Vicky Graff Photo
The relationship between University of Kentucky athletics and JMI, a media rights and venue development company, has been a controversial subject recently in part because there has been no clear explanation about the relationship for fans and media to understand.
Some are blaming UK’s complicated relationship with JMI for the lack of men’s basketball recruiting success. Kentucky has yet to sign a top 10 player in coach Mark Pope’s two seasons and does not have a high school player signed or committed for the 2026-27 season.
Kentucky athletics director Mitch Barnhart was more than a bit miffed after Will Stein’s introductory press conference when talking about UK’s NIL funding.
Pope was asked during his press conference Friday about Kentucky’s partnership with JMI — and he took the company line with lavish praise for Barnhart and JMI.
“We have this incredible partnership with JMI that’s enabled us to do so much, and they’re doing incredible work for us. And the way Mitch has kind of worked this and led this is, in a sense — I have a whole team of people that are working contracts, working possibilities,” Pope said. “One of the complicated things right now is that there’s not a clear interpretation of exactly what the rules are. Literally, it’s a dynamic process every single day.
“We’ll make sure that we always air on the side of doing this legally, which is a guessing game, because nobody knows exactly what’s legal right now. This would probably be like when someone needs to do like a super in-depth, New Yorker magazine 30-page article on Mitch, but his leadership in this space has been incredible, and I get to see it firsthand, where I have AD’s from other major universities reaching out and trying to figure out, how are you doing this? How did you move ahead this way? This partnership with JMI is incredible.”
Incredible? That’s not what all recruits and national recruiting analysts are saying about UK’s approach to NIL opportunities that now are handled by JMI.
Kentucky basketball does not have a general manager like some programs do. Pope was also asked if that could be a direction UK might go.
“There’s just a million different parts of this, but that’s all in the conversation of how we do the management part of this program and it’s something that we we’ve spent an inordinate amount of time talking about, actually had long, long discussions with a bunch of people that could, at some point, maybe in some way, fill a position like that,” Pope said Friday.
Kentucky has only a 6-4 record going into Saturday night’s game with Indiana even though it reportedly has the nation’s highest payroll this season despite what Pope calls a “ridiculous” level of support from JMI and Barnhart.
“We have an incredible team in the dynamic times. Finding, landing on exactly the right spot is ultimately, that’s my job, to get the right spot. But the support that we’re getting is ridiculous from Mitch and the administration from JMI,” Pope said.
5 Responses
JMI requires that kids sign over the ownership of their NIL money. WHY??? Do the kids have access to that money while playing at UK? Do they keep that money when they leave UK? Nobody is answering those questions and high school recruits are avoiding Kentucky like the plague. This is another Mitch Barnhart fiasco! No other other top 100 school has anything to do with JMI…why is Kentucky neck deep in with them? How many stupid F'ing things does Barnhart have to do before he gets fired?
Not a JMI fan myself Barry
To supposedly be so intelligent Pope is not that smart and he is showing he is a great Suck Up to make the statements he does?! The proof is that he hasn’t signed any high school stars because of the JMI Barnhart screwed up deal that he loves !’)$&@
Talk is cheap Coach. If the JMI partnership is “incredible,” then why have we missed out on so many 5-star recruits? And why haven’t we signed a single recruit so far this season?
I understand your loyalty to Barnhart. He hired you. I get that. But if you don’t do a better job recruiting, it’s going to cost you your job and bring the BBN’s wrath down on Barnhart and JMI.
If the JMI partnership is so “incredible,” prove it. Start signing some of these top prospects who, so far, always sign with another school.
Phenomenal story Larry. The proof is in the pudding and that pudding isn't tasting very good right now. Other than an injured Jayden Quaintance, UK has struck out on every top 15 player in the portal or coming out of high school. All fingers seem to be pointing to JMI causing most of the issues AND not having a good GM. I'm still all in on Coach Pope but Mitch needs to get the JMI situation figured out or he needs to go for once again putting the University behind the 8 ball.