doesn't care much about the program. One of the problems is that UK must get state money to do literally anything. UL with a large population and many donors can raise private funding for bonds, etc. (this is how the new stadium was built and expanded).

Swamp Daddy