Kentucky Wildcats Basketball assistants are getting paid

Good morning Big Blue Nation and Happy back to work post Memorial Day Tuesday. Is that a thing? Unfortunately, it seems to be, but at least we have to trudge through just four days of this work week now. Here is a look at some of the Kentucky Wildcats headlines over the holiday weekend and moving forward.

First off, the whole Kentucky Wildcats basketball staff is coming back and that is a good thing. It is kind of remarkable that John Calipari has lost just one assistant in the time he has been in Lexington to the head coaching ranks. The loss of Orlando Antigua last year is though to have been a reason that recruiting has struggled a bit this year, so Mitch Barnhart and John Calipari have worked to keep this staff together, Most notable is the fact that Kenny Payne is now going to make $700,000 a year, but everyone saw an increase.

"Kenny Payne, John Robic and Tony Barbee will make a combined $1.44 million next season – according to contracts released by UK’s Office of Legal Counsel – which is $415,000 more than the trio made last season with the Wildcats.Payne signed a three-year deal that expires June 30, 2018, and is worth a total of $2.1 million. He’ll make $650,000 next season, $700,000 in 2016-17 and $750,000 in 2017-18. His average annual salary is $200,000 higher than his previous contract and more than at least 22 head coaches in the NCAA Tournament last season, according to USA Today’s database.Robic and Barbee both have one-year deals that expire on June 30, 2016. Robic’s is worth $415,000, a raise of $40,000 from his previous contract. Barbee will make $375,000, the same as the assistant he replaced, Barry “Slice” Rohrssen, but a significant bump from the $150,000 Barbee made as special assistant to the head coach last season.All three assistants, like Calipari, have just one incentive in their contracts: a $5,000 bonus (Calipari’s is $50,000) if the team maintains a score of 950 in the NCAA’s Academic Progress Rate. Each assistant also receives four tickets to all home basketball games and two tickets to all home football games."

Lest anyone doubt it, the University of Kentucky is paying John Calipari to win basketball games. Not get players to the NBA Draft. I’m not sure why this needs to be clarified, but there still seems to be a contingent of the Kentucky Wildcats fan base confused about this. I think it’s been said a million times that everything John Calipari utters is extremely calculated and he is not talking to you even if he is talking directly at you. A John Calipari quote is as layered as an onion and therefore dissected and sliced apart as such. Tim Sullivan reminds us of Cal’s main job though.

"You would think Kentucky’s highest-salaried public employee is not paid to find jobs for non-graduates of the state’s largest university. You would think his primary purpose is to win basketball games.That Calipari has won at a school-record .833 clip in his six seasons at UK is a testament to his salesmanship, his skill and his leadership. And it provides him some allowances when his rhetoric goes off the rails. But much as his “players first” mantra might resonate with elite prospects, the notion that the NBA draft exceeds the importance of the NCAA championship sends a strange message to a fan base still grieving over the previously unbeaten Wildcats’ Final Four loss to Wisconsin.To suggest that the career advancement of soon-to-be millionaires deserves higher priority than the vicarious thrills of their tax-paying public is a tough sell in the best of times, and it feels like a calculated diversion in the wake of a dispiriting defeat. It’s like asking an audience to judge a play based on what jobs the actors landed afterward. It suggests a poor grasp of what matters most to Big Blue Nation."

Meanwhile, the people close to Jamal Murray have kept up almost a very tight wall as to what their plans are. There has not been a lot of news since Murray visited the Kentucky Wildcats but apparently we can expect a decision soon. All signs point to a reclassification to 2015 and it appears that this will be a Kentucky vs Oregon decision.

"Murray is likely to decide by June. High school players typically decide by the national letter-of-intent deadline, which this year was set for May 20 – but Murray has rushed to complete additional schoolwork so he can play college hoops this fall, instead of the planned 2016. To do so, he would bypass the letter-of-intent deadline and sign a letter of financial aid at some later point.“You have to have some knowledge of where everyone is coming from,” Roger Murray said of recruiting. “Just maintain your structure, of the original way you wanted to go, without getting caught up in the whole hoopla of it. It’s a delicate balance.” Asked about his son’s ability and readiness for college basketball, Roger is emphatic: “Without a doubt.”Other schools interested in Murray include the University of Oregon, where Canadian Dillon Brooks, a friend of Murray’s, has finished his freshman season. Kentucky declined comment when asked about recruiting, but Oregon confirmed it is pursuing Murray."

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