Leighton Harris
- Thread starter BluegrassBaseball
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2024 kid. Looks solid from just a profile.
www.perfectgame.org
Leighton Harris Class of 2024 - Player Profile | Perfect Game USA
Leighton Harris Class of 2024 Perfect Game Player Profile
www.perfectgame.org
86mph fastball from a sophomore lefty most certainly stands out as impressive. And he's not even played his sophomore year in high school at this point. Lot of room for him to add velo.
Good commitment and those usually stick in baseball. Question might be whether he becomes such a good pro-prospect that he never makes it to campus. 86 as a new sophomore and a lefty is pretty darn good. He is already a top 100 player in the 2024 class. So, it isn't unreasonable to believe that he continues on that trend and goes pro rather than playing for UK. We got a while to wait to see what happens, but it certainly doesn't hurt having his commitment.
#2 rated prospect in the State behind UL Commit Righty pitcher Davis.
Hopefully he sticks.
His parents are HUGE UK fans and travel to basketball/football games very, very often. This is one kid who may be more drawn to UK than the pro route.
Chances are Ming won’t be here then, so we’ll see how that plays out.
I think this kid is the biggest recruit in the 2024 class even after another 10 are added. He could have gone almost anywhere and decided to commit to UK. A huge get.
Someone like that doesn't commit without liking the coaching staff.
As parrott said, they're huge UK fans. I don't think the draft will be a factor for him. He probably could sign out of HS but will be in that mold of guys like Thompson who know going to school will elevate their draft stock.
Someone like that doesn't commit without liking the coaching staff.
As parrott said, they're huge UK fans. I don't think the draft will be a factor for him. He probably could sign out of HS but will be in that mold of guys like Thompson who know going to school will elevate their draft stock.
Whether they like the current staff is irrelevant. The current staff won’t be at UK after May. This family and the rest of the college baseball world know this. This family committed to the University and kudos to them for doing so.
Interesting. What makes everyone in the world know this?
I believe the team is going to improve for the third year in a row. Doesn’t mean I believe they will host a regional but should be better, again.
Why do these kids keep committing to a place where everyone thinks the coach is getting fired?
Too much to get into but a lot of behind the scenes stuff going on with past/current players plus add in the fact the team has consistently under performed.
If we do improve this year it will not have been the third year in a row that we've improved. In 2019 we won just 7 SEC games. In 2020 we didn't have any SEC games, but I highly doubt that UK would have won many more than 7 if we even won that many. We had already lost 6 games out of 17 and lost every game to any team with a pulse. The majority of our success were against teams that were outright awful. Last year we won just 12 SEC games, which is the second fewest out of Mingione's 4 years of SEC play. I think you can easily argue that 2021 was the 4th year in a row that UK didn't (or wouldn't have) made the NCAA tournament. I also legitimately believe that Covid saved Mingione's job because in 2020 we were going to be very bad in league play and I don't know that he would have survived two seasons in a row of only winning 5-7 games in league play.
I think, at best, you can say we improved in 2021 and that we might improve again in 2022.
Again, the issue for me is that I think that the 2021 type of year is moreso the norm for Mingione and I want more for our program than that. I fear that we might more regularly win 11-13 SEC games. We will have some random years where we win 14-16 SEC games and make an NCAA tournament. Then have some major down years where we only win say 5-7. Again, similar to what we got with Gary Henderson... staying around 4th-7th in the SEC East and seasons where we win around 30 games.
This, to me, just isn't where I want the baseball program to be. I want the new standard to be making the NCAA tournament every year and to look at it like it is a failed year if we don't make it. I don't want randomly making the tournament to be some sort of pass for the numerous years we don't make it. Again, look at how Henderson had 2 NCAA tournament years out of 8 total. That was a failure to me and I want a coach to pull us out of that rut.
I agree with you on those expectations.
But hasn’t the program made the tournament like 10 times ever? Isn’t that unrealistic, to some extent?
It seems like winning 11-13 as the floor would be a good building block to get to the next step. Avoiding years like 2019 seems to be what has always hurt us in the past. That terrible year in the middle of some competitive seasons hurts recruiting.
Yes, UK is historically awful at baseball. In large part because of weather and lack of administrative support. However, I don't think that past can or should stop them.
Prior to Corbin, Vandy had only been to the NCAA tournament 3 times (1973, 1974, 1980). They now have two national titles and have played in more title series than they had been to NCAA tournaments prior to his arrival. Prior to McDonnell, Louisville had been to the NCAA tournament 1 time (2002). Now they have been to the CWS 5 times since 2007 (the same year UK hired Cohen and kind of turned their baseball program around). Prior to Tracy Smith and Chris Lemonis Indiana had been to the NCAA tournament 1 time (1996), they have gone 7 times since 2006 and went every year but one between 2013-2019. Tennessee baseball has some good history, but hadn't been to an NCAA tournament since 2005 until Vitello took them in his second season (2019) and last year took them to the CWS.
