One-on-one with UK's John Calipari

University of Kentucky basketball coach John Calipari sat down with The Courier-Journal on Sunday morning, the Wildcats' last of nine days in the Bahamas, to talk about the value of the trip. But he also discussed at length his interesting in coaching in the NBA, specifically LeBron James, and just how long he might stay in Lexington.

Asked the odds he'll end his career at Kentucky, Calipari offered an 823-word exposition about "feeding the beast" in a job that he thinks might be the best in all of sports but is "hard as hell." Here is Part I Calipari one-on-one with the C-J:

JOHN CALIPARI

On how close he came earlier this summer to leaving for the NBA: "Not as much as everybody thought. Again, when you have players coming back, they did not come back so that it was good for me; they did not come back so that it was good for the program; they came back because it was good for them and their careers and they knew they needed more developing and coaching. That was by me. That's what they wanted. So that made it a tough deal to say, 'I'm just going to leave these guys here.' With who? It may be somebody I don't know that wouldn't do the things for them that they needed to do. Now, obviously coaching at Kentucky is special. It is unique and special. But this, for me, becomes about these kids. I have no desire, nor am I out looking for (jobs). I got the job. I got the job. So what would move me to stay was these kids need me here. That's what I'm doing. At the end of the day, that was what (kept him at UK). It wasn't money."

On having said he'd love to coach LeBron James and whether knowing James was going to return to Cleveland would've made the decision tougher: "No. No. I don't think so. Because he and I have a great relationship, but it's not based on me coaching him. We've got a relationship. I've known him for years and years. We've always been friends. But it was never based on that. I've said that. I've had a chance to coach Derrick Rose, John Wall and DeMarcus (Cousins), Anthony Davis and Michael (Kidd-Gilchrist). And I'm leaving names off, but I've coached some of the best players in basketball, and it is a thrill. There's nothing better than that. Especially when those guys are all good guys. Well, LeBron is also that kind of player and that kind of person. But again, leaving guys who made decisions based on what's right for their career was something I couldn't have gotten by anyway.

"People got upset. 'Well he said he stayed solely for them. It wasn't the program.' Stop. You must not have listened to one word I've ever said in my life. When you talk about players first – look, I know where I'm coaching, that this place is special, and I know that, in my opinion, this may be the greatest coaching job of any sport, anywhere. Now, the other side of all the stuff that goes with it is trying to feed the beast. Feed the beast means people come back (and say), 'How does he do all this?' Well, I can either feed the beast or the beast is going to eat me. I mean, that's what it is. So you're running and going and moving and trying to stay ahead of the beast, who is chasing you, and you're feeding him and feeding him and we just keep feeding him and feeding him. That's the downside of what we do. You can't say, 'I'm just going to sit back this year.' Well then the beast eats you. It's just how it is."

On what Vegas odds he'd put on UK being his final coaching job, given how taxing it is: "Um, it could be. It could be. The issue becomes: How long can you last in a job like this at the pace you have to go to feed the beast? This isn't a normal job. This isn't a normal coaching job. This isn't a golfer's paradise. It's just not. So then it becomes: How long can you do this? This job? And do it right. You can retire on the job and cheat all the fans and the university and the program and all. Or you just keep going until you can't go. So I don't have any aspirations for this to be anything but my last job, but after 10, 12 years of this and you stop it, you might come back and say, 'You know what, I may want to coach some more; I just couldn't coach there anymore.' My mindset right now is: How many groups of kids can we develop and move to reaching their dreams? How many groups of kids can we do that to?

"All the records we're setting with kids getting drafted, kids making it, max deals, No. 1 picks, how long can we just keep that going? And if that keeps going, and I see the effect we are, as a staff, having on young people, I'll probably keep going. Like, I'll just say, 'Hey, if we can keep doing this, let's keep doing it.' If we can keep getting four to five guys a year drafted, then I'll probably just keep doing it. Now, has it hurt us in the classroom? No. 3.0 grade-point average, graduate 10 kids, three kids in the NBA with degrees, three kids with graduate degrees. No, it hasn't. Has it hurt us on the basketball court? No, no. So let's just stay focused on: How many kids are we helping? How many families are we helping? How many kids are getting drafted and going on to reach their aspirations?

"Let's stay on it academically and get them to understand that an educated man is not going to get fooled or robbed, so however long you stay, educate yourself – and understand the scholarship waits for you. So if you leave after one or two years, the scholarship is still here. All this stuff and pronouncements these other schools made, we've been doing it. You come back when you want to come back and we will pay for it. I don't know if you call that 'lifelong education' or 'yearly education.' You can call it what you want; we've been doing it. But that's because we're about players first. We're not going to hold you back and this education will always be here for you.

"If we can keep this going that way, then you just ride that wave. It's been – not only have I enjoyed it, it's been really rewarding. So the impact we've had, the seat I sit in, you can raise a million dollars in three hours to go give to (Hurricane) Sandy, to Haiti, to do an alumni game and give a million dollars away. What? All those kind of things you can do, the impact you can have, the impact you can have on families, the impact you can have on your own community, on your campus, that moves me. So is there another place like this?

"I have enough money. Do I really need more notoriety or fame or whatever you want to call it? No. I mean, I'm fine. So what's going to move me? My ego of more wins, more national titles? No, what moves me is the other thing, which leads to all that stuff that you think moves me, which doesn't move me. But that's what I said: For me, that's what it came down to, for any of those teams that talked to me. What's your why? Trying to win the championship, to make more money, for your own pride and ego? Really? That does nothing for me. Well, we're doing this to move a city, to create this, to create that – that moves me. So what we're doing here, how we're doing it, people have bought in.

"So all this stuff that people don't agree with what I'm doing, you can write that and try to get people to agree with you, but they're looking at it saying, 'Wait a minute. Everybody's winning. What's the problem?' Now, the only person that it gets hard as hell (on) is me and my staff. It's hard as hell every year having a new team. It's hard as hell trying to figure it out. You don't know. How about scheduling? You don't know who's on your team to schedule. So why did you overschedule? Because we didn't know who was going to be on our team. We thought a few guys would stay. All those things make it difficult, but at the end of the day it's right for the kids."

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