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The Kentucky Brand has become Craftsman

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BetterThanYou

Junior
Jan 31, 2026
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Hear me out.

Kentucky basketball was THE brand for a long part of college basketball history. Same as Craftsman tools. Craftsman was the tool in every American’s garage. It was synonymous with tools. They were well made and the brand was the sign of a quality product trust led by Americans.

Now, Craftsman has become a label to slap on to any crappy product in the hope that the brand recognition or nostalgia factor will attract buyers. The underlying product was allowed to become slop while those at the top sucked all the value out of the brand.

The same is happening to UK basketball. It probably started with Calipari but has accelerated during the Pope years. It’s becoming a brand without any substantive meaning behind.

Meanwhile, coaches, administrators, assorted hangers-on, and now players are getting rich because of the brand. They are leeching off the last bit of value behind the brand and soon all that will be left is those that follow it out of tradition or name recognition. But in the end, it isn’t the same product that it used to be.
 
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kfwa

kfwa

Senior
Oct 12, 2014
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I think we're in a world where coaching alone isn't going to keep the brand going forward.

We're in a pro model now.

We buy players in the off season

You need a GM, you need a finance person and you need to look at how professional teams excelled prior to CBA's and salary caps

whats clear is we have a serious gap in player valuation, injury risk and NIL contract structure.

If those were addressed last year, we wouldn't have the team we have now, we'd probably have Caleb Wilson, we probably wouldn't have JQ, and Pope wouldn't be held hostaage to whatever agreements he made

If we allow a situation where Cal (from the previous 5 years) or Pope or whoever, along with the AD is responsible for spending and player evaluation, we're going to fall behind. This isn't an era where you bring a kid in and turn him into the player you want over 3 years.
 
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I’m The Village Idiot

I’m The Village Idiot

Heisman
Jul 30, 2024
5,747
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BetterThanYou said:
Craftsman tools are prominently sold in Lowe’s.

They did not go anywhere.

They just became a crappier product while all the value was drained by leeches.
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I understood the metaphor in the first place. Which one of these is true:

A.) We are an irrelevant brand so we just need to deal with it

B.) We are the most storied program in CBB and despite down years, we are of the biggest brands in basketball. Therefore, coaches have to perform or we find another?

Pick a lane.
 
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A

ArcticChar

Junior
Mar 18, 2022
362
399
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We could invest in some humanoids real soon. Wouldnt even need to pay them money. PA: "These are your 2027 AI Wildcats".
 
ChicagoCat90

ChicagoCat90

All-American
Oct 12, 2014
1,964
5,602
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The Kentucky brand is stale right now because it lacks star power right now. No one outside of homegrown fans will turn on their tv and be captivated or motivated by watching UK. It starts from the top down. Right now our coach is goofy so therefore our brand is a bit goofy.
 
P

preacherfan

All-Conference
Oct 11, 2003
28,965
4,526
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We are living in strange days to be sure. We do not have enough data to know the how NIL and the transfer portal are affecting college basketball. IU wins the football title while leaving behind all of the traditional powerhouses. Is that an anomaly or a new trend?

Look at college basketball now: UNC, UK and KU all had early exits this year. IU AGAIN failed to make the tournament. Duke has the Boozer twins who would have gone to Duke anyway. Arizona has built a team on foreign players. Michigan has used NIL and the portal quite effectively. Houston changed the entire culture of the program. Purdue has a team largely who have been at Purdue for a while.

Anybody have any thoughts?
 
I’m The Village Idiot

I’m The Village Idiot

Heisman
Jul 30, 2024
5,747
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Tim0808 said:
I hope you are correct. I do not have as much faith in this leadership as you do.
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I didn’t base it on any leadership though. Simply the brand itself. I hope that next AD hire is wonderful, but saying our brand isn’t one of the premier in CBB undermines the whole idea of replacing Pope. Kentucky is Kentucky and it will be that even after down years.
 
CutNets

CutNets

Sophomore
Jan 13, 2026
67
157
33
I’m The Village Idiot said:
Call it whatever you want. The “we are Indiana” posts are ridiculous. If you all really believe that stuff, then why worry about a coaching change?
Click to expand...

Coaching is the clear difference in today's college athletics climate. All the blue bloods will have the money, including UK, to land portal targets. What separates everyone is and will be coaching. A coaching change means everything in the world. What are we talking about?
 
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I’m The Village Idiot

I’m The Village Idiot

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Jul 30, 2024
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CutNets said:
Coaching is the clear difference in today's college athletics climate. All the blue bloods will have the money, including UK, to land portal targets. What separates everyone is and will be coaching. A coaching change means everything in the world. What are we talking about?
Click to expand...
I agree with every word of that. And do you know what is attractive to those prospective coaches? This brand. That’s the point.
 
MegaBlue05

MegaBlue05

Heisman
Mar 8, 2014
10,740
21,047
66
I’m The Village Idiot said:
Melodramatic.

Kentucky is still a top brand in CBB. We aren’t going anywhere.
Click to expand...

