We're switching things up on this Friday.

Instead of going inside Kentucky politics, we're going inside Kentucky sports and we're talking with legendary broadcaster Dick Gabriel, who's with us.

It's good to see you, sir.

Thank you.

Very much.

Good to be here.

You know, I deal with the sport of politics and the real sports, but I have always admired your work and what you still do.

Thank you.

Yeah.

And I like to see you wearing that bling right there.

People may see that on the side.

Glance now and then the football team and I'm on the sidelines.

Radio guys will earn a bowl game ring.

They're kind enough to take care of the radio crew.

So.

Yeah, our.

Fun.

There's fun.

So before we start talking about some other sports, let's talk about the derby.

Let's start off there.

So we are in it for the Running for the Roses here in just a little over a week from now.

Bob Baffert is still in the news, Right.

So tell us about what's going on there and how this what's happening now affects his legacy.

Well, he's out again because Churchill Downs decided that this ongoing battle between them, a verbal battle, had just gone too far.

So they decided you're going to sit out this derby as well, pal.

And that meant that the owners who were sending his horses, their horses to Bob to train up to the Derby, their horses will not be eligible to run in the Kentucky Derby.

And some of them have remained loyal to Baffert.

Some have moved their horses.

But as far as his legacy goes, I think, Renee, this second year I think will taint it much more than the first year, really, just because it's been ongoing.

Yeah, you know, he'll always be the guy who has trained Derby winners, Triple Crown winners, Breeders Cup winners.

He's tremendous in terms of bringing the sport to the common man.

He's such a great interview, a great talker.

You know, we love going to his barn because, you know, you're going to get something good and he can communicate to the one person or the person who's a horse fan for one weekend out of the year.

That's right.

You know, but it's a shame that this is going on.

It's not good for anybody.

What I was going to say, what does it do to the sport of horse racing?

Well, I think to the to the fans who only watch the derby and maybe the Triple Crown races, not a whole lot.

But to those of us who really love the sport, you miss a guy like Baffert, but it also throws a cloud of suspicion over him, you know, And they just need to do everything they can to try to keep this sport as clean as they can.

And that's a major task.

Yeah.

Now let's talk about UK basketball.

So, you know, you've got the pope.

We're just going to call him the pope.

Good coach Pope.

He's really working very quickly to rebuild, to recruit not just players, but coaches.

How is that going so far?

I think he's put together a really good staff, including Alvin Brooks.

He was approved Thursday afternoon officially.

Everybody knew he was coming.

But this was a guy, ironically enough, who worked at Baylor, Kentucky, couldn't get the head coach away from Baylor.

Mark Pope plucks his top assistant and reportedly and the proof is in the pudding.

He's an excellent recruiter.

Now, recruiting has changed so much over the last five years because of the portal and nil and all the free movement.

You're recruiting future players, you're recruiting your current players, trying to get them to stay right with you.

But they're building a roster like so many teams.

But building a roster from the ground up is unprecedented at.

Duke and he's talked about changing the culture.

What does he mean by that?

How do you interpret?

What do you mean?

What I interpreted was that John Calipari did great things at Kentucky, both on and off the floor.

But the way he did it worked.

When he first got here with the one and done kids, he'll sell the NBA to them.

They'll come in and win a lot of games to go to Final Fours to win a national championship.

But the years have gone on.

They have run into some bad luck not getting back to the Final Four and then with the portal, Calipari teams were so young teams going to the Final Four were much older, and so that really was a disadvantage for Kentucky.

I think Mark Pope wants to get back to the way it was when he was here, which is almost impossible because his championship team was full of veterans.

But he wants older players who think as much about being at Kentucky as being in the NBA.

Now, that's that's a challenge.

But if he can pull that off, I think the fan base will reconnect.

And I think Exhibit A was that huge crowd at Rupp Arena.

Right.

I mean, can you describe the feeling I've heard it electorate Nothing like anything it ever happened in Rupp ever before even if it was a Taylor Swift concert.

Yeah, that's that's a great analogy.

I was sitting in the middle of that wondering, when's the last time I heard a ballgame with this kind of noise and this kind of electricity when you can when you can walk in to an arena and kind of go like this and feel it literally in the air, then you know, there's something going.

On, something special.

And they kept and I got down there early because I heard the crowd are starting to build.

But Rupp Arena expected about seven sections worth of people and they turned away anywhere from 3 to 5000.

So but that was, I think, the fan base saying we're all in and we like what you bring.

Yeah.

And he even said it, you know I understand the assignment of that to get those banners in the rafters.

Right exactly.

So what does it mean that now Coach John Calipari and Kenny Payne are back together again at Arkansas?

Does that affect Coach Polk's recruiting at all?

Of course, especially if they go after the same players, which will happen, I'm sure.

I think that there was a little bit of a drop off at Duke, if not a lot when Kenny Payne left because the players related so well to him.

He worked well with the big man, But Kenny was a good cop.

When Calipari would come down on somebody, Kenny would be the one rubbing their neck.

And every program needs that.

And, you know, I'm wondering now about Mark Pope being a bad cop and who's going to be as good cop because he doesn't seem like he's built that way, but he will be.

You played for Rick Pitino, right?

Right.

Yeah.

But he'll just whatever language he uses will be very clean compared to Pitino.

Yeah, but no, I do think that the Arkansas Kentucky rivalry, which was big in the nineties, could come back.

Yeah.

Duke baseball that's starting back up again.

So you love this stuff too.

Yeah well I do their games on the SCC network streaming channel filling on the radio for Darren Hedrick now and then and when I traveled with the team as Darren does all the time you really get to know guys and so we're supposed to be objective as possible.

You're basically calling the games through the UK prism but you get to know these kids and they're just really good people.

This team the last couple of years.

So you kind of root for them.

And I didn't expect this kind of start.

I mean, they're in the driver's seat right now in the SCC.

I thought they'd make it back to the postseason.

They got a shot at a championship.

That's awesome.

Speaking of baseball, the legends, Now we're back to that neighborhood.

Was there a homeowner home opener just Thursday night?

Right.

What do you expect?

I expect what we saw in 2001 when the team first got off the ground.

So in other words, everything old is new again, because Allen Steines, part of the ownership group.

Now, Allen helped bring that team, that franchise to Lexington.

And I think we'll see the return of national acts that are all part of minor league baseball.

You know, the sideshow stuff is part of the culture of minor league baseball.

And fans love kids, love.

I think you'll see the stadium upgraded a bit because that's that's one of the things that held the legends back when minor league baseball cut some teams.

Now, they're not an affiliated team.

They're an independent team.

The good news there is they can sign whoever they want so they can get local kids and they have a lot of former UK and EKU players.

Yeah.

It's always good talking to you.

Good talking to you.

And we should say, speaking of Derby, you've done more than 40 derbies.

Between 40 and I think around 40.

Five.

Yeah.

So we should really see you about who we should pick.

Oh I can't pick 45 winners.

Yeah.

I root for the bluegrass Stakes winner.

I want to see another blue, and that's Sierra Leone to go to war.

That's right.

Yes.

Yeah, but it's hard.

I'm putting my money there.

Okay.

Thank you, Dixie.

You.