Never before have so many Cardinal fans and broadcasters uttered the word “gist” — the result of a Thursday story by CBS Sports college hoops writer Gary Parrish that started like this: “Ohio State freshman JaQuan Lyle spoke with an NCAA investigator this week about his recruiting visit to Louisville in June 2013 and confirmed the gist of allegations involving paid escorts. . . “
This set off a talk-radio frenzy of speculation about what “gist” means, and was the first shoe to drop in that an actual recruit verified at least some part of the allegations in the controversial book – “Breaking Cardinal Rules: Basketball and the Escort Queen.” I doubt the “gist frenzy” affected things at Gist Piano Center, but it must have been nice for the business to hear its name repeated so often on local airwaves.
But the gist story was only one piece of a giant puzzle, one that continues to reveal itself and will for some time. As I said on this week’s Rusty Satellite Show, the bigger picture here is the revelation of all sorts of bad behavior, of individuals seeing an opportunity, knowing that the action was not the right thing to do, but doing it anyway because it appeared they might get away with it.
I’m good with assuming that Rick Pitino, Tom Jurich and James Ramsey are men of integrity who wouldn’t look the other way if they knew of such antics, but Andre McGee? Would McGee have bent the rules to help land a recruit for his boss, to keep his job, to build his resume for the next coaching stop?
Moving on. . .
And Down the Aisle He Goes: My son Josh Redding, just back from an interview at Google, gets married to Sarah Saturday. Then goes off to honeymoon in Greece. Hear all about it on Rusty. Plus, learn about the good work being done by Dr. Ali Haider in restoring sight in the Middle East through World Sight Inc.
Give These Gals Some Food: You remember Laura Melillo Barnum from last week’s Rusty show talking about the food drive over at Yum! HQ. Get on over there today and help them collect 18,000 pounds of food in honor of Yum’s 18 anniversary. Here she is with friend of the show Caroline Knop.
Luna Gale at Actors: I went to see the new play at Actors last night. It deals with serious issues, like addiction, abuse and an overwhelmed system for dealing with problems, through the eyes of a social worker. Here’s my take on LouisvilleKY.com.
2.8 million pages of news: That’s what’s available to you from the Courier-Journal, dating back to 1830. It’ll cost you $7.95 a month for access. I noticed that you can also see every issue, all 1,000 of them, of my favorite magazine, Esquire. So that’s a trend.
Ironman is Here: I was driving downtown yesterday and noticed a lot of fancy bikes – a sure sign that the Ironman Triathlon is upon us. The latest scare — that there was too much bacteria in the Ohio River to safely conduct the swim portion, seems to have been put to rest. Be careful driving on Sunday, and the party at 4th Street for the finish is worth the trip.
And So is the Texas Trio: That is Los Lonely Boys, at the Kentucky Center on Sunday night. Traffic may be a challenge. Blues, Rock, Roots, Reggae, and that song “Heaven”.
A New Park Opens Next Week: I gave you a sneak peak at Turkey Run Park last week. Now it’s set to open, and here’s a legit story about it.
