Longtime Kentucky reporter clarifies comments about John Calipari 'counter offer'

As the fallout continues from John Calipari’s decision to leave Kentucky, reports have flown in about how both sides handled the situation. On Tuesday, longtime Kentucky reporter Dick Gabriel indicated Calipari looked for a counter offer of sorts before the university declined, but clarified those comments later in the day.

“Clarification about a comment I made on KET: I should not have made it sound like there was a ‘counter offer’ situation,” Gabriel wrote on X (formerly Twitter) Tuesday night. “I did a poor job of saying UK was aware of what Arkansas was offering, but to make it sound like Calipari sought a counter-offer was inaccurate. My apologies.”

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Clarification about a comment I made on KET: I should not have made it sound like there was a “counter offer” situation. I did a poor job of saying UK was aware of what Arkansas was offering, but to make it sound like Calipari sought a counter-offer was inaccurate. My apologies. https://t.co/D6PwDGIRxU

— Big Blue Insider (@bigblueinsider1) April 10, 2024

The circumstances around Calipari’s departure are interesting because of the terms of his contract. If Kentucky fired him, the school would pay $33 million. But if he left on his own volition – as appears to be the case – the school doesn’t owe him anything.

There’s another wrinkle, though. Calipari doesn’t have an agent to represent him. That means he had to let UK know he was in conversations for another job without breaching his contract. While Calipari didn’t do so during his offseason conversations with athletics director Mitch Barnhart, Gabriel initially said he went to UK to present “what it’s going to take” to keep him in Lexington, and the school said no.

“Calipari, going into that meeting with Mitch Barnhart, didn’t have much leverage,” Gabriel said in regards to their end-of-season meeting. “Mitch had the leverage. But, now, when you’ve got somebody else in your corner who is a viable candidate for your services? I mean if, you know, a junior college team had tried to hire him? No. This is Arkansas – powerful school with deep, deep pockets and all kinds of booster money out there from Tyson Chicken and Wal-Mart. They come in and say, ‘We want you and we’ll do what it takes to get you.’ That’s leverage.

“Calipari, as I’m told, said, ‘Here’s what it’s going to take to keep me’ and UK said, ‘I don’t think so.’ As I understand it, now if the deal isn’t done, it’s going to be done.”

John Calipari was already on a $86 million lifetime contract at an average of $8.5 million per year. The ‘lifetime’ aspect of that deal was a role as a special assistant to the athletics director and university representative after this season if he so chose. That move would have paid him $950,000 annually.