The Floyd Street Tribune: Louisville men's basketball is undergoing a significant rebrand

Inside: What good is cool? Well, for right now, cool is ... cool. And that's what Louisville men's basketball is becoming under Kenny Payne: one of the sport's cool programs.

Thanks for reading The Floyd Street Tribune! If you missed last week’s newsletter, you can catch up here with a breakdown of Louisville’s roster and recruiting opportunities. Subscribers have access to each newsletter from the main TFST page.

One Big Thought: Louisville’s major steps toward a rebrand

When Louisville Rivals writer Ty Spalding first reported on Easter Sunday the expected hire of Justin Perez to Kenny Payne’s staff as director of basketball operations, I had the same reaction as most of you.

Who is Justin Perez?

That just showed my ignorance to a segment of the basketball/entertainment crossover world I haven’t studied, operated in or really considered. Perez is the son of parents with significant power and influence — his mother, Desiree, is the CEO of Jay-Z’s Roc Nation entertainment agency, and his father, Juan, is the president of the agency’s sports division. Juan, nicknamed OG Juan, has been a close friend and business partner of Jay-Z’s for decades. Now, Justin is also a former Division I hoops player who played at American University and is due to graduate this spring from Columbia Law School, according to his LinkedIn page. He is clearly a sharp guy with a bright future, too. But there is no doubt about the value of the familial connection.

Once I learned more about Perez, my first big-picture thought was that this is what a major rebrand looks like. Louisville, under Payne, is experiencing a radical regeneration of its reputation. The Cards are cool again. And that is one major reason why Payne’s hire is so impactful: We have no clue if Louisville will win games. We don’t know what Payne’s style of play will be. We don’t even know if Payne will wear suits or more relaxed fits on the sidelines. But one thing is clear: We do know Payne’s early days on the job have pushed the Louisville name into the highest echelons of recruiting clout and college basketball coolness.

Let’s start with the how.

Get used to not knowing what Payne is going to do until it’s announced. Danny Manning’s name never came up — not once — in any conversations I had with U of L or hoops industry sources in the weeks leading up to his hire. Not a single mention. Manning’s name only surfaced the day of the announcement. Do you realize how difficult it is to keep people in sports from gossiping? That just appears to be the Payne Way. Everything is zipped up, very close to the chest. He moves in silence. And in a time in American life when people share way too much about themselves on social media and want to know everything about their favorite teams, moving in silence is both different and cool. It just is.

Nolan Smith’s hire certainly added to the vibe. Smith, a former Duke star and NBA player, is an up-and-coming basketball coach who was perceived as the young, cool guy on Duke’s staff. The addition of Manning, one of the all-time greatest players in college basketball history, enhanced the coolness factor. Add in Perez and the proximity to Jay-Z and Roc Nation and, well, it’s a move that takes everything to a new level.

A program that was cool in the 1980s — heck, one of its biggest stars was nicknamed the Iceman — has rekindled that energy. There was a swagger about those teams, and it all started with the coach. Denny Crum talked his trash. He let his players express themselves. And he cultivated an environment that attracted recruits and won games.

Who knows what Kenny Payne’s record will be at Louisville? We’ll find out soon enough. But you have to be able to land high-end talent if you want to compete at the highest level of college basketball, and to get high-end talent, you need a high-end staff. So far, at least from the outside looking in, Payne has achieved that.

Now the talent needs to start rolling in to match the vibe.

Then the vibes have to become wins. But you can’t take all those steps without taking the first ones.