Jerry Tipton, Professional Hater

"After the NCAA ruling denied UK's final appeal on Kanter's eligibility on Jan. 7, UK made him a student assistant coach. It's a role usually reserved for players who have exhausted their eligibility or been sidelined for the rest of their college careers because of injury.

"Student assistant coaches are not supposed to participate as players in practice, but the NCAA does not regularly enforce the rule."

-- Jerry Tipton, in today's Lexington Herald-Leader

Years ago, I used to watch "Barney Miller," a sitcom about cops in New York. Once or twice a year, they would have an episode featuring this character from Internal Affairs -- Lt. Scanlon -- who hated Barney Miller and all the cops who worked for him. Scanlon guy was convinced that they were dirty, and he was always trying to catch them. Of course, it never worked and it was very funny -- we, the audience knew that Miller's guys were clean and that Scanlon was a nut.

It is a tribute to the power of the old newspaper monopolies that for years, the Lexington Herald-Leader has been able to afford to pay a beat reporter who covers the UK Wildcats in much the spirit of Lt. Scanlon. The quote from today's article above gives you the spirit of Tipton's writings. Every article -- no matter how trivial -- usually features some type of dig at UK, Coach Cal, the players, or the Kentucky fans. (After the UNC game, for example, Tipton wrote about the response of Lee Todd and Mitch Barnhart to his questions about the likelihood that this Final Four appearance will be vacated).

There are too many moving parts here to analyze in one blog post. Why does the Herald-Leader think it's a good idea to have a beat reporter who is so hostile to everyone he is supposed to cover? Does someone who constantly pursues a negative agenda really get closer to "the truth" about the UK program than someone who wants to promote the team? Will newspapers in the future be able to afford such unpopular reporters? Even if UK were cheating -- and the Herald-Leader busted them -- would that make anyone in the greater Lexington area better off?

I'm not going to get into those questions here. I just want to point out that Tipton is a middle-aged guy who spends his life writing about a college basketball team he hates for a fan base he hates -- and who hates him in return. That seems like a very odd career choice.