These things are his job! He has been here 15 years, and he FINALLY gave some upgrades to football, still hasn't for baseball, and painted some ductwork at Rupp.
Rupp hosts the largest regular season attendance, annually. I guess the ductwork needed painting, but the paying public wasn't shouting for it.
I think baseball has a new stadium under construction.
As to his 15 years, I think the internal politics he inherited would have prevented a football focus the first 5 to 10 years. UK sports is a pretty big ship, and he and the new (then) powers had to jettison lottsa' dead wood, early on. This jettisoning earned Barnhardt a whole lot of loud negativity his first 5 years, some of which still shows up in these perpetual threads trashing him.
And as some have asked whether a complete stranger could have done as much or more, I think Barnhardt has elevated Kentucky Football support to the level, or close to the level of support UK basketball receives. I never thought that would be possible at UK.
Did his accomplishments take time?
Yes.
Jauk loves to point to the time period of 2007. A year that a long-term 750 million dollar plan was announced, only to fall on the scrap heap of the Great Recession . . . . just as the planned new law school at Kentucky was lost (or at least still delayed) to the down turn.
Rob asks what did Barnhardt accomplish in his 15 years . . . . a pretty easy question to answer. He has accomplished the longest tenure of Kentucky athletic modern history without the "shame" of NCAA penalties or sanctions, and at long last, brought UK sports into the 21st Century.
He came here battling an established system that would (then) have rivaled the questionable business model of U of L (now), and has slowly turned the ship of UK strongly toward the future, and has done so, by all accounts, ethically.
Could he have done it quicker? Sure, just look at U of L's recent forensic accounting to show you how short cuts can be taken, to deceive a city, a state, donors, and students to achieve tons of brick and mortar on a foundation of greed, self-dealing and filth.