Have I mentioned that I feel a little sorry for Phillips?
He has made some mistakes, but from the time he was named Kentucky's head coach in waiting after the 2007 season, bad luck and bad timing have been his constant companions.
Start with the timing. In 2007, Phillips as offensive coordinator presided over one of the best offenses (36.5 points and 443 yards a game) in Kentucky history. That Andre' Woodson-led attack was the strength of a Wildcats team that beat the defending SEC West champions (Arkansas), two top-10 teams (No. 9 Louisville and No. 1 LSU) and a perennial national power (Florida State) in a bowl game.
Had Phillips become head coach then, he would have inherited the job with gale-force momentum at his back.
Instead, he became UK head man after the 2009 season. For Joker, that timing could not have worked out worse.
The '09 regular season ended with Kentucky having a chance to beat Tennessee late in regulation at Commonwealth Stadium. It was a victory Kentucky fans, sick of having lost to the locally loathed Volunteers every season since 1984, desperately craved.
But the Cats failed to score a potential game-winning touchdown from deep in UT territory when Phillips, as play caller, did not put the ball in the hands of star Randall Cobb on UK's final two attempts from scrimmage. Tennessee went on to win in overtime.
Leaving Commonwealth Stadium that night, I'd never seen UK fans as angry. The ire from that one game, in my opinion, served to deprive Phillips of any honeymoon when he became head coach.
Along with bad timing, Joker has had plain old bad luck.
In the year before Phillips became Kentucky head man, UK signed not one but two high school quarterbacks — Ryan Mossakowski and Morgan Newton — that were ranked as four-star prospects by at least one major rating service.
You would have thought for certain that one of them would provide Phillips the kind of quarterback play Woodson supplied Rich Brooks on the eight-win UK teams of 2006 and '07.
Instead, Mossakowski underwent major shoulder surgery before he ever got to UK and never threw a pass in a Kentucky game. After transferring to a junior college, he is now quarterbacking Lamar of the FCS. Newton has made 17 career starts but has thrown for more than 200 yards in a game exactly twice. As a senior this year, he is backing up true sophomore Maxwell Smith.
Quarterbacking misfortune bit Phillips in another way after his first regular season. Before a 6-6 Kentucky was to face Pittsburgh in the BBVA Compass Bowl, UK starter Mike Hartline was involved in a late-night altercation with a woman that ended with his being arrested and charged with disorderly conduct.
Phillips (correctly) suspended the fifth-year senior for the bowl game. With Hartline, the UK offense had scored 31 points or more in five of eight SEC games in 2010. Without him in the bowl, the offense looked anemic in a 27-10 loss to Pitt.
Had Kentucky won that one game, it would have given Phillips a winning record for his first season. From a perception standpoint, that would have left him, even after last year's 5-7 campaign, in a far stronger position to survive 2012 no matter what this season holds.
When it comes to coaching football at Kentucky, the margin of error is thinner than a nail file. To survive, a coach needs to catch some breaks.
For Joker Phillips, more than his share have been bad.
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