We’re in a down decade. It’s what we do every 20 years. The alarming part, however, is that this decade is the worst so far.
In the 2000s we made 0 Final Fours and won no titles but went to 2 elite 8s. This decade we’ve made a Sweet 16 and had a good team that won the SEC the year there wasn’t a tournament. All the other seasons where any where from bad to decent with poor postseason results.

This melodramatic “the program is dead and buried forever” hyperbole is silly and rooted in extreme recency bias.

With that said, we do need a coaching and administration upgrade. Our admin, like the fanbase, lives constantly in the past and was slow to adapt to the NIL era. Hopefully the new admin lives in 2026 and beyond, not 1998 like Mitch and Co.
 
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Old Blue Fart

All-Conference
Mar 23, 2014
1,642
4,219
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preacherfan said:
We are living in strange days to be sure. We do not have enough data to know the how NIL and the transfer portal are affecting college basketball. IU wins the football title while leaving behind all of the traditional powerhouses. Is that an anomaly or a new trend?

Look at college basketball now: UNC, UK and KU all had early exits this year. IU AGAIN failed to make the tournament. Duke has the Boozer twins who would have gone to Duke anyway. Arizona has built a team on foreign players. Michigan has used NIL and the portal quite effectively. Houston changed the entire culture of the program. Purdue has a team largely who have been at Purdue for a while.

Anybody have any thoughts?
Click to expand...
College sports have taken a turn and coaches will either change with it or die with it.
Remember years ago when the 3 point shot came about? Two coaches that were slow to adapt to the 3 point shot were Crum and Knight. One could argue that was the start of the end for them.

Today, it is NIL and portal that is driving the change.

Think of it like a business owner. You have a company that ever few months you have to completely hire new employees. How long doing that before you think that owner starts getting frustrated and finds their time spent on the company now all being taken to one area like hiring new employees constantly. This owner will lose focus of the companies core mission.
This is what is happening in college. Coaches are having to replace their players every season.

As a business owner, this is a crappy way to not only run a business muchness build on what you already have.
 
1

#1 cat fan

Sophomore
May 7, 2009
158
155
43
kfwa said:
I think we're in a world where coaching alone isn't going to keep the brand going forward.

We're in a pro model now.

We buy players in the off season

You need a GM, you need a finance person and you need to look at how professional teams excelled prior to CBA's and salary caps

whats clear is we have a serious gap in player valuation, injury risk and NIL contract structure.

If those were addressed last year, we wouldn't have the team we have now, we'd probably have Caleb Wilson, we probably wouldn't have JQ, and Pope wouldn't be held hostaage to whatever agreements he made

If we allow a situation where Cal (from the previous 5 years) or Pope or whoever, along with the AD is responsible for spending and player evaluation, we're going to fall behind. This isn't an era where you bring a kid in and turn him into the player you want over 3 years.
Click to expand...
It can be that way if you let it be.
Iowa st doesn't have high level recruits. Our players were just as highly ranked or higher . A good coach can take under rated players and make them great. Still today.
Yesterday otz knew our 2 biggest weaknesses and came in with a game plan. At first they wanted to make us shoot 3's. Well we made them. Then after the tv timeout he went after our 2nd biggest weakness, guards that can't dribble. Trapping, playing in your face defense, and making us hand the ball back to them with turnovers. A brilliant game plan. In fact every time we faced defense that played up on us from half court on this year we lost.
Then you have our coach that doesn't emphasize any kind of fundamentals on the other side line. Fir 2 straight season nobody has blocked out. Maybe an occasional one but it doesn't happen. Careless with the ball, and just not very smart. Stepping out of bounds when u have a wide open drive to the basket. Nil can make you great if you have the tools in place to be great , but you can't just spend 20 million and expect wins.
 
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U

UKCowboys

All-American
Oct 14, 2019
3,324
5,601
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Way over the top. There is nothing wrong with the brand. Hire the right coach. Its really that simple. And there are plenty to choose from
 
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AttyHunt

AttyHunt

All-Conference
Sep 2, 2022
1,188
1,419
113
preacherfan said:
We are living in strange days to be sure. We do not have enough data to know the how NIL and the transfer portal are affecting college basketball. IU wins the football title while leaving behind all of the traditional powerhouses. Is that an anomaly or a new trend?

Look at college basketball now: UNC, UK and KU all had early exits this year. IU AGAIN failed to make the tournament. Duke has the Boozer twins who would have gone to Duke anyway. Arizona has built a team on foreign players. Michigan has used NIL and the portal quite effectively. Houston changed the entire culture of the program. Purdue has a team largely who have been at Purdue for a while.

Anybody have any thoughts?
Click to expand...
How does UT keep doing it? Made 4 straight Sweet 16's.
 
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preacherfan

All-Conference
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28,965
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AttyHunt said:
How does UT keep doing it? Made 4 straight Sweet 16's.
Click to expand...
I've often said that "Barnes is Tubby Smith without a title." Tubby always made the tournament at UK and made 3 E8's after the title year. Tubby just couldn't get us back to the FF and Barnes hasn't done that at UT either. Both came close but just couldn't quite get there.
 
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