These are some really great coaches who took bad programs and built them into great programs. I want UK to find the guy that can make us into something similar to that and not just be content with squeaking into the tournament a quarter of the time.
I’m following.
Comparing our financial situation to Vanderbilt or UL isn’t even remotely fair, though.
Those two coaches did well at Indiana, but they also didn’t have to play against SEC teams.
I think the transfer portal is the first time something has happened that gives Uk Bsb a chance to improve its standing. Maybe this will be how we can move the needle forward and get that extra pitcher or hitter each year.
Louisville and McDonnell turned things around immediately. CWS in his first year. So, it wasn't a recruiting advantage that made them become a top program. It was the coach. Vitello, very similar. I live near Knoxville, and I've never in my life heard the baseball team have more hype than they do now. He created that with winning and now the school is investing a ton into baseball.
Would just like to see UK do similar with the right coach and we're more apt to stay below average with what we have now.
The transfer portal will be interesting. Baseball kind of had similar with JUCO being a very prominent feature, but this just furthers it. Ming already likes that strategy, so I imagine he sticks with it, but I think we need to do a better job balancing our roster.
As Comeback said, it takes the right coach. The argument could be made that prior to Dan McDonnell getting to UofL, UK was better at baseball than Louisville. If, and I’m not saying you particular, 11-13 wins in the conference and maybe a tourney bid is the goal every year, then do us all a favor and shut the program down. There is zero excuse for Louisville to have a better baseball program than Kentucky.
Do you think the UL scholarship situation is an advantage over UK?
Ive known several kids from Cincy to go to UL over UK bc of the price difference.
MacDonnell is a great coach. I wouldn’t say to take anything away from him but it’s hard to say they shouldn’t be better when their financial situation is better. Even though our stadium is top notch, now.
Kids go to U of L because of Dan McDonnell and Roger Smith the pitching coach. Period. Mingione is a clown. Coggin was a sports agent before Mingione brought him on. He wasn’t even in coaching. Roszel is a respectable pitching coach. All three are sub-par communicators. I know of guys who have committed and go many, many months and don’t hear out of these guys. Clowns.
Interesting. I’ve heard other stories about the 3 of them that go the other way.
How does UK get kids over UL? If the coaches have that bad of a reputation then why does anyone commit?
Care to elaborate on what recruits they go months without speaking to?
What kids has UK gotten OVER UL? I know of none to be honest. Only exception would be a Lexington kid. I won’t get
Into specifics. Kentucky Baseball has also been black balled by some of the most prominent travel ball programs in the country. Again I’m not getting into specifics. But I am right. Facts.
Well, 247 to me is a joke when it comes to discussions but that’s just my opinion.
Your point about liking the staff. I want to like this staff. I thought after Mingiones first year that UK had finally found lighting in a bottle. But it’s been an absolute disaster since. The off the field stuff is worrisome. Just go find former players tweets to get an idea of where he stands with them.
But my biggest problem with Mingione showed itself in the Florida series last season. Yes, UK got absolutely shafted on a strike call that should have ended the game. But the way Minge handled that bothered me worse. The team looked like it absolutely quit after that game. They played scared the rest of the year. There was a disconnect between the players and the staff. That was obvious.
The way I have been told and understand it is that most of the players do not care for Mingione, some of those even stayed on this year despite their true feelings. They call him fake. He gives the public persona of being this great, caring, christian man but behind the scenes he is very shifty and won't communicate the truths to the players. I know he doesn't have a good relationship with the local press either.
I was at that Florida series and most of the players had way more heart than the coach. I remember seeing Hill and Strickland fighting to get back on the field at the end of the game. IMO it comes from lack of respect and a total lack of trust for a head coach. The current and past players have said time and time again that Coach Guilliams ran the day-to-day show more than Mingione but Mingione made all the game day decisions and those were based on whom he wanted to promote and favored and not based on who was the better player for that position. Really, just look at back at all the players that have quit or transferred from the program. There is definitely a problem somewhere! I listened to the radio broadcast and heard how they said there is a "different energy" around the program than last season. So are they saying the players and coach that left were a problem? To me, yes, the energy is different. It would have to be. Is it coming from Mingione changing or coming from a ton of transfers playing their last years, hoping and wanting to be excited and just haven't been around the program enough to become disgruntled yet. Let's see how those players are in the middle of the season.
I think communication is an issue with this staff, at least with Mingione and then resonating from him. It feels like players and recruits don't necessarily know what is expected of them and what they need to do in order to compete, make the team, etc.
