Let's get the obligatory jokes about it not being basketball season out of the way early, shall we? I'm doing a football preview on Kentucky, which some of you will find interesting, and the rest of you might learn something for your betting book. Kentucky was a well below average team in 2015 that finished with a 5-7 record, and a 2-6 record in the SEC. The Wildcats haven't been to a bowl game since 2010, yet every year I hear about how things are improving from Kentucky fans. Let's see if they are right this year.
Kentucky's problem last year was very simple: They turned the ball over entirely too much. While their QB Patrick Towles had what I considered to be an impressive arm, he threw 14 interceptions on the season. If you're throwing more than 12, that's more than 1 per game, and that's baaaaaaaad. You better have 30 TDs to go with that, and he only had 9 on the season. So at the end of the year since Towles was such a turnover machine, the Kentucky coaching staff benched him for Drew Barker, who wasn't much better. Then, Towles decided to transfer to Boston College. Which I find hilarious because he transferred from a 5-7 SEC team to a 3-9 ACC team. That's like leaving Applebee's because you didn't like the food, and heading to Golden Corral. It's not a step up.
Go ahead and type "Kentucky quarterback" into Google, and one of your suggested choices will be "Kentucky quarterback fat" which will then lead you to Jared Lorenzen. This is apropos of nothing except that when you try to find information on the current Kentucky quarterback, Google will sideline you with tales of the Pillsbury Throwboy who hasn't taken a snap for the Wildcats since 2003. I think that says something about the current Kentucky quarterback situation that I honestly couldn't put into better words. You have to really dig to find any information about this program this year.
The actual Kentucky quarterback this season will be Drew Barker, and absolutely nobody should be excited about that. Head coach Mark Stoops named him the starter after spring practice, likely because of a lack of options. If you read more online, you can see that Alabama poached a top QB recruit from Kentucky for 2017, which again should shock nobody. If you have a choice between Alabama and Kentucky and you choose Kentucky in the current football climate, you need to be tested to make sure you're under some sort of mind-controlling super-drug developed by the Russians for Cold War soldiers. Because only they would choose something that bleak.
Barker played some snaps as the starter last season against Louisville and Charlotte. Yeah. So he's seen exactly ZERO teams from the SEC, and even against those rather mediocre clubs he still didn't throw a single TD. If Barker is the answer, I'll be thoroughly shocked. What is going to be an answer for Kentucky is their running game, led by Boom Williams and Jojo Kemp. I watched Jojo Kemp play over the last two years, and he's absolutely electric when he gets the ball in space, especially in games against South Carolina. Meanwhile Boom Williams had some injury issues that had him missing two games last season, but he finished with 855 yards on just 128 carries. That's over 7 yards a carry, which is frankly absurd. If Kentucky has any shot at doing well, it will be on these running-backs to get the job done along with their offensive line.
Speaking of the line, Kentucky returns four starters from a unit that helped those Kentucky running backs amass quite a few yards. The problem for them will be in pass protection against SEC defenses ready to eat a young QB alive. They'll have to rely on receivers like Dorian Baker and Garrett Johnson to provide Barker with targets, who did well last season catching passes from Towles. The line can only keep a young kid upright for a few seconds, and if Baker or Johnson can't find some space, it's going to be check-down-Charlie or duck-and-cover for Kentucky.
On defense, Kentucky was terrible last year, on par with teams like South Carolina and Auburn in points allowed. Stoops was quoted after recent practices complaining about his depth on defense at the Linebacker and Defensive line positions. That's a HUGE issue because Kentucky's only real hope to keep up with the talent at other higher recruited programs is to keep fresh legs on the field. If they can't rotate in and out effective line players, they have no advantages in a man-on-a-man scenario with 12 of the 14 teams in the SEC. Instead, they'll have to resort to ball-hawking, and that was a decent strategy last year as Kentucky forced 20 turnovers. The problem was their own team gave away 22. You can't be that careless with the ball and have a defensive unit this questionable.
Overall, Kentucky looks good on the run, good on the offensive line, good on receivers, and pretty much everything else has the potential to be a disaster. Kentucky could make a bowl game if Barker plays WAY better than I think he's capable of playing, and their defense continues to force other teams into bad decisions with the football. However, if I'm guessing, I think this is another slide back year for Kentucky given the schedule and their issues on defense.
KENTUCKY PREDICTION: 4-8
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