Lots of people here know about it. It was in USA Today and on ESPN.
In the early 2000's I was working with the pioneers of recruiting - Max Emfinger, Tom Lemming and even Clark in the dark Francis.
I was pretty close to taking over Wildcatfaithful for Mel before he passed, but things became very complicated.
I was approached by Jim Heckman and Bernie Kosar. Heckman had founded Rivals (this network) but couldnt get it going, Rivals basically shut down in 2001 after its bankruptcy and fired Heckman. The company brought in new money and leadership.
Heckman immediately started the Insiders.com (which eventually became Scout).
He and Kosar wanted me to start the Insiders KY website.
This site also came with a publishing deal from Vulcan Publishing for a monthly full color magazine.
I accepted and named my company Nations Media.
I named the UK portion of the media Big Blue Nation and realized I was the first to ever use the name in commerce.
So I filed to trademark it.
This was 15 years ago and long before all the other "Nation" craze, I also set out to trademark Buckeye Nation, Gator Nation, etc, even Sports Nation and many more. One of the few things i was very early on.
So we started our website and really took off very well, primarily because of recruiting. We couldnt hang with Darryl Bird at the time with all of his connections with the Cats Pause so we had to go another route. And since recruiting was my sweet spot we hit that.
The Insiders were also actively setting up a very tight recruiting network. You may recognize these guys, who were very young in the biz at the time:
Dave Telep
Jamie Newburg
Chris Fetters
Greg Hicks
Chris Pool
Myself and a few others I cannot remember.
Things moved very rapidly and we were able to build good relations with many coaching staffs, not just UK.
We eventually started a radio show which aired weekly on Monday nights, we also did pregame and post game shows, and a Sunday morning call in show all on Clear Channel.
We eventually launched a television show which aired on Ch27 local CBS and 56, then on Fox Sports South and even on ESPN2.
We always had former players on the radio and TV shows, and Jim Tirey was our host, we eventually hired a couple of Fox Sports anchors for our television show.
I hired some very good writers for the magazine:
Dan Wetzel now with Yahoo.
Larry Vaught
Lonnie Demaree
and several writers from other publications
We started doing screen printing and embroidery, moved to a 20,000 sf building and were awarded NCAA licensing rights. We sold to Wal Mart and many other locations and even had an SEC tourney contract.
I actually opened a UK only store on Nicholasville Road.
We were KSR on steroids long before KSR ever started and we blew the Cats Pause away.
But things started to go badly.
Host Communications had the media contract for UK sports and these guys were awful.
Our show aired right before their coaches show with Rob Bromley (boring)...and we had recruiting highlights, music, slow motion, all kinds of cool stuff. Made that show look amateur.
Jim Host was not happy and I heard about it.
UK began to prevent access to my staff, and were throwing away our magazines on campus.
Sandy Bell let us know that she had to proof our magazine prior to printing, she also demanded unfettered access to our website including the moderator forums.
Then UK found out about my trademark application for Big Blue Nation. They wanted it bad. I offered free use for eternity but that wasn't good enough.
Sandy launched a war against us.
She said Dougie Allen couldnt interview recruits because he didnt have a journalism degree, she blackballed us at away games.
She was incensed that I had been at Claude Bassett's secret recruiting update meetings for big boosters. Of course I was there, I was the area recruiting expert, i never gave money however.
She was also was mad that I told fans who we were recruiting and when/where they were playing.
Remember the whole KSR go to Damian Harris football game campaign? Ours wasn't nearly that intense at all, but she said this was helping UK recruit. We did also ask fans for info on any potential walk ons or grey shirts (a request that came from the staff).
We also were the first to hold combines, before Rivals or any other Insiders company.
We were at Auburn, Bama, and held a big one at UK, some posters here actually volunteered and worked that camp. All of our coaches attended.
But Sandy didnt like this, even though we refused to interview any player without their coach present.
When I fought their lawsuit on the trademark the hammer came down hard.
Sandy accused me of being a booster and a rogue fan. Although I never gave the school one penny and graduated from Transy.
She claimed that our interview of Woodsen and Tamme on our TV show was a NCAA violation. Their coaches were there as well btw.
We posted the televised interviews on the BBN website and Sandy proclaimed:
"Websites are NOT media" she totally dismissed our other media units.
Only Sandy could determine if you were a media entity regardless of your operation.
The NCAA said it MAY be a violation but we heard nothing from them.
We never contacted kids like these guys do today and we never asked leading questions.
Nevertheless UK banned me for 27 years.
I was declared a rogue fan, not a business owner, despite the 25 employees, website, magazine, radio and tv shows.
UK just buried us in the lawsuit as we tried to fight it, they kept extending knowing we would run out of cash.
We eventually folded, all of these employees were just like you guys, I basically hired from our website. Big time fans happy to be in the sports industry.
Friends and family lost money, I was destroyed financially.
I could go through way more stories than the BCG thread on all the little things Sandy and her office did to hurt us.
- Making our camera guy leave Rupp at tip off
- Telling away opponents we were under investigation and they revoke our passes after driving 12 hours.
In my opinion she is not a good person, and many in Lex will tell you that. She is good at her job though.
Mitch as well, he knew all of it, and he and I went to the same church. Lots of dirty play.
But I learned that college sports is fun for us fans but in reality it is BIG business and you will get run over if a school doesnt want you around.
USA Today:
http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/sports/college/other/2004-01-14-kentucky-booster-ban_x.htm
ESPN:
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/print?id=1709656&type=news
