Mitch Barnhart was very defensive about Kentucky football's NIL situation

Kentucky football has been seen as a program in the SEC with less resources than teams like Alabama, LSU, Georgia, Texas, and others. With NIL, resources have become more important now than ever, and revenue-sharing among a programs many sports are so, so important for balancing respective athletic programs across schools in order to have success everywhere. Many schools are balancing their revenue-share budget with most going to football before basketball, but Kentucky has seemed to operate differently, gearing a larger portion to basketball.

Reports surfaced earlier this summer, mainly one specific piece from CBS Sports' Matt Norlander where he included that UK Athletics is putting nearly half of it's rev-share budget, which caps at $20.5M, into the basketball program. Meanwhile, other teams are putting about 75 percent into football, or around that. Most teams in the conference reportedly spent around $3M of the budget on basketball, but Kentucky is spending close to $10M of the $20.5 cap. This report, which was then combined with the football team's result being a 5-7 season, caused fans to then question if the program has enough resources to compete fairly with other teams' budgets in the SEC.

Mitch Barnhart spoke briefly with media following new head coach Will Stein's press conference on Wednesday, and he seemed pretty defensive while debunking the notion that Kentucky doesn't have enough NIL resources to compete in the conference, where some have not been playing by the rules sticking to the budget cap. Barnhart seemed very aggressive in his answer.

"Enough about how we don’t got enough. We’ve got enough, and we're working at it. This notion has got to stop. We're working it just like everyone else is," Barnhart said. "This notion that we don't have enough is ridiculous. We've got enough. We've got to resource it the right way. We've got to assess talent the right way. We've got to acquire it the right way, and we've got to make sure within the boundaries of the rules. We're not going to break the rules, that's flat out. We're not doing that. We will do it the right way. We don't need to do that."

It seems like Barnhart is upset that he keeps being asked this question in the rare media appearances he has, but it is still warranted for fans and media to wonder if Kentucky has enough NIL resources towards football, because the facts are there. Kentucky is putting as much of their budget towards football, while other programs are spending likely triple of what UK is putting into the program. Kentucky is going to have to give Stein the resources to succeed, because he has proven to be a winner, and that's what he came here to do, and money is such a big part in a team's chance to win in this day and age in college athletics.

Kentucky's lack of rev-share budgeting towards football showed this season, and you have to wonder if the athletics department is going to up the program's resources, because they'll need more to help them survive in the beast that is the SEC. Barnhart's comments on Kentucky football's NIL situation weren't the best, especially since he seemed very defensive and less on explaining and giving more information on it.