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***Kentucky baseball commits***

I’ll give mingione some credit, he’s brought in some pretty solid talent this off-season and recruiting has seemed to be on the uptick. Huge implications coming up with the draft that could really impact how next season goes. Either way I still think next year should be ncaa tourney or bust for coach, but glad to see some positive news lately.
 
I’ll give mingione some credit, he’s brought in some pretty solid talent this off-season and recruiting has seemed to be on the uptick. Huge implications coming up with the draft that could really impact how next season goes. Either way I still think next year should be ncaa tourney or bust for coach, but glad to see some positive news lately.
Recruiting has improved but could be a case of too little too late.
 
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Is there any chance at all Caden Dana makes it to campus? Or has the coaching staff pretty much given up on the idea of that happening?
 
I'll ask around on Specht and see what the latest is but my gut feeling is he signs. But I still think he's someone who could greatly benefit from being in an SEC program.
 
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^ Looks like a great prospect. These guys seem to be honing in on recruiting - both HS and portal. Good to see
Seems to be the best this staff has done in recruiting so far. I still think it will take a lot for Mitch to fire Mingione, such as last place in SEC standing next season.
 
You guys been a little quite last couple days. Waiting on draft?

If I had to guess, I imagine that the staff is in a bit of a limbo right now. Draft is coming up and I am sure they know for sure that a few guys (Ritter) are gone. However, there are some others that could go as well that they might expect to, but are still holding spots for them in case they don't get the draft spot/money they want (Estep, Plastiak, Ewel). Then there are a few they expect to be here, but a team under the right circumstances could take a flier on them and they might take it (Stupp).

So, they may be in a bit of a holding pattern in terms of 2023 roster because seats on the bus are starting to get limited and we won't know for sure how limited until things begin to shake out with the draft this weekend.
 
Baseball is without a doubt the hardest sport for a coach to recruit/fill a roster. Can you imagine a football team having a top 5 recruiting class and then losing 75% of it to the draft?!? Stuff like that happens all the time in baseball. Or the flip side when you over commit on scholarship offers and then guys come back that you thought were gone... so brutal. But then try to save a scholarship or 2 and you're left scrambling when more people than you thought take off and youve got to go fill a couple positions last minute. It's got to be next to impossible to handle.
 
Always a chance with the unpredictability of the draft, but I'd say Dana is the guy they're least expecting to be on next year's team out of all the commitments in the portal and high school.
What’s Dana’s status after the draft?
 
Good pickup to be this late. Not sure there is anyone to replace Vinyard but a solid addition this late.
 
I will update the original post tomorrow, but Zak Spurrier took a big leap in Perfect Game's updated 2024 rankings. He's now ranked 149, giving Kentucky three commits in the top 150. He joins Bradley Farrell and Leighton Harris in the top 150.

Spurrier was also ranked No. 1 in Kentucky in 2024 by PBR.
I’m a bit surprised that the second best player in Kentucky for 2024 is committed to Xavier.
 
I’m a bit surprised that the second best player in Kentucky for 2024 is committed to Xavier.

Take those rankings with a grain of salt. Though I think the Martin kid has tremendous upside and is a physical freak, he didn’t have any P5 offers. Not sure how the Gregor kid or Harris kid aren’t #2. Gregor is a 6’4 mountain that is touching 93-94. Harris has battled some injuries over last few months which hasn’t allowed him to really pitch which is where he is most intriguing as a prospect. Though he still can hit it a ton, he’s also a team usa guy so it’s bit odd he’s dropped so low in these “rankings”.
 
It also looks like Tennessee has a commitment from a 2026 kid in Taylor County.

And he’s a kid I know UK knew about. First off it is crazy how some of these schools are recruiting guys this early who currently don’t have the numbers/skill to play there, though he is very projectable. UL does the same thing and grabbed Kentuckys 2 best last year in Elam and Jenkins while UK didn’t pursue either.

UK has to either join the game or will continue to lose out on these guys bc baseball players/families refuse to wait. In saying that UK waited on the 2024 class and now have ended up with the top player in the class while UL basically had no room for the kid bc they took 4 kentucky kids freshman year. And Spurrier ended up surpassing them all while 1-2 of the UL commits have started to fade a bit in their development.
 
And he’s a kid I know UK knew about. First off it is crazy how some of these schools are recruiting guys this early who currently don’t have the numbers/skill to play there, though he is very projectable. UL does the same thing and grabbed Kentuckys 2 best last year in Elam and Jenkins while UK didn’t pursue either.

UK has to either join the game or will continue to lose out on these guys bc baseball players/families refuse to wait. In saying that UK waited on the 2024 class and now have ended up with the top player in the class while UL basically had no room for the kid bc they took 4 kentucky kids freshman year. And Spurrier ended up surpassing them all while 1-2 of the UL commits have started to fade a bit in their development.
This is exactly why the recruiting staff waits.
 
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