Had family Christmas today. In years past, a 7:00 game would have been the perfect after early dinner thing for us to watch together. 4 of us have degrees from UK and are big sports fans, and the kids are all UK fans. Well, they were anyway.
As it is the game wasn’t even a thought. My dad turned it on out of duty and then turned it off. I’ve never in my life seen him turn off a UK game. That’s a sign. Another sign is my wife. Grew up in Lexington, two degrees from UK, grew up watching all of the games with her parents and then rewatching them on VHS and then DVR. Cant even get her to watch anymore. And recently I’ve caught her rewatching Bengals games. That’s another sign.
This is bad. The end of Tubby was bad but in some ways this is worse. Let’s face it- there’s no real connection (outside of Oscar I guess) between the program and the fanbase anymore. Guys come here to try out for a year, then leave. They’re mercenaries- and I don’t fault them for it, they shouldn’t have to go to college for a fake year- and as fans we don’t feel the connection to them. I can’t keep track of the roster year in and year out. And Cal warned us year ago- he’s set the program up to get kids to the NBA and if we happen to win some games along the way, cool. And that’s what’s happening now. And it sucks.
Lot of people have invested a lot of time and money as fans with the only expectation in return is to have an entertaining product to help us get through the winter, something to look forward to in the spring, and something to be proud of. We ain’t getting that. If I may paraphrase noted motivator and national security news source Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, it’s time for Calipari to get to stepping’. This is broke.
Anyway, merry Christmas, eat Arby’s, and this **** sucks farts.