It's the off-season for the Kentucky baseball program, if you can even call it that in the transfer-portal era of collegiate athletics. UK baseball head coach Nick Mingione has spent the past several weeks constructing (another) new roster ahead of the 2026 season.
Before we completely move on to the future of the Bat Cats, Coach Mingione sits down with BBN Tonight anchor Maggie Davis to wrap up the 2025 season, including more on the staff's transformation throughout the season, how the fan base helped fuel the Wildcats, and why he thinks there were no teams that made back-to-back trips to this year's College World Series.
In part two, Mingione delves into the big-picture questions of roster construction. His portal class, at least so far, is primarily right-handed pitchers. When did the staff know that would be a priority this off-season? How do they narrow down a 5,000-player pool into a small list of new Wildcats? What's still on Mingione's wish list?
Plus, a few weeks ago, Mingione said having a preseason top-10 team wouldn't surprise him. How does he feel now? Watch both parts of his conversation with Maggie to find out!
For more on Kentucky baseball and all of the Wildcats, watch BBN Tonight weeknights at 7:30 p.m. on the official station for UK Athletics, LEX 18.