Julius Scearce as a recruiting example. Never made it to campus because the coaches told him a month prior to move-in day that he was no longer a preferred walk-on and that he had to go elsewhere. This left Julius and his family scrambling to find an alternative place for him to go to school (not sure what happened to him). This is probably not the best thing to do when you're also recruiting a kid who is a top talent that goes to (or went to) the same school (Fredrick Douglass). You could burn some bridges and change some minds with this and you could have Scearce telling someone like Harris that he felt mistreated and wronged by the staff and something like that could have a negative effect and resonate.
The reason, to my understanding, that they cut Scearce was because he had a poor senior year and they felt like they couldn't develop him. Well, to the first part... what I often hear is that coaches that are recruiting a player, especially one kind of conditionally, will tell the player what they want to see from them as they grow and get better. Sometimes even setting some goals for the player to shoot for. It doesn't sound like this happened with Scearce and that he was pretty blindsided by being cut even before getting a chance to compete at UK. It is fine if he has that bad year and they think that they can't develop him, but you have to communicate that before a month prior to him coming to campus so he has time to explore other options, maybe get money to go out of state. This seemingly didn't happen, which probably left a bad taste in some mouths around the state, and that sort of thing can really have a bigger impact than just one player.
He is now on Rend Lake Community Colleges roster.
Wonder if that is why Fredrick Douglass is not participating in the fall ball series that is going on with the local high schools at KPP. Hmmmm?
This thread really stayed on topic.
Know how everyone feels about the staff and I agree but it seems every thread containing a bit of positive news goes down a rabbit hole about the staff.
Know how everyone feels about the staff and I agree but it seems every thread containing a bit of positive news goes down a rabbit hole about the staff.
I know of another kid who was told roughly a month prior to move in the same thing. Both Scearce and the kid I know of had been committed for a very long time. As a staff you don’t figure out a month prior to move in these kids arent good enough. Says a lot about the morals and values of the Kentucky coaching staff to do kids this way. I know of other stories. These guys are clowns I tell ya!
I asked this question. Ethan Hindle from WI chose KY over UL and Oregon. He visited all 3.
What teams are black balling them? I heard one team in Cincy who’s upset with the current staff. I heard both sides of that one after asking a friend who’s a coach. That situation was just awful for everyone in involved.
You are correct on the discussion. Is there this much talk about football and basketball? I may need to get access to that board as well.
I’ve seen a lot of the tweets you are referencing. Terrible look for the program! Does anyone know why that same group of former players are so upset? I have heard the side from some former parents but have never really asked for the whole story.
I thought the USCe series was such a bad weekend. The team had no energy that weekend and they were a beatable team.
I think there are more recently departed players/families upset with Mingione and the program than there are "older" former players. I've only seen a few older players on twitter complaining, but this last season had a ton of players/families upset. We only see the older former players more because they can speak out but the others can't yet because they are still involved in baseball and won't risk it.
I don’t really know much about baseball recruiting. It is difficult to keep up with and it starts when kids are very young. So, I am prefacing this so everyone understands I have little to no knowledge on this. What seems to be said about UK recruiting is that they are doing a pretty poor job in state. That they are not making the connections that they need to in order to get a lot of the best talent in the state and allegedly some HS coaches feel kind of slighted that UK isn’t paying attention to some of their players.
To compare just purely on numbers… I believe Louisville has 17 of their 47 (36%) from Ky and UK has 10 of 39 (26%) from Ky. 4 of the 10 for UK came to UK after transferring from elsewhere (T.Guilfoil, D. Williams, K. Liebert, J. Felker) while 2 of the 17 transferred to UK after going elsewhere. So, UL makes up a larger portion of their roster with KY players and even moreso with KY HS players.
I do not know if this is an intentional strategy by UK coaches to recruit out of state players (for any number of possible reasons), or if it is a result of them not putting in the effort to get in-state kids, or some other reason/mix of reasons. I know it seems like UK has preferred to target JUCO players and now transfer players.
To compare just purely on numbers… I believe Louisville has 17 of their 47 (36%) from Ky and UK has 10 of 39 (26%) from Ky. 4 of the 10 for UK came to UK after transferring from elsewhere (T.Guilfoil, D. Williams, K. Liebert, J. Felker) while 2 of the 17 transferred to UK after going elsewhere. So, UL makes up a larger portion of their roster with KY players and even moreso with KY HS players.
I do not know if this is an intentional strategy by UK coaches to recruit out of state players (for any number of possible reasons), or if it is a result of them not putting in the effort to get in-state kids, or some other reason/mix of reasons. I know it seems like UK has preferred to target JUCO players and now transfer players.
This thread might clear up some things
Kentucky Baseball 2022
Weird to type 2022. Might as well begin to look forward as we're done for the year. Not sure what is going to happen from here on out, but I think things and people have began to move. I imagine that some have already taken at least the preliminary steps they need to take in order to get out...
kentucky.forums.rivals.